by Edwin Hill
She reached for her phone, forgetting for a moment that she’d dropped it in the fire. She imagined the unanswered messages from Morgan, piled on top of one another. How much longer would he put up with her? When would they be whole again? When would they put the arguments and lies behind them? How she yearned to be able to send him a text right now, one that simply said I need you, though she imagined typing it, her finger hovering over the Send button before hitting Delete instead. Why was it so difficult to admit? What did it mean to confess to her heart?
She lifted Ethan onto her shoulder and headed to the inn, which was quiet and empty. She found a phone in the kitchen and managed to dig Morgan’s phone number from the recesses of her memory. His phone rang until it went to voice mail, and she suspected he’d ignored it because he didn’t recognize the number. When she called back, he answered.
“Where are you?” she asked.
“In bed,” he said. “It’s after midnight.”
“Is Kate there?”
“She’s in the other room. With Angela. We celebrated tonight.”
“What’s the celebration?”
“Nothing, really. We made fun out of nothing.”
I need you.
“I found Daphne,” Hester said. That was easier to say. “She’s safe.”
There was a silence on the other end of the phone. “Good, I’ll talk to her tomorrow.”
“Does Kate want to talk to her?”
“I don’t want to wake her. And you never know.”
“You don’t,” Hester said. “And you’ll need to come to the island in the morning. We’re still in the middle of something here.”
“We’ll be on the morning ferry.”
Hester’s mouth felt dry. She swallowed. “I need you,” she said, wishing instantly that she could reach into the air and pull the words back.
“I love you too,” Morgan said.
It was just what Hester needed to hear.
* * *
Upstairs, Daphne sat on the bed as Hester let herself into the room. She carefully laid Ethan down and ruffled the boy’s hair. “How long have you been here?” she asked.
“Just a few minutes,” Daphne said. “They had a lot of questions.”
“Did you tell the truth?”
“As much as I could.”
“Then I guess we’ll be fine.”
Daphne nodded at the sleeping boy. “You still have him.”
“I need to be sure he’s safe,” Hester said. “Now. In the morning. Always.”
“He’s not yours,” Daphne said.
“But he’s not anyone’s,” Hester said, pushing her hair behind her ear and kissing the boy’s cheek. “Everyone should belong somewhere.”
She took out her wallet, where she kept $200 in cash hidden behind her credit cards for emergencies. Now she fished the bills out, folded them in half, and left the wad tucked under a lamp by the TV.
“Come to bed,” Daphne said. “It’ll be like the old days in Allston. Just the two of us.”
“There are three of us tonight,” Hester said.
“You know what I mean.”
“Can you watch him for a minute?” Hester asked, and in the bathroom she stood under a hot stream of water hoping to feel clean, hoping to wash away the day, even if she had to change back into the same smoky clothes she’d been wearing for days. When she returned to the room, the money still sat where she’d left it.
Ethan had woken, and Daphne crawled on the bed beside him pretending to be an elephant and then a chimpanzee. Hester remembered that, the way Daphne could transform into any animal. She remembered watching as a three-year-old Kate sat transfixed by her mother the lion. Now, Hester watched till Ethan fell back to sleep, and then she crawled into bed. The mattress was soft, and Daphne was warm, and when they turned out the lights, it could have been any time or any place. “Should I be a hyena?” Daphne asked. “Or how about a gorilla?”
“Shh, you’ll wake him.”
They lay for what seemed like hours, silent and together, listening to each other breathe. When Daphne said, “Tell me about Kate,” Hester let the words flow. She told her about Sebastian the rabbit and making homemade Play-Doh. She told her about trying to drop Kate off at daycare and failing day after day. She told her about pushing Kate on that swing as they practiced their numbers. What Hester didn’t tell Daphne about was her heart, that her heart traveled with Kate, that it beat with Kate’s, or that she couldn’t imagine having her own child, because if she’d ever love anyone or anything more than Kate, it would consume her.
“I probably messed Kate up for the rest of her life,” Daphne said.
“Children have short memories,” Hester said. “And Kate loves you. She loves all of you, every part.”
“And I love her,” Daphne said, a hitch in her voice. A hitch that gave Hester hope.
“She’ll be here in the morning. They’re coming on the ferry, and she’ll be ready to let me go and to be yours.” Hester paused and added, “Completely yours, all over again.”
“Will she want that?”
“She wouldn’t want anything else.”
Hester could play this game. She could play it better than Daphne. She could play it better than anyone.
* * *
In the morning, Hester lay still as the dawn light filtered in through the window. And she listened.
Daphne’s breath was soft, even, gentle. Her face was peaceful and at rest, like those times when they’d slept side by side in their dorm room, or in the apartment, or those long nights when Kate first came home.
Daphne shifted, and Hester closed her eyes. When Daphne sat up, Hester lay as still as she could. She sensed a hand hovering at her shoulder, as Daphne decided whether to wake her. This was one of those times when paths were chosen. Hester could say good morning. She could take those choices away. Or she could lie here for a while longer and let Daphne decide.
The early-morning ferry to Bar Harbor blew its horn as it chugged into port.
Daphne swung her legs around. She sat for a moment. And then she stood. The alarm clock on the bedside table clattered to the floor, and Hester wondered if Daphne had knocked it over on purpose to see what Hester would do, whether Daphne knew that when Hester’s eyes didn’t flutter open, she had permission to leave. She gathered her things and stood in the doorway for a moment. Then she left.
But Hester still didn’t dare move. Not till the ferry sailed away.
When she did get up, she found a note in Daphne’s handwriting folded under the lamp where the two hundred dollars had been.
The truth is, I’m tough to love, and almost impossible to like. Somehow, you’ve managed both. You’re a good friend. I love you. More than you know. Don’t try to find me.
Hester read the note through again, then folded it and put it in her wallet where the two hundred dollars had been. It would help her remember.
* * *
Later, a breeze blew through Hester’s hair. All around her, boats came and went as lobstermen brought in their hauls. She stood by the pier, holding Ethan’s hand. “Is Mommy coming?” he asked.
“Not today.”
Hester prepared for an onslaught of questions, but Ethan seemed to understand that the truth was still too hard to face.
“I miss her,” he said.
“I know,” she said.
Off in the distance, the ferry chugged into the harbor. Hester couldn’t wait to see Morgan and Kate, despite what lay ahead. She’d find the right words to explain what had happened and what she’d done. She’d tell Kate a story that would help her understand where her mother had gone. And she’d tell Morgan the truth. And she’d hope, somehow, that he’d forgive her.
Someone joined Hester at the railing.
“Big night,” Barb Kelley said. “Rory came by after you left. Told me some things, but I think you know some of them, don’t you?”
“I don’t know anything,” Hester said.
“Do you know where Daphne
is? I need to talk to her.”
“She left,” Hester said. “She took the morning ferry. She could be anywhere by now.”
“I wish she’d stayed,” Barb said. “Now we’ll have to find her.”
They wouldn’t be able to, no matter how hard they tried. Daphne was too good at disappearing.
“Before the fire,” Barb said. “We searched her room at the house and found a few things. Had them tested. Normally these tests take a few weeks, but not when you have a dead cop.”
The ferry was getting closer.
“There was a ‘sample,’ ” Barb continued. “It was from Trey. Did Daphne say anything to you about him?”
“No,” Hester said. “Nothing. I don’t even know if they knew each other.”
“There was something else,” Barb said. “Last spring, there was an Amber Alert in Portland for a girl named Jordan.”
Someone on the deck waved. Hester raised a hand and waved back.
“The girl showed up in her own backyard,” Barb said. “Her mother walked out and found her sitting there.”
“Sounds like she wandered off and made her way home again.” Hester ruffled Ethan’s hair. “Like this one.”
“Exactly. Any idea why Daphne might have had a lock of Jordan’s hair tucked into a book?”
Hester turned to face Barb. “I don’t,” she said.
“You sure?” Barb asked.
“More than I’ve ever been in my life,” Hester said. “I don’t know anything, and I don’t need to know anything else.” She glanced across the water to where Morgan stood on the deck of the ferry. “Morgan doesn’t want to know anything either.”
“But I bet he does,” Barb said. “I bet you both do.”
“He doesn’t.”
“I may have questions.”
On the deck, Morgan lifted Kate in the air, and the girl waved both arms over her head. When Hester shook her head, he shrugged. Daphne was gone. Again.
“Then come to me,” Hester said. “I’ll have the answers.”
Hester would do anything to protect Morgan, like she protected Kate. Like she protected Daphne.
But tomorrow was Friday. Tomorrow, Hester and Morgan would bring Kate to daycare together. Not just Morgan, but Angela and Cary and Prachi and Jane and Jamie and Ms. Michaela and even Daphne, in her own way, all of them, everyone who Hester loved, lined up along Mass Avenue to cheer her on, to guide her forward, to help her push away the pain and terror that came with life. She didn’t live in that apartment in Allston anymore. She wasn’t alone. She had more people than Daphne to rely on as she forged her way through this world.
She waved again. Beside Morgan, Angela held Waffles by a leash. Hester lifted Ethan up into her arms. Children didn’t disappear, not in this world. Neither did problems.
“Who is that?” Morgan shouted.
“This is Ethan,” Hester shouted back. “He likes Thomas the Train!”
“The tank engine!” Ethan said.
“The tank engine!” Hester shouted. “He likes Thomas the Tank Engine. And I don’t know what to do with him!”
“We’ll figure it out!” Morgan said.
“You know you can’t leave with him,” Barb said. “Someone from family services is on that boat. They’re here to take him.”
Maybe, in the end, Ethan would stay on the island with Lydia, with his half-brother Oliver. Maybe he’d go with that social worker. And maybe he’d wind up coming to Somerville with Hester. Whatever happened, she’d be sure he was safe, always and forever.
Another dog ran around Morgan and lifted its two front paws onto the ferry’s railing.
“George!” Morgan shouted, pointing at the dog and grinning. “This is George!”
“George!” Hester shouted.
George was huge, with a mangy coat and giant teeth and the kind of face that made people cross the street when they saw him coming. He was the kind of creature only a lunatic could love.
Hester couldn’t wait to love him.
December
Hope wakes to the smell of warm croissants wafting through the cold inn. She burrows into the quilts and blankets that cover her bed. They’re soft. And safe. When she finally wakes fully, she tests the frigid morning air with a finger, then her whole arm. Like diving into the ocean, she shoves the bedding aside and leaps into her day.
After showering under hot water that pulses from the showerhead and changing into jeans and a red sweater, she heads down the narrow back staircase. Christmas decorations hang along the bannister, into the living and dining rooms, through to the kitchen where the croissants cool on racks. There are four dozen—plain, chocolate, and her favorite, almond. They come frozen, shipped here from a factory, ready to bake, hardly homemade the way the guests at the inn expect them to be.
The tiniest of lies.
Hope tears into an almond croissant, shoving the pieces into her mouth before Sandrine catches her.
Sandrine believes that she sees everything.
Hope fills two baskets with the croissants and strides into the dining room with confidence. Because Hope is confident. Happy.
She’s hopeful.
“Let’s invite Hope!” Sandrine had said only the other night as she’d made plans with friends. She’d said it into the phone while Hope listened from outside the room.
“Bonjour, hello,” Hope says, delivering the baskets.
The French sounds like a song, and it still feels like everyone who speaks it is pretending, that they’re all in one long high school exercise and that the bell will ring and they’ll all return to speaking English.
In the kitchen, Sandrine has appeared, her springy hair tied in a ponytail, that apron screaming Tres Bien! tied around her ample waist. Despite their location in southern Québec, despite her name, Sandrine doesn’t speak a word of French. Oh, she tries, but she only manages to sound like a three-year-old. She moved here from Vermont, two generations removed from her Québécois heritage. She told Hope that she dreamed of owning an inn, of making happy people feel “at home.” But Hope can tell, and Sandrine doesn’t try to hide it, that the woman has stepped into her own hell. She hates standing all day, and the varicose veins that have spread down her legs, and the way those uneaten muffins and croissants and poutine—endless, endless poutine, the only thing that Americans think they eat in Québec—somehow make it into her mouth and onto her hips. “Before I had Jean-Marc . . .” Sandrine had said only the other day, looking at herself from the side in the mirror and leaving the sentence unfinished. Practically begging Hope to finish it. To give it a hopeful flourish. Hope had split a muffin in two and watched while Sandrine succumbed in two quick bites.
This morning, Sandrine looks as if she hasn’t slept. Her husband, Henri—he speaks French—came home last night drunk, and the screaming had started with a whisper, seeping through the vents and into the cold air like frozen breath. Henri moved with ease between French and English. Soon the whisper turned to a roar, and Henri shouted words like salope and ta gueule, the words that Hope had loved tossing off in high school French, the words that had stuck. She caught those that she could, piecing together bits of the conversation in the Québécois she was only beginning to learn. So it took a moment for Henri’s words to take hold. Je vais te tuer.
Hope sat up, the cold flooding her blankets.
I’ll kill you.
The yelling stopped. Even Sandrine, in her ignorance of French, had understood what Henri meant.
* * *
“Two eggs benedict, Table 5,” Hope says.
Sandrine pulls a skillet down from over the stove. She seems to be moving in slow motion, cracking eggs into a pot of simmering water and mindless of the shells that follow. “All those years of high school Spanish,” she says. “And I could have ridden my bike over here to practice French.” She clucks her tongue and watches the eggs simmering. She tilts her head. “I saw you,” she says.
Hope’s stomach drops.
“I saw you eat that croissant,
” Sandrine adds. “You don’t have to sneak food. We’re family.”
The panic subsides almost at once. Hope mumbles thank you and grabs two more baskets and retreats to the dining room, only to see Henri at reception. He’s different this morning, removed from last night’s disembodied voice. He has thick, unruly black hair and piercing blue eyes. He makes customers want to return year after year. But most of the people who come to the inn are American and blissfully monolingual. Henri could threaten to gouge Sandrine’s eyes out, and all that these people would notice would be his smile.
But not Hope.
Last night, she snuck out of bed, her feet going numb when they hit the cold floor. Down the hallway, and to their bedroom door, where she put an ear to the keyhole and listened as a fist hit soft flesh, the parts of the body easily covered with a Tres Bien! apron.
Now Hope passes by Henri, waiting till he meets her gaze before letting her eyes fall. A coquette. That’s her part to play. He wants his women to be thin and pretty. Submissive. She heads upstairs and into an empty bedroom. She remembers hearing him last night, his voice barely a whisper. “Ton fils,” he said to Sandrine, “il sera la prochaine.”
Had Sandrine understood? Had she been relieved this morning to find Jean-Marc safe, asleep, his thumb in his mouth. Unbruised. What will she think later, when he goes missing? What will Sandrine imagine? What will she convince herself she should have done? When the police do show up, Hope will tell them that she spent the morning serving breakfast and going from room to room, cleaning bathrooms, changing sheets. She’ll say it in broken French, more broken than necessary. It’ll make her seem simple. Easy to ignore. And if they get too close—if they point the finger at the stranger, the outsider, the one from away—it’ll be easy enough to start a whispering campaign to fend them off. To discredit them. To deflect the blame right back at them.
She’s done it before.
The door to the bedroom opens and closes. Henri holds the knob behind him, his hips thrust forward, a grin forming at the edges of his mouth. He likes to stand, to watch in the mirror. Hope looks at herself, at her black hair. It felt best to make a change. To be someone new. Is coloring your hair a lie, however tiny, when it’s out there for all the world to see, when the roots, still orange like a carrot, sprout from her scalp? But she’ll need to take care of that soon. To let Daphne remain Hope.