The Beach House

by Jane Green

  ‘Oh Michael,’ she says. ‘I’m so sorry.’

  ‘I know. So am I.’

  ‘It’s definitely yours?’ Daff thinks of the high heels, the brassy hair, the big diamonds. She wonders if Michael has truly been her only conquest of late.

  ‘I think so. I’m pretty sure. I’ve known Jordana a long time and I don’t think she’s a liar. Although,’ he snorts in mock laughter, ‘I would also have said she wasn’t the type to have an affair.’

  ‘That’s what I would have said about you.’ Daff smiles wryly.

  ‘Me too. It was a case of bad judgement. I’m still not quite sure what came over me.’

  ‘I have to say –’ Daff is careful – ‘she’s not quite who I would see you with.’

  Michael starts to laugh. ‘Who would you see me with?’

  Someone like me, she thinks. But doesn’t say it.

  ‘I don’t know.’ She shrugs, embarrassed. ‘Someone more down to earth, I think. Someone more natural.’

  ‘A single mother, perhaps?’ Michael grins, and Daff blushes and moves to the sink to wash up, stay busy.

  ‘Then there’s the small matter of my father turning up when he is supposed to be a bundle of bones at the bottom of the ocean.’

  ‘Ah yes.’ Daff turns to look at him. ‘I was wondering when you were going to mention that.’

  ‘It didn’t seem important.’ He shrugs, and they both laugh.

  ‘I’m waiting for the next bomb to fall,’ he continues. ‘It feels as if everything in my life is not what I thought it was, everything has changed, and nothing will ever be the same. If everything I thought I believed, everything I trusted, was wrong, how can I ever trust again?’

  Michael pauses, but Daff senses he has more to say and doesn’t interrupt.

  ‘Remember 9/11?’ he says. ‘After the planes hit the towers we heard the news about the Pentagon, then the plane in Pennsylvania?’ Daff nods. ‘We were all waiting for the next thing, waiting for the world to come to an end. That’s how this feels. It feels as if my world has come to an end. Everything that was safe and secure and real for me, is not. How do I trust?’ He looks pleadingly at Daff. ‘How can I trust in anyone again?’

  You can trust me. The words are on the tip of Daff’s tongue, but she doesn’t say them, just stands there gazing at him as he sighs and runs his fingers through his hair. You are a beautiful man.

  She wants to say: You will find your way through this, you will find a way forward because you are all good. You are goodness and kindness and perhaps the best man I have ever met. You can trust me because I trust you. Because even though I barely know you I would place my life in your hands. I know you would look after it.

  ‘Can we go?’

  ‘What?’ Daff shakes her head, breaking her reverie. ‘Go where?’

  ‘For that walk.’

  She laughs. ‘Yes, I’ll just get my shoes.’

  They walk for hours. Along the pretty roads of Sconset, alongside the beach, neither of them with any time constraints, they are happy to just walk and talk, lapsing into occasional companionable silence.

  ‘How do you feel about being a father?’ Daff asks as they reach a pretty cove.

  ‘I don’t know.’ Michael winces at the thought. ‘I love kids, but they’ve always been other people’s kids. I’ve never felt ready for my own.’

  ‘I’m not sure any of us are ever ready for kids.’ She laughs. ‘They always seem to take you by surprise. You’ll be a great father,’ she adds. ‘If you choose to be involved.’

  ‘Of course I’ll be involved. Oh God. That’s the next thing. Talking to Jordana and telling her just how involved I plan to be. I’m not going to just walk away from my child. I’d never do that.’

  ‘I know,’ Daff says.

  ‘Shall we stop for a bit?’ Michael points to another little cove ahead, smaller, hidden in the dunes.

  ‘Sure.’

  Suddenly it’s awkward. The two of them are sitting on the sand, knowing what’s coming, not knowing how to get there, unsure whether this is the right thing, or whether this is just another huge complication in an altogether-too-complicated life.

  There doesn’t seem to be a choice any more for either of them, and as Michael leans over to kiss Daff, he realizes that she is the only safe place for him right now. How could he possibly walk away from the only thing in his life that is good?

  ‘Now I know why they always say sex on the beach is overrated.’ Daff furiously shakes the sand out of her hair.

  ‘Oh thanks!’ Michael says.

  ‘I didn’t mean that.’ She laughs, pulling on her shorts and allowing herself to be wrapped in his arms and kissed. ‘Not that,’ she murmurs, looking at him and smiling, unable to believe this has happened with someone so wonderful. ‘That was lovely.’

  ‘Was that your first time since your husband?’

  ‘Ex-husband.’ Daff smiles shyly. ‘Yes.’

  ‘Was it okay?’ he asks nervously.

  ‘Okay? It was better than okay. It was marvellous! Like riding a bike,’ she says, laughing. ‘Only better.’

  Truly it was marvellous. Better than marvellous. Blissful.

  Who would ever love me, Daff remembers thinking during those early days when she and Richard first separated. My breasts are saggy from childbirth, I have stretch marks on my stomach, legs I forget to shave for months at a time. The last person to fall in love with me did so when I was young, firm, gorgeous. When I was bathing-suit-ready every morning of my life, just by the sheer act of falling out of bed. Who would love me now?

  She had thought that when she did come to have sex with anyone again, it would be awkward as hell, would have to be done with the lights out.

  Yet there they were, on the beach, and it didn’t feel awkward, it felt like the most natural thing she had ever done. And she didn’t feel ashamed of her lines, or her veins, or her sag. She felt beautiful.

  Lying in his arms afterwards, as they continued to chat softly, the thought occurred to her that this is intimacy. This isn’t what she and Richard had. Ever. They never lay in one another’s arms after the fact, but rolled over after a perfunctory kiss goodnight and went to sleep. Or, in the beginning, rolled over to get out of bed and get dressed. This feels like something she has been waiting for her entire life.

  This feels utterly new and utterly familiar at the same time. It feels right… like coming home.

  Chapter Twenty-Six

  ‘I’ll take the girls to the beach.’ Daniel holds his hands out for Lizzie and Stella as Bee nods gratefully, sinking down on the chair next to Michael, both of them smiling at each other before looking out to sea, letting the silence envelop them for a few minutes before Bee starts to speak.

  ‘I always wanted a brother when I was growing up,’ she murmurs. ‘I had a best friend at school, Sophie, who had three older brothers. Going to her house was so exciting. There was constant noise and activity and friends over, whereas my house always felt like a museum.’

  ‘You should have been here.’ Michael laughs. ‘I’m an only child too… or at least I thought I was… until now. But this house was always filled with people. I used to long for a little peace and quiet.’

  ‘This is just so weird.’ Bee shakes her head. ‘I can’t believe that my dad had this whole other life before us, that he abandoned you all. It seems so out of character.’

  ‘I barely remember him,’ Michael says. ‘I mean, I know all the stories and I remember snapshots, but I was six when he… left. It becomes harder and harder to distinguish memory from the stories you hear or the photographs you see.’

  ‘You look like him,’ Bee says, turning and gazing at Michael. ‘It wouldn’t have occurred to me before, but I wasn’t looking for it. Now, of course, I can see how much you look like he must have done when he was younger.’

  ‘So what did he tell you about his old life? I still don’t understand how he could have just turned up out of nowhere with no friends, no family, and have no one
question it.’

  ‘Because I think we accept people at face value. My mom always said he fitted into the community, and they all thought he’d been through a bad divorce with no children, was making a fresh start somewhere else. I guess, as well, in those days people weren’t as open, didn’t feel entitled to know everything about a person, and of course how could you have found out, back then?’

  ‘What was he like?’

  ‘As a father or as a man?’

  ‘Both.’ Michael looks at her.

  ‘He was a wonderful father,’ she says. ‘I don’t want to hurt you, I can’t even imagine the pain of growing up without a father, but maybe he was trying to do for me what he couldn’t do for you, because he was always there for me. He was fun. He’d take me places and always talk to me. Talk and talk and talk. He would explain everything, so going out with him, especially when I was little, was such an adventure.’ She sighs. ‘I used to feel so proud.’

  Michael lays his head on his arms to listen.

  ‘When I went away to school, Dad was always the one I wanted to talk to. He always seemed to have such wisdom. We disagreed on a lot of things, though. He and Mom are both religious and I don’t really do anything. But he would always pause and think things through before giving me advice. His advice was almost always good.’

  ‘How old were you when he divorced your mom?’

  ‘It was more like she divorced him. I was eighteen. She always used to say she was tired of the secrets. I never understood what she was talking about, although now of course,’ she says with a snort, ‘it all makes perfect sense. He was closed with her, at least that’s what she always said, but I never felt it. Never felt him be anything other than warm and loving and open with me. What about you?’ She turns her head to look at Michael. ‘What do you remember?’

  ‘Not much. I remember loving being with him. When he was here, all I wanted to do was help him do whatever he was doing. I remember hero-worshipping him, even though a lot of the time he wasn’t around. When he was, he seemed to be lost in thought, concentrating on something else. I remember him being irritated a lot of the time.’

  ‘Irritated? My dad? Wow.’ Bee shakes her head. ‘I don’t think I’ve ever even seen him lose his temper.’

  ‘I didn’t know this until I was much older, but he left us in horrible debt. Mom had to sell off all the houses on this property and our home in New York. This was just a summer house but we had to move here because it was the only place we had left. He used to gamble. He gambled away everything, plus –’ he laughs mirthlessly – ‘a ton of stuff we didn’t have. For months after he… disappeared, people would turn up at the front door demanding money.’

  ‘God, what did your mom do?’

  ‘She’d usually invite them in, pour them a stiff drink then pour out her story. They’d usually stay for dinner and end up friends. Seriously.’ Michael laughs. ‘A few of the more frightening heavies came to our Christmas parties for years afterwards.’

  ‘I’m so sorry,’ Bee says, tears in her eyes. ‘I don’t know what to say. I’m just so sorry that you thought your dad was dead, and I got him instead.’

  ‘I’m sorry too,’ Michael says. ‘I grew up with such a loss, and now… Well. Now I don’t know what to feel, other than completely betrayed.’

  ‘He says he didn’t think he had a choice back then,’ Bee says quietly. ‘He’s in so much pain. He wants to make it up to you, to you and your mom, but he doesn’t know how if you won’t let him in.’

  ‘I can’t. Not yet.’ Michael exhales. ‘I’m just not ready.’

  ‘Could you at least think about it?’

  ‘Yes. I could do that. I could think about it.’

  ‘Please do,’ Bee says. ‘Instead of looking at this as a betrayal, could you maybe look at it as a blessing? That you have your father back after all these years, you have a chance to learn where you came from, before it’s too late.’

  ‘It’s not as easy as that.’ Michael shakes his head sadly. ‘I’ll try. Honestly. Hey…’

  ‘What?’

  ‘Put your hand out.’

  Bee puts her hand out and they both laugh.

  ‘Look at that,’ she says with delight.

  ‘We have the same hands.’

  ‘Even the way our little fingers curve slightly. How weird.’ And the two of them sit there gazing at one another’s hands before Bee starts to speak.

  ‘I know you can’t see this as a blessing,’ she says, ‘not yet, and I’m struggling with it too, but it is kind of a blessing, to have found something you always wanted, particularly at a time when everything in your life is horrible, when everything you thought was precious and treasured and safe seems to be falling apart.’

  Michael turns to look at her. ‘You’re talking about Daniel and the divorce.’

  ‘Yes. And the fact that he’s gay, so my entire marriage, from the very beginning, was a lie. I’ve been feeling like there is no light at the end of the tunnel, like there will never be a light at the end of the tunnel. Until now.’ Bee pauses and looks at Michael. ‘I don’t want to get soppy or sentimental, but I think finding a big brother may be a truly wonderful thing in my life.’

  Michael reaches over and takes her hand, squeezes it gently. ‘Thank you,’ he says. ‘My life’s been pretty awful recently too. Thank you for showing me there’s another way to look at this.’

  ‘There’s always another way,’ Bee says softly. ‘There’s a reason we came to Nantucket and rented the house, a reason Dad came back here and found you.’

  ‘I believe the same thing,’ Michael says with a small laugh. ‘Everything does, indeed, happen for a reason.’

  He thinks of Jordana, of his child growing inside her.

  ‘Sometimes it’s just hard to figure out what the reason is.’

  ‘I’m calling a family meeting,’ Nan says. ‘I’ve been worrying myself sick. I’ve suddenly realized that I’m trying to do everything myself, make all the decisions myself, and I can’t do it all alone. I need my family around me.’

  Daniel and Daff exchange a look.

  ‘Um, I’ve grown terribly fond of you,’ Daff ventures. ‘I’m just not sure I qualify as family.’

  ‘You do now,’ Nan says. ‘As far as I’m concerned the people I love are my family, and I’m afraid that now counts you. And I’m still getting to know young Jessica but I’m pretty certain you’re family too.’

  Jess blushes but can’t hide the beam of joy at being included.

  ‘Michael, my darling, I don’t want to say anything that might upset you. For years I tried to hide the truth about your father, but the time has come for all of you to know the truth…’

  ‘He gambled everything away and you were forced to sell the cottages and then the apartment in New York?’

  ‘Oh.’ Nan stops. ‘I thought you didn’t know.’

  ‘Of course I knew. You told me a million times.’

  ‘I did? I always thought I was protecting you.’

  ‘You did when I was younger. Then you’d just tell everyone who came to the house, and I’d sit on the stairs and listen.’

  She sighs. ‘That’s all beside the point, rather. The point is I think he’s come back because he wants Windermere. I can’t think of any other reason why he would show up here, out of the blue. He did a terrible thing, all those years ago. As far as I’m concerned the sort of man who can fake a suicide, abandoning his wife and child without a second glance, is the sort of man who can steal a house that he believes is rightfully his.’

  ‘Surely the house is in your name, though?’ Michael says.

  ‘Well, no. I never bothered changing it,’ Nan says. ‘I thought it was a way of honouring Everett’s memory, to keep the house in his name. It felt like a way of keeping him alive somehow, although when I found out the nature of the debt he’d left us in I was furious. I just never got round to doing it.’

  ‘Oh Jesus.’ Michael whistles. ‘He could. He could claim it.’

>   ‘No!’ Daff says. ‘Are you sure? I think any judge in the country would have a hard time awarding him the house after he’s been presumed dead for over thirty-five years. I Honestly don’t think you have anything to worry about, even if he were to go after you. He’s here because he had a fall, because he’s Daniel’s ex-father-in-law.’

  ‘She’s right,’ Daniel says. ‘He had no idea I was staying in his house. I agree that this is all coincidence.’

  ‘There’s no such thing as coincidence,’ Nan says wearily, convinced she is right. ‘Jessica? What do you think?’

  ‘Me?’ Jess, slouched in the sofa, sits forward, unused to being asked her opinion.

  ‘Yes. Do you think he’s come to take the house away or do you think it’s innocent?’

  ‘Well. This kind of reminds me of a show I once saw on TV. The husband came back, except he hadn’t pretended to be dead or anything, but he came back pretending he wanted to get back together and he missed his family, but he murdered his wife and tried to steal everything.’

  ‘Jess!’ Daff is mortified.

  ‘What?’

  ‘Oh don’t worry.’ Nan bursts out laughing. ‘I doubt very much Everett’s come back to murder me.’

  ‘What channel were you watching?’

  ‘Lifetime,’ Jess says, and Michael grins.

  ‘Sounds like a Lifetime special.’

  ‘I do think he’s come back to reclaim the house,’ Nan continues smoothly, ‘and the only thing I can think of to do is sell the house and hide the money. I never thought I’d sell my house, but I’d rather sell it than let Everett get his hands on it, or a penny of the money that results from the sale.’

  ‘How do you hide money?’ Michael smiles at her benevolently. ‘You can’t hide it any more, Mom. The IRS knows everything. You can’t slip it into offshore accounts or pass it over to a bank in Switzerland. You have to declare everything now. Everything.’

  ‘I know,’ Nan says with a smile. ‘So here’s what I’m thinking. We sell it partly for cash – enough for me to live the rest of my days out quite happily, and we can always store cash in a safe deposit box on the island – and the rest of the money can be put in trust for you, my darling. That way, Everett won’t be able to get his hands on it.’