by Amy Frazier
“Being a potter—an artist—isn’t work. It’s part of who I am. Right here in Pritchard’s Neck.”
“You can be a potter in Atlanta, Mom.” Gabriella’s voice seemed far away to Isabel.
As the other three talked, Isabel kept thinking, This can’t be happening. It’s all so wrong. It was wrong to move when she’d just started to feel as if she belonged here. As if she had reinforcements in her grandfather and her aunts and uncles when stuff got too hairy at home. And now Dad wanted to pull that security out from under the four of them?
“I need an aspirin,” she mumbled, then headed upstairs.
In her room she couldn’t settle down. It was as if her arms and legs had a twitchy energy all their own. Pacing, she flipped through clothing and papers in search of her poetry notebook. Maybe if she tried to write…
Flailing her arms aimlessly, she bumped her desk, sending a stack of books, her poetry notebook included, crashing into her waste basket. When she went to fish them out, she found them among the shredded remains of her college applications.
She’d thought she could help her family by staying home, by commuting to college as a day student. How naïve she’d been.
She grabbed her poetry notebook and a pen. Tried to find images that might convey her sorrow. Tried to find something to say that would make her feel connected and minimize her loneliness. But the words refused to come. If she couldn’t express herself, she had to escape.
She headed for the bathroom and the razor blades.
CHESSIE WONDERED at her daughter’s absence. As difficult a topic as Nick had brought up, at least he’d presented it for family discussion. Isabel needed to be part of this, to make her opinions known.
“Gabby,” she said, “would you check on your sister?”
“Sure.” As Nick had pushed the pluses of the possible move, Gabriella had become quite perky in her support. It was obvious she was pleased to be in her father’s good graces.
When she left the room, Chessie turned to Nick. “What’s the real agenda here?”
To his credit, he looked genuinely perplexed. “No agenda, Chess. This is a serious proposal. We need to take a serious look at it. With Isabel in college a year from this September and Gabriella three years later we could use the extra money.”
“I’m beginning to make extra money with my pottery. And now I want to settle down. Finally. Here in our hometown, with your family around us. I think Isabel—”
Her sentence was cut short by a blood-curdling scream.
Nick bolted from his seat with Chessie right behind as they heard Gabriella frantically wailing, “Omigod, omigod, omigod!”
By the time she reached the landing, Nick was in the girls’ bathroom, kneeling over Isabel, and Gabriella was pressed against the door frame, sobbing uncontrollably.
“Call 911!” Nick barked.
“No!” Isabel screamed. “I can make it stop, Dad. See!”
As Chessie peered into the bathroom, she didn’t know what made her sickest— Isabel’s forearms covered in blood, or her seventeen-year-old methodically stanching the flow with a hand towel as if she were an automaton without feeling or emotional involvement.
“Omigod, omigod, omigod…” Gabriella whimpered, hugging the woodwork and averting her eyes.
Instinctively, Chessie took her younger daughter in her arms where Gabby clung, shivering.
“It’s stopping, Dad.” Isabel held up her arms. The bleeding was reduced to thin red lines like bramble scratches…but there were so many. “Don’t call 911. Please.”
A wave of nausea swept over Chessie as she stared at her older daughter while holding fast to her younger. “Isabel, what is going on?”
“I think I know.” Nick scooped up Isabel, bloody towel and all, then carried her to her bedroom. “Take Gabby downstairs and put on some tea.”
“Tea!” Was he crazy? Their daughter had just slit her wrists. “We need to get her to the hospital.”
“Tea, Chessie.” He laid Isabel on her bed. “Trust me.”
He seemed so calm. In fact, so did Isabel. Unlike Gabriella, who still trembled in Chessie’s none-too-steady arms.
“Chessie, please. Take Gabby downstairs.”
She left, as much to protect her younger daughter as to show her trust in Nick.
In the kitchen she went through the motions of getting down the teapot, the mugs.
“Peach mango,” Gabriella whispered as she huddled on a chair. “That’s Izzy’s favorite.”
“Peach mango it is.” To be sure, this was a nightmare, making tea while Isabel lay upstairs. She didn’t know what was going on, but Nick seemed to. She was grateful for his self-assurance. If Gabriella didn’t need her, she’d be beside him.
But Gabriella did need her. With wide, uncomprehending eyes, she watched Chessie move around the kitchen. A girl who usually spoke before she thought, she remained unnaturally mute.
When the tea had steeped, Chessie poured two mugs and set them on the table, then put two more on a tray. “Wait here,” she said. “I’ll be right back.”
Gabriella hugged a mug of steaming tea to her chest and didn’t argue.
At the top of the stairs, Nick met Chessie in front of Isabel’s closed door. He took one of the mugs off the tray and nodded to the other. “Take this in to Izzy,” he said softly. “Tell her you love her. Tell her everything’s going to be all right. I’ll go down to Gabby.”
“But don’t we need to take Isabel to the hospital?”
“She needs a doctor, but not a medical doctor. I called the school guidance counselor. She’s recommended a family therapist.”
“What—?”
“Just give her the tea. Sit with her a minute. If she wants to talk, let her. If she doesn’t, that’s okay tonight. Then let her rest and come downstairs. We need to talk to Gabby. I’ll tell you both what I know.”
“Oh, yes! Please. Gabby’s terrified.” As was she.
Nick kissed her gently on the cheek. “It’s going to be okay, Chessie. I promise.”
How could he promise that when everything seemed so awful?
Tentatively, she pushed open Isabel’s bedroom door, expecting to see her daughter in some kind of agony, physical or emotional. Instead, she lay on top of the covers, her eyes closed, her features peaceful.
“Izzy,” she said quietly. “I brought you tea.”
Slowly Isabel sat up. “Thank you.”
Although Chessie tried not to look at her daughter’s arms, she couldn’t help herself. With her sweatshirt sleeves pushed up above her elbows, Isabel made no effort to cover the pattern of cuts covering both arms. So this was why she’d been wearing long sleeves during even the hottest days. Chessie racked her brain to remember the first time she’d noticed the strange attire.
Sipping her tea, Isabel seemed almost relieved. Why? Had she wanted to be found out? Chessie didn’t understand.
She sat lightly on the edge of the bed, and brushed the hair from Isabel’s temple. Her skin felt cool, un-fevered. “I love you, darling. Daddy does, too. And Gabby.”
“I know.”
“Things are going to be—”
“Okay. Dad promised.”
“Do you want to talk?”
“Not now. I’m tired.” She put the mug on her nightstand, then lay down. “Talk to Dad. He understands.”
He did? Chessie fought back tears as she closed her daughter’s door. Then why didn’t she?
In the kitchen Nick was talking quietly to Gabriella, who now seemed calmer. Chessie wished she felt calmer, but, if anything, she felt close to hysteria.
“Will you please tell me what’s going on?” she asked.
“Yes.” Nick took her hand and drew her into the seat next to him. “The term for it is cutting. Isabel cut herself because, ironically, it made her feel better. Inside.”
“How could she consider suicide and we never saw any signs?”
“Not suicide, Chess. This type of cutting—painful, yet shallow—is
rarely life-threatening.”
“How do you know that?”
“I deal with suicidal teens and teens who cut. Isabel let me check her arms and legs. A good sign this was a cry for help. Her cuts are superficial. Enough to cause pain, not enough to do real damage.”
“Girls do it to get attention,” Gabriella mumbled, biting her nails. “But it’s so gross.”
“You know about this?” Chessie was shocked. Here she thought she was current with the issues in her children’s generation.
“About cutting, yeah.” Gabriella leaned into her father. “About Isabel, no.”
Chessie turned to Nick. “What, outside of normal adolescent angst, is troubling Isabel?”
“I’d say normal adolescent angst would be enough to push a sensitive girl like Isabel to the edge. Plus, Gabby tells me Izzy thought the…discussions we’d been having lately might signal impending divorce.”
“Oh, no. And then you talked of taking a job in Atlanta. Of getting an apartment by yourself…”
“Talk of moving might have triggered this episode, but there were other times, Chess. I saw healing cuts. She’s been doing this a while. Not long, but a while.”
“How could she do something so brutal?”
“As crazy as it sounds, there’s a poetic sense to cutting that would appeal to a girl like Isabel. It’s a display of strength—look at the pain I can bear—as well as sensitivity—look at the pain I am feeling inside. The operative phrase is look at. Eventually, cutters want someone to notice. To help bear or ease the pain.”
“That’s why she seemed almost relieved.”
“Yes.”
Feeling inadequate, Chessie leaned into Nick, who was now bookended by his daughter and his wife. What else did Nick know about kids that she didn’t?
And then the epiphany hit her.
All three of them— Isabel, Gabriella and she—felt the desperate need to be seen and connected to the others. They also needed the others to help bear or ease any burdens along the way.
In the wake of this last upheaval, Nick had contacted a counselor. She hoped the sessions could include all four of them.
FOR THE FIRST TIME in…he couldn’t remember how long, Nick took a day off work. A Thursday, no less.
He called in and took a personal day because Isabel, although she had her license, asked him to drive her to her morning appointment with the therapist who’d proposed a plan wherein Isabel would come alone at first. Then later, when she felt as if she could articulate her issues more clearly, the family would be invited to join the sessions. He sat in the waiting room and worried. Giving over control in this area made him very uneasy. Unease, however, was a small price to pay for his daughter’s well-being.
After therapy, he and Isabel picked up Chessie and Gabriella, and he treated them all to lunch at The Breakwater restaurant, a place frequented by tourists who, more than likely, earned more than a high-school principal. Because his three ladies seemed to relax and enjoy the breathtaking view of the coast, the linens and extensive place settings, surprisingly, so did he. When the bill came, he viewed it as vacation money they hadn’t spent. In trying to turn Coastal High around, he’d worked through any time he’d been slated to take off this past year. If he moved the family to Atlanta, he wouldn’t get a chance to make it up to them for another year, at least. Why hadn’t he seen the importance of vacations before now?
After lunch and a stop back home, he headed out alone to talk to his brothers and sister and Pop.
He caught Mariah at Wiggin’s Landscape Nursery where, as manager, she was working on the order for fall bedding plants. He got Brad’s whereabouts from the electric company, then tracked him down in the field. His brother took a break from replacing a section of line to talk. Sean was just pulling his lobster boat up to the pier for refueling when Nick arrived. He sat on the wharf and talked to Sean below just as the two of them had sat as kids talking to the lobstermen. Jonas was a little harder to track down. He was doing some custom cabinetry work on one of the summer houses on the point. The security guard at the gate didn’t want to let Nick through, but Nick convinced him it was a family emergency, which it was in a way.
He didn’t stay with any one sibling long, just long enough to tell them exactly what had been going on in his life. He didn’t expect them to solve his problems; he wanted them—for the first time ever from his lips—to be aware he had his share. If they had suggestions, well, he was open to hear them.
The visit to Pop he saved for last.
By the time Nick got to the family lobster pound, Sean had arrived to give Penn a break. When Penn heard his son wanted to speak to him, he led Nick into the small back office. It was devoid of decoration, except for Alex’s drawings, spare of furnishings and cluttered with paperwork, kids’ books, half-filled coffee mugs and empty soft drink cans. A good spot for a long overdue father-son talk.
“What’s up?”
It was difficult for Nick to find an opening. Finally, he said, “I don’t know exactly how you handled Gabriella, but she seems to have taken your message to heart.”
“I tried to give her a different perspective.”
“Thank you.” He paused to clear his throat. “I wasn’t getting through to her.”
“I don’t know about that. You’ve had a lot on your mind. That’s always when kids really angle for their share of attention. You were gettin’ to her, but not in the way you wanted.”
“I have had a lot on my mind. Too much work and not enough family, Chessie thinks.”
“Well?”
“Work is how a man takes care of his family. Isn’t that how it goes? And just putting in the hours isn’t enough. You have to have a plan, and a backup plan, and a complete disaster plan…”
Penn watched him, but said nothing.
“You can jump in any time,” Nick urged, “if you’ve got a better handle on this than I have. Because I’m down to my complete disaster plan and searching.”
He stopped, fully expecting his father to tell him to suck it up. To tell him a show of emotion never put food on the table. Hard work did.
Surprisingly, Penn didn’t resort to that oft-repeated credo. “After your mother died,” he began slowly, “you took on a man’s job, helpin’ me with your brothers and sister. It amazed me, at times, how you, a kid, could worry the big picture while I was just sloggin’ along day to day. I admired you for that.”
“You did?”
“Still do.”
Nick didn’t know what to say. It was as if he’d been holding his breath for years, waiting for his father’s approval.
“But sometimes,” Penn continued, “it helps to pull your visor down and stay in the moment.”
“As in…?”
“Spend as much time as you can with your girls. They’ll be grown up and gone before you know it. And let that wife of yours know how much she means to you. Lord knows there are too many days when I wish I still had the opportunity to tell your mother I love her.” His father rubbed his whiskery chin, and the audible rasp was familiar and strangely comforting. “How does that old saw go? No tombstone ever read, ‘He wished he spent more time at the office.’”
Nick let out a long slow breath and shook his head.
“So how do I get off this hamster wheel?” he asked.
“Figure out what’s most important and start from there,” Penn replied. “For me it was this town. I came home from Nam and never wanted to set foot out of Pritchard’s Neck again. It just worked out that now I have my kids and grandkids around me. Color me lucky.”
Nick paused. “I’ve been offered an associate superintendent’s position in Atlanta. A promotion with a big raise. Any words of wisdom?”
Penn shook his head. “You’re gonna have to think that one long and hard.”
“That’s it?”
“Nick, you’ll do the right thing… What do you need? What do you want? Not as a man climbin’ the ladder. As a man. Period.”
Nick didn’t
know what startled him more—the fact that his father felt certain he’d make the right decision or the thought of making a decision based on what he wanted. Really wanted.
He wanted his wife and his girls happy. He wanted to love them and be loved in return. It sounded so simple when he put it that way.
“And somethin’ else…” His father looked uncomfortable. “I was tough with you when you were a kid because that was the only way I knew to get you ready for what life might throw your way. Maybe, I was too tough.”
“No, Pop. You did what you thought was best. That’s all any of us can do. Thanks.”
His father turned gruff. “Get on with ya. Sean will be dockin’ me for takin’ too long a break.”
“I have to run anyway. It’s my night to get supper.”
“Don’t tell me. Grilled cheese sandwiches and maple syrup.”
Nick chuckled. “You know, I think it’s time I introduced my crew to that treat.”
Feeling twenty pounds lighter, he stopped at Branson’s to pick up the ingredients for supper along with the biggest box of chocolates he could find.
As he pulled into his driveway, Chessie came out of the barn. The sun backlit her short auburn hair, making it seem like a halo around her head.
“Hi,” she said quietly, coming up to him. “How’d it go with your family?”
“Really well.” He held out the box of chocolates.
“Supper?”
“Uh-uh. These are for you. Just you. From me. Just me.”
“Oh, Nick.” She hugged him around his neck and snuggled close. “That is so sweet.”
“That’s not all,” he murmured in her hair. “What if I put a moratorium on new jobs? What if we stay put, right here in Pritchard’s Neck until Gabby’s in college, and it’s just the two of us? Then we can decide where we go from there.”
She stepped back to look up at him. “Do you mean it?”
“I never meant anything more in my life.”
Clutching the box of chocolates, she kissed him so exuberantly someone driving by honked the horn and whistled.