Diana stopped. “I thought I did,” she said quietly.
Ford just nodded. “You think a lot of things. And you know what? When you’re done thinking? You’re just as stupid as you were before you started.”
3
It was all a matter of meeting him when she did. She loved him. She wanted to love him—she believed that—but if she hadn’t met him when she did, she would not have ended up with him. The wrong place, the wrong time. Her brother Phillip lived on the second floor of a three-family with his roommate Barry Fortunato on Chestnut Street in Brockton, and Ford lived downstairs.
Ford was pretty, if not handsome. Blue eyes, and long thin red lips. A ski slope nose and a pockmark on his cheek. He would come upstairs to drink and play cards with Phillip and Barry, and from time to time, Diana, with Samantha still a baby and sleeping at her mother’s, would be there, too. Diana had gotten pregnant with Samantha a month out of high school, two months before she was scheduled to leave for college, three years earlier, and she had been single since she had broken up with Sam’s biological father. Billy. A twenty-one-year-old ex-high school baseball star turned Nintendo-playing stoner. Jobless. Billy had made it quite clear in the first weeks after Sam was born that while he was interested in maintaining a relationship with Diana he wasn’t particularly interested in one with Samantha, and that had been that; Diana had made it quite clear she wasn’t particularly interested in hearing from him again.
But Ford seemed different.
Ford both worked and was going to school, part-time—night classes at Harvard Extension—and he lived independently. Organized and neat, he seemed to have a grasp on the world much beyond that of someone his age—he was four years older than Diana—and he never made excuses for anything. And that was something that attracted her to him. All most of her family did was make excuses, knitting delusional veils to cover faults and failures and lies—and to see the absence of it in someone else, even someone with problems of his own, made everything seem somehow more real. Diana was looking for real.
And Ford had problems of his own, and she had known that from the start. She remembered their first time talking. Their first real time talking. Three a.m. Post-party of some twenty or thirty people. Her brother, and Barry, asleep, and the apartment littered with overflowing ashtrays and empty bottles of beer. Vodka and gin. Cheap rock ’n’ roll mirrors—the Led Zeppelin blimp and Aerosmith logo in loud colors painted on the glass—were scattered about the room, rolled-up dollar bills on the side, and scratches from razors. Ford had done a little coke himself, and was coming down. Dark circles below his eyes. They sat in the kitchen, the lights hard and bright above. Tears in the oil cloth covering the table. Spilled cereal, and more cans.
Diana had told him about what had happened after the pregnancy. About Billy. And about her mother, Charlotte. First placing Diana in quarantine so the neighbors wouldn’t see her, then being forced to forgo her undergrad plans at St. Elizabeth’s and exiled to her uncle’s house in Connecticut until she came to term. She had returned in shame after Sam was born, and Charlotte forced her to send a letter of apology out to everyone they knew, including the local priest.
Diana had told Ford everything, and Ford had shook his head. “That sucks they treated you that way,” he said. “But you’re lucky.”
“Lucky?” she asked. “How is that lucky?”
“Well, it’s not like they’re criminal or anything. Just a bunch of crazy Catholics. It sounds like they love you, they just have their priorities a little messed up. Things could be worse.”
“You think?”
“Sure. I don’t even talk to my parents. I have seven siblings, and I talk to one of them—my sister Cybil. One. That’s it. And she’s kind of a fruitcake.” He laughed a little. “Worse.”
“But why?”
Ford shook his head and snubbed his cigarette out in the ashtray. “It’s just my old man,” he said at last.
“What? What about him?”
“How old did you say you were?”
“Twenty-one.”
“Twenty-one.” Ford took a breath. “Well, you seem like a nice kid, and you know what? It’s probably better you don’t know. No one needs to hear that stuff. He’s my father and everything, but let’s just say the world would be better off without him and leave it at that. He’s a piece of garbage. Your mother sounds like she can be a pain in the ass, but at least it sounds like she loves you, in her own messed-up way. That’s important, having two parents that love you. You need to think of that when it comes to Samantha.” He lit another cigarette. “Any chance that you’ll get back together with her father?”
Diana shook her head. “No.”
“Really?”
“I haven’t talked to him in over two years. My decision.”
“Well, your decision, his loss. Your daughter is a cute kid, she cracks me up, and she seems smart as hell. My daughter, with Tara, would have been about her age. A little older, I guess.”
“What happened?”
Ford lit another cigarette. Blew the smoke at the ceiling. “She was a stillborn. Got tangled up in the umbilical cord and she got stuck coming through the birth canal. Couldn’t get enough oxygen.”
“You’re kidding me?”
Ford shook his head, cracked another Bud Light. “No. It was terrible. I didn’t even know what was happening at first, and then I saw the doctor looking at the nurse and shaking his head. And then everyone was panicking. Tara almost coded. The baby stuck like that. She was beautiful, too. So small and so precious. And she just looked like she was sleeping, so I just held her. I held her for like an hour, just hoping she would open her eyes. I could see our whole future together, her whole future, but none of it was ever going to happen. None of it. Ever. I didn’t want to let her go, didn’t think I could. And then when they came to take her away, I just started sobbing like a little kid.”
Diana reached out and put her hand over his. “You poor thing. I’m so sorry. I can’t imagine how that must have been for you.”
“The whole thing was a nightmare. I wanted to end it all right there. To go with her, the baby, be there—wherever there is—to protect her, but I couldn’t. I had to be strong for Tara—they had her sedated, and she still wasn’t really clear about what was happening. So I just held her hand and kept whispering in her ear, telling her I loved her, telling her she was going to be fine.”
Diana had thought back to her own delivery with Sam. Billy nowhere to be found. No one from her family was there. Not even Charlotte. It was after three in the morning when she went into labor, and her friend Allison from high school had driven her to the hospital, stayed until six a.m. when she had to leave to get ready for work, and then she was on her own, Samantha coming just after eight. Charlotte arrived later that afternoon, and she leaned over and kissed Diana’s forehead, but she wouldn’t touch or hold the baby. Not yet. Not until they saw the priest, she said. The baby was soul-less, she said, until they saw the priest.
“So what happened with Tara?” Diana asked Ford.
“We broke up, broke off our engagement, a few months later. It was like we couldn’t go on together anymore, couldn’t look at each other, without thinking of her, thinking of the baby. You know something though, I would go through it all again if it meant I could see her precious little face again. She was just so beautiful.” Diana had wrapped her arms about him, and then Ford was pulling her tight. First just sobbing, and then brushing his lips across her cheek.
She had wanted him that night, she remembered wanting him—it had been a long time; she had been on dates since Billy but hadn’t slept with any of them, had never slept with anyone but Billy, despite their pushing, telling herself she wouldn’t, not unless it was serious—but after a moment, he had kissed the top of her head and whispered good night.
It was the next day he had asked Phillip if he would give him her phone number. If he could call her.
Their first date was the following weekend, and whe
n he called, Diana figured he would suggest they go out to dinner. Or maybe to a movie. But he didn’t. Instead, he suggested they go out in the afternoon, and take Samantha with them, take her someplace she would want to go, so they drove into Boston and took her to the aquarium. Diana remembered Ford holding the little girl up at the top of the enormous tank to peer down into the water. Squealing over the sharks, the fish, the enormous turtles. He seemed a natural, the way he acted with her. Nothing forced, nothing phony. And then he carried her all the way down Atlantic Avenue, heading toward Faneuil Hall, and the food court for lunch.
They stopped at Rowe’s Wharf, watching a cruise ship coming in to dock, and Ford pointed out several of the harbor islands, spotted with crumbling buildings and green foliage in the distance. He told the little girl a story about a giant sea turtle named Melville, and an old hermit named Jackson that lived out on Bumpkin Island, hiding in the remains of an old military fort.
“Every day, every morning, old Jackson goes down to the beach with a new plan to catch Melville, but every day he comes back empty-handed.”
The little girl’s eyes were wide. “But why does he want to catch him?”
Ford chuckled. “To make turtle soup, and to make a house out of his shell so he can stay nice and warm for the winter, and not have to worry so much about his raggedy clothing. He’ll just grow his beard even longer, and that will help keep him warm, too.”
“But how does the turtle get away?” Samantha had asked.
“How does he get away? Well, the seals help him, of course. There are seals all over Bumpkin Island, and when they see old Jackson coming down the beach with his net, they flop into the water to let Melville know.”
It was a nice day, and the wharf was alive with activity. Sidewalk musicians with upturned hats on the ground before them, people lining up for the whale watches and harbor tours, diners at the outdoor tables, and a man with a megaphone shouting about Clinton. The cruise ship had sounded then, and Ford picked Samantha up again to give her a better view of people climbing aboard.
“I want to see the turtle,” she said.
“Well, you can’t see him from here. You have to be out in the harbor, out in a boat, or on one of the islands.” He was quiet a moment. “My family has a house out there on one of the islands, so maybe we can visit some time. That one is on the other side of Cape Cod though.”
Diana looked at him, not sure if he was still joking. “Which island?”
Ford wasn’t looking at her, he was still holding Sam, watching the look of wonder in her eyes. “Martha’s Vineyard,” he said quietly.
“You have a house on the Vineyard?” Diana asked.
“My aunt does. Great-aunt. More like a grandmother to me, though. She’s like ninety-something years old. I go out there a lot to help her out though. Or at least I used to, been tough with work. I’ll have to bring you guys sometime. Would you like that, Sam? Would you like to go to Martha’s Vineyard?”
Samantha had smiled at him. “Do I get to see the turtle?”
On their next date, they went to the movies, The Little Mermaid, back in the theatres, and then to the Science Museum, a few trips to the park. And he and Diana had gone out to eat twice, but other than kissing her goodbye, he tried nothing. Just held her hand once while driving in the car. Two months had passed before she began to wonder if he ever would. It had never been like this before with the few guys she had dated after Billy. She was very young, a single mother, and if not by the first date, at least by the second, they all assumed she would have sex with them. Of course she would, she had gotten pregnant at eighteen, she had to be easy, right? Easy. The word stuck with her. Most of the guys she had dated were at least a little discreet, willing at least to pretend they were interested until she said not yet for the second or third time and then they were gone. And the only one who had been different was Ford.
And then when it finally happened, it was just before Halloween. They had taken Sam to Salem for the afternoon, Ford holding her close when she became afraid of an old woman, dressed as a witch, hobbling out of one the haunted houses, and that night, after they had put her to sleep in Ford’s spare bedroom, and Diana had made him a dinner of chicken parmigiana, they lay down on the couch. Ford held her for what seemed forever, and then he moved his lips down over her neck.
“It’s been so long,” he whispered. “So long.”
Diana felt her entire body reacting. Stiffening, tingling. And then she moved her hand between them and began to tug at his jeans.
They ended up on the floor, rolling off the couch and landing with a thump. Ford whispered something about her brother waking up upstairs, and she said she didn’t care. And she didn’t. It had been too long for her, too, since the months after she conceived Samantha, and Diana had almost forgotten how it felt. She didn’t want to forget again. Ever. He cried out as he came, and then she came with him, and then they wrapped themselves in each other’s arms on the linoleum floor, and he was saying he was sorry. He respected her, he said. He wanted her to know that. He had wanted to wait a little longer. Really.
“So did I,” she whispered, holding him tight. “But you know something? I’m glad that we did. I’m so glad that we did. Keep a secret?” she said, nibbling on his ear. “A dirty secret?”
“What’s that?” he asked.
She leaned in to whisper. “I could fuck you all day long.”
Ford laughed a little, and then he was back inside her. It went on like that, every day for the next few weeks, and they were perfect for each other. Young and hardworking and happy. Strong survivors of scarred pasts, and quickly falling desperately in love. Perfect for each other.
“We are,” she told her mother when she finally approached her about him. “Perfect for each other. I’ve never met anyone like him.”
Charlotte had just looked at her a moment, and then started across the room, walking with a limp. Diana wasn’t sure where the limp came from—she hadn’t noticed it before. Charlotte’s eyes, a beautiful blue, looked both empty and heavy today, overly medicated. Painkillers and little helpers. Charlotte was in her late forties, narrow shoulders and round about the middle. She had high dark hair, and colorless lips. But a perfect smile. One that often seemed too perfect to be real. Diana and Samantha had been living with her parents since Samantha was born, and the house was full. Diana had worked as a waitress while going to nursing school, and her mother had watched Samantha while she did. Still watched her now that Diana had her job at the hospital, and Diana paid her two hundred dollars a week, which included room and board.
“Where’s he from?’ Charlotte asked, picking up a wet rag and pretending to work on a spot on the counter.
“He’s originally from Willington,” Diana now said in response to Charlotte’s question.
“Willington,” Charlotte repeated. She looked up suddenly, her eyes on the wall, feigning thought. “I wonder if the Romanowskis know him. They know just about everybody in Willington. They’ve lived there a long time.”
“He comes from a big family,” Diana added, her fingers pulling at the edge of the tablecloth. She had been putting off this moment, dreading the conversation, and her entire body felt tense, belonging to someone else. As if she were just visiting inside. You could never tell how her mother would react; it all depended on her mood but the problem was her mood could change from one minute to the next, and Diana knew how Charlotte could be when it came to someone breaching the family’s inner circle. But Thanksgiving was coming, and she wanted to have Ford over for Thanksgiving dinner. One thing her family did every year, as crazy as half of them were, was spend the holidays together. It was important to them.
“Seven brothers and sisters,” Charlotte said. “Eight kids. Hmpfff. I thought we had a lot. The Lord must have really seen fit to bless his mother.”
“He’s very family oriented,” Diana added. She had a photo mug of tea in front of her—a picture of Charlotte emblazoned across the front—and she wrapped both hands a
round it to take a sip. She could see Ford’s face in her head. She wanted to see it, to give her strength as she approached Charlotte. He was already saying he wanted to adopt Samantha, as soon as they were married; Diana laughed when he said that. Married? They had only known each other a couple short months. It didn’t matter, he said. When it was right, it was right. You could just tell.
“Well, with that many brothers and sisters you don’t have a choice,” Charlotte said. “You have to be family oriented, don’t you? Same as us.” The spot was apparently gone, and now she had set to unloading the dishes from the strainer by the sink. A dishwasher was just a pipe dream, she told her friends. She stopped and looked Diana head-on, her eyes just a shade more distant. “You know, I’m glad he has such a big, close family. It’s important around the holidays. Important to be near them.”
So that was it, Diana thought. Charlotte was more clever than she ever gave her credit for. Had seen this coming. Probably looked at the calendar, the date, noticed the way Diana was sitting nervously at the table. She wasn’t going to allow anyone to breach the circle. The holidays, and immediate family. Never had, and she wasn’t going to change now. Not yet. Diana took a deep breath; she had already come this far.
“Well, that’s what I wanted to talk to you about,” she said. “I was wondering if he could come to Thanksgiving.”
Charlotte didn’t immediately respond. Instead she stood staring at Diana a moment—eyes now completely blank, no one home, no one inside.
“I’d really like for you and Dad to meet him,” Diana said.
“Well,” said Charlotte, taking a long breath. “I think that’s a great idea.”
“Really?” Diana asked, a guarded hope suddenly rising.
“Yes. Of course I do. If he’s important to you, he should be important to us, too.” She picked up the broom and started in the floor. “Why don’t we have him over for lunch the Saturday after Thanksgiving? That way it gives everything a chance to wind down a bit.” She turned and smiled, false and wide. “I wouldn’t want to overwhelm him with all the chaos over here on Thanksgiving Day.”
In the Midst of the Sea Page 3