by Amy McNamara
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contents
John Wells’ Daughter
I Won’t Start Now
The Woods
No-Person
Behind a Cemetery Wall
If You Tell Me You’re Okay
A Small Town Is A Small Town Is A
Falling Like Snow
Nearer Now
A Good House
Nothing Happens Anywhere
Nothing to Say
One Side has to Go
Thank You, Mary
The Room Takes Shape
Looking Up
A Regular Person
A Little Like I Might Fly Away
Open Your Eyes
Look, Look
The Stars are Brightly Shining
Swap Night
Clumsy
It’s So Still
Mornin’ Sunshine
Where did All the Air Go?
Bad to Worse to Worst
It Almost Made Me Laugh
Way Too Fast
It was Dark
Whose Woods
Beacon
The Only Air
No Agenda
Your Color’s Back
Hard to Argue Against the Evidence
Say Something True
A Routine
Breathe
Meredith
You’re A Freak
Flinch
Must be Love
Just Say It
Where we Live
Still Here
Acknowledgments
About Amy McNamara
for
rynn
john
wells’
daughter
BE CAREFUL WHAT YOU WISH FOR.
I had things I didn’t want, and then I lost them. One minute I was breaking up with my boyfriend, Patrick, the next I was the only one left standing. Empty-handed. A ghost of who I’d been. Broken in a way you can’t see when you meet me.
My name is Mamie, but my dad calls me Wren. My parents never agreed on anything when they were married, so I answer to both names. I like having a spare. Especially now. Besides, it drives my mother nuts. She thinks my dad calls me Wren to bug her. She says she named me Mamie because it means “wished-for child” and she had to try so hard to have me. Like she conjured me out of sheer will. Which she probably did. That’s the kind of person she is. But I looked it up, and it also means “bitter.” Either way, Mamie died on the side of a road somewhere back in my old life, and I moved away. Now I’m Wren full time, in a house on the Edge of the Known World, upper East Coast, with my dad, who spends his days in his studio. Perfect for us both.
I came here because it’s pine-dark and the ocean is wild. The kind of quiet-noise you need when there’s too much going on in your head. Like the water and the woods are doing all the feeling, and I can hang out, quiet as a headstone, in a between place. A blank I can bear. I wake up in the morning, get into clothes and out on my bike before I can think about anything. It’s a place that could swallow me if I need it to.
So that’s what I’m doing, music on full blast, trying to think about nothing, crunching over brittle twigs and sticks in the woods along a road I never see anyone use, when a Jeep comes flying around a bend, right at me. Before I can think, I swerve off the road and into a huge tree. My front tire crumples when I hit. Dust and pine needles lift into a cloud as the car skids to a stop.
The driver door whips open and a guy gets out. A couple years older than me.
“Are you all right?”
He looks totally rattled, and maybe even a little annoyed, like I’m the one who messed up somehow.
I sit up, untangle myself from the bike, and wipe sticky needles from my palms. The fall knocked the wind out of me. Takes me a second before I can make air come in and out again normally. The front wheel of my bike is bent like an angry giant grabbed it and gave it a twist. For a second I think it looks kind of beautiful. Like something my dad might like. Something that used to make me wish I had my camera. I stare at the ruined rim.
“Are you all right? Can you talk?”
He’s looking at me wildly, like he thinks I might be really hurt or something.
I can breathe again, but I’ve kept quiet for so long, I’m out of practice—I can’t think of a single thing to say.
He turns away and I hear the engine clunk off. Grabs his phone.
“Wait,” I say, finding my voice. “I’m fine. See?” I stand. “I was just shocked.”
He tosses his cell back onto the passenger seat and runs a shaking hand through his hair. After a deep breath, he says, “I didn’t see you. There’s never anyone along this road.”
I’m trying to think if I’ve seen him around. The town’s pretty small, but I haven’t exactly been hanging out anywhere. And he doesn’t look small-town. Charcoal-gray shirt; thick, dark hair falling into his eyes; long, straight nose. Something faraway inside me rings like a little wakeup bell in a long-abandoned cavern.
He’s still kind of scanning me, a slightly frantic up-and-down, like he might spot something broken, like I’m a miracle for not being flattened into the ground.
“God. I could have killed you.” His eyes go to the bent tire. “I wrecked your bike.”
I can’t find anything to say. When you’ve been quiet as long as I have, words leave you.
“I’m fine,” I manage, again. “I had my music on loud. I didn’t hear your car.” I reach up to my hair and pull some leaves and sticky needles out of it.
“Did you hit your head?”
“No, it’s just tree stuff, in my hair.” I blush.
He stares at me for a second. I look at the sky. Like maybe I could somehow slip out of this situation. Fly up and away.
“Are you John Wells’ daughter?” He’s starting to sound relieved. Runs another shaking hand through his hair. “I thought I heard you’d come up here.”
I nod. God knows what he’s heard. I’m sure I made the news last May. The Telegraph doesn’t miss a chance to print stories on my dad. Their adopted famous son. Never mind that his work leaves them scratching their heads and laughing at what people will pay good money for and call “art.”
I look at my hands. Both palms are torn up and pitch-sticky. I pick a small piece of rock out of one. The knee of my jeans is torn. Like I’m an eight-year-old and just wiped out on my bike in the park.
His eyes follow mine. “You’re hurt.” He winces. “Let me take you into town. Dr. Williams can check you out, clean you up.”
“No, no. That’s okay. I’m okay.” I don’t want to go anywhere, see anyone. Certainly not to the clinic. Or anywhere remotely like a hospital.
“I’m fine,” I say more assertively. “Really, I’ll just go home and wash up. It’s no big deal.”
“Let me give you a ride home, at least,” he says, getting in the car, reaching across the front seat, and pushing open the passenger door.
I start to pick up my bike but my palms are a wreck. I stop a second, wipe them a little on my thighs.
“Leave it,” he says, watching me. “Please. You’re bleeding. I’ll come back for it later.”
I lift the frame a little more, lean it against the tree. A bird is loud overhead. A hawk maybe, hunting. That strange raspy screeching sound.
I wasn’t even close to the end of my ride. I need to be out, alone. But he’s not going to let me walk h
ome, that’s obvious. I kick around in the needles to find my iPhone, buy myself another few seconds to get it together, calm down a little. I look at my bike one last time and walk around to the waiting car door.
A pair of metal crutches lean against the passenger seat. He moves them over a bit and I slide in. He watches me look at them.
“Break an ankle?” I ask. I always say the right thing.
His turn to blush. Shakes his head. “I’m sick.” Looks away. “Buckle up.”
I’m thrumming from adrenaline. Takes me a minute to get the buckle in the right place.
He backs the car into the woods a bit, whips a U-turn, heads for my dad’s.
i won’t
start
now
“I KNOW YOUR HOUSE,” he says. “My father was the architect.”
I keep my eyes on the trees whipping past my window. I can’t look at him. Not without my heart doing a little flutter. And I don’t want to feel anything for anyone, that’s the whole point of coming to this godforsaken place. But he has this sure, quiet air to him. Apparently I still react to things like that. I wonder for a second what he meant about being sick. Then I push it away. I don’t want to know.
We pull out of the woods and onto paved road. The pines are replaced by a sudden emptiness that feels like a deep breath. A crazy wide-open sky over the ocean. It’s a coast road, a stunning route, the kind you could accidentally drive off because you’re staring at the view.
When I was little I imagined I was an arrow above it, shot from the city, speeding and twirling up the coast, flying high and free. The few times I came up to visit my dad after he left, this part of the drive was the best. It meant I was close to running wild for a day or two. No rules.
It’s definitely the right place for my dad. Freedom-wise. No distractions. I guess we were a distraction. When he’s not traveling, showing his work, he’s in his studio all day, every day. At least that’s what I think he’s doing. I don’t know much about his life. I was little when he left, and I only really saw him when he was in the city for an opening or something. We would have awkward dinners. Mom, Dad, and me. Little fractured trinity.
My mom hates it up here. When I was ten, I wandered into the woods, away from one of his parties, and she stopped letting me come up after that. I’m kind of hazy on the details, but I guess another kid at the party and I sampled from a few forgotten wineglasses. Then we explored the cliffs and woods. After dark. An impromptu search party was involved, and that was the end of summers at my dad’s. Probably she was trying to punish him or something. At the time I thought she was punishing me. Dad didn’t push back too hard, so I stopped coming.
I think it kills her now that I want to be here. The cliffs scare her—she doesn’t like heights. My dad’s place sits on one. Overlooks the water. Behind the house the woods are thick to the road. It’s a great place, if a little man-cave-ish. Very quiet, private, which is ironic because anytime anyone interviews my dad, they send a photographer to get shots of it.
Our driveway winds off the highway through fifty-foot red spruce and white pines. The house is a wide V shape—arms flung open to the ocean. Tucked in the trees behind the house is the giant outbuilding my dad uses for his studio. More like a galvanized steel barn with concrete floors, skylights, and a roll-away wall that makes a space in front for showing work to visitors.
As soon as we pull up, I throw open my door. My knee’s stiff, and my palms sting.
“Wait,” he says, touching my arm. “Are you sure you’re all right? I don’t want to just drop you off if you need someone to look at you.”
“No. That’s okay.”
I want to get away from him, out of the car. Don’t want to keep looking at his face.
“I should talk to your father, tell him what happened.”
“My dad’s working today. He hates being interrupted. He’s got people from RISD up here.”
“If you’re sure . . .” he says.
“I’m fine. Really. I’ll just go in and wash up. It’s no big deal.”
I’m shivering, out of nowhere, like I’ve caught a sudden chill, like I’m excited or terrified or both. He hears it in my voice. Gives me this look like he can see into me or something. His hand is warm on my arm. To my horror I think I might cry. I haven’t cried since May, since the world flipped upside down. I’m not going to start now.
I pull my arm away. I have to get out of his car, into the house. The place on my arm where he touched me feels like it might keep its heat the rest of the day.
He’s unconvinced. “Well, then here.” He opens the glove box and pulls out a pen and a scrap of paper. Writes on it. “Take my number. Please. Call if you need anything.”
“I’m fine,” I say again, getting out of the car.
“And when you’re ready, pick any bike in town, I’ll buy it, or anywhere, buy it online, any bike you want. And I’ll get your wrecked one . . . I should have today. I’m . . .” he glances at the crutches and looks pained.
“Oh, it’s okay,” I say fast. “Really. It’s fine. I’m not worried about the bike. Thanks for the ride.” I sound like such an idiot. I give the car door a little shove before he can say anything else.
I’m at my door and in the house in seconds. Lean against the entry wall a few minutes to try to control the shivering.
After I get the dirt out of my palms and knee, I look at the scrap of paper. No name. Just as well. I’m not going to think about him another second. That’s something Mamie would have done, wandered around the rest of the day imagining things about this guy. Not me. Not now. Not anymore. My heart’s shut tight, if I still have one. No complications. It’s how I keep it together. I toss his number in the recycling.
And my dad isn’t working in the studio. He’s not even in town. Flew out the day before to meet with a new gallery in Berlin. Like I said, I moved up here for quiet.
the
woods
MORNING, NIGHT, then morning, then night. Sunlight flashes its SOS on the water all afternoon, then slips down, lets dark roll in. It’s reliable. I move through time because I have to. Watch the light. Wake up. Breathe. Eat some things. Take a sleeping pill, sleep, and wake again. It’s all I can handle.
When Dad’s gone, other than endless calls from my mother, I have little contact with anyone. Mary, one of Dad’s grad students, pops in and out of the house during the day. I find her in the kitchen from time to time washing dishes, which is supposed to be my job, but Dad’s a charmer. People do anything for him. She’s started coming into the house before I wake up, and I find fresh coffee and usually fruit or some baked good waiting for me on the table. Dad probably asked her to keep an eye.
I’d skip Mom’s calls if I didn’t know that would make her jump right in her car and head up here. She wants me to get past what happened. Move on. Like we planned. Think of it as a “clean slate.”
Clean slate. Empty plate. Whatever. My mother’s a planner. She’s a hospital administrator. Solo unit since my dad left, not one to show a lot of feeling, but I’m pretty sure he broke her heart. When he left, she washed her hands of the art world and their friends in it. It was like watching workers collapse a circus tent, Mom went back to work, and our house got very quiet. So junior year, when I mentioned I might want to go to art school instead of one of the schools on our list, she told me if I was still interested, I could pursue art in grad school. End of discussion. Any conflict between what I wanted and what she thought was best, she won, hands down. But if I hit her marks, toed the line, she pretty much left me alone. It worked for both of us. According to Meredith, I should be glad I have a mother who actually cares what I do. Her parents pay no attention to her or her brother but act like they care when it makes them look good. I hated it when she said that, made me feel bad for complaining, but she’s right. I do have a mom who cares, a little controlling, but she cares. Even so, I was ready to get out of there. Move on to the next thing. It was a matter of weeks between me and freedom, star
ting fresh on my own. I didn’t even care too much about the art-school debate, just as long as come September I was waking up somewhere new.
Got that wish.
But I missed my graduation. Didn’t leave for Amherst. Meredith and I didn’t go shopping for matching duvets and mini-fridges. We didn’t map out the travel time between Vermont and Massachusetts. The plan changed.
I’m lying across my bed trying not to think about it when the phone rings. According to the clock, it’s nearly five. The day’s gone, and I haven’t showered. It rings again. My mother. She calls and calls. She’s the only one who still bothers. The phone’s ringing and vibrating a little now, like it’s learned the language of her constant need to check in, rattling noisily on the shelf where I dropped it the last time she called. Third time today. I never have anything new to say. She talks at me, saying this or that about one of my friends. People I no longer want to see. Mostly I listen to her voice, not the words, the music of it. Sometimes it’s soothing.
Any more buzzing, and the thing’s going to work its way right off the shelf.
I answer without looking at it.
“Yes?”
I don’t even try not to sound annoyed.
“Mamie?”
His voice.
My heart picks up a few beats. I switch the phone to my other ear.
“Yes—well, no.”
“Oh, sorry . . .” He sounds surprised.
“No, I mean, it is Mamie—was—I don’t go by that name anymore, well, here, my dad calls me Wren.” I talk too fast. Sound like a first grader. My dad calls me Wren. Who says that?
“Wren?”
“Yeah, like the bird.” Deep breath.
“Okay, Wren.” He laughs. A nice sound.
My body tenses and I sit up. To clear my head. I’m not going to get interested in this guy.
“It’s Cal Owen.”
Cal Owen.
“With the car, the other day, in the woods?” He clears his throat. “I’m calling because I hadn’t heard from you or your father, and when I try to reach him I don’t get voice mail.”