by Ames, Alex
They stepped into the house, and she offered him some lemonade. They talked about the trip, the kids, and about living on an island in the Atlantic.
“I like the fact that we have seasons,” Vicky said. “The summers are beautiful, you enjoy being outside. The winters are brutal with storms and tons of snow, but beautiful in their own way.”
“Not sure you’re selling me with these arguments. I learned my trade in Portland, Maine, with Ned McConnaugh’s shipbuilding outfit, and I hated the weather for the first two years.”
“How is your own shipyard doing?”
“Not good, to be honest. The current client and his project is the only thing keeping us afloat.”
“Yeah, I know that feeling. My father shut down our shipyard when I went away to college in Boston, and it was clear that there was nothing for me to inherit except debts and loans.”
“No other kids to take over the family business?”
Vicky shook her head. “Only child. I became a teacher and got a job at Nantucket High School. Mom moved away to Florida after Dad died.”
“See, the weather is a decider for many.”
“Maybe.” Vicky gave a little smile.
“And you are taking care of your Grandma? No Florida for her?”
“No, born and bred in the Northeast and planning to die here, too. She is still a tough cookie; would hunt whales with a rusty old kitchen knife if Greenpeace would let her.”
They could hear Vera Folsom before they could see her, some floorboards creaking and someone slowly moving upstairs. Vicky excused herself and went up to help her grandmother.
Rick looked around at the house of three generations, at the photos on the wall that chronicled a life with nothing left other than this house and an ending family line. There was no indication that Vicky had any children of her own, no recent photos or toys. Opposite from the Flint household, where everything was always out of order but full of life, this house was tidy but waiting. Waiting for death, waiting for things to be over, waiting for things to change. And Rick briefly wondered how his life would look thirty years from now. Well, he had four kids, and in thirty years probably about fifteen grandkids, and maybe even great-grandkids. He had to smile at that. Grandma Agnes. Then he thought about Officer Flint, and his mood soured.
A whirring noise brought down Vera Folsom on a staircase lifter—slow motion defined. For someone close to a hundred years, she still looked young. Her eyes were a piercing blue and she had a long, straight nose. A walking cane held her upright and helped her in getting out of the lifter.
“Stay seated, Mr. Flint, I enjoy doing things. It’s the only exercise I get.” An old lady’s rusty voice but no out-of-air wheezing.
“I’ll leave you two alone, Grandma,” Vicky said. “I’ll be in the garden.”
Vera slowly walked over and sat in a comfortable armchair that was probably her dedicated place to sit, read, and watch the garden through the bay windows.
“You found the Vera,” she started without preamble, her eyes steady on Rick.
“Well, she found me. Or Mr. Hancock to be more precise. I am just the builder.”
“Young Mr. Hancock. But still, you are here, and he is not.”
Rick shrugged. “He is touring the Asian region for a movie promotion, so my kids tell me.”
“Why are you here then?”
“I have been hired to restore the Vera to its former glory. And from what I can see and from the few things I have heard, she must have been quite a boat.”
Vera Folsom sighed. “You young people are so full of energy, hope, and optimism.” She looked at Rick. “You might think that these words have nothing to with why we are here. But I assure you, this is all that this is about.”
“You’ve lost me, ma’am,” Rick said.
“What was your honest first impression when you visited this house? Can you describe it in one all-encompassing word, Mr. Flint?”
“Call me Rick, please.”
“Only if you call me Vera.”
“Deal. One word?” Rick thought for a moment.
“You are already thinking too long, Rick. Make it honest and from the heart.”
“Waiting,” Rick said. “The feeling I get is, the house and its inhabitants are waiting.”
Vera looked at him for a long time. She nodded slowly. “That well describes it. Maybe even better than I would have done myself. I would make it more about my own state: dying. But waiting is more accurate. I am waiting for my maker to take me. Vicky is waiting for someone to take her from this home.”
“And the house is waiting for laughter, kids, a new layer of paint, kisses on the staircase, and making love in the master bedroom,” Rick added.
“It will come to that in a few years, I am sure,” Vera said, looking at her granddaughter through the bay windows, cutting roses in the garden. “If my granddaughter has any spark left in her, she will have a new start, move away, make room in this house for new life. Otherwise she will continue the next forty years of her life in waiting herself.”
“So, you want the story of the Vera.”
“If you have any issues in telling it, I won’t insist. I have a more technical desire, getting an idea what she looked like originally. We have neither photo nor drawing of her original deck and rigging,” Rick explained.
“It is an interesting story, one that doesn’t happen anymore, young man.” Vera looked Rick over. “Well, maybe in your case, it still does.”
“You make it sound like a romantic story around a boat.”
“And that is what it is, Rick,” Vera said. “There is a certain significance in the fact that Josh didn’t come himself to discuss the Vera with Vicky and me.”
Rick looked astonished. “He knows both of you?”
“Of course. But we are getting ahead of ourselves.”
Rick started with what he knew. “John Scott built the Vera. And that is no coincidence; he was in love with you, we know that from his diaries.”
“Diaries? He kept those? A romantic fool he was.” Vera collected her thoughts. “Let’s go back in time. The postwar late fifties, buzzing in New York or Boston maybe, but not in sleepy Camden, Maine. Folsom Boats was a recognized name, a popular brand in sail- and motorboats; that’s what people bought in those optimistic postwar days. John was a young engineer and designer who got a job with my father.”
“This is when you met him?”
“Yes. I was a young widow. My first husband, Mitch, had died in the Korean War shortly after we were married. John was five years younger than me, but fell helplessly in love. We didn’t date formally, but I was around the shipyard, he was around, we talked, liked each other. Things developed. Feelings developed. The first time we were alone was on a sailboat! Where else?”
“A wooden one, I presume,” Rick smiled. Vera’s face had lit up considerably during the storytelling, and her eyes brightened.
“Of course a wooden sailboat! I was a Folsom girl after all. It was some sort of company sailing regatta and the luck of the draw had placed us together. Maybe he had helped Lady Luck and had bribed the woman who took the draw. Both of us had started arguing who was to take the helm, and rock, paper, scissors decided in my favor. Man, he was so annoyed having to take the foresail under a woman skipper. But we had a great afternoon, and afterward both of us were helplessly in love with each other.”
She gave a bittersweet smile. “Like I said, youth and optimism.”
“But it didn’t hold?”
“It wasn’t meant to. You see, I was already promised to another man.” Vera held up her hand. “I know what you want to say, but we are talking New England in the late fifties. Mothers held their hands over their daughters’ eyes when Elvis came on the tube. And I came from a good family, so I was about to be married into another good one, even for the second marriage.”
“I understand. Was it hard for you?”
“Not at all. I was in love with my second husband-to-be, too. They were very di
fferent men, so I had reasons to love them both. I had to decide after a year which way to go. Marry my designated Franklin or run away with John. And I went with Franklin.”
“Was it the right choice?”
“No, but that doesn’t matter now. We make our decisions, and life does the rest. It’s all ancient history, including Franklin and our two sons. All dead and gone, too soon. Only Vicky and I are left.” She stared over at the old dining table where a lot of old photos were displayed. “Like you said, waiting.”
“And John?”
“He never got over it, I think.” Vera rubbed her nose. “No, I am sure.”
“When did he build the Vera?”
“That was after we had split. He had quit my father’s company and moved through a string of other similar jobs as a designer. Any designs he came up with were on the market under names not his own. What beautiful boats did he build! Very ambitious, and very successful. It was as if he had poured his anger and frustration, his passion into creating great boats.”
“Were there any bad feelings between you?”
“Not bad, considerably cooler. We met now and then, of course. The wooden boat world is a small one. There were races, trade shows, that kind of thing. We said hello. He was aware that I had become a mother. Later, I helped my father transition Folsom Boats into Franklin’s hands. My second husband was also a boatbuilder, more so on the business side than on the design side. Time went by. The sixties and the seventies. Our company was suffering. Fiberglass hulls became the norm, fewer and fewer wooden boats in demand.”
“I understand fully. My company is suffering, too. Wooden boats are popular, mythical . . .”
“But an economical niche,” Vera said. “What is the euphemism the banking people use? Yeah, we rightsized! We specialized in rowing boats, went mainly into repairs for bigger ones.”
“Norman, my firstborn, Vicky’s father, had moved to Nantucket to set up his own sailing boat company. Called it Folsom Fine Ships and Sails, even though his surname was a different one, Wallace. It was more . . . contemporary, wood, fiber, whatever, as long as it sailed well and looked good. But the name Folsom ensured recognition. After my Franklin died in the early eighties, I moved from Maine to Nantucket to be close to Norman, his wife, and my only grandchild. Into this house.”
“And now we are connecting your former lover John with Josh Hancock?” Rick asked.
Vera laughed a short-breathed rattling breath. “So right and yet so wrong, young man. But I’ll tell you anyway.” She gathered her thoughts. “1986. Along came a young man, spending his summer on Nantucket. He was in his late teens, went to acting school but came from a well-off family. Acting was his passion, at least that’s what he said.”
“Called Josh Hancock, I presume?” Rick asked.
“Right. He was a big boy then, with a big mouth, nothing more than determination. My granddaughter Vicky had also come home from college for the summer, and both of them found each other on the same sailing team.”
“Led by John?”
“No, he never had been part of the Nantucket scene. He stayed in the Maine area, creating his wonderful boats as a nobody. But Vicky and Josh hit it off. Well, that’s what I think. Vicky never talked much about these things at home, least with her grandmother.” She held up her finger. “And now came the coincidence. Josh and Vicky kept seeing each other now and then. She went to college in Boston, he was at Strasberg in New York, a weekend here or a holiday there, whenever they had the time.”
“I understand Josh became quite a sailor.”
“Yes. He was a natural, especially in competitions. Josh quickly stepped out of the regular training, where he had met Vicky, and joined one of the talent pools in the 470-class competition. By the time he started acting school, he was already an Olympic team alternate. And this is how he met John.”
“How come? I thought John was a builder?”
“I don’t know, young man,” Vera said. “As I said, I wasn’t following John’s career any longer. And this was all before the Internet, remember. But as he had been building racing yachts, the Ferraris of wooden boats, he might have had a soft spot for coaching. He was in his late fifties by then—maybe a change of direction in his life?”
“Interesting, Josh and John connected. And Josh of course presented his girlfriend Vicky Folsom?”
“Yes. The trials for the 1988 Seoul Olympic sailing competitions were held right off Long Beach. Vicky told me about this later. John knew immediately who she was. The name of course, plus the fact that she looked exactly like me. And he actually asked Vicky whether it would be all right to contact me.”
“Did he have any renewed intentions?”
“Maybe, maybe not. Come on, young man, in your sixties, you don’t feel the same passion you did in your twenties. Both of us were young then, and turned into seniors.”
“Did he visit you?”
“No, he didn’t.”
“What happened then?” Rick asked.
“Life happened again. Josh got his big acting break with the Firestorm franchise, overnight superstar. John never contacted me. Vicky went her way. Never married.”
Rick looked out the window. “A strange unfinished story. There seems to be no closure nor happy ending for anyone.”
Vera looked at the grandmother clock in the corner, then back to Rick. “I don’t want to worry you, young man, but this is the way any life will turn. Except maybe when you are stuck by lightning and die at the very moment you kiss the love of your life.”
Rick thought about Isabella, who had left him and the kids too soon, and his failing business and the changes that were upcoming. Fate, or life, had given him Louise—so much luck no guy should ever have, nor should ever get handed. Other people’s lives had similar disruptions and unfinished business, lost baggage or old regrets. John, in his twenties, was in love with a girl he couldn’t ever get. Never getting over it, something Rick knew from the diaries, dying as an old man in Portland, Oregon, schlepping along a rotting boat like a talisman. Vera with her choice to take another man, waiting for her life to end. Josh, the talented sailor, leaving young Vicky for a career that took him into different galaxies but didn’t make him happy, judging from his problems with alcohol and drugs in his thirties, then getting back on his feet again to become even bigger.
“You didn’t come here for the story; you came here for background information.”
“My hope was that you could offer me insight into the Vera and her construction. Plans, calculations, maybe photos?” Rick said.
Vera looked at Rick for a long time with her small eyes in a wrinkled face. “I wanted you to hear the full story. And maybe understand your own life a little better. You don’t need to say anything, because I doubt you know what I am talking about. But keep the story in your heart; there aren’t many people around to retell it. Bring me the box from the shelf, please.” She pointed to the bookshelf that held a variety of collected books and knickknacks. Rick dutifully got up and retrieved an old shoebox that was bleached and bumped. It didn’t seem to contain much because it was very light.
“Memorabilia?” he asked and handed it over.
Vera didn’t accept it. “No, you keep it. It is yours.”
“Do I dare to open it?”
“Sure. There is no poisonous snake inside.”
Rick lifted the lid. Various pieces of paper inside, newspapers and old photos. Rick’s heart beat faster as he unfolded the top-most newspaper page and immediately recognized the Vera. Never in his life could he have imagined the design of the upper deck and the mast and rigging formation. “This is . . . fantastic,” he whispered, carefully straightening the paper. It was an article from the early seventies from a regatta in Chesapeake Bay from a local paper Rick had never heard of. It didn’t mention the Vera by name, as it concentrated on the regatta event as a whole.
“Not what you expected?”
“I feel . . . humbled by looking at this boat. I have made some design v
ariations on how the boat could have looked, but I was being stupid. Stupid and small. This is the most extreme and exciting design I have ever seen on a boat this size and that age. Look at this, there is no cabin whatsoever. The complete deck from the cockpit on one level and only some beams for improved mast stability. John had added these stabilizers in the middle, but that is about it. Any other designer would have tried to build a cabin. But no, this boat is a racing beast, so he stripped anything away that did not race! Just like an Indie racing car has no trunk. And look at the mast proportion. That is huge, much longer than any rule or calculation dictates. Bummer, we have to reorder the mast; we need a much longer one.”
Rick took out some of the other newspaper articles and photos that showed the Vera in various angles, focuses, or situations. Sometimes alone, sometimes sailing around others. Rick forcefully pulled himself away from the photos, carefully put them back in the box, and then looked at the real Vera. “How come?”
“Come on, the boat was named after me. Of course I had an interest in it. And therefore I collected the mentions in news. Had friends send me snapshots. Some of them were sent to me by John himself, plain envelope, no return address.”
“He was a persistent man, it seems,” Rick smiled.
“He was an idiot. He could have come and fought for me and our love. Why send some stupid photos or clippings? To torture me? To remind me of what a great designer he was? But enough, we have had our chances in life, we have made our mistakes and our choices. So take this box and rebuild the best boat ever designed.” Vera took a deep breath and stood up. “I am tired and need some rest. Pass me that blanket, please, and tell Vicky to prepare me a bowl of soup when you leave.”
Rick got up, too. “Thank you for your time, Vera. Take care.” He shook her frail hand, which was like touching matchsticks hidden inside a glove.
“Young man, take care of yourself. My life is almost over and yours mostly ahead. Be careful of the choices you make in your time, especially with your famous girlfriend.” Vera held his hand for a long moment.