by Luanne Rice
Alan dragged his hand over his eyes. He had only one niece. Staring at the calendar, he saw how fast summer was coming. Julia loved the sea. When the water was warm, she and her mother would lie on the tide line at the protected lighthouse beach, letting small waves wash over them. Alan had seen it, two summers earlier at Jetty Beach, Dianne holding Julia in her arms as the sea swirled all around. The clean green wash, the cream-white foam, the two blond heads.
They seemed so free: Dianne unencumbered by worry, Julia afloat in her mother’s arms. Alan heard Dianne singing, saw her smiling. The summer sun was pouring down, and the tide was going out. When they finished their swim, Dianne built a castle from the wet sand. Julia lay peacefully beside her, warm and content.
The sand castle was vast, elaborate. Dianne built turrets and a moat. She used jingle shells, sea glass, and driftwood for decorations. This was her beach version of a playhouse, and it was for Julia alone. Taking her daughter’s hand, Dianne helped Julia to pat the sand. Julia did her part, unaware. But the look on Dianne’s face was pure joy. She was playing with her daughter, and no one could say she wasn’t.
Seven months, Alan thought. Seven pages. He didn’t know how many more times he had left to see her, to see Dianne-once Julia was gone, Dianne would disappear from his life. Alan would have no reason left to see her. Their worlds would go dark with missing Julia.
White squares on the calendar. Alan wanted to go after Dianne. She had asked whether they would have time “together.” Alan wanted to be part of that. He wanted to marry Dianne. He wanted to help her raise Julia for the little time she had left, be with her through it all. The little girl deserved a father. Alan wanted to be that for her.
Holding the chicken soup someone had left in his kitchen, Alan stared at the days and wondered which one would be Julia’s last. He thought of his brother Tim, far away on a lobster boat. Out of sight of land, alone with himself and the stars, the focus of so much unfinished business. Alan wanted to haul Tim back to shore, force him to settle things with Dianne. With Alan. Give everyone a chance to move on.
Before it was too late.
Lucinda Robbins had been hoping to talk to her daughter all evening. But Dianne was late getting back from her mission and Lucinda’s reading group had gotten wrapped up with layers and irony and symbolism and love in Shakespeare, staying a full forty-five minutes later than usual. Then Dianne rocked Julia to sleep and Lucinda went for a walk in the fog. Finally they were alone in the kitchen.
“Well?” Lucinda asked.
Dianne stood at the stove, stirring squares of bitter chocolate into the pan of steaming milk. She wore a white summer nightgown, and from the back she looked thinner than ever, as if she were shrinking right down to Julia’s size.
“It’s almost ready,” Dianne said.
“Not the hot chocolate,” Lucinda said. “That’s not what I mean at all.”
“How was your reading group?”
“Marvelous. Ducky beyond belief. We’re all wondering how we got through college without reading Love’s Labor’s Lost. All of us English majors, and not one—”
“I’d like never to do that again,” Dianne said.
“What, honey?”
“Deliver soup to Alan McIntosh.”
“Why? Did he—”
Dianne shook her head. She tasted the chocolate, added more milk, continued stirring.
“He was asleep. I know, because he didn’t answer the door and I walked in. I should have just left the soup on the porch, but I wanted him to find it-I feel like a jerk.”
“But why? It was a caring thing to do.”
“It was your caring thing to do, Mom.”
“He’s all alone, dear. You think of him as the great doctor, but let me tell you: He comes into the library on his days off just because he’s lonely through and through. He’s not Tim, you know.”
Dianne gave her a look. It was completely smile-less, a serious signal for Lucinda to back off.
“Let’s not get into this,” Dianne said.
“Dear …”
“Mom, please. I’m not mad. I swear I’m not. But I like things the way they are. Alan takes care of Julia. I need him for that, you know? I don’t want to mess it up with chicken soup and dropping by and thinking maybe, someday …”
Lucinda watched her pour the hot chocolate into blue mugs. Dianne’s hands were shaking a little; the spoon clattered against the rim. Stella jumped up on the counter to lick a spot of milk, and Dianne leaned down to let the cat rub her cheek.
“Someday what?” Lucinda asked.
“Someday we could be friends like we used to be.”
Lucinda didn’t answer. She remembered way back, to the early days of Dianne’s involvement with the McIntosh boys.
One day, just before Dianne’s twenty-seventh birthday, she bloomed. She turned gorgeous and radiant: their carpenter swan. Dianne had wreaked havoc between two brothers without even realizing it. She had had no sense, at least at first, she’d really wounded Alan: She had not understood his attraction to her in the first place. She must have seen the hurt in Alan, though. After a while it was unmistakable.
So Dianne came home with a boyfriend and his brother-Tim and Alan-and the three of them had become nearly inseparable.
“Emmett loved those boys,” Lucinda said. Although she had wished things had worked out between Dianne and Alan, Emmett had felt more comfortable with Tim. Never mind that Emmett was the smartest man Lucinda knew, he had that old blue-collar inferiority complex about being around men with degrees. “Both of them.”
“I know.”
“He liked seeing you so happy.” Lucinda thought back on the years they’d all had together. Emmett had gone out lobstering with Tim many afternoons. He had built cupboards for Alan’s exam room. He’d been overjoyed by the news of Dianne’s pregnancy, but he’d died of a heart attack a month later. And then Tim left. Eleven long years ago.
“Dad never even knew Julia,” Dianne said, staring into her cocoa.
“No, but he was thrilled the day you told him you were pregnant,” Lucinda said, taking her daughter’s hand.
“So was Tim.”
“Tim couldn’t help himself,” Lucinda said. “Poor weak thing.”
“He never even saw her,” Dianne said. “He just ran.”
“A cowardly man,” Lucinda said. “Does not deserve you.”
“He always told me I made his life so perfect.”
Lucinda hesitated, but she reached across the pine table to take her daughter’s hand. “That was the problem,” she said quietly. “He thought perfect could be only one way.”
Lucinda watched Dianne. Dianne traced the knots and grain in the old table with her free hand. Her father had made it decades earlier, the first year of his marriage to Lucinda.
“I miss Dad,” Dianne said.
“He rejoiced, Dianne. That’s the only word for it. He went out into the backyard, shouted to the stars. He bellowed that he was going to be a grandfather.”
“But he died before that happened,” Dianne said.
Lucinda cleared her throat, gathering herself together. Talking about Emmett, almost twelve years after his passing, brought him as close as ever.
“Oh, I don’t see it that way,” Lucinda said. “I don’t believe he did either.”
“But, Mom,” Dianne said. “He died in my fourth month….”
“Yes, but don’t say he wasn’t a grandfather,” Lucinda said. “That would upset him just terribly! He was very attached to your baby, honey. Just because they never officially met doesn’t mean much at all.”
“She’d have upset him,” Dianne said.
“He would have loved her,” Lucinda said steadily.
“Her own father left her!”
Well, there was nothing Lucinda could say to that. It was true, men were more squeamish about sickness and such things. Emmett had never been able to sit up through Dianne’s croup, chicken pox, strep throats. He hadn’t changed many of her d
iapers, and he had gagged the one time Lucinda had asked him to clean her ears.
“She has us, darling,” Lucinda said.
“I know.”
Lucinda saw her staring at the table, tracing the grain with her fingernail. These late-night kitchen talks were worth the moon to Lucinda, and it broke her heart that Dianne would never be able to have them with Julia. Love came in such odd shapes, with such indecipherable rules, it was a wonder families got by at all.
“Emmett would have loved her. He was that baby’s grandfather,” Lucinda repeated, gazing up toward Julia’s room.
Dianne nodded. She looked so frail and lovely, but she had a constitution of steel. Her hands were delicately boned, the skin as rough as Emmett’s had been. Strangers stopped her on the street and congratulated her for not putting her baby into an institution. Lucinda knew Dianne wanted to find Tim’s ship and sink it.
As Lucinda often did in times of stress, she pictured her husband. There he was, sitting at the head of the table. His leonine head, full of white hair, was nodding, his deep blue eyes steady as ever. He was chewing on one of the yellow pencils he had always carried to mark measurements on wood.
He had been difficult in many ways. Moody and intense, he had kept to himself. If Lucinda had had her way, they would have gone out more often. They would have given dinner parties. Lucinda had imagined literary evenings, with people reading their favorite poems, acting scenes from plays, drinking wine. Emmett would have laughed her out of town before letting that happen.
Early on, he had left the raising of Dianne to her. He was a little nervous around his baby girl, afraid he might harm such a fragile creature just by touching her. Emmett had yet to realize the strength and resilience of babies. So Lucinda, a full-time librarian, had stuck Dianne’s playpen behind the front counter. But as Dianne grew, her father had started taking her in his truck. She would ride through town, standing on the seat, her arm slung around his neck. Love can take time to grow-even between a father and a daughter.
She thought of Alan, of the way he was with Julia. Wishing she could find something to say that would make Dianne see him in a different light, Lucinda smiled. “Well, I hope my chicken soup does some good. Alan is Julia’s uncle, after all.”
“He did look pretty sick,” Dianne said.
“He was positively green around the gills when he came into the library.”
Dianne laughed. Staring off into space, she seemed to be seeing something that amused her.
“You find it funny,” Lucinda began, “to see Alan McIntosh laid up with the flu?”
“No,” Dianne said. “I was just thinking of his arms. He’s got that myopic-professor look down pat, but under his frayed blue shirt, he’s actually pretty muscular.”
“Surprised you never noticed before,” Lucinda said. She certainly had, and so had the other librarians.
“Amy has a crush on him,” Dianne said.
“Do you like having Amy around?”
“Yes,” Dianne said. Her eyes scrunched up as if she didn’t like the thoughts in her head. “She reminds me so much of how Julia would be if she could talk. And she seems to like Julia so much-she treats her like a real person.”
“Oh, honey,” Lucinda said.
“I wonder about her mother …”
“Maybe she can’t talk to her. Maybe she needs to talk to you.”
“That’s how it feels,” Dianne said.
Lucinda didn’t think this was the time to point out that Alan had sent Amy to them. Her matchmaking instincts were buzzing, and she knew she’d better slow down. She didn’t know what Dianne, in her present mood, was liable to read into any comment Lucinda might make about their helpful pediatrician. So she just smiled across the table and waited for her daughter to smile back.
One afternoon in the beginning of June, waiting for a second coat of paint to dry, Dianne discovered something else they all had in common. She and Julia had always loved driving: Something about the rhythm of the road, the warm breeze in their hair, the sense of moving ahead, of being together in a small space, brought them comfort. And now it was revealed that Amy loved riding too.
Dianne’s Ford pickup was dark green and shiny. She had stickers from Mystic Seaport, the Mystic Marinelife Aquarium, and the Connecticut River Museum on her back window. Julia’s wheelchair lay in the flatbed, folded under a blue plastic tarp in case of rain. With Julia buckled into her special car seat, set in the middle, Dianne drove with her elbow out the open window.
“We’re up so high!” Amy said.
“Ever been in a truck before?” Dianne asked.
“When I was a baby-my father used to have one. My mom told me. He needed it for his fishing gear. I wish we still had it. I’d get my mom to park it somewhere till I was sixteen, then I could drive and drive….”
“My dad had one too,” Dianne said. “Trucks are great for hauling things. Wood, fishing gear, wheelchairs … right, Julia?”
Julia gazed straight ahead. In the truck she didn’t have to move her head from side to side. The world was spinning fast enough, whizzing by her window at forty miles an hour. She clasped and unclasped her hands.
“Can I ask you something?” Amy asked.
“Sure,” Dianne said.
“Do you hate it when people call girls chicks?”
“By people, you mean guys?”
“Yeah, at school. They call us chicks. One guy called me something bad because I wouldn’t let him copy from my test.”
“Good for you for not letting him copy.” Dianne glanced across Julia, saw Amy frowning at her knees. “What’d he call you?”
“Two things. Bitch and the C-word.”
“Poor fellow,” Dianne said, shaking her head as if she were filled with true compassion and sorrow for the nameless sixth-grader. Admitting only to herself how murderous she’d feel if anyone ever said that to Julia.
“Why do you call him that?” Amy asked, looking confused.
“’Cause he’s so limited. Imagine revealing your ignorance that way, in the middle of school for everyone to hear. Pathetic, really. I feel sorry for him.”
“Yeah …” Amy said.
“So, the boys call you chicks?”
“Mmm. Is that okay?”
“What do you think?”
“I kind of like chicks. My friend Amber and I talked about it. We like the word, and we like chicks themselves. Cute, peepy little things. All busy and happy and feathery.”
Julia sighed and hummed.
“I love feeling feathery,” Dianne said, turning on the radio. “But I’m picky about what I want boys calling me. Like, you and Julia can call me a chick, but I don’t want men doing it.”
“Because it means something different when they do, right?” Amy said, her face screwed up as she worked on getting this ancient and vexing truth.
“I think so,” Dianne said.
“But when it’s just us together-you, me, and Julia-we can be chicks?”
“Sure.”
“Huh.”
“To men we’re women.”
“Women?” Amy asked doubtfully. “I’m only a sixth-grader.”
“Still,” Dianne said. “It’s in the attitude.”
Julia tilted her head, blinking at the sun.
“Women,” Dianne said, “are strong.”
“My mother says lady.”
“That’s okay,” Dianne said. “Everyone has their own path. They get strong in their own ways. For me, it means I want people to call me a woman.”
“Even us? Me and Julia? We have to call each other women?”
“Nah,” Dianne said. “As long as we know who we are, we can relax when it’s just us. If we want, we can be chicks.”
“In one week I’m out of school. Then next year I’m in seventh grade.”
“Wow,” Dianne said, meaning it.
“Seventh-grade woman,” Amy said, trying it out.
“Smart and excellent,” Dianne said.
“With my
chick friends,” Amy said, and she grinned. “That’s us, right, Julia?” “Babes,” Amy said. “Girls.”
“Gurlz,” Amy laughed, spelling it. “Gaaaa,” Julia said. “That’s us too!” Amy said.
“Three gaaas, off for a ride by the sea,” Dianne said, smiling so hard her cheeks hurt.
Amy was free!
School was out, finally and forever. At least till September. Her first week off from school was hot and muggy. A heat wave had fallen on Hawthorne and all they wanted to do was keep cool.
Dianne gave Amy a straw sun hat. It had a wide brim, a blue ribbon, and it looked almost exactly like Dianne’s. Amy loved her new hat so much, she wouldn’t take it off.
The three “gurlz” went rowing in the marsh. Bluefish, the first good-sized ones of the season, turned the water silver-blue. A gray heron skulked in the shadows. Amy dipped her fingers in, trickled cool water onto Julia’s bare legs. Dianne had made a little bed for Julia in the V of the rowboat, between the seats, shading her with a blue umbrella.
“What’s your favorite animal?” Amy asked.
“A particular animal or a species?” Dianne asked.
Amy exhaled. Dianne had such a complicated way of thinking, it sometimes made Amy feel stupid. At home, people didn’t talk like this. Their answers were so much easier: “dog” or “shut up, I’m watching TV.” But the weird thing was, Amy wasn’t embarrassed about feeling stupid around Dianne. She knew if she stayed with it, Dianne would help explain her way of thinking, and Amy would get it sooner or later. Amy was starting to feel smarter all the time.
“What do you mean?” Amy asked.
“Well, Stella’s my favorite animal in particular, but cats aren’t my favorite species. Sea otters are.”
“Oh, yeah!” Amy still didn’t know the exact definition of species, but she was ready to go with the flow. Drifting through the marsh, she looked for sea otters on the banks.
“What’s yours?” Dianne asked.
“Gaaa,” Julia said.
“I guess the puppy at home, or maybe Stella, is my favorite in particular. The best spee-sees”-Amy spoke carefully, getting it right-“in my opinion, are whales and dolphins.”