by Lisa Unger
Dean kept driving. Since the motel, he’d been pliant. But he was starting to seem edgy and jittery. He chewed mercilessly on his thumbnail while he drove. “How much farther?” he asked.
Emily glanced at the navigation computer that sat on the dash between them, another bizarre gift from Dean. She had no idea where it had come from, but it was new, in its box. So she’d kept it in her car, in case she ever needed it. She really hadn’t thought she would—she never went anywhere she hadn’t been a hundred times before. But it was coming in handy now.
“Not far,” she said.
For many years, she told anyone who asked about her father that he was dead. He’d died in a car accident when she was little, she’d say. She didn’t even remember him. People, especially adults, found that so sad. She got a lot of attention and sympathy, which she enjoyed. The truth was that her mother had an affair with a married man. Emily was the product of that affair. When his wife found out, there was a terrible drama. To save his marriage, he had to promise never to see them again. He’d kept his promise. That was what Emily had pieced together from the little her mother would tell her, from overheard conversations between her mother and her aunt. She had his last name, different from her mother’s.
When she was thirteen, she’d found a check on her mother’s dresser. It was written in the amount of five hundred dollars; at the top of it were his name and address. The information was all so black-and-white, printed words on a slip of paper. He was real, a real man with a checking account. She had always thought of him as existing someplace unreachable and so far away. She never imagined him nearby, living a real life.
She was nodding against the window when she smelled smoke and gasoline. She sat up. This had happened before. A moment later, the car started to stutter, then rattled to silence.
“Fuck!” yelled Dean. “Fuck me!”
He steered the rolling car toward the side of the road, where it drifted to a halt. Dean tried the ignition a couple of times, and a terrible grinding sound came from the engine. He popped the hood, and Emily watched big plumes of black smoke billow into the sky. They got out of the car, coughing. Dean covered his mouth and leaned over the hood, cursing. Neither one of them knew anything about cars, but only Emily seemed to realize that.
After a few minutes of staring pointlessly into the engine compartment, Dean came away coughing harder. It was dark, with only the dim light from a streetlamp up the deserted road a bit. There was nothing around them but trees. An old mailbox tilted up a bit at the end of someone’s long driveway.
“Now what?” Dean said. His voice echoed in the quiet night, and something in the bushes moved. Emily figured he’d get angry with her, start yelling like he usually did when things went wrong. She braced herself for it, but when she glanced at him, he looked as lost and desperate as she felt.
“Maybe this is it. We’re done. We have to turn ourselves in,” she said. She hadn’t meant to say it: The words flew out.
“No,” he said softly. “I can’t.”
He sank down on the grass by the side of the road and put his head in his hands. She sat beside him, rested her head on his shoulder. They weren’t going to make it to the place they were headed. It didn’t exist. Like everything else she’d ever wanted, it was too far away for her to ever touch. She thought they could go there, and hide through the winter. The idea of that, that she could visit and be with Dean, live there, just the two of them even for a short time, filled her with a luminous joy. Everything good and right lived in that place. Even people who weren’t happy, like her mother, were happy there.
“What do we do now?” asked Dean.
She was about to say she didn’t know when she heard a car approaching. Without thinking, she moved into the road. Dean leaned into the car. She saw him grab the bag with the money and the larger one with all the supplies. He had the gun at his waist.
Emily watched the headlights draw closer and started waving her arms. Dean leaned into the car one more time, then moved out of sight.
It was as if they’d done this before, even though she didn’t have a plan. She’d pulled back her hair, managed to get the rest of the blood out from beneath her nails. She knew she looked young and clean-scrubbed, except for the bruise on her face. Who wouldn’t stop for a stranded girl with a broken-down car on a dark stretch of road?
The other vehicle, a beefy maroon SUV, came to a halt, and she ran toward it. She couldn’t see who was in the driver’s seat, and she had no idea what would happen next. She didn’t know what she would say when she reached the car. It seemed to Emily that some moments were an eternity; they stretched and yawned with possibilities. And something about that simultaneously terrified and thrilled her.
chapter eighteen
Mother and I shared something that she didn’t share with Birdie or Gene. Even though it wasn’t my fault, or hers, I think Birdie and maybe Gene, too, hated me for it a little bit. There was something kindred between us, something beyond even the mother-daughter bond. It’s why she left her journals to me. I think she wanted me to know her as a person, as Lana, a young woman who made choices and mistakes, not just as my mother. She wanted me to know about her, her joys and sorrows, her failures and successes. You can’t really know your mother that way until you’re grown, maybe not until she’s gone.
You’re the closest thing I have to a daughter, Kate. That’s why I am leaving my journals and hers to you. I know that you, and maybe you alone, can understand and appreciate the things written here. I know you won’t judge me—or your grandmother. You told me that it was your worst nightmare to think you’d one day be like Birdie. You could never, ever be that. You’re nothing like her. You’re not like your father much, either. In fact, I think you’re the perfect product of their incompatibility. Somehow, darling, you’re the very best of both of them.
Since Kate had arrived at the island with the girls, Caroline’s words had been alive in her mind. It was the first time she’d been back here since completing her novel, and she was seeing the place with fresh eyes, with the eyes of an adult and not a child.
She’d been living inside the pages of Lana’s and Caroline’s journals, and the island seemed electric with their recorded memories. Their words mingled with Kate’s own recollections of all her summers spent here. The island was alive in a way it never had been.
At this point, Kate knew more about her mother’s sanctuary than Birdie did. This thought brought a mingling of emotions—sadness, fear, and a little bit of glee.
She’d wanted to share it all with her mother, even though she knew it wouldn’t be easy. Sitting there, with a pot of tea between them, it seemed like the perfect time to tell her: about Caroline’s and Lana’s journals, about everything written there and how it had inspired Kate in so many ways. In fact, she had brought the journals to the island with the intention of giving them to her mother. But Birdie had practically fled from Kate’s news. The moment, uncomfortable and not at all what she had hoped, had passed.
Birdie left the girls with specific instructions on how to prepare dinner. And now Kate listed the rules for them to follow while she and Birdie were across the channel: Clean as you go along. Don’t leave dishes in the sink before dinner begins. Make sure the lettuce doesn’t have any grit in it. Turn off the oven as soon as the ham is done. No smoking in the house, Lulu. She’d seen Lulu smoking down by the shore earlier and was glad to note that Chelsea had not been smoking with her.
If it were up to Kate, the girls would come to Cross Island. But Birdie didn’t think children should socialize with adults. And Kate could tell that Lulu was already regretting coming along.
“I thought you said there was cell service,” she said to Kate. Lulu was wearing an apron Birdie had insisted she wear; it was too big for her and covered in a hideous floral pattern. It made Lulu look like the child she actually was.
“It’s intermittent, apparently,” said Kate. Lulu gave her a blank stare. Kate clarified: “It comes and goes. It mig
ht be because of the storms. Or because of the mountains.”
Lulu looked down at her phone. “Oh.”
Chelsea plucked it from her hand and put it on the counter out of reach. “Let it go, Lulu. Help with the salad.”
Lulu gave the phone a longing look, then turned her gaze reluctantly to the tasks at hand. “What do I need to do?” She sounded truly mystified.
Kate heard a too-familiar, high-pitched whistle and looked out the window to see Birdie sitting in the skiff at the dock, exuding, even from a distance, annoyance at being kept waiting. All of Kate’s life, Birdie had used that whistle on the island to call the children from wherever they were. It was maddeningly rude and imperious when they were young; it was insufferable now that Kate was an adult. She was an adult, wasn’t she? As soon as she was in Birdie’s thrall, she never felt like one.
“You’re being summoned,” said Chelsea.
“That’s messed up,” said Lulu. She was chopping carrots. “I mean, seriously, who does she think she is?”
How can you stand it, Kate? Theo had asked. I hear that godddamn whistle in my nightmares. Kate should have known after last summer’s visit that he’d never come again. Maybe when they’re gone, he’d said. Maybe I’ll come back then. He’d said it without a hint of emotion during the conciliatory conversation they’d had right before she left for the island. He would come back to the island after their parents were dead. How sad, she’d thought. How terribly sad.
Down at the dock, Kate climbed into the skiff. It wobbled beneath her weight, and she felt a familiar flutter of nerves.
“I’ve been waiting,” said Birdie.
“Everyone knows, Mother,” said Kate. “We heard your whistle.”
Birdie gave an annoyed grunt and started the engine.
“Can I see that?” asked Kate. She held out her hand, and Birdie handed her the whistle from around her neck. Kate regarded the slim silver missive; it was warm from Birdie’s skin, gleaming in the waning light. Then, without a thought in her head, she tossed it in the drink. Birdie looked stricken.
“How—” she said. “How could you? That’s for emergencies.”
Kate felt a wave of regret, a kind of fearful feeling she got when she stood up to her mother. She pushed it down hard, the way she’d promised herself she would. An odd feeling of pleasure took its place.
“If there’s an emergency, Mother,” she said, “try screaming. Otherwise, try politely waiting, as you would expect others to do for you. I had to speak with the girls. They’ve never been alone on the island.”
“There are other whistles,” said Birdie. She hadn’t taken her eyes off of Kate, nor could she seem to lose the look of shock that pulled her features long.
“Well,” said Kate, “don’t use any of them to summon me again.”
The water lapped against the side of the boat. Above them, a hawk circled slow and easy on the air.
“I didn’t realize you found it so offensive,” said Birdie.
“Really,” said Kate. She’d meant to say no more. But she couldn’t let Birdie have the last word. “How could you not?”
She turned to face the Crosses’ island and saw John waving from the dock. He knew Sebastian, her mother had said. But Kate didn’t recognize the name or the face from her years with her ex. Publishing was a small business; at a certain level, everyone knew everyone, it seemed. But she didn’t know him.
By the time they reached the shore, Birdie had a bottle of wine tucked under her arm and her game face on. She was all smiles, compliments, and polite conversation. Well, this is a sturdy dock! Who built it for you? Oh, what a lovely home. I just adore those picture windows. We used to have a weather vane like that. We lost it in a storm a few years back.
While Birdie was a guest in their home, the Crosses would find her irresistibly charming, impeccably well mannered, and delightfully funny. But when they were out of earshot once again, Birdie would tell Kate in unsparing detail what she really thought. Birdie Burke took merciless measure.
The Cross home was lovely: high ceilings, panoramic views, plush surfaces. Kate was thinking that Sean would be impressed, angling for a tour of the rest of the house. It was quite a bit nicer in some respects than the house on Heart Island. More spacious, more comfortable, newer—facts Birdie was sure to observe. Whether it was a mark for John Cross or against him depended on how he scored elsewhere.
“So how are you doing after yesterday?” asked John. He wore a concerned frown that Kate felt was not quite sincere, though she couldn’t have said why.
“Oh,” said Birdie. “Fine.”
“What happened?” asked Kate.
“Your mother didn’t tell you?” said John. He was oblivious to the fact that he had misspoken—or maybe not. Birdie turned away, pretended to regard a piece of art. “She thought there was an intruder on the island. The police were out.”
“It was nothing,” said Birdie. “Just an old woman’s mind playing tricks on her.”
“Well,” said John, “there have been a number of breakins in the area, some vandalism. You never know.”
“Yes,” said Birdie. “I suppose. So, is your wife not joining us?”
A deft change of subject. How could Birdie not have told Kate about this? Now the girls were alone on the island. She felt anxiety start to rise.
“She had to pop back into the city,” John said. He ran a hand through his thinning hair. “She’ll return by the weekend.”
“Mother,” asked Kate. “What did you see?”
Birdie reluctantly recounted the events, ending with a shrug. “I haven’t been sleeping well. My blood sugar was low yesterday. I really don’t think anyone was there, now that I’m better rested.”
Kate watched her mother uncertainly. Birdie did not seem well rested in the least. She seemed vulnerable and pale, and for a moment, Kate regretted tossing her whistle in the water. It was a little over the top, and not very nice.
“Should the girls be alone?” Kate said.
“Oh, Kate,” said Birdie. She rolled her eyes elaborately at John. “Don’t be such a nervous Nellie.”
John seemed embarrassed for Kate, threw a sympathetic look her way. She felt heat rise to her cheeks. Now she wished she’d held on to the whistle and thrown her mother in the drink.
John put a comforting hand on Kate’s shoulder. “We can see the island from here,” he said. “And we can be there in a flash. Nothing to worry about, I’m sure.”
Kate thought about how the landline was down, and about the bad cell phone service. Chelsea knew how to use the radio, but that was inconveniently located in the bunkhouse.
She tried not to think about it as John poured each of them a glass of wine and they came to sit on the plush brown sofas, facing out the window. But she found it hard to take her eyes from the window. Heart Island was visible (perfectly centered in the frame) and, beyond it, the vast expanse of the lake and other islands in the distance. The setting sun was painting the water golden, violet, and rose.
Kate could see the roofs of their main house and the guest cabin. The glow from whatever lights were burning lit the darkness between the trees. While John and Birdie chitchatted, Kate’s thoughts remained with the girls.
Kate took a long sip of wine and felt its warming effect almost instantly. They’d stay another fifteen minutes, and then Kate would insist on going back, whether Birdie liked it or not. Kate kept staring at the darkening sky, unable to focus on the conversation. She’d managed to talk briefly with Sean earlier on her cell phone. It seemed to work fairly well from Lookout Rock, which she hadn’t shared with the girls. She didn’t want them racing up there at every opportunity to use their phones.
“The ankle is still bad,” Sean had told her.
“Really?” She had been gripped by guilt. She shouldn’t have left them. She should have waited until Monday morning, and they all could have come together. Why hadn’t she?
“Don’t worry,” Sean had said, understanding her tone. “I
’m sure it’s fine. He’s tough, our guy.”
Brendan hadn’t sounded tough when she’d spoken to him before Sean got on the phone. He’d sounded like a hurt kid who needed his mom but was trying to be brave.
“We shouldn’t have come without you,” she said to Sean. Regret flooded through her. “I’m sorry.”
“It’s okay,” Sean had said. His voice alone soothed her. She had sighed into the phone. “We’re right behind you. It’s no big deal.”
“The story is that my great-uncle won Heart Island in a poker game,” Birdie was saying. “I don’t know if that’s true or not. But it’s a story Joe loves to tell. My parents gave it the current name, my father’s last name, of course. And from the air, it looks to be in the shape of a heart. So it was quite serendipitous.”
Kate had heard the story many times. She gazed over at the shelves and shelves of books that lined the far wall. Sebastian’s books were face-out on a shelf at eye level. She wondered if John had done that intentionally for her visit.
If he had read Sebastian’s most recent book, which she didn’t see there, his so-called memoir, he knew all about Kate—or thought he did. He would know Sebastian’s version of who she was—a doormat, an enabler, and finally, a deserter. He would imagine that he knew the intimate details of her first marriage and its unraveling. This didn’t make her as uncomfortable as she would have imagined. She didn’t think of the woman in that book as herself, just a character Sebastian had created. And if she’d ever been that woman, that girl, she wasn’t anymore. The woman in that book was a ghost, a sad and silly specter.
“Ours is the first structure on this island,” said John. Kate could feel his eyes on her, but she looked down at her glass. “We bought it from the estate of a man named Richard Cameron. Does that name ring a bell for you, Kate?”
“Of course,” she said. She looked up at him; he was smiling as if he had a secret. The name did more than ring bells. It set off a jangle of alarms. If John noticed, he made no sign.