“Beautiful,” he says.
“Hah. No.”
“I was headed to the information desk when I saw you in here.”
“I can’t believe you came.”
“I wanted to see you. Make sure you’re okay.”
The words are sincere, and the look in his eyes tells me he means it. “I don’t know what to say.” I shake my head, overcome with emotion.
“Just say it’s okay I’m here.”
“It is. I―”
“Look like you could use a hug.”
The tears well up then, and I have no ability to stop them. He reaches for me, pulls me into the circle of his arms and locks me there. I tuck my face to his chest, sobs shaking my shoulders. He presses a kiss to the top of my head, and I melt beneath the need to be comforted by a man I cannot deny caring about.
In a few moments, he takes my hand and leads me from the cafeteria. We walk outside and into the small park to one side of the hospital. He leads me to an enormous tree lending shade to the grassy area. He leans against the wide trunk and pulls me to him again. He feels as strong as this tree, able to weather the darkest of storms, and I’m not ashamed to admit now I need his strength. I slip my arms around his neck and press myself to him. I cry against his chest, sobs pouring out from somewhere deep inside me, shaking my shoulders and leaving me weak beneath the release.
And he just holds me, rubbing the back of my hair with one hand, saying nothing, as if he knows there aren’t any words that will dissolve the pain. There is only comfort for acknowledgement of this, and it is only in receiving it that I realize how much I need it.
I don’t know how long we stand there, anchored against that tree trunk with a soft breeze whispering against us. But at some point, my tears stop, and I am now quiet against him, weak with release.
He puts his hands on my shoulders and pushes me back far enough to look into my face. “I’ve missed you.”
“I’ve missed you.”
“There are plenty of reasons we don’t make sense. I get that. They don’t matter though. Because I know how you make me feel. I love where I live and the life I’ve made there. But since you left . . . it’s not the same.”
I absorb this admission, and wonder if I’ve imagined what he’s just said. This man. . .this beautiful man wants me. And I want him. All the reasons I presented to myself as to why we wouldn’t work won’t materialize in my brain. I grapple for them, but they no longer form into anything I can make sense of. “Are you sure?”
“I’ve never been more sure of anything.”
I put my hands to either side of his face, lean up and kiss him. Softly at first, and then deeper, gasping when he swoops me up and takes the lead, kissing me with physical proof of his confession. And I have no desire to hide what I feel for him. What is the point? Life is here. Right in front of us. We can reach for it and find the happiness being together provides us. Or let it slip away to be nothing but a memory of what could have been.
I reach for it with no intention of ever letting it go. And he feels the change in me. Because he slips an arm to the back of my legs and swoops me up, carrying me to a nearby bench and sitting down with me on his lap. We kiss until we both begin to believe we really are together, and that we’ll find our way forward to a place where a life with each other is not only possible, but definite.
“I love you,” he says, leaning back to stare into my eyes so I can see that love like my own reflection in a perfectly still lake. “What I’ve been thinking is that just because I recognized it nearly from the moment I met you, does that make it a lesser love? It doesn’t,” he adds, answering his own question.
My heart is full, so full that I have nothing but truth for him. “I love you. I do.”
He kisses me softly.
And then I say, “It won’t be easy.”
“No. But it will be worth it.”
“Yes. It will.”
We sit for a while, peaceful in the knowledge that whatever lies ahead, we’ll be facing it together. And when we’re ready, I stand, take his hand and lead him inside the hospital to meet the rest of my family.
Epilogue
“There are only two ways to live your life. One is as though nothing is a miracle. The other is as though everything is a miracle.”
― Albert Einstein
Anders
IT’S ONE OF those days that could be used for a postcard shot of Needham’s Point Beach. The sun has dipped its lowest against the horizon, pink tendrils of light lacing the still blue sky. There’s a crowd on the beach this evening. Over one hundred babies to release tonight, according to Hannah. The most they’ve had in a good while.
“Da-da!”
I turn to see Evie toddling toward me in the sand, her arms outstretched. Her blonde hair hangs in braids, a pink ribbon at the end of each. I swoop her up, parking her on my hip and brushing sand from her sun-brown little feet.
“Evie turtle?” she asks.
“I’m sure Hannah will have a turtle for you to help.”
A smile breaks across her delighted face, and my heart is crushed yet again with love for her.
“Hey.”
Catherine touches my shoulder, leans up to kiss my cheek. “Sorry we’re late. I had one last phone call to make, and Evie took a long nap this afternoon.”
“You’re just in time,” I say, leaning in to kiss her on the lips, taking my time with it.
Footsteps sound behind us, and I look up. Nicole walks across the sand, her dog Callie trotting along beside her. Ever since Nicole adopted her from the shelter she volunteers at in West Palm Beach, the dog does her best to never leave her side, traveling with her on visits here as an emotional support companion. Like Nicole, she’s become a seasoned traveler to Barbados. “Hey,” I say, glancing around Nicole and adding, “Luke came, didn’t he?”
She smiles her quiet smile and says, “He’s back there talking to Hannah. He’s fascinated with the turtles and wants to know everything he can learn about them.”
“He’s in good company then,” I say.
Nicole reaches out to brush a few more grains of sand from Evie’s leg, and I take the moment to wonder at the difference in her. I think of the pale gray woman I met in the hospital in West Palm Beach three years ago and this rejuvenated version beside me now. She has fought her way back from a depression that robbed her of all will to live to the place where she is now, aware that she will have to take care of herself in the ways people with depression have to in order to stay well. She’s coming to the island to visit us every three months or so, and this time she brought Luke with her, a guy she met at the animal shelter. He founded the sanctuary with part of an inheritance from his grandmother, and it seems as if the two of them have found something in each other that fits. Not unlike Catherine and me. Their puzzle is different from ours, but the pieces go together just the same.
I drape my arm around Catherine’s shoulder and tuck her against me as we take in the sun setting before us. Hannah and a few of her volunteers start across the beach with the trays of tiny turtles.
“Evie see! Evie see!”
“Hold on now,” I say, laughing and setting Evie on the sand in front of me.
“We have to be gentle with them, sweetie,” Catherine says, smiling. “I remember the first time I saw this,” she says, squatting down to look our daughter in the eyes. “I was so excited I could barely contain myself.”
“Where turtles go, Mama?” Evie asks.
Catherine hesitates and then, “Home, baby. They’re going home.”
Hannah approaches with one of the trays, drops to her knees next to us and reaches for Evie’s hand. Evie looks down at the baby turtles, her eyes wide with awe.
“Pick one up, sweetie,” Catherine says. “Just be very, very gentle.”
Evie reaches down and takes one with a kindness that makes my heart swell. “Okay,” I say, picking one up and showing her how to set it in the firmer sand.
She sets hers next to
mine and smiles a smile of delight as they take off for the ocean. “Turtle go home,” she says, and there’s now sadness in her voice.
I put my hand on her head and rub her hair. “It’s okay, honey. Home is where they want to be. It’s where they’ll be happy.”
She raises her arms for me to pick her up. I do, and we watch as the rest of the baby turtles are released and head for the water. “When they grow up, they might come back to visit one day,” I say.
I put an arm around Catherine, and the three of us stay there until all the babies have found their way to the sea. Catherine looks up at me, and I see in her eyes what I am thinking. Life is hard. But life is beautiful. And it will always, always be worth the struggle.
***
The Barbados Sea Turtle Project
I really can’t find the words to describe how much I am moved by the beautiful sea turtles who struggle against great odds to survive and thrive in the ocean that is their home. Below are some pics of our family trip to Barbados where we got to see them for the first time.
If you would like to learn more about them, please visit Barbados Sea Turtles. You can also Like their Facebook page and receive updates about releases and other fascinating information about the ongoing effort to preserve these magnificent creatures. You can make a donation to help the Barbados Sea Turtle Project here.
Inglath Cooper
Book Club Guide
What made you decide to read That Birthday in Barbados?
How did you feel about the characters?
Why do you think Catherine was blind to the affair between Connor and Nicole?
Do you think it is possible for siblings to deeply love each other but also have very complicated layers to the relationship? How so and why?
Escape is a central theme in the book. Do you believe people sometimes need to remove themselves from their regular lives to see other ways of living?
What do you think of the older woman, younger man dynamic? Do you think age differences matter?
What did Anders’ illness lead him to realize about life? Was he willing to die rather than live in a way that did not make sense to him?
Forgiveness is a central theme in the book. Do you think it is possible to forgive a loved one for unimaginable betrayal? Should Catherine have forgiven Nicole sooner than she did?
Why did Catherine and Nicole keep the truth about their fractured relationship from their parents?
Nicole experiences the callousness of people who leave devoted pets at shelters. How do you think realizing what happens to many of them affected her? Do you think most people know what happens in these types of shelters? Do you think if they did, they would want it to change?
The quote from David Foster Wallace – You’d have to have personally been trapped and felt flames to really understand a terror way beyond falling. – What do you think he is saying about people who choose to take their own lives? Do you think Nicole could see no other way to right her wrong? Or that her own depression was beyond enduring?
Catherine realizes that life is a continuous blend of good and bad, hard and easy, miraculous and horrifying. How do we accept this constant state of contradiction about life, and what makes it all bearable?
What do you think Catherine and Anders find in each other?
What do the sea turtles represent for you in the story? Do you see a comparison between their incredible will to live and the struggle they face to survive and Anders’ own will to live?
What is your favorite scene in the book?
How do you picture the lives of the characters after the story is over?
Did this book make you think about anything in your own life differently?
Would you recommend That Birthday in Barbados to a reader friend? If so, why?
If You Enjoyed That Birthday in Barbados. . .
Excerpt from That Month in Tuscany
Lizzy
IF I’M HONEST with myself, truly honest, I will admit I knew that in the end, he wouldn’t go.
But to leave it until the night before: that surprises even me.
Here I sit on my over-packed suitcase in the foyer of this too large house I’ve spent the past five years decorating and fussing over — picking out paint colors and rugs, which include the exact same shade, and art that can only be hung on the walls if it looks like an original, even if it isn’t.
I stare at the pair of tickets in my hand, open the folder and read the schedule as I have a dozen times before.
Departure Charlotte, North Carolina 3:45 PM
Arrival Rome, Italy 7:30 AM
Departure Rome, Italy 9:40 AM
Arrival Florence, Italy 10:45 AM
My name on one: Millicent Elizabeth Harper. His on the other: Tyler Fraiser Harper.
I bought the tickets six months ago. Plenty of time to plan how to get away from the office for a month. Make whatever arrangements had to be made. Didn’t people do things like that now and then? Check out of their real lives for a bit? Let others take over in their absence?
Tyler’s response would be, “Yeah, people who don’t care about their careers. People who don’t mind risking everything they’ve worked for by letting some Ivy League know-it-all step into their shoes long enough to prove that they can fill them.”
Our twentieth anniversary is tomorrow. I’d imagined that we would arrive at the Hotel Savoy and celebrate with a bottle of Italian champagne in a room where we could spend the next month getting to know one another again — the way we had once known one another. Traveling around the Tuscan countryside on day trips and eating lunch in small town trattorias. Exploring art museums and local artisan shops.
I shared all of this with him, and he had done a fine job of making me believe that he found it as appealing as I did. It felt as if we again had a common interest after years of a life divided into his and hers, yours and mine.
Then, a little over a week ago, he’d begun to plant the seeds of backpedaling. I had just finished putting together a salad for our dinner when my cell phone rang.
It lay buzzing on the kitchen counter, and something in my stomach, even at that moment, told me that he would back out.
I started not to answer, as if that would change the course of the demolition he was about to execute on the trip I had been dreaming of our entire married life. Actually, maybe the trip was a metaphor for what I had hoped would be the resurrection of our marriage during a month away together. The two of us, Ty and me like it used to be when we first started dating, and it didn’t matter what we were doing as long as we did it together.
Ironically, we’ve had the house to ourselves for almost two years now. It’s hard to believe that Kylie’s been away at college for that long, but she has. Almost two years during which I’ve continued to wait for Ty’s promises of less time at the office and more time at home to actually bear fruit; only they never have.
And I guess this is what it has taken to make me see that they never will.
Me, sitting on a suitcase, alone in our house, waiting for something that’s not going to happen. Waiting for Ty to realize that we hardly even know each other anymore; waiting for him to remember how much he had once loved me; waiting for him to miss me.
I feel my phone vibrate in the pocket of my jacket. I know without looking that it’s Ty. Calling to make sure I’ve canceled our tickets and gotten as much of a refund as I can, considering that it’s last minute. I know that he’ll also want to make sure I’m back to my cheerful self. He’ll be waiting for the note of impending forgiveness in my voice, the one that tells him he doesn’t need to feel guilty. I’ll be here, as I always have. Things happen. Plans get changed. Buck up, and move on.
I pull the phone from my pocket, stare at his name on the screen.
I lift my thumb to tap Answer. I’m poised to do every one of the things that Ty expects of me. I really am. Then I picture myself alone in this house every day from six-thirty to eight o’clock at night. And I just can’t stand the thought of it.
I actually feel physically ill. I realize in that moment that I am at a crossroad. Stay and lose myself forever to someone I had never imagined I would be. Go and maybe, maybe, start to resurrect the real me. Or find out if she is actually gone forever.
The moment hangs. My stomach drops under the weight of my decision. I hit End Call and put the phone back in my pocket. And without looking back, I pick up my suitcase and walk out the door.
~
I PARK IN THE long-term lot and not in the back, either, where Ty would insist that I leave the BMW. I park it smack dab up front, tight in between a well-dented mini-van and a Ford Taurus with peeling paint. It is the very last parking space Ty would pick and petty as it sounds, I get enormous pleasure from the fact that my door has to touch the other vehicle in order for me to squeeze out.
I get my suitcase out of the trunk, letting it drop to the pavement with a hard thunk. I roll it to the white airport shuttle waiting at the curb. An older man with a kind face gets out and takes my bag from me, lifting it up the stairs with enough effort that I wish he’d let me do it myself.
Then he smiles at me, and I realize he doesn’t mind.
There are two people already on the shuttle, sitting in the back. They are absorbed in each other, the woman laughing at something the man has said. I deliberately don’t look at them, keeping my gaze focused over the shoulder of the driver who is now whistling softly.
“What gate, ma’am?” he asks, looking up at me in the rearview mirror.
“United,” I answer.
“You got it,” he says, and goes back to his whistling.
I feel my phone vibrating in the pocket of my black coat. I try to resist the urge to look at who’s calling, but my hand reaches for it automatically.
Ty. It’s the third time he’s called since I left the house. I put the phone back in my pocket.
When we arrive at the United gate, the whistling driver again helps me with my suitcase. I drop a tip in the cup by the door and thank him.
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