289 Captain's Walk

by Katie Winters

  “True.” Olivia placed her half-eaten slice of pizza back on her plate. The elephant in the room remained seated in front of them. It blinked at her expectantly. She had to say something. And when the commercial break came, she did.

  “Chelsea, I have to get something off my chest.”

  Chelsea placed her pizza back on her plate and dabbed her fingers on her napkin. “Okay.” There wasn’t even a trace of sarcasm to her voice. This was a rare thing.

  “Xavier has had a lot of trouble this year. I know he’s had some trouble at home. And sometimes, I don’t know if I fully trust him. The fact that he bailed on school today to come see you, well, it makes me think that maybe, he isn’t the right kind of guy for you to be spending time with. Does that make sense?”

  Chelsea chewed on her lower lip for a moment before answering. Olivia dreaded what might happen next.

  “Xavier and I didn’t know each other when I was in high school,” she finally began. “I saw him in the halls and thought he was cute or whatever, but we never spoke. But over the past few weeks, we’ve really gotten to know each other. I think we see something similar in each other. He’s really having a hard time. That’s true. But Mom, I don’t know if you’ve noticed, but I have been having a really hard time, too. I know it’s stupid that so much of this revolves around Dad. I know that sometimes, dads leave. People get divorced. It happens.

  “But Xavier has been trying to teach me to trust my feelings. And I’ve been trying to help him work through his. His parents are really cruel. He and his sister don’t really get along, even though he tries to protect her. He feels like he doesn’t even fit into his own life. And sometimes, I feel that way, too.”

  Olivia couldn’t breathe. Chelsea had never spoken to her so candidly before.

  “You’ve never been cruel to me, Mom. I know that. I know it’s different. But Xavier and I talk about everything. And somehow, it’s been helping me figure some things out. Even though I’m kind of stuck with the leg and everything, I don’t feel as mentally stuck as I used to,” Chelsea continued. “I don’t know if that makes sense. But please. Don’t dismiss Xavier as just another messed up kid. He’s so much more than that. He’s smart and funny and —”

  Olivia placed her hand in the air to stop her daughter. Her eyes were brimmed with tears that threatened to fall over onto her cheeks.

  “Thank you for letting me know how you feel. It helps me understand and not have to guess,” Olivia said finally. “I already know that you’re the kind of woman who will make good decisions. The fact that you’re falling for this boy shouldn’t scare me and I know it comes from a good place. But after all, you are my daughter and I’ll always be on the lookout for you. That’s just what mom’s do.”

  As she said the words, Olivia knew she meant them, despite everything.

  After another pause, Olivia forced herself to ask, “Chelsea, have you given any more thought to what you might want to do?”

  Chelsea nodded her head. “I have and, well, no. I don’t want to work at the diner for the rest of my life. I know that’s worried you this past year.”

  Olivia tipped her head a little lower to see Chelsea’s face a little clearer and then asked, “What are you thinking?”

  “Well, Xavier and I have talked about this a lot,” Chelsea said. “I know we’re a new thing. But we really care about each other. We connect in ways I didn’t think were possible. And he’s about to graduate this year.”

  “That’s true,” Olivia said.

  “And he hates it here,” Chelsea continued. “I think it might be a phase, but if you knew everything I did about his parents, then I think it would make sense to you. He — he wants to go to college off the island. And I want to go with him.”

  Maybe a year ago, this news would have thrilled Olivia. All she wanted was for her daughter to reach her potential, to rush into the world and demand what she wanted from it. But now, for whatever reason, news that her daughter planned to leave the island felt like a punch in the stomach. She would miss her so much. She would miss her more than she’d thought possible.

  “Wow. That is big news,” Olivia finally said. She folded her hands in her lap as she sucked in a deep breath to control her emotions. Olivia felt on the verge of losing it while trying to keep it together in front of her daughter.

  Chelsea nodded. “We were looking at schools today, actually—before you came in.”

  “Funny way of doing it,” Olivia said.

  “Mom...”

  “What?”

  “But yeah. Boston College looks amazing. I even thought about potentially doing something in education, like you. Xavier is a genius, but you know that already since you read his papers.”

  “He is a very good writer,” Olivia affirmed.

  “So he could really do anything if he put his mind to it,” Chelsea continued. “He wants to explore a little bit. And who knows? Maybe I’ll discover something at college. Maybe I’ll discover I’m a computer genius or a sculptor or ...”

  “The world is your oyster, my dear,” Olivia smiled, blinking back tears. “You shouldn’t let anyone tell you that you can do only one thing. You have your entire life ahead of you. Think of it as a blank canvas.”

  Chelsea reached for Olivia’s arm to get her full attention. “Mom, thanks for really listening and understanding. You know I love you more than anything, right?”

  Olivia looked at her daughter and felt the lump in her throat threaten to choke her. She finally let out a gasp and her tears spill over onto her cheeks. “Oh, honey, of course, I do. I love you so much. Never forget that!”

  Olivia pulled her into the largest bear hug and just held her there for the longest time until she finally released her. She sucked in a breath and wiped her tears away, flashing her daughter a smile.

  They talked for several more minutes about Chelsea’s dreams, visions and goals, which she’d decided to pair up with Xavier’s. They made a few tentative plans to research schools together. Olivia told her daughter that anything she wanted, she would help her achieve. And Chelsea thanked her whole-heartedly. When their conversation petered out, they took refuge in another home improvement show and made fun of the curtain colors a young couple picked for their dining room.

  “Disgusting,” Olivia said.

  “No, tact,” Chelsea agreed.

  BUT LATER THAT NIGHT, when Olivia found herself tossing and turning, she reached for her phone and texted Jennifer.

  OLIVIA: U up?

  JENNIFER: Can’t sleep.

  OLIVIA: You with Derek?

  JENNIFER: He’s in NY. Want a glass of wine?

  Olivia wore sweatpants, a sweatshirt and stabbed her feet into some thick winter boots. She walked toward Jennifer’s place on Green Hollow Road. It was only about half a block away and the bright, crisp late-night air cleared her mind. When she reached the warmth of Jennifer’s kitchen, however, she burst into tears.

  “She’s going to leave,” Olivia breathed into Jennifer’s shoulder, as her dear friend wrapped her in a hug. “She’s going to go out there and find herself and she’s going to leave.”

  Jennifer and Olivia sat at Jennifer’s kitchen island as Olivia explained what had happened with Chelsea and Xavier. Jennifer’s son was engaged to be married, but they lived on the island, and Jennifer saw him all the time and probably would the rest of her life. Olivia ached with fear that one day Chelsea would leave and never return.

  “She can’t do that, and she won’t,” Jennifer said softly as she poured them each a second glass of wine. “You’re her mother. She’ll always be connected to you.”

  “I guess.”

  “Listen. It seems like maybe you’re going through your own kind of life transformation.” Jennifer’s eyes shone with excitement as she stepped lightly over the words. “As you change and grow, so does Chelsea. It’s painful. But these changes, I think they’re what life is about. Like when Joel and I broke up. I thought my life was completely over. But now, he’s a d
ear friend and I’m grateful that we allowed ourselves to step out of our comfort zones and become so much more than we were before.”

  Olivia nodded somberly and sipped her wine. She knew Jennifer was right, that she and Chelsea were both headed toward lives that weren’t so tied up in one another. But maybe, that would allow them a deep friendship. Maybe, instead of fighting all the time, Chelsea would think to call her mother when something big happened, when she got an A on a test or bought a new car all by herself or ...

  The list of possibilities was endless.

  “I know you’re right, Jen,” Olivia answered, attempting a small smile. “Change is necessary, right?”

  “That doesn’t mean it doesn’t feel like getting run over by a car,” Jennifer told her with a laugh. “But we survive it, we learn from it and we limp forward.”

  Chapter Eighteen

  Anthony stood in a pair of boxers and a thick sweater. The soft click-click of the spoon against his coffee mug as he stirred the sugar was joined with the bright twittering of the seabirds outside. It was the middle of February, and here he stood alone with the rest of his life before him. Yet still, in the beauty of these mornings, he often thought back to all he had left behind and sometimes, the memory of it all threatened to destroy him.

  With his coffee prepped, Anthony pushed his feet into his boots and headed out onto the porch to look out across the Nantucket Sound. He hadn’t bothered with pants, but all the way out there, so far from the center of Edgartown, nobody would spot him. He imagined that Matilda might have told him to get back inside immediately; this had always been her way. She had always thought you had to do what everyone else thought was appropriate all the time. She’d always wanted to have her way.

  Well, she’d gotten her way, hadn’t she? He just wished he could make her vanish from his mind.

  Through the trees, a sharp-tailed fox eased toward the house. His nose was tilted high, and his feet scampered out in front of him, projecting him faster and faster. Anthony’s father had been a hunter, but Anthony had never taken to it in the same way. He never saw nature, like this fox before him, and thought, I want to kill it. It wasn’t that he looked down on people who liked to hunt. He certainly respected their abilities. It just wasn’t his thing. He didn’t have it in him.

  This was another thing that Matilda hadn’t liked. What was it she had said all the time? “It would be really nice if you’d go out hunting with my dad.” The subtext of that had always been, My dad doesn’t like you, and I really wish you would try harder to make this work.

  It was a Tuesday—a Tuesday in the middle of February. Anthony had his work cut out for him with plenty of plans for one of the upstairs bedrooms, and he’d also told Olivia he would cook dinner for her. He was grateful that they’d abandoned all talk of his wild goose chase for Marcia’s grandfather’s treasure. When he had seen Marnie, the awful woman who had probably taken the diaries, he’d thought, I never want to see this person again. I don’t care. If she wants whatever it is, she can take it.

  All he wanted these days was more time with Olivia. It felt crazy, like a fire burning in the back of his mind that just wouldn’t let up. Sometimes, late at night, he imagined what it would be like to have her in bed beside him. He imagined the soft lull of her breathing how soothing it would be. He imagined her turning over and whispering to him, “I had a dream, and you were in it.”

  Maybe these ideas of the future were just feeding into his fantasies or like one trying to grasp at straws. But all in all, they kept him going and gave him something to at least look forward to. They brightened his mind and soul after so much darkness.

  Later that afternoon, at around four-thirty, Anthony received a phone call that nearly knocked him over.

  He recognized the number immediately, obviously, although she had forced him to delete her number from his phone that night when she had told him never to call her again. She’d also blocked his number, just in case, or so she’d said. He lifted the phone and blinked at it for a long time. After five rings, he finally answered.

  “Hello?”

  “Anthony, thank god.” Matilda’s voice was panicked. It sounded as though she was in tears. She sounded genuinely grateful to hear his voice. How strange. How illogical.

  Her voice made him totally freeze up as memories shivered through him.

  “Matilda. Is everything okay?” he finally asked, even as she wailed.

  “She’s — she’s gone.”

  Anthony’s heart stopped beating. It stopped beating just as quickly as their baby’s had — that very first one, which Matilda had lost after eight weeks. One day, the heart had been strong; the next, it had been no more.

  “What the hell are you talking about?” Anthony demanded. His heart now raced in his chest as he sucked in a breath.

  Matilda’s words were difficult to understand. “Melanie and I got into a fight. I — I don’t know. She told me she never wanted to see me again and she just stormed off. I don’t know what to do. Anthony, I genuinely wouldn’t have called you if it wasn’t an emergency. I —”

  Anthony’s voice lowered to an angry growl. “I’ll be right there.” He then hung up the phone, grabbed his car keys, and raced for his truck without thinking an extra thought. Within five minutes, he was headed toward the ferry. So much of his heart had been in Providence the entire time he had been away and now he was headed back.

  When he’d described the situation to Marcia, before her death, she had called Matilda a lot of things, most of the words that you wouldn’t expect a very old lady to say. Anthony had only shaken his head when he heard Marcia’s anger and told her, “It’s complicated, Marcia. A long time ago, we loved each other very much. A long time ago, we never thought any of this was possible.” Marcia had scoffed and said, “It’s always the same story. But she kicked you out of your daughter’s life. And she won’t let you fight for her. That’s disgusting to me.”

  After he drove the truck onto the ferry, his mind flickered to thoughts of Olivia, who was surely preparing to head over to the mansion for dinner. His heart panged with regret. Over the previous weeks, Olivia had opened up a great deal, telling him about her best friends, about her relationship with her daughter, and even a bit about her ex-husband, who had left her six years before and wanted nothing much to do with their daughter. Throughout, Anthony had offered only bits and pieces of his own life. He had told her about his parents, but he’d skipped over a lot of Providence.

  She didn’t even know he had a daughter, one just a few years younger than Chelsea.

  He had to text her, something, anything.

  ANTHONY: Hi! Something came up tonight. Do you mind if we reschedule? I’m so sorry.

  He knew this was strange; after all, what kind of thing would he, of all people, have “come up in his schedule”? He didn’t have any friends on the island besides Olivia. He hadn’t had anything to do, except work around the mansion, for a year. So he knew she probably wouldn’t buy it.

  Anthony pulled up in front of the old place in Providence a few hours later. Once there, he pulled out his phone to see if Olivia had called him. Unfortunately, though, his phone had died on the drive since he had apparently forgotten to charge it. He muttered a curse word under his breath, returned the phone to his pocket, and charged out of the truck.

  As he stepped toward the front door, through the frigid chill and darkness of another winter’s night in Providence, memories shot through him. There, on that very driveway, he had taught Melanie how to ride a bicycle, first with four wheels and then with only two. They had gone through a whole package of bandages that week, but she had finally mastered it. They’d gone for ice cream afterward. Matilda had taken a photo of the occasion, which had featured Melanie’s face, covered with chocolate ice cream. His heart had felt so full.

  He and Matilda hadn’t been in love for a long time. But he’d never been vengeful toward her. He had just kind of thought that maybe, that’s what marriage was, that it turned int
o a friendship or just a business partnership. He figured that maybe when Melanie went off to college, he and Matilda would either rekindle or separate. He loved his daughter more than life itself; he hadn’t cared about the rest so much. Often, he had slept out on the couch, as he had grown tired of the insults Matilda threw at him in the morning when her frustration for the day ahead was at its highest.

  “A mean, horrible woman,” Marcia had called her. “I don’t know how you stayed married to her all those years. She never deserved you, you know!”

  Anthony could practically hear how he’d told the story to Great Aunt Marcia.

  “I caught her with one of my best friends. I walked in on a late Friday night after I had dropped Melanie off at a friend’s place, and she and Jim were in our bed. The emotions I felt are indescribable. Jim totally freaked out and jumped up and acted crazy. He was drunk, and he lunged at me. He wanted to hit me. I got out of his way, but Jim lost his balance and barreled forward and hit his head on the side of the coffee table. He had to go to the hospital. I was actually the one who drove him there, because Matilda was too drunk and, well. She stayed at home and she called Melanie and by the time I got back home, they’d gone to some hotel. Matilda thought I was crazy. She told me not to contact her. That she wanted a restraining order. I was totally heartbroken. I tried over and over again to contact Melanie. I was just a handyman, and any idea of contacting a lawyer or something was out of my reach due to my finances. I ended up writing Melanie a letter and putting it in the mailbox. I guess that was around the time I contacted you.”

  “Horrible woman,” Great Aunt Marcia had said ominously. “But you have to find a way to get your daughter back and tell her the truth. It’s eating you up from the inside.”

  “I know it is,” Anthony replied. “But if she doesn’t want me around, then I don’t want to be around. It makes me feel like the biggest villain on the planet. And I can’t take it.”