No Secret Like Nantucket

by Grace Palmer

  “I want to help. You have your hands full with Winter and—”

  “And I can’t handle a kid and keeping the house clean as well as you can?”

  Eliza blinked at him. She didn’t know whether it was a question or a statement, but either way, it seemed excessive.

  Oliver was usually so easygoing. She had no clue how to handle this flare-up.

  She opened her mouth to respond when Winter’s bedroom door opened. Oliver’s shoulders sagged with exhaustion, but before he could turn around, Eliza moved around him.

  “I’ll take care of her.”

  Eliza met Winter in the hallway. Her eyes were puffy from crying. Winter was as exhausted as anyone else from the events of the last week.

  Usually, Eliza would kneel down to get on her eye level, but the most she could do was brush her hand over Winter’s cheek and lift her little face up to meet her eyes. “You need to stay in bed, sweetheart. Why don’t we go lay down and sing a song? Maybe ‘The Goodbye Song’?”

  “I want Daddy’s song.”

  Eliza stared at her daughter blankly for a moment. “What?”

  “Daddy’s song!” Winter repeated with a huff of frustration.

  Eliza shook her head. “I don’t know that one, baby. Why don’t we sing—?”

  Winter darted past Eliza and wrapped her arms around Oliver’s legs. “Sing me your song, Daddy.”

  “I made it up,” Oliver explained. “I was so tired I honestly forgot other music existed.”

  He laughed humorlessly, then carried Winter back into her room. Eliza gingerly lowered herself into the chair. She could hear Oliver start singing through the door.

  In the hospital, Eliza had been out of her depth. As much as she’d wanted to care for Summer and take care of all of her needs, her baby had needed oxygen and a team of nurses and special tests. Eliza couldn’t provide for her entirely.

  That was hard. But the knowledge that Winter was at home, perfectly healthy and whole and understandable to Eliza, had comforted her.

  Now, she realized that wasn’t entirely true. There were things in her daughter’s eyes she didn’t quite recognize anymore. There was no telling if she’d ever recognize them all again.

  Maybe no child is ever fully understandable to their parent.

  Oliver came out of Winter’s room again a few minutes later and sat on the sofa. This time, he was perched on the edge, prepped to stand up at a moment’s notice.

  “She sleeping?”

  “Yeah,” he sighed.

  “Daddy’s song, huh? I’ll have to learn that one from you.” Eliza tried her best, but she couldn’t keep a bitter edge out of her voice. “You’re doing a better job than you think you’re doing. I think Winter was happier when I wasn’t here.”

  Even as she was still in the midst of saying it, Eliza was surprised by her own vulnerability. She was tired and in pain—she’d stopped taking the pain medication two days earlier—and her usually stiff upper lip had gone a little wobbly.

  Oliver laughed, to her surprise.

  Eliza snapped her attention up to him with an arched brow.

  He gestured around the room. “Have you seen this place? We’ve been a mess without you, babe.”

  Summer began to stir on Eliza’s shoulder, making little whimpers in her sleep. “But you’ve made do. Ginny said we should make a routine, but you two already have a routine. And I don’t know the rules anymore.”

  “We had a routine,” Oliver said, gesturing between himself and Winter’s bedroom door. “The two of us cobbled together a system that worked—for a few days. But now we all need a routine. All four of us. And that’s going to take some time.”

  As if on cue, Summer began to cry. Wailing in the way only newborns could, a shrill siren call.

  “She’s hungry,” Eliza said. “I’ll make her—”

  “No, I’ll make her a bottle,” Oliver cut in with a wry smile, pushing himself to standing. “You just stay there and look pretty, okay?”

  Before he could even take a step, there were clumsy footsteps from the back of the house and then Winter’s door opened once more.

  When she appeared in the living room, there were purple marker streaks across her face like war paint. She’d even colored in her lips.

  Oliver’s eyes widened. Eliza gasped. Even Summer stopped crying for a just a second, as though surprised by the sight of her older sister.

  “Is it morning time?” Winter asked, seemingly oblivious to why everyone was staring at her.

  Eliza and Oliver made eye contact. He raised his brows. “See what I mean? Chaos.”

  Nothing had gone the way Eliza imagined it. Not Summer’s birth. Not their stay in the hospital. Not their first day home.

  Oliver was right. They needed a new routine. A new system. And Eliza would make it.

  She held Summer out to Oliver. “Make her a bottle. I’ll deal with this one,” she said, hitching a thumb over her shoulder at Winter.

  He bit his lip, nodded, and took their daughter carefully between his hands.

  She used a quarter of a pack of baby wipes to get the marker off of her daughter’s chubby cheeks. Thank the heavens for washable markers.

  By the time she finished, Oliver was sitting on the couch feeding a now-content Summer.

  The floor was still a mess of crumbs and toys, and as soon as Winter was released, she tore a cushion down off of the couch and jumped on it.

  But soft afternoon light was coming through the white curtains covering the windows, washing across the blue shag rug. Oliver had his bare feet on the coffee table. Summer was swaddled in a soft muslin blanket—the same blanket Eliza had first brought Winter home in, decorated with smiling hedgehogs. And Winter’s giggles broke through the air like music.

  They’d figure the rest out eventually.

  18

  Mae

  The Workshop At 114 Howard Street

  Brent held the mobile out to her. “What’s this, Mom?” he said softly.

  Mae bit her lip. “Oh, dear,” she murmured in a voice she hadn’t used since Henry died. “Oh, dear.”

  Thirty-Seven Years Ago

  Mae dropped down into the kitchen chair. “I’m sorry, what?”

  “You aren’t sick. You’re pregnant,” the nurse said again through the phone. “Congratulations.”

  Mae had woken up that morning feeling nauseous, which wasn’t anything new. She’d been feeling sick for days.

  Her favorite breakfast—scrambled eggs with strawberries and a coffee—made her gag. She couldn’t even keep water down. It tasted like old pennies in her mouth.

  “Go to the doctor and get a few tests done,” Henry had said before dashing out the door of their one-bedroom beach cottage for work.

  Henry’s parents had owned the property for over a decade, renting it out to vacationers on odd weekends. The wood-shingled house had seen better days. The red paint was all but chipped off the exterior after years of salty spray and more shutters than not hung drunkenly askew off their hinges.

  Perennials popped up in the yard every spring, looking more and more wild with each passing year, and pink roses peeked through the gaps in the fence like nosy neighbors.

  Now that Henry and his sister Toni were grown and gone, his parents didn’t make it over to the cottage as often. Fewer guests came calling and Willa’s hip made it hard for her to garden the way she used to, anyhow. So the cottage had become a chore to them.

  But Mae had always loved the humble place.

  When Henry approached his parents with the idea of buying the house for him and Mae to live in, they’d refused him at first.

  “It’s one bedroom, Henry. You can’t raise children in a one-bedroom house!” his mother had balked.

  But he’d done his Henry thing—wheedled and charmed and chuckled—and eventually, he’d talked Willa into it with a promise that it wouldn’t delay the family planning.

  Six years later, much to Willa’s dismay, it was still just the two of them.<
br />
  Henry had been telling the truth. The cottage hadn’t delayed them having children. They simply didn’t want children. Yet.

  Mae was busy running Mae’s Marvels, her catering company, out of their small kitchen, creating menus for garden luncheons, family birthday parties, and small corporate gatherings. And Henry had been working for Nantucket General Contracting, slowly but steadily working his way up the ladder.

  They were a young couple finding their way in the world. They would have children when they were both ready. When they’d had time to plan out their future.

  Or rather, that was the plan. It seemed now that things had changed.

  Mae was pregnant.

  “Thank you,” Mae said, surprised her lips could form the words. The rest of her body was numb with shock.

  She thanked the receptionist for her time, then dropped the phone on the table with a clatter.

  When Henry came home thirty minutes later, Mae was still sitting at the table. Only now, the kitchen was cleaned and spotless, and Mae was drumming her fingers on the red- and white- checkered tablecloth.

  She couldn’t sit still. Almost like the life inside of her was creating an excess of energy, something Mae of all people certainly didn’t need.

  As he walked inside, Henry had to duck through the front door to avoid hitting his head on the rafter beam. Mae had never understood how he enjoyed living in the cottage, given how clearly undersized it was for someone of his height.

  But that was Henry. He hunched his shoulders and ducked his head and did so with a smile. How much trouble could it be to bend my knees, he’d say.

  “How did the doctor go?” he asked, hanging his denim jacket on the old doorknob they’d fashioned into a hook on the wall.

  “I’m pregnant,” she blurted.

  So much for a gentle delivery of the news.

  Mae’s heart thundered in her chest, and she wondered if it was good for the baby. She’d also had a glass of wine last night when her nausea had subsided enough for her to enjoy the bluefish Henry brought home. One glass of wine wouldn’t hurt the baby, right? Mae made a mental note to ask the doctor.

  Henry stared at her, blinking for a second. Then his full lips split into a grin. His bright blue eyes glittered like the morning sun off the water.

  “Mae, that’s incredible.”

  His long arms wrapped Mae in a tight hug, and for the first time, Mae let herself be excited.

  “You’re going to be a mom,” he said, whispering the words against her hair. “I’m going to be a dad.”

  “We’re going to be parents,” Mae said when Henry held her at arm’s length, taking in the sight of her as if he’d never seen her before. As if everything that mattered had changed.

  The smile couldn’t be wiped from his face. He tipped his head back and stared up at the ceiling of their cottage. His shoulder-length blonde hair swayed as he shook his head. “We’ll have to move.”

  “We can’t raise a baby in a one-bedroom cottage,” Mae laughed, repeating his mother’s words.

  Henry grinned down at her. “No, we certainly can’t.”

  Four months later, he was grinning down at her again.

  “Henry, it’s beautiful,” Mae told him.

  Mae held the handcrafted mobile in her hands. Gently, as if worried she’d break it. She knew she wouldn’t, but there was a way one had to hold precious things. A way to look at them, too—soft eyes, soft heart.

  “You made this?” she asked, blinking at him in awe.

  Henry puffed out his chest. “I told you I’d gotten good at whittling. See the old mill and the lighthouse?”

  “And the island,” she said, rubbing her thumb over the sanded-down finish of Henry’s carving. “It’s perfect. It’s home.”

  The new house at 114 Howard Street felt like a mansion compared to the old cottage.

  They’d been living there for two months, but the big house still didn’t feel like it belonged to her yet. This was a new home, though. She’d have to make it hers.

  She wanted the kind of home that you could close your eyes and see, smell, taste. This mobile in her hands was the first step of that. Whenever her firstborn son looked up from his crib and saw the striped lighthouse idling above his bed, he’d know he was home.

  Mae stretched onto her toes and kissed Henry, the beginnings of her baby bump brushing against his flat stomach.

  He chuckled. “I couldn’t agree more.”

  Present Day—Friday Evening On The Beach

  Mae clutched the coffee cup between her palms, letting the warmth sink into her. Hoping to gather strength from it.

  She didn’t normally drink caffeine after noon. It would keep her up all night. But she was going to be up all night anyway, given the turn her afternoon had taken.

  “Did you just find the mobile today?” Mae asked, staring down at her toes buried in the white sand.

  She couldn’t bring herself to enjoy the sunset the way she usually would. It seemed too cheerful for the moment.

  The afternoon had been beautiful. A day to paste on postcards and send off to lure people to Nantucket. Even now, the clear blue sky was marbled—rich amethyst and sapphire shades over her head giving way to a warm wash of glowing citrine behind the clouds.

  The splash of ruby at the horizon line said a dark sky was only a few minutes away.

  “I found it last Friday. Before your party,” Brent said, resting his arms on his bent knees. He had a coffee cup in his hands, too, but Mae hadn’t seen him take a drink of it yet. “I was cleaning out the workshop to make space for your things when I found it in the corner of the highest shelf. Wrapped in a trash bag.”

  Mae’s heart squeezed. She could hear the implication in Brent’s voice.

  Like they’d been trying to hide the mobile away. Shoving it in a dark corner like they were ashamed of it. Ashamed of him. Ashamed of Christopher.

  “I didn’t know the mobile was still in there,” Mae admitted. “I thought your father might have gotten rid of it. Thrown it away or something. He never told me where it went.”

  Brent looked over at his mother, his brows pulled together. “We aren’t really talking about the mobile, Mom.”

  Mae lifted her eyes from the sand. Brent looked so young.

  He was young. Younger than she was when she first got pregnant.

  The instinct to protect him from pain, from bad news, overwhelmed her. She wanted to change the subject. Look how smooth the water is or How’s work going or Caught any big fish lately?

  But Brent wasn’t a child anymore, much as she may always see him as such. He was a man, a man who’d floundered, who’d seen bad things and maybe done some of them, too, but who’d long since learned the difference between hopes and heartbreaks.

  She owed him that much respect, at least.

  “It was a surprise when I found out I was pregnant. I went to the doctor thinking I had the flu. But it wasn’t the flu; it was a baby. We weren’t ready for children yet—I know, I know; who ever is?—but your dad was excited. I was, too. We were happy.”

  “So…” Brent ran a hand through his blond hair. The strands looked golden in the fading light. “So, you didn’t… get rid of him?”

  “No!” Mae reached out and wrapped her hand around his elbow. He was muscular now. She could barely wrap her fingers halfway around his arm. “No, no. We wanted Christopher. Very much.”

  Brent nodded. “I figured. Dad made him a mobile. He wouldn’t have done that if he didn’t want him.”

  “The mobile was a surprise for me.” Mae could close her eyes and see Henry’s young, smiling face. The way he radiated with pride.

  He had bought a whittling set at an estate sale in ‘Sconset and never used it. Mae tried to get rid of it twice, but Henry assured her he was a great talent and she’d regret it.

  Turns out he’d been right. He usually was, the stubborn old goat. Goodness, how she missed him.

  “He gave it to me two days before it happened.” Mae s
wallowed down the emotion rising in the back of her throat. She shook her head. “I’m sorry. I haven’t talked about this in a long time.”

  “Why not?” Brent laid a hand on his mom’s back. It was comforting, but stiff. Unpracticed. Confronting tough emotions had never been his strength. Brent was Mae’s sunshine boy.

  When Brent came along, Eliza was nearing her teenage years, and their peaceful house on Howard Street was more tumultuous than ever. “Too much estrogen,” Henry would joke when the girls argued or when Eliza locked herself away in her room to be alone.

  Then Brent arrived, his white-blonde hair matching his happy demeanor. He was cheerful, and he wanted everyone else to be cheerful, too.

  “You could have told us about Christopher,” Brent continued, smoothing his palm in a circle on Mae’s back. “He was our brother, too.”

  Mae sniffled and batted her lashes, trying to keep control of herself. “I went into labor early. Spontaneously. The doctors tried to stop it, but there wasn’t anything they could do. I was only twenty weeks along. Christopher was too small.”

  More circles on her back. Slow and steady.

  Henry’s eyes, crinkling with a laugh.

  The white and red stripes of the lighthouse.

  Memory after memory like seagulls cawing in her head, each one forcing her to hear it, see it, acknowledge it.

  “For a long time, it simply hurt too much to talk about him,” Mae admitted. “Or to think about him. Maybe that’s why your father hid the mobile away. So I wouldn’t see it. Then, maybe a year later, Eliza came along. She fixed things up. And I suppose, if I’m being honest, I let myself hide in that for a while. I didn’t want to be sad, so I tried to forget.”

  Brent let out a humorless chuckle. “I know that feeling.”

  “After that… Well, you kids were so little, and I didn’t know how to explain something like that to you. It felt so big that I just couldn’t find the words. Then enough time passed that it seemed too late to bring it up.”

  Mae pressed her coffee cup into the sand and folded her fingers together tightly. The sun was almost gone now and the wind off the water felt colder, biting through the thin cotton sweater she had on.