Dream House (33 page)

She hated him.

She drifted down the stairs and out the door, across the front yard to the crest of the hill, where she sat down behind the rose bush. The tide was on its way out, and the mudflats stretched out brown and lifeless, as if the cove's soul were being taken with the tide. But it would be reborn an infinite number of times each time the water returned: blue, green, still and reflective, rippled and dancing, frozen white.

She drew her knees up under her chin. There was no rebirth for her, only moving forward from this day, forward in this body—the same, yet irreversibly changed.

“Gina.” Mark had come out of the house, and he sat down beside her without touching. “Are you sad?” he asked sheepishly.

Sad?
Not sad; sadness was heavy and still, when feelings finally came to rest. Hers still whirled furiously around her like birds afraid to light. “Nope,” she said, her eyes fixed on the dinghy, stranded on the mud.

It was the closest thing to the truth she would ever again bother to tell him.

“Come on now, kiddo. Get up and get going. Don't take yourself so seriously.” Gina's mother snapped up the shade and whisked out
of the room.

Gina put down her book and looked at the clock. It was eleven. Tuesday. Mark had left ten days ago; her period was three days late.

As soon as Gina felt reasonably assured that an exchange with her mother about the incident was never going to take place, her rage toward Mark began to consume her. Then, the long summer days grew hotter, the light more golden, the zinnias in the garden reached their glorious peak, and her anger boomeranged. How could I have been so careless? Why wasn't I stronger? She let her feelings loose in her journal, writing around the event, careful not to name it.

Cassie's room was a mess. In three days, Gina hadn't even bothered to open the window. The stuffier the room became, the less inclined she felt to leave it, as though she were being slowly absorbed into its walls. She rolled over and flipped to the end of her book. Ten more pages of summer reading, six more weeks of summer. Downstairs, her mother was giving her father his daily dose of hell; no doubt he was paying for the sins of his daughters. It suddenly occurred to her: it was not only her mother who made her crazy, but the
house,
too. If she lived in a long, modern ranch house like Mark's, in a room like his at the end of a wing, she could do whatever she wanted and have total privacy.
Wings:
she needed them.

She kicked off the covers and flew out of bed.

When she rode into Tobey's parking lot, a pickup filled with lobster traps and stinking of bait was parked next to the phone booth and a man in filthy khakis was using the phone. This she hadn't counted on. She had to spill her guts to someone
now
while she still had the nerve. “Cassie,” she would say, “I did a terrible thing.” No. “Cassie, a terrible thing happened. Cassie, Mark . . .” What? Mark what? “Cassie, Mark and I made love in your room.”
Ha
! Made love.
Had sex. So many ways to say it, but none of them fit. “Gina,” Cassie would cry out. “Do you use birth control?”

“Cassie, Mark just attacked me,” she could say, just to make it simple. “What an asshole!” Cassie might say, and she might be right, but she might not be, either.

Gina rode in circles in the parking lot, stirring up clouds of dust around her. The man in the phone booth had turned around, and she frowned at him for looking at her, the letch. When he left the booth, she picked up the phone and dialed Cassie's number; it rang, and she hung up. Because the only thing more humiliating than the truth would be the telling of it.

“Gina!”

Gina turned toward the voice to see Kit strolling across the street. He'd shaved his beard.

She brushed her hair out of her face and forced a smile.

“You okay?” he asked.

“Yeah, I'm fine. I was just going to call Cassie. I like to use the pay phone because . . .” Flustered, she rolled her eyes and fought back tears.

Kit turned toward the harbor, giving her a moment. “I just went down to the dock and put my shell in the water. I've been repairin' it all week. Are you sure you're okay?” he asked again, turning back to her and putting his hand on her bike to steady it.

“I'm fine,” she said. “Just having a bad day.”

“But it's still early! How bad could it be?”

Gina looked up at his open smile, the blue sky framing his head. She hadn't noticed how clear a day it was. Or anything about the weather lately. The traffic was picking up on the road and shirtless boys—“wharf rats”—were heading down to the town dock to hang out.

“Wanna go rowin'?”

“Now?” Gina realized she'd do anything not to go home.

“It's so great to have a friend who can
row
!” Kit said.

Gina followed the rhythm of his strokes as they sliced through the harbor and out past the islands. She breathed in the reviving air rising from the blue. For a long time, she didn't look up from her hands as they pulled back, forward, back, forward. A song came into her head, its notes aligning with her strokes, and she watched the muscles in her thighs flex, her arms tighten and extend, until they were not just legs and arms, but
her
legs and arms again. “Friend,” he'd said. Exactly what she needed to hear; exactly what she needed.

They reached Miller's Island where the lighthouse stood. “Let's pull the boat up on the beach for a bit!” Kit called.

“Okay,” she said, though she'd been enjoying the rowing and the quiet distance it allowed.

They climbed out of the shell, and she followed him to the abandoned house where the lighthouse keeper had lived before the light became electronically operated. When they stepped onto the broken floorboards of the porch, Kit looked out to sea and spread his arms. “Wouldn't this be an amazin' place to live? Surrounded by water, no cars . . . no noise except the foghorn and the birds.”

Gina smiled and nodded, wishing she could hear that music now, over the crescendo of her worries. She left the porch and wandered slowly across the scruffy grass and tangle of sweet peas, then scrambled over the rocks until she found a large flat one to sit on. She was hoping Kit would follow her.

He didn't. He inspected the house inside and out, then walked to the southernmost edge of the small island. Gina watched him meandering along the shore, every now and then stooping to pick up something. Slowly, he made his way back to her and held his fist
out. She opened her hand and on it, he deposited several pieces of sea glass, all of them blue, the color most treasured by beachcombers.

He sat on the rock with his back to hers, nearly touching. “It's great out here. All that talk with the tourists at the Project can get to me. By the time the weekend rolls around, I need some time to be alone.”

Alone. Only during the past week did Gina understand what alone really meant. She swallowed and pushed back tears, relieved that Kit couldn't see her face.

When she didn't answer, Kit asked, “So how was the visit with your boyfriend?”

Emotion overwhelmed her; embarrassed, she covered her face with her hands. Kit stood and found a rock where he could sit facing her.

“We broke up,” she managed.

“Aw. I'm sorry. Could ya use a hug?”

She nodded. When he put his arms around her, she felt ten years old, thirteen, seventeen. It was a hug she had needed for a very long time.

Kit pulled back, his hand gently holding her wrist, and kissed her lightly on the lips. When he pulled away, she did her best to smile, stood, and walked toward the boat.

“Should we get rowing now?” she called over her shoulder, knowing this would be the last time they would cross the harbor together, the last time she would be, for Kit,
a friend who can row.

Architecture is to be regarded by us with the most serious thought. We may live without her, and worship without her, but we cannot remember without her.

John Ruskin,
The Seven Lamps of Architecture

Chapter 13

“He's a tough old guy,” Annie pronounced to Gina in the morning as she hauled her hose around the garden. Green shears leaned from the pocket of her khaki shorts. “I sure wish Mike and Karen weren't off in Alaska. But we'll be all right.”

“I know you will,” Gina said, thinking, you have to be. You have a barn full of life waiting to be created. “But since Lester can't come home today, I'm going to stay an extra day.”

Annie insisted she and Lester would be fine, but her eyes were owlish from fatigue, and she was wearing her shirt inside out. Gina sat down on the stoop. Her drawings would have to wait while she kept Annie company. The air smelled different this morning, she noticed—sweeter, maybe. The heat was still overbearing, but now and then a tiny breeze touched the grass.

“Thank goodness you saw the skylight and found the studio!” Annie said, shaking her head. “I'd been meaning to show it to you. We only put in the skylight and new lighting two years ago, but we've had the studio, mmm . . . almost five years. Your dad helped Lester with the floor, and your ma and I painted. I think at the time they'd
temporarily run out of projects at their house, so they were
thrilled
when we recruited them. Especially since your mother could hardly bear to go inside the house. When we finished the studio . . . oh, they loved it! We'd have our gin and tonics right there on the big rug.”

If her parents had mentioned it, Gina had forgotten. The brightness of the studio shone through in Annie's words, and Gina felt a corner of herself light up, too, as she pictured the four old friends together. Her father would have loved the idea of the studio since he'd given up his darkroom when he'd retired. Her mother would have admired the modern lighting and the wide-open space.

“They were the only ones who knew about it,” Annie went on. “Everyone needs a little hideaway; don't they? But, oh my, what a job!” she said. “First, there was the termite problem, then the family of raccoons nesting in the wall. Let's see . . . half the foundation needed replacing. What else? We put in a new beam . . .”

Gina listened with fascination. She could see how, when her mother was at her creative and energetic best, she and Annie would have hit it off. They had their shared interests—nature, the arts,
projects.
But also, the two women seemed unflappable in the face of construction, despite, or maybe because of, their relative lack of resources. Was this Yankee stoicism or just the way they were? Each time Annie said “Ellie” with affection in her voice, the idea of her mother as companionable became more real. It seemed her growing fondness for Annie was opening up her heart to her mother, too.

Annie stooped to turn off the hose, picked up something small from the flowerbed and threw it over the fence. “You know,” she said, “the day we christened the studio, your mother said, ‘Now's your chance. Tell Lester if he doesn't quit smoking, you'll lock him out of here.' It worked! Well, I mean, it took two years, and I did have to actually lock him out once or twice.” Annie laughed. “Your mother
was really the first—well, maybe the second—feminist in town, you know. She was one of the few people who understood I needed my career with the symphony.”

“Mom really admired you, Annie.”

Annie turned and looked at the studio, her eyes moist. When her lip quivered, and she began to cry, Gina stood up to hug her. The back of Annie's shirt was damp, and she smelled of rosemary. “They hadn't even drunk their tea!” she said, wagging a limp lily. Gina thought of Annie going into her parents' house the day of the accident, and all at once the dam she'd been shoring up for months burst. She cried into Annie's collar with such abandon that for a few moments, she forgot where she was. When she finally stopped, she felt Annie's arms tight around her and filled with the deepest comfort she'd felt since her parents' accident.

They remained in their embrace for several minutes. Finally, Annie stepped back and smiled warmly through her tears. She turned on the garden hose, and Gina returned to the stoop.

“Sometimes I think your mother and I were born a generation too early.” Annie said. “Ellie wanted her children to have the things she didn't—the important things, not material things—and by golly, she made it happen. She made you girls independent. She certainly got that part right.”

Annie looked over her shoulder at Gina with a smile and hint of mischief. “Of course, you and I both know that most days, she regretted the
independent
part.”

Gina laughed. The siren at the firehouse sang out, triggering a chorus of dog barking.

“I hope you've had time to do what you came here for,” Annie said. “I confess I snooped a little and noticed you're making some drawings of the old house. What a wonderful idea.” She turned again
and cocked her head worriedly. “I've been afraid to ask, but I hope you aren't upset about Sid's buying it. You know, he's really okay. He's settled down . . . been with the same man for years now. We're just relieved developers didn't get their hands on that property. Imagine how they could've ruined it.” She shook her head. “Sid must've paid a bundle. But he did well in the antiquities business, I guess, and his different real-estate deals. Who knows? Maybe he inherited some Holloway money.”