“Well, that’s what I was wondering,” I reply, trying to monitor the spiral of cars and assess my chances of getting in and out without going around five or six times. “But I mean, do you think-”
“Charlotte, there’s no question-”
There’s a hum and a buzz. And the connection is gone. Mom is probably still talking.
I take the last watery slurps of my no longer fizzy Diet Coke and, readying myself for the scariest part of the trip, I chant the mantra of Massachusetts drivers. “Vehicles already in the rotary have the right of way.” The moment there’s an opening, I blast the Jeep into the whizzing traffic.
TRURO’S ALWAYS a little bit father away than I remember. Every time I get to Orleans, one after another roadside emporium pushing taffy and T-shirts, I think I must have already passed it. And every time as I persevere through the touristy hustle-bustle of Eastham, I remember that means there’s half an hour to go. Which gives me some quiet time, finally, to think.
Twisting open the new Diet Coke I got at the Pick ’n Pay, I’m thinking about Gaylen. So here’s the precious daughter, the result of a shotgun wedding. I picture the prom queen, sobbing quietly, being lectured by her world-weary mother. Being reminded her beauty would fade, and her only chance at happiness is to forget her high school Romeo and latch on to the up-and-coming Ray Sweeney.
Poor Dorie had to break the news to her despondent but desperate sweetheart. Channeling some kind of made-for-TV movie, I see the red-eyed Dorinda. In my daydream she still has on her tiara, since that’s the only picture I carry around of her. So here’s Dorinda, tearfully explaining grown-up reality and maternal orders to her soon-to-be discarded Romeo. What’s his name. CC. Even knowing the futility of their teenage declarations, they bitterly vow never to part, and then heavyhearted but flaming with desire, they embrace, and then-
The video in my head screeches to a halt.
Maybe CC Hardesty was actually Gaylen’s father. Maybe that’s why CC left town so quickly. Enlisted, then exited. Maybe that’s why Dorie agreed to marry Ray with such haste. And that would mean Ray Sweeney is not Gaylen’s real father. So Dorinda knew it. And possibly CC. But did Ray? Does Gaylen?
I try to count months, see how the wedding date meshes with Gaylen’s birthday, but I don’t have enough specific information to do the gestational math. But theoretically, it could be true. So imagine Dorinda’s despair. Her daughter’s real father, killed in some faraway military explosion. Perhaps never realizing their teenage lust and passion had resulted in a child. Or, worse maybe, did. Later her daughter’s stepfather, notorious, with a predilection for inappropriately young girls, makes disgustingly unwelcome advances. Maybe that proves Ray knew he wasn’t Gaylen’s biological father.
The only people Dorinda ever loved. CC: dead. Gaylen: fighting off a sleazy creep she thinks is her father, only to give him a fatal push in a final burst of self-protection. So Dorinda, finally, gets to take control. She takes the fall for Gaylen, sacrifices herself so her daughter, at least, can have a life. Not exactly a foolproof plan, since it relies quite a bit on Gaylen’s ruthless selfishness. But maybe that’s the proof I’m right. Ungrateful child to the end, Gaylen disappeared the moment the prison doors slammed shut, and lifted not a finger to exonerate the mother she knows is innocent. Anyone who is unfairly incarcerated would unquestionably want to talk about it. Unless there were an ulterior motive.
I like this theory. And Will Easterly will soon have to break it to Dorinda. I now know her secret. If she doesn’t talk, I’m going to tell.
I see my turnoff onto Pamet Road, and navigate the final curves of my journey to the weekend. For Josh’s sake, and Penny’s, and my potential future with both of them, I won’t call Franklin about my revelation until tomorrow. On Saturday. He knows as well as I do, there are no weekends in TV.
CHAPTER 16
The white lace curtains over the open bedroom window flutter in the breeze, letting in the day. The morning sun feels different on the Cape. Maybe because there are no buildings to block it, maybe something about the pollution, or the wind across the ocean. I look at the empty space and rumpled pillow next to me, and allow myself a lazy playback of last night.
Happily, Penny had claimed what she labeled the princess room, a cozily bay-windowed whitewashed bedroom on the second floor. Tagging behind Josh and me as he gave the tour of their rented summer cottage, Penny showed how she installed Flo and Eddy on the dresser and ensconced Dickens in special stuffed animal bed made of the blue-and-white throw pillows from her bedroom love seat. The princess seat, she called it.
Josh’s bedroom is downstairs. And while Penny was finishing her vanilla frozen yogurt with only-white jimmies on top, her father had stealthily moved my suitcase into the same room. We were fairly certain the solidly sleeping Penny would never hear us, especially after we’d let her stay up too late watching Mary Poppins until she fell asleep, sated with popcorn, on the rumpled couch.
Josh carried her upstairs, then finally we were alone. And although we attempted to muffle each other’s late-night laughter with pillows, that made the whole hide-sex-from-the-eight-year-old escapade even funnier. Finally, desire and longing won over stealth. Time and place forgotten, Josh and I lost ourselves in lust and comfort and passion. And, as he repeated many delicious times, in love.
I run my hand across the yellow flowered sheet, back and forth, over the empty space Josh left behind. Remembering his words. His touch. This is what people do, if they’re lucky. A cozy home, summertime, kids with sand in their shoes and sunscreen on their noses, the smell of bacon and coffee in the morning, memories in the making.
When Mom was my age, I calculate, I was off in college. I never thought about her and Dads, someplace on vacation, cozy and happy. I’ve seen snapshots, wavy-edged and falling out of those glue-on triangular photo album corners, but they’ve always been from another time. Me age three, with curly hair and a floppy sunbonnet, standing barefoot on the beach at Lake Michigan. Mom looking like Deborah Kerr in a structured black bathing suit and dark glasses. Dads squinting, holding a towel, looking out of his urban element, surrounded by water and sand. They don’t seem like real people, that family from the past.
And yet, someday Josh and Penny will be captured in photographs like that. And me with them. Maybe. And I wonder why I’ve never thought before, that’s why people take photos. To try to capture happiness. Without the memories, though, the photos are just pieces of paper.
I roll over and scrabble though the pile of watch, beeper, reading glasses, water bottle, hand lotion, and Blistex on the nightstand beside me, looking for my cell phone. Talk about ungrateful daughters, focused on themselves. I dial the hospital. I’ve been thinking about Mom the mom, not Mom the person. Who probably, who certainly, just wants the same things I do. Love. Contentment. Family. And I’m part of her family. I need to let her know I understand. She just wants me to be happy.
“The patient you have called…”
Should I leave a message? I hang up the phone, deflated. But resolute. Later.