Body Surfing (27 page)

Sydney has no answer for the exuberant girl who would have been a magical tonic for a dying father.

Julie keeps her arm wrapped tightly around Sydney as they walk toward the house. Sydney would like to pause on the steps and collect her thoughts, but there is no time for that. Julie, dressed in jeans and a pink sweater, pulls her up the stairs. The girl is twenty-one now.

But once inside the door, as if understanding that Sydney might now need a moment to herself, Julie lets her go.

The white sofas are covered with large black trash bags. A note has been pinned to one of the bags: Salvation Army. On the floor are piles of household items--appliances, paintings, books. Sydney tries to discern an order to the piles. Perhaps each is meant for a member of the family. Which is Julie's pile? Sydney wonders. Or Ben's?

The sense of emptiness is palpable. Discolored oblongs dot the wall where paintings and maps once hung. Lamps have been disconnected, stacks of magazines tied with string. Slipcovers have been removed, rugs rolled up. A broom is propped up against a wall. A bottle of Windex sits on a sill, and, beneath it, a roll of paper towel has unraveled nearly to the center of the room. The last time Sydney was in this house, ribbons and bows decorated a stairway, and bowls of roses sent up a celebratory perfume. The last time Sydney was in the house, champagne and people waited for a wedding.

In the periphery of her vision, Sydney can see Mrs. Edwards standing by the counter in the kitchen. Sydney says hello, and Mrs. Edwards says hello back to her. The woman is astonishingly gaunt. She has cut her hair short and has lost all the weight any woman could ever wish to lose--worry and grief an immensely more effective diet than counting carbs. Sydney guesses there are few normal meals now. She walks to the counter. "I'm so sorry," she says.

"Why should you be sorry?" Mrs. Edwards asks, taking up a sponge and wiping the granite.

Over Mrs. Edwards's shoulder, Sydney can see through the window to the rose garden, or what is left of it. Single blooms bend from mostly leafless stalks. Where there are leaves, there are black spots. An entire garden of rose hips and rotted blossoms moves in the breeze. Part of the decay is due to the time of year, but most, Sydney can see, is simply from neglect.

The contents of a kitchen drawer have been laid out upon the counter above it. On a table in the dining room are cartons marked Dishes. Tablecloths, not yet put away, sit in a neat stack. Sydney recognizes the oilcloth used for lobster dinners, the damask napkins--old Emporia finds. Ben opens the refrigerator and takes out two bottles of water. He hands one to Sydney.

"We were just about to eat lunch," Julie says. "Are you hungry?"

"I'll just take a quick shower," Ben says.

Bread, ham, mayonnaise, tomatoes, and lettuce have all been arranged on the granite counter. The spread reminds Sydney of the sublime confections Mr. Edwards once put together in the panini maker. Sydney fixes herself a plain sandwich and is glad for it. She hasn't eaten anything since an early breakfast.

She sits with Julie at the kitchen table. Instinctively, Sydney looks for the crack in the wood on which she used to catch her sweaters.

"How are you?" Sydney asks. "How are you really?"

Julie's face and nose immediately turn red. "It's so hard!" she blurts out.

"I know," Sydney says, though, of course, she does not. Not entirely. Both of her own parents are still alive and apparently healthy, still speaking to each other, though not particularly friendly. Daniel happened, but that was different, over before Sydney even knew about it.

Julie takes a paper napkin from a loose pile and blows her nose. "I'm okay," she says. "Most of the time. Helene's been coming on weekends. Oh, I'm having a show."

"That's great," Sydney says. "In Montreal?"

"In a suburb near the city. It's a group show. I'll have three paintings in it. I should have brought slides."

"I'd love to see the show. When is it?"

"In January."

"Then I'll come."

"Would you?" Julie asks, her face alight. "There'll be a party. Helene's sure there will be a party."

"I'll definitely come," Sydney says, only just then realizing how hard it might be to visit Montreal again.

Beside her, Julie folds and refolds a new napkin. Sydney is reminded of the blue handkerchief now in a drawer in her apartment. "I can't believe he's gone," Sydney says. She can see so clearly the package of Gummy Lobsters in Mr. Edwards's hand; the spots of lobster juice on his pale green polo shirt; Mr. Edwards holding his stomach and bemoaning the doughnut he had at breakfast.

"He'd be glad you're here," Julie says.

"I wish I had known," Sydney says. "I would have come sooner."

"I knew you would have!" Julie cries. "Ben said no, but I was sure you would have wanted to come."

"You thought of calling me?" Sydney asks.

"God, Sydney," Julie says. "I only wrote you a hundred letters."

At the counter, Mrs. Edwards is wrapping up the ham and the lettuce. She puts them in the refrigerator. Sydney senses a slight reproof for not having done so herself. She stands with her dish and glass and walks them to the sink.

"You won't want your old room," Mrs. Edwards announces.

Sydney, startled, turns. "Oh, I can't stay," she explains.

Though an invitation has hardly been delivered, Mrs. Edwards appears miffed. "I thought you were staying," she says.

"Oh, stay!" Julie pleads from the table.

Sydney shakes her head. "I can't," she repeats.

"But surely you can stay for dinner," Mrs. Edwards says.

And Sydney decides, glancing at Mrs. Edwards and then at the young woman who has so recently lost her father, Yes, I can stay for dinner.

Sydney, loading the dishwasher, feels as if she has unintentionally fallen into her expected role--something between a guest and a servant. Julie has gone upstairs to pack her room. Behind Sydney, Mrs. Edwards wipes the granite counter. Sydney thinks by now it must be nearly sterile.

"I've never liked you," Mrs. Edwards says in a low voice. "I can't pretend I ever did."

Sydney holds a glass, someone's glass, in her hand. Despite the truth of the statement, and the fact that it is hardly news, she cannot believe what she has just heard. She slowly turns toward the woman.

"I suppose I should be sorry about that," Mrs. Edwards continues, not looking at Sydney, "but I can't pretend to be someone I'm not." The woman's sleeves are rolled to the elbows; the veins on her forearms are raised. "I can't pretend that I wasn't glad when Jeff. . .when Jeff did what he did. Well, I wasn't glad exactly," she says, folding the rag she is using and wiping the same spot she's been polishing. "It was embarrassing, and it was a tremendous hassle. Of course it was. But there was relief, too. I won't say there wasn't."

Sydney can think of no way to respond.

"I watched you leave the house," Mrs. Edwards continues, "and I said to myself, That's that."

Sydney sets down the glass and wipes her hands on a sheet of paper towel. "I think I should go," she says quietly.

"Oh, for heaven's sake, don't go," Mrs. Edwards says, as if Sydney has missed the point entirely. And only now does the woman look up at her. Perhaps she has been practicing this confession for months. "No, don't go now that you've just got here. Ben and Julie are glad that you've come. It's been hard on them. Especially with Jeff away. . ." Mrs. Edwards looks quickly up at the ceiling. "No, you're welcome now," she says. "That's not what I meant at all. I just wanted to say that I know I was rude to you all that time, and I'm, you know. . .It's too bad, that's all."

It is, Sydney thinks, an appalling confession. She searches for a reply, which Mrs. Edwards appears to expect. The silence draws itself out.

"Well, you wouldn't know what to say, would you?" Mrs. Edwards says. "I expect this is all a shock to you. It is to us, too, even though we've had months to get used to it. But it doesn't matter, does it? Time? There's never enough time."

Mrs. Edwards pauses in her cleaning, hand on the granite, and closes her eyes, like a woman trying to rid herself of hiccups. "I just miss him so much," she says. She covers her eyes with her arm, the cloth dangling from her hand.

Sydney, not knowing what else to do, moves toward the woman. She lightly touches her elbow.

Mrs. Edwards flinches, as if she had been singed.

Sydney seeks refuge in an upstairs bathroom. She walks to the window, draws back the curtains, and looks out at the marsh, moss-green and russet in the afternoon light. The water has left deep trenches in the mud. A flock of birds soars, an air show over the grasses. The birds change from gray-winged to white and back again, making crazy eights in perfect formation. They do it for the fun of it, she thinks.

To the north is a house on a hill, its white facade gleaming. Sydney spots a fox. Occasionally, she can hear, but not see, a car. All along the road, thickets of beach rose and something else make a nearly impenetrable wall. From where she stands, Sydney can peer into the backyard of the house next door. A slim boat waits in its blue plastic sleeve for summer. The windows of the cottage have been shuttered.

Across the marsh, the grocery store and lobster pound are closed. A few fishermen are coming in for the day, but they will have unloaded their catch elsewhere, perhaps in Portsmouth. The low-tide waters are reflective in parts, corrugated in others.

Sydney fingers the white curtain. The Reverend "Hemmings Motor News" ?used this bathroom. So did Art and Wendy. Sydney flashes on the image of a lamp in the shape of an antique car horn. Over the years, the house has sheltered perhaps hundreds of guests. Did the nuns have visitors? Did the unwed mothers? Would parents have come and scolded their young daughters and then wept at their bedsides? Would the political agitators have ignored the beauty of the marsh entirely, interested only in signs of smoke from the mills beyond?

Sydney thinks about Mrs. Edwards's confession. A death, her grief, has given Mrs. Edwards license. There will be no more dinner parties now. Sydney is reminded of the small double bed in the parental bedroom, of the photo on Mr. Edwards's desk. Sydney can never know how much love, physical or otherwise, there was between husband and wife.

Mrs. Edwards is now a widow. At last, Sydney thinks with some irony, the two women have something in common.

Sydney hears a knock on the door.

"Yes?" she calls.

"You okay?" The voice is Ben's. "You've been in there forever."

"I'm fine," she answers. "I'm just coming out."

She washes her hands, dries them, and opens the door. Ben is standing in the hallway, holding two sweatshirts.

"Want to go for a ride?" he asks.

Sydney, asked to hold the faded navy sweatshirts, wonders what they are for. They walk to a Jetta parked at the back of the house.

"Where's the Land Rover?" she asks.

"Sold it," Ben answers.

She takes the passenger seat and shuts the door. Ought she to be apprehensive about being alone with Ben, a man with whom she has never felt comfortable? But then the moment passes. The man has just lost his father, Sydney reasons. Isn't everything a little different now?

They drive in companionable silence the length of the beach road and into town, each place infused with both new life and abandonment: the new life in the girders and rafters of construction on the beach; the abandonment in the shuttered windows of the houses in the village. Only the post office has a vehicle parked in front of it.

Ben says, "You may have to get the cuffs of your pants wet. Is that all right?"

Sydney answers, yes, that is fine. It seems to her, as Ben turns on the engine of the Whaler, that she has hours ago stopped caring about her clothes or her appearance.

She zips up the sweatshirt and sits on the bait box.

The blue above the ocean is determinedly cleansed and rinsed after a long hot summer. The salt wind seems full of pure oxygen. The engine strains against the tide. It is impossible to speak to Ben, who is standing at the wheel behind her. Perhaps he means to round the point and have one last look at the summerhouse before it no longer belongs to his family. She understands that impulse but wonders why he wanted to bring her along. Possibly, having overheard his mother, he is only being kind.

But when they clear the gut, Ben heads west rather than east, his destination unclear to Sydney. The wind whips her hair straight back. The Whaler picks up its pace, slapping against the chop. She notes that the white cushions have turned a faint pink in spots, that the abraded deck is stained. A sense of disorder pervades the boat: a balled T-shirt in the bow; uncoiled rope on the console; a fishing rod, unsheathed, its hook dangling.

They round a promontory she has never seen before. They travel what seems a good distance, and Sydney begins to doubt the wisdom of having accepted Ben's invitation. She wonders, too, if she ought to have called one of her colleagues: Will they worry about her?

The Whaler heads along a shoreline she is not familiar with. Sydney is aware of islands, lobster buoys, a fishing boat coming into port. She feels, too, an odd sense of freedom, of having escaped the village as they run fast along the shore. Perhaps there is an agenda after all.