Chance Harbor (43 page)

“I do not! Russell, she’s not here!” Catherine said, feeling her heart start racing. “Willow never came home yesterday. In fact, she texted me to say she planned to spend Sunday night at your place because you were going to help her with a paper. I thought you were taking her to school tomorrow morning. Why? What did she tell you?”

“She didn’t tell me anything!” Russell roared. “That’s what I was saying! Willow texted me while I was at the store yesterday morning and said she was leaving to study with a friend at your house.”

“Oh my God,” Catherine whispered. “So where is she?”

“I don’t know. Jesus. Where’s Zoe? Could Willow have sneaked off to see her?”

“That must be it,” Catherine said. “Mom called last night and asked me to come to Newburyport to speak to Zoe. Apparently Zoe had some kind of relapse and was drinking. She’s at Mom’s house in Newburyport right now, and Mom wanted Willow to come with me to talk to Zoe. Some kind of family intervention, I think. Mom asked Zoe’s friend Grey to be there, too. I told Mom I didn’t want to do it, but maybe Mom called Willow and asked her to come anyway.”

“She wouldn’t do that,” Russell said. “Your mother would never tell Willow to come up to Newburyport alone. And, anyway, that still doesn’t explain where Willow was last night.”

Catherine was having trouble breathing. “With another friend, maybe? So she could go to Mom’s this morning on her own without telling us? She knows how we feel about Zoe. And, if Mom thought it would help Zoe to hear Willow ask her to stay sober, Mom would do it.”

“Did she have money?”

“I don’t know,” Catherine said. “But the bus doesn’t cost much. She’d figure out a way. Look, I’m hanging up now to call Mom. I’ll call you back.”

“All right,” Russell said.

Catherine dialed Willow’s number. When there was no answer, she called her mother; when Eve picked up, she barked into the phone, “Is Willow there?”

“No, of course not,” her mother said. “You said she was at Russell’s.”

“I thought she was, but Russell just called me to say that Willow didn’t spend the night at his house,” Catherine said, fumbling for the right words. Her throat was tight with fear as she explained what was going on.

“Could she have spent the night with a friend?” Eve asked.

“I don’t know! Did you talk to her? Tell her what happened with Zoe last night?”

“I didn’t tell her about Zoe’s behavior, but Willow did call me this morning. She wanted to know if she could come up here next weekend and maybe see her mother at my house, since you don’t want her seeing Zoe unsupervised. But I would never, ever tell Willow to see her mother without your permission. I certainly didn’t tell her to come up here this morning.”

Catherine thought about this, biting her lip hard enough to hurt. “Did you tell her Zoe’s at your house, though?”

“Yes.”

“All right. Keep Zoe there, will you, please? I’m betting Willow might try to come up and see her. I’ll head up to Newburyport and catch up with her there.”

“That doesn’t make sense, honey. Willow wouldn’t come up here without you, would she?”

“Why not? She went to Salisbury by herself,” Catherine said. “I don’t know what Willow’s capable of anymore, Mom. Look, I’ve got to go. I’ll call you when I know something.” She hung up and dialed Russell as she hurried back up her porch steps. She told him what her mother had said, adding, “Can you stay home today, in case Willow shows up back at your place? I’m going up to Mom’s. Zoe’s there, and Willow talked to Mom this morning, so she knows that. I’m betting that Willow’s on her way to Newburyport.”

“Wait,” Russell said.

Catherine heard a voice in the background: Nola. She waited several moments before he came back on. “Nola says she knows where Willow might have spent last night.”

Catherine unlocked her front door, grabbed the car keys off the table in the front hall, and let herself out again. “Why would Nola know?”

“She took her there, apparently,” Russell said. “They drove out to Framingham. Willow wanted to meet her real dad. Some guy named Mike Navarro. Have you heard of him?”

Catherine swore under her breath. Nola’s fault, again! “Yes. He used to be Zoe’s boyfriend. Then they were roommates for a while. I don’t think he’s really Willow’s dad. Did Nola give you his address?”

“Yes. She’s finding the number for me online right now. Hopefully the guy has a landline. Wait for me to call him before you start driving north, all right? Otherwise you might be on a wild-goose chase.”

“All right. But hurry,” Catherine said, because she couldn’t imagine waiting at the house and doing nothing if Willow was in some kind of danger.

But maybe she wasn’t. Maybe—in the best of all possible worlds—she really
had
found her father, and it was as simple as that: locating Mike Navarro, whom Catherine vaguely remembered as a skinny nerd who used to love playing Ping-Pong with them in the basement of their house in Newburyport. Mike had come up to Chance Harbor with them once, too, and entertained them with magic tricks.

Russell called a few minutes later. “All right,” he said. “I talked to Mike. He says Willow spent the night at his house. She told him she’d cleared that with us.”

“That little sneak.” Catherine felt a pulse start in her temple, like someone was pushing something sharp there. “Why is she lying to us about everything all of a sudden?”

“I don’t know,” Russell said, sounding grim, “but I’m sure you’re going to say this is all my fault.”

Catherine wanted to blame him. To blame someone. But she said, “No, it’s not all you. It’s everything.”

They were both quiet for a moment. Then he went on. “Mike thinks you’re right that Willow’s trying to see Zoe. He says he dropped her off at the bus station in Framingham this morning. She told him she was taking a bus to her grandmother’s house.”

“Did he know which bus?”

“No,” Russell said. “But according to what he told me, and to the schedule I found online, she probably got on the eight o’clock from Framingham to Boston. If she got directly on the nine o’clock bus to Newburyport after that, she’d be there by ten ten.”

“I’m driving up there,” Catherine said. “Oh, and tell Nola thanks very much for continuing to make my life such a fucking nightmare.”

•   •   •

Zoe sat bolt upright in bed, as if an alarm had gone off. Her short hair was pushed to one side of her narrow face, giving her the look of a molting bird. The bruise on her cheek was an extravagant blossom of red and purple. “Why am I in my old room?” she asked in astonishment.

Eve had been sitting beside her since Catherine’s call, the cell phone in her hand, about to wake Zoe and ask if she’d talked to Willow last night. “I put you to bed here. What do you remember about last night?”

“Not a lot.” Zoe looked quickly around the room, then stared intently down at herself, as if checking for wounds.

Eve waited quietly beside her. She imagined this must be a routine that Zoe had developed over the years. She shuddered a little, thinking of all the times Zoe must have been as out of it as she’d seemed to be last night. So much could have happened to a young woman in that vulnerable state. Probably
had
happened, in Zoe’s case.

Then Eve remembered what Catherine had said about Willow. The poor child. What had she seen and heard through the years? And where could Willow be now? Eve had to hope that Willow was sensible enough to keep herself safe.

Zoe took a deep breath and looked at her now with troubled eyes. “I remember you finding me outside,” she said. “I was pretty drunk.”

“Yes. Did you do anything else?”

“What do you mean?”

“Drugs, honey.”

Zoe shook her head. “I was on my way home from Cambridge, but I was upset, so I stopped at a bar in Newburyport. Some guy kept buying me drinks. I made myself throw up in the ladies’ room because I realized I’d had too much, but I knew I still shouldn’t drive. I walked here. God. I don’t even remember where I left the car.”

“Where were you before the bar?”

“Catherine’s.” Zoe put a hand to her mouth for a minute, wincing, then said, “We had a fight. A bad one. She threw me out of her house.”

“What was it about?”

“Willow.” Zoe lay back down on the pillow and pulled the covers to her chin. “Cat hates me now because of some things I told her.”

“What things?”

Zoe closed her eyes and thrashed her head hard against the pillow. “I don’t want to tell you. I shouldn’t have even told Catherine. I was just trying to explain why I left Willow. How I was trying to protect her. But Catherine told me I’ve fucked up Willow’s whole life.” She opened her eyes again and stared up at Eve. “Do you think that’s true?”

“No,” Eve said with as much certainty as she could inject into her voice. “Willow is resilient and smart and loving. Anyone who knows her can see that.”

“I’m not sure. That’s what Willow
lets
us see,” Zoe said miserably. “I think she might be unhappy, Mom. Really unhappy. And that’s my fault.”

She could be right, Eve thought, but there was no point in speculating about that. “Did you talk to Willow last night, honey?”

Zoe shook her head. “No. Why?”

Eve debated about whether to tell Zoe that Willow was missing, then decided there was no point in saying anything about that, either, because it might upset Zoe. She couldn’t chance that now, with Grey on his way. She could only hope that Willow had spent the night with a friend and was perfectly fine, just feeling rebellious because Catherine wouldn’t let her see her mother.

Not that Eve blamed Catherine for being protective, but the sisters were going to have to work something out that would allow Willow more regular contact with Zoe, at least if they could keep Zoe on the straight and narrow. Which was her main goal this morning, in asking Catherine and Grey and Willow to come to Newburyport: Eve wanted to convince Zoe that her actions affected all of them, not just herself.

Finally, Eve said, “No reason. I just wondered. Anyway, I’m glad you came here last night. I’ve been trying to find time to see you alone. I need to tell you some things that might help you. I fucked up, too.”

Zoe gave her a sharp look. “Mom! I can’t believe you said the F word.”

“I meant it, though. I royally fucked up.”

“Quit saying that! It doesn’t sound like you!”

“I’m sorry, honey. But there really isn’t another word for what I did. For so many mistakes I made.”

“Like what?” Zoe challenged, then instantly raised both hands to ward off an answer. “No. I don’t want to know.”

“Yes, you do.” Eve sat up beside her. “And I don’t have any choice. I have to tell you these things because they concern you. You and your father,” she added.

“Daddy,” Zoe said mournfully. “He hated me as much as Cat does.”

“No, sweetie. He just couldn’t see you as a person.”

“What does that even mean?” Zoe chewed on a thumbnail.

Eve put a hand on her daughter’s wrist, tugged Zoe’s fingers away from her mouth. “Daddy wasn’t your real father.”

“
What?
”

Eve had never actually seen someone’s mouth drop open in surprise before, but her daughter’s did now. It was almost comic.

“See?” she said. “You’re not the only one who fucks things up.” Eve watched as a series of complicated emotions passed over her daughter’s pretty freckled face. Waited for the inevitable questions.

Finally, Zoe said, “Did Daddy know I wasn’t his?”

“Oh, yes.”

“So you had an affair after Catherine was born? Wow. Why?”

Eve hesitated as she formed a response. She was so sick and tired of lies. Lying had obviously never done their family any good at all. “Your father was seeing another woman and I was hurt. Devastated, really. I thought it was somehow my fault that he wasn’t satisfied. I had an affair because of that, only the affair turned into something more. I fell in love with that man and got pregnant with you.”

Zoe’s face was pinched with shock. “Who was he?”

“Your dad’s cousin Malcolm. He was a fisherman on PEI.”

“Did I ever meet him?” Zoe looked panicked now, her eyes darting about the room.

“No.” Eve felt the weight of her old sorrow, heavy and damp, as if she were lying facedown in a chilly field, a boot on her neck.

One therapist she’d seen after Zoe disappeared, when Andrew was trying to convince her to have a memorial service for her, had tried to explain to Eve that each person’s sorrows harken back to some original pain. The past is always with us, the therapist said, so there’s no point in ignoring any of it. “Love yourself as you were in childhood, during adolescence, and as a young woman, and you will love yourself now,” she had promised.

Eve hadn’t ever tried following that advice. But now she knew that the therapist was right. She could see in Zoe’s adult face how she’d looked as an infant, her cheeks round, her hands chubby. She remembered the satisfying physical sensation of Zoe clinging to her neck when she cried, hot with fever or murmuring in her sleep.

At the same time, Eve could picture Zoe exactly as she’d looked as a skinny girl in elementary school, wearing a hot pink snowsuit and tunneling through snowdrifts with Catherine. She could also envision Zoe as a teenage girl in tight jeans and tank tops with armholes cut dangerously low, a girl who’d learned the power she had to attract boys and men, and as a harried single mother scraping by in an apartment where every day there were noisy arguments in the apartments around her, the sounds of despair and anger filtering through the floor and ceiling.

Yes. The past was with her, and with Zoe, too, going all the way back to Eve’s own feelings of anger and abandonment with Andrew, to her affair with Malcolm and Zoe’s beginning, to Eve’s love for this daughter and her mistakes winding through Zoe’s life, through Zoe’s own love for Willow and mistakes as a mother, all of that twining together like strands of the same rope.

“Mom?” Zoe said, startling Eve into wakefulness again, though she’d been sitting there with her eyes open. “What happened to my real dad?”

“Malcolm drowned before you were born,” she said.

Zoe’s eyes swam with tears. “Oh.”