The Summer House (30 page)

It was difficult to believe that it had only been last night and that she had felt so happy, so blissfully content, as if she had come home, as if there had still been a home left to come to.

She didn’t even know how she felt about him. Had she loved him all these years? She had, of course, thought of him often, more often of late, since he’d entered the race against Michael. Once, such a thing had been inconceivable. But Liz had allowed herself only a few moments of wondering if he had done it on purpose, if he were trying
to prove he was good enough for her, if perhaps he still loved her, had always loved her, and this was his only way of proving it.

Then she had realized that was a feverishly selfish way of thinking, as if the world or anyone else’s world revolved around her.

“You know, of course, that Gay Head’s now called Aquinnah,” Tuna said to BeBe.

Liz tuned them out, these two people beside her who she suspected once had been lovers.

Old lovers
, Liz thought, and once again, an ache blossomed somewhere inside her.

She suddenly wondered if she should have told Josh that Danny was missing. Was that how it worked? Now that he knew Danny was really his son, was he entitled to know anything? And more importantly, did he
think
he was entitled to know anything?

She put a thumbnail into her mouth and slowly chewed the edge. Of course, Danny wasn’t a child; he was a full-fledged adult, legally entitled to make his own decisions. Did that make a difference?

The windshield wipers creaked. The breath of three adults crammed into the cab of the old truck began to steam up the windows. Tuna laughed. Then BeBe laughed.

Liz squeezed her eyes closed. “Shut up!” she screamed. “Both of you, please just shut up!”

The laughter halted, chopped like a carrot by a ginzu knife on one of those TV infomercials that Liz sometimes watched in the middle of the night when she could not sleep.

Liz opened her eyes and was not surprised to sense they were wet, as wet as the pavement that stretched up toward the lighthouse, the empty pavement where no cars—not even pink tourist buses—were parked at the souvenir shacks. No cars, no buses, no van. For a few
moments they sat there in silence, staring out at the vacant cliffs and the dark, choppy waters below.

“You’ll have to excuse my sister,” BeBe said softly. “She’s so worried about Danny.”

For all his seeming character flaws, Tuna at least had the sense not to speak.

Liz felt like a fool. “I’m sorry,” she said. “I have a lot on my mind, but that’s no excuse to be rude. I do appreciate your help, Tuna.”

“Guess it’s best to head down to Oak Bluffs,” Tuna said, steering the truck around the big, U-shaped loop, the one that began the return to the island.

And then Liz remembered that Danny had once called this spot “end of the world,” because your only choice was to turn back or to go forward, off into the sea. He had called it that long ago, back when he was a child, back when he was a whole child and would never have run off without letting his mother know where he had gone.

The boat pitched and rolled and heaved like a Disney World E-Ride gone out of control. Danny hung on to the edges of the bench where Reggie and LeeAnn had plunked him and tried to focus on not throwing up and on not looking to see if his catheter was full because there was nothing he could do if it was. It wasn’t as if he could mosey out of the wheelhouse, walk up to the rail, pop the cap, and drain his pee into Vineyard Sound. It wasn’t as if he could ask Reggie to do it for him, because Reggie had relieved LeeAnn and was now at the helm, struggling to keep the catamaran upright, struggling to keep them alive. He couldn’t ask LeeAnn, either, because she had gone below to puke her seasick guts out, and Danny could not have followed her there, because there was merely a ladder from the wheelhouse down to the galley
and bunks, and, well, ladders were pretty much out of the question for a guy with virtually no legs.

It was amazing, Danny mused, how focusing on battling the elements to stay alive took one’s mind off other, less consequential things, like learning your father was not who you thought.

“If we make it into the channel we’ll be okay,” Reggie shouted above the whip of wind that lashed against the windows.

Danny knew the channel was Canapitsit, which, tucked between Cuttyhunk and Nashawena, provided the only access from Vineyard Sound to the town dock at Cuttyhunk. He knew all this because, back in his youth, he had made it a point to learn all about the Indians and their influence on the Vineyard because he’d been trying to score points with LeeAnn and make her think he was really one of them, not one of those summer people who only “took” from the island and never gave back. It had never occurred to him that she knew what he was and had liked him in spite of it.

“We’re not going to make it to Penikese are we?” Danny asked.

Reggie pulled his eyes from the horizon and shouted above the roar of the wind. “Danny, my boy, we’ll be lucky to make Cuttyhunk. The storm is kicking up sooner than expected. LeeAnn was right. We were stupid to try.”

Danny dropped his gaze to the floor, to the wet, thin carpeting that had seen the feet of so many happy tourists. “Sorry, Reg,” he said. “I was miserable and depressed and had no right to drag you two into my problems.”

Suddenly the boat lurched on a wave that seemed as high as the Prudential Center in downtown Boston. Danny felt the roll come in a split second. He grabbed for the edge of the bench. But he was too late, and his body
was flung onto its side and dumped onto the blue indoor-outdoor-carpeted floor.

“Fuck,” he said.

“No kidding,” Reggie said. “Hold still a minute and I’ll get you up.”

“Forget about me,” Danny said, hoisting his upper body as upright as possible. “Keep us afloat. I’ll be fine until we get there.” With the force of his hands, that at least still worked, Danny tried to push his body around, tried to straighten the rest of himself so he would not be too twisted, so he would not break any bones if he already hadn’t. Pain below the waist, like pleasure, was something Danny did not have to worry about.

He did, however, have to worry about the catheter, which he now could see quite clearly and see that it bulged. Just as he knew that the last thing he could do to his friends was release his pee all over the boat, they hit another wave, and the boat pitched again. Danny automatically clutched at the catheter just in time for it to pop open and empty its contents.

“Jesus, Danny, are you okay?” It was LeeAnn’s voice, calling to him not from below deck where she should have been, but from the ladder she had climbed to check up on them.

He would have been more embarrassed if her face was not barf-seasick green.

“Just another day in paradise,” he said. “Sorry, though. It seems I’ve pissed the bed.”

Reggie glanced down at him, then back to the helm. “Jesus,” he said.

LeeAnn’s eyes fell to the floor, to the puddle of urine that surrounded him now, mixing with the rainwater and creeping up to his chest—he knew because he could feel its warmth there.

LeeAnn started to laugh. “This is absurd,” she yelled above the noisy assault of Mom Nature or whoever was
causing such chaos. “I’m downstairs puking my guts out, you’re up here pissing your pants, and Reggie is barely keeping us alive. I say it’s absurd and it’s more fun than I’ve had in years.” With that, she clutched her stomach, rolled her eyes, and ran back down to the galley, retching as she went.

“She’s right,” Danny admitted from where he was sprawled on the floor. “It’s more fun than I’ve had, too.”

“Which only proves,” Reggie added, “that you’re both assholes.”

Danny smiled. The boat rose up again, then quickly slapped down. And Danny realized that if he died out here, if they all died out here, it was better to die happy with friends than to die miserable and alone … or even worse, with people who had spent your whole life lying to you.

Chapter 27

By the time they arrived in Oak Bluffs, it was dark. Like Gay Head, it looked like a ghost town. BeBe gazed at the huge Victorian homes that rimmed the water and were now boarded up with beige plywood eye patches that covered their windows, blocking their view of the blackened sea. The few vehicles on the streets were mostly all parked, abandoned like the houses, waiting for the wrath of Carol.

They circled around the Flying Horses carousel and drove up Circuit Avenue, past the movie theater on the corner, past the T-shirt and fudge shops and the bar where Josh had once extricated BeBe. There was no green van parked in any of the angled spaces that bordered the left side of the street.

“Stop,” Liz commanded. “I’m going to go into the theater. Maybe he parked somewhere else.”

BeBe did not point out how unlikely it was that Danny would park any distance away since he would have to wheel himself all the way.

Tuna stepped on the brake and stopped the truck. Liz pulled the navy-lined slicker hood over her head, got out,
and slammed the door. The rumble from the truck bed told BeBe that Joe was following Liz.

BeBe dropped her face into her hands. “This is such a nightmare.”

“Does her son run away often?” Tuna asked.

BeBe shook her head. “You don’t understand. There’s so much more involved. So much at stake …”

“Do you think Barton will win the election? Do you think he has a chance to beat out the Jew?”

BeBe winced at the way Tuna referred to Josh, at the prejudice that people like Tuna—and Father—could not seem to break through. Despite how she felt about Josh, the prejudice repulsed her. “I don’t know if Michael will win the election,” BeBe said quietly. “I don’t know anything anymore.”

Tuna parked the truck. “Come on, Beebs, I’ll buy you a quick cup of coffee at Linda Jean’s. And you can tell me how rotten your life is, and I’ll tell you how perfect mine is.”

After a moment of hesitation, BeBe agreed. Even if Liz came back before they did, BeBe needed a break. And at least Tuna would always be Tuna and never pretend to be anyone else.

“My wife doesn’t understand me,” Tuna was saying while BeBe stared into the mug of steaming coffee. She didn’t know which was funnier—the outdated pickup line or the fact that Tuna thought there was anything there for his wife to understand in the first place.

“What’s to understand?” she asked. “You like to fish, you like to fuck. What else is there?”

“Come on, BeBe, you know me better than that.”

“No I don’t. And you’d better not be making a move on me, Tuna, because now’s not the time or the place,
and I’m definitely not the right person. Besides, the last time I saw you, you were happy with your marriage.”

“The last time you saw me was almost twenty-five years ago.”

“Shit,” she said, “we’re getting old, Tuna.”

“All the more reason we should take advantage of every opportunity that comes our way.” He took a long drink of his coffee, plucked a thin paper napkin from a chrome container, and wiped the Formica table where he had spilled a drop.

BeBe was fairly certain he wasn’t doing all this because he was neat.
He’s thinking
, she knew.
He’s thinking about making his next move
. She hated it that he was so transparent. She glanced out the window, wishing that
her
next move could be out the door, fast. Leave it to her to find the one man on the island knee-deep in male menopause, and to drag him back into her life. God, how she longed to be at her desk, consumed by her work, where the real world could not intrude.

“It must be exciting,” he said, “this political life. Being out there campaigning, traveling around the country.”

It took her a second to get what he meant. “Political life?” Then she laughed. “Not me, pal. I stay as far away from that as I can. That’s my sister’s life, not mine.”

“But you must get into part of it. All the celebrities that do all those golf tournaments and things. All the singers who perform at fund-raising concerts. God, it sure is a lot different than being stuck here on a damn island.”

BeBe leaned across the table. “Get this straight, Tuna. The last ‘celebrity’ I saw was James Taylor when he gave a benefit concert right here on this ‘damn island.’ I do not travel around the country. I live in Palm Beach, where I sweat to death in summer and work my ass off at my very successful business. I never have time to play golf; nor do
I care. And I’m sorry to disappoint you, but I like my life.” As she said it, she realized she wasn’t far from the truth. Well, not too far.

“Geez, what a waste,” Tuna said.

“Not really,” BeBe said, staring at him now, at the face that was leathered from too many years on the water, and weary perhaps from looking at the same wife for so long; the wife who probably also felt “stuck.”

“Thanks for the java.” BeBe stood up. “But I need to find out what my famous sister is doing.”

They left the restaurant, Tuna blessedly walking with distance between them, as if he had gotten the message, hallelujah. But BeBe felt a small seed of sadness for this man she had once known, sadness for his life, and for the lives, she supposed, of most people, whose lives had begun with so many possibilities that were now so few.