Julia's Daughters (26 page)

“I've thought about it, but not enough to do it.” She looks at me as she pushes down her sleeve. “I don't know how to explain it, but I never
wanted
to do it, Mom. It just . . . I just . . . did it.”

I look at her and smile. I can't tell her I understand completely because I don't, but I want her to know that I empathize with her. I exit the road, following the signs to Interstate 95/Maine Turnpike South. We'll be at the airport in fifteen minutes.

I glance over my shoulder as we get to the bottom of the ramp and I start to merge. I'm just turning my head to say something to Haley when I hear someone lay on the horn behind me and brakes squeal. I jerk the wheel and a big white utility truck goes flying past me, still laying on the horn.

“Oh my God,” I murmur. My heart is pounding as I ease back onto the interstate.

I look at Haley. She's pale, paler even than usual. “Are you okay?” My heart is pounding in my ears. “Haley?”

She looks at me. “That truck almost hit us.” Her voice is shaky.

“I'm sorry.” I feel shaky. That was
way
too close a call. “I didn't see the truck. I don't know where he came from.”

Haley turns her head slowly to look out into the driving rain and I see her reflection in the window. She hasn't asked to drive since the accident. I wonder if my near-miss brought back all the memories. “Are you all right?” I ask. “Do you need me to get off the interstate and pull over?”

She shakes her head. I can't read her face. “Let's just get Dad and go home.”

Chapter 40

Izzy

“I don't think it's going good,” I tell Haley.

“Well, it's not going
well,
” she corrects me.

I stick my tongue out at her.

We're supposed to be doing the dishes, but I keep coming up with excuses to go into Aunt Laney's dining room. If I stand on the far side of the table, I can hear Mom and Dad talking out on the front porch.

Mom and Dad were supposed to go out to dinner tonight. Like on a date. Aunt Laney and the boys were going to stay here and have spaghetti dinner with Haley and me. But Dad didn't want to go out, so Laney and the boys took some spaghetti and went to stay at the lake cottage for a couple of days. To give us some
space,
while Dad's here.

“Quit being nosy,” Haley tells me, coming into the dining room to get the water glasses off the table. “Get in there and load the dishwasher.”

I glance at the window. I can hear Dad talking, but I can't really hear what he's saying. His tone isn't good, though. He's talking quietly. He sounds really serious . . . and sad.

I walk back into the kitchen. Haley's rinsing dishes in the sink. “Help me load,” she tells me.

I stand there chewing on my lower lip. “You don't think Dad's going to make me go back to Vegas with him, do you? Because I don't want to go back. I want to stay here with you and Mom.”

She glances at me and then goes back to loading dirty dishes. “Four days ago, you didn't want to speak to me ever again,” she says, putting a glass in the top rack of the dishwasher. “Now you want to stay here with me?”

“You want me to stop talking to you?” I ask. I don't really want to stop talking to her. I didn't like how I felt when I was doing it. It made me feel alone. It's bad enough having to live without Caitlin. I don't want to live without Haley, too.

Haley turns to face me, wiping her hands on a dishtowel. Tonight she's wearing a pair of Liam's gray sweatpants, Aunt Laney's green fleece, and green sock/slipper things someone made Liam, but he doesn't like them. It's the first time I've seen my sister not wearing black in I don't know how long. She took her black fingernail polish off too.

“No, I don't want you to stop talking to me,” Haley tells me. “I don't want you to ever do that again. Okay? I don't care if you're mad at me. Because we're still sisters. Okay?”

When I don't answer right away, she says, “
Okay?
”

“Okay,” I tell her, loud.

“Good, now come load the silverware.” She points to the sink.

I slowly make my way over. I finally got my SpongeBob sleep pants back from Mom and I'm wearing them. I like them so much that I might wear them again tomorrow. “When do you think we'll have to go back?”

“I don't know. If Mom can convince Dad to move here, maybe we don't have to go back at all. You could just enroll in school here. You could go to Garret's school. Megan goes there.”

I think about that as I turn on the faucet and watch water run down the drain. Aunt Laney has a cool big white kitchen sink like you see on TV in old farmhouses. “Do you want to stay here?” I ask her.

She nods.

“Why? You've lived in Las Vegas for almost eighteen years. That's where your friends are. That's where our home is.”

“My friends aren't really my friends anymore. And it's where our house is,” she says. “But it doesn't feel like it's home anymore. You know?”

I like the way she's talking to me, like I'm older than ten.

“Mom thinks . . . I think,” Haley says, “that maybe here would be better for us because Caitlin never lived here.”

“But she came on vacation here,” I remind her. I'm not trying to argue with her. I'm just saying.

Haley looks down at me with her sad brown eyes. “It's not the same thing, though. I don't feel like it's the same. Do you?”

I rinse off a fork and drop it in the silverware basket. I have to reach around Haley and I bump into her, but I don't mind. I don't feel like she's an infectious disease anymore. I don't know if I've completely forgiven her for what happened, but I'm glad we're talking again because now I don't feel so lonely. “I guess not,” I say. I think for a second and then I look at her. “If I tell you a secret, will you swear you won't laugh? And you can't tell Mom.”

She turns to me. “I won't laugh. But is it dangerous?”

I shake my head.

“Then I won't tell Mom.”

I look down at the running water. It still feels weird to be talking to her after not talking to her for months. I mean she's still Haley, but she seems different, too. Everything seems different now. “When we were home,” I say softly, “I talked to her sometimes.”

Haley reaches out and smoothes my hair and looks at me the way Mom does sometimes. “Me too.”

“You did?” I look up at her. “Did she talk back to you?”

She shakes her head no. “She talk to you?”

I very slowly nod my head yes.

She grins. “Lucky dog.”

Chapter 41

Julia

I was so full of hope when I drove to the airport this afternoon. Granted, I was apprehensive, but I was still clinging to the idea that Ben would do anything for us. If push came to shove.

It's coming to pushing and shoving, now.

We're lying in Laney's bed, me in a cute nightie I borrowed from her, him in his boxers. The girls have gone to bed. Laney and her boys are staying at the lake cottage to give us some privacy. We had a nice family dinner, spaghetti and meatballs, even wine. Then Ben and I went out on the porch to talk. That's when the family reunion started to go downhill. We picked up the conversation again, after we all turned in for the night.

I'm devastated.

My conversations with Ben this evening have gone nothing like I imagined they would go, even worst-case scenario. I actually thought we might have sex tonight. I shaved my legs.

I don't think there's going to be any sex tonight.

Not only has Ben made it clear he's not willing to move to Maine with us, but now he's telling me he's brought me information about boarding school for Izzy. He wants to send her to St. Andrews in Northern California where he and his brothers went. Now. As in next week. He wants her to fly back with him so he can
get her settled
and Haley and I can just wander back cross-country when we're ready. Apparently he and Linda cooked up this idea. With Haley turning eighteen in a couple of weeks, he realized (or
she
realized and told him) he couldn't force her to do anything, but I guess their idea is that he can still control Izzy. Still
save
her. From me.

I stare up at the ceiling of Laney's bedroom, trying to follow where he's going with this. We're lying side by side, but I feel as far from him as I've ever felt in our married life. “But Izzy hasn't even been a problem. Why would you think we should send her away?”

I'll give him credit, at least he'll look me the eye. He turns his head. “Jules, let's face it. You haven't been yourself since the accident.”

“What's that supposed to mean?” I stare at him. “My
child
died.”

“And so did mine. But it's not normal, to lie in bed for two months and then . . . this.”

“Driving here. Now saying we should all move to Maine and open a restaurant.”

“A café,” I correct.

“If Izzy went away to school, it would give you some time to get yourself together.”

“Get myself
together?
” I repeat testily. “And what about Haley?”

“What about her? We'll get her counseling, like we talked about, but honestly, as I said—” He exhales. “I don't know why we have to keep rehashing stuff.” He stops and starts again. “Once she turns eighteen, I don't know what we
can
do with her. Legally, she can leave our house. She can go live on Crack Street if she wants and there's nothing we can do about it.”

I roll onto my side so I'm facing him and I draw up my knees, wanting to curl into a fetal positing. I'm so profoundly sad and angry and . . . sad. “You won't even
consider
moving here?” I look up into his beautiful brown eyes that I've loved for so many years. “Come on, Ben. Forget about what Linda's saying. Think for yourself. My idea for the café is a good one, and you know it. Totally feasible. I told you, the rent is dirt cheap and Laney knows someone who might be interested in being some sort of silent partner so I might be able to get some financial backing. I even talked to a couple of the restaurant owners and managers in town. There's definitely a place for the kind of café I'm talking about. Organic is big in the area and getting bigger.” I reach out and lay my hand on his broad shoulder. “This was our dream, Ben. Remember?”

He shakes his head. “I can't do it, Jules.”

“Why not?” I fight back tears. I'm not going to cry. I can't cry. “Why can't you? We have the money. If you sell your quarter of the business, we could easily live at least two years without having to make a profit, even pouring money into the café.”

“And what if this business fails, Jules?”

His expression is earnest. I think about what Haley said about me expecting more from him than he had to give. Maybe Izzy's not my only wise daughter.

“What then?” he asks. “After I've spent my whole adult life building our lawn business at home, what do we do if this fails?”

“I don't know. We pick up the pieces and we start again.” I grip his shoulder. “
Together,
you and I and Haley and Izzy.”

He rolls onto his back and rests his fist on his forehead. He stares up. “My life is in Las Vegas. My life is my business. My family.”

I push up with one hand, leaning over him. “
We're
your family.”

His eyes fill with tears. “I can't do it, Jules.” He slips his arm around me and pulls me down against him. “I just can't do it.”

I rest my cheek on his bare chest and listen to his heart beating. I smell the scent of his skin that mingles with the scent of the lavender sheets. “So what does that mean?” I whisper.

“Are you set on this? Moving here with the girls?”

My voice catches in my throat. I feel like death has come to us again, only this time, it's not a child I'm losing. It's my marriage. It's twenty years of laughter . . . and tears. And it hurts. When I spoke my vows, promising to be with him until death do us part, I always assumed that meant the death of one of us. It never occurred to me that it might mean the death of a child.

But it's the right thing to do. I know it.

And I think he does too.

Chapter 42

Haley

 

I had a bit of an epiphany last night, and this morning I'm still trying to work through it. I took the pipsqueak to the bakery to get fresh doughnuts to give Mom and Dad a little bit of time alone and now we're walking back. Dad's going back to Vegas today.

We're not.

I haven't totally worked my way through this whole mess. I can only deal with so many things at once and honestly, my parents' marriage is more their problem than mine.

I looked up the word
epiphany
this morning on Caitlin's iPad. I thought I knew what it meant, but I just wanted to check. It can mean the manifestation of Christ to the Gentiles, as represented by the Magi. But it can also mean a sudden insight into a reality, initiated by a commonplace occurrence. My epiphany wasn't exactly sudden . . . but close.

Two days ago, when Mom and I went to the airport to pick up Dad, Mom almost merged us into a four-ton utility truck. If we'd collided, going at that speed, someone could have died, in our car or the other vehicle. It probably would have been one of us, considering the size of Mom's Toyota versus the size of that truck.

She didn't mean to do it.

It was raining and visibility wasn't good and there was a lot of traffic. If she
had
hit that truck, I wouldn't have blamed her. Not even if I were dead now, hanging out in my little sister's bedroom, talking to her in the dark when she's scared.

If Mom had killed me on that interstate, it would have been an accident.

And that's all it was at the intersection two months ago.

I didn't kill Caitlin on purpose. I made a mistake. A horrible, terrible mistake. But just a mistake.

So it's only logical that I stop holding it against myself. Mom and Dad never blamed me. Izzy doesn't blame me anymore. I need to let it go. The way I would want Caitlin to let it go if
she
had been the one driving that night.

I'm feeling a little shaky and I take a deep breath.

The idea of forgiving myself is overwhelming. I mean, I've spent the last two months of my life beating myself up twenty-four hours a day.
Cutting
myself up. I spent my every waking hour being angry at people at school, at Mom, at the whole world, but mostly at myself. But if I stop beating myself up over this, what am I going to do now? The Haley I was before Caitlin died is gone; there's no doubt about that. Who am I going to be now?

I have a feeling there's going to be no epiphany with that one.

“So . . . we're not going back to Las Vegas
at all?
” Izzy asks me, bringing me back to the sidewalk and the hot coffee I'm carrying for Mom. She doesn't sound upset.

I glance over at her. I can smell the warm doughnuts in the bag she's carrying. She already ate one; there's sugar on the corners of her mouth.

“I don't know. Maybe to get our stuff. Do you want to say good-bye to your friends? To Nana?”

She thinks for a minute and then shrugs. “Not really. Nana didn't like me that much. And I can FaceTime my friends.”

I smile to myself.

“And Dad's really not coming back here? He'd rather stay with them than come with us?”

I exhale. “It's way more complicated than that.”

When Mom and Dad sat us down last night and told us they were separating, Izzy bawled. And I got a little teary. But . . . I don't think I can go back to that house and I don't think I'm ready to be on my own, either. Hell, right now, I'm a high school dropout. I need Mom. And I need Izzy. And losing Dad . . . fallout. There has to be some, doesn't there? And I don't think this is the end of my relationship with Dad. We'll figure things out, he and I.

I think Mom and Dad are making the right decision and I'm proud of Mom. I know this can't have been easy for her. She was only a few months older than me when she met Dad. (I can't imagine me, right now, being old enough to choose a lifelong mate. I had a hard enough time picking out doughnuts this morning.) But I think once we got to Maine, Mom realized that even though she left Vegas thinking our road trip was a way to save me, it ended up being about saving herself, too. I wouldn't say so, but even though Mom wasn't cutting herself with razor blades, I think she was as screwed up as I was.

“You going to be okay living here with me and Mom?” I ask my little sister. “Because you can go to Vegas with Dad. Mom said so.”

She frowns. “It disappoints me that you'd say that. You're my sister. You should know me better than that.”

I shrug. “When a family is splitting up, it's important that children don't feel they're powerless.”

“Did you read that S on the Internet?” She licks sugar off her finger. “You're an idiot.”

I laugh because while it may not be a nice thing to say to your sister, I know she doesn't mean anything by it. And the fact that she's speaking to me again is worth any derogatory remarks she can throw my way.

When we get back to Laney's house, Mom and Dad are on the front porch, talking quietly. They both look sad . . . but not mad. It's clear this was a mutual agreement and there was no question that Mom would keep Izzy, which is good because I think that will make things easier for Izzy. It wouldn't be good for her to have her parents in some kind of crazy-ass custody battle like the kind some of my friends have gone through over the years.

I see Dad's duffel bag at the bottom of the steps. He didn't bring much with him; I don't think he ever had any intention of staying with us long. I wonder if it hurts him too much to be with us, with Caitlin gone now. Kind of like me not being able to be in our house. I don't get it because people are different than things, but I'm trying not to judge. I, of all people, ought to know that everyone deals with their pain in different ways. Even if I never cut myself again, I'll probably carry that reminder for the rest of my life.

When Mom sees us, she comes down the steps. “I was beginning to wonder if you got lost.”

“We waited for a fresh batch. They had blueberry and the cinnamon crunch. We got a dozen.” Izzy holds up the bag.

I hand Mom her caramel latte and look up at Dad, who's coming down the steps. “We're not taking you to the airport?” I ask him. I keep my tone neutral. I'm trying to be mature about this whole thing, but there's still a little part of me that's disappointed in him, that he can't be who we need him to be.

“I called a cab,” he says.

He looks sad. And his eyes are red. Mom's obviously been crying, but I think maybe he has been too.

“I wish you could stay another day, Dad,” Izzy says. “There's a show on Discovery tonight about how maybe aliens came from another solar system and built the pyramids.”

He puts one arm around her and kisses the top of her head. “The Egyptians built the pyramids, sweetie. We have records.”

“I know.” She sniffs. Her eyes are getting watery too. But she's not crying. “But it's fun to watch things together.”

“So maybe we can figure out how to FaceTime and watch shows together.”

She frowns. “With the time zone difference?”

“Quit being a naysayer. We'll
record
the shows and watch them together.” He kisses her again, like he can't get enough of her.

She looks to me. “What's a naysayer?”

“What it sounds like, but I'll explain it to you later,” I tell her, seeing the cab approach.

We all watch in silence as the cab pulls up in front of Laney's house.

Dad grabs his duffel and Mom walks over to him and they say something I can't hear. Then Dad kisses her on the cheek, which makes me tear up. I have the sudden thought that maybe we're making a terrible mistake. That maybe we should just go back to Vegas with Dad and try harder. But looking at Mom's face, I know that's not an option now, at least for her. Which means it isn't for me. My first inclination when Mom and Dad told us last night that they were separating, my first impulse was to blame myself. One more way I've screwed things up. But I know I'm not responsible for this. I don't know if Caitlin hadn't died, if they could stay together, but I know that marriages often don't withstand this kind of tragedy.

Dad lets go of Mom and walks over and hugs Izzy again. Then he turns to me. I'm going to feel like an idiot if I start crying.

“Bye, Haley.” He puts his arm around me.

I turn around and throw both arms around him. “I'm sorry, Dad,” I whisper. “For everything.”

He squeezes me, his voice breaking. “I know.”

We all stand together in a huddle and watch Dad get into the cab. Izzy lifts her hand to him, the doughnuts still in her other hand.

I put my arm around her and whisper. “It's going to be okay, Sizzy Izzy. We're going to be okay.”