Off Season (6 page)

Listening to an announcement for another departure and another arrival, Jill decided the first thing she’d do when she got home was call Addie and decline, before there was any more time wasted on
if onlys
and
what ifs
.

“Where’s Ben?” Jill asked her daughter, who had not had burgundy-colored hair the last time Jill had seen her but definitely did now. She smiled quickly at the thought that burgundy hair and the tiny heart tattoo above her daughter’s ankle once would have seemed earth-shatteringly rebellious.

“He’s at the museum, I guess,” Amy replied, kissing her mother’s cheek and helping carry the suitcases without being asked. “I left early this morning. I told him last night that I’d pick you up.”

Once Jill would have suspected that meant Amy had an agenda. Now she expected it and it didn’t matter: Jill no longer lived in a constant state of being braced, waiting for that proverbial shoe—or in Amy’s case, platform sandal—to drop. Since she’d found that once-elusive inner peace, things like agendas and shoes and heart tattoos no longer mattered.

Still, she thought as they went out to the car and loaded up the trunk, it would be nice to go home, take a hot bath, and maybe go through the mail, before being accosted by the crisis of the week. She smiled, reminding herself that nothing was perfect, nothing at all.

“What’s so important it couldn’t wait until tonight?” she asked, climbing into the passenger side, liking that sometimes it was fun for Amy to be in control, both at the wheel and in her own life.

“Mom,” Amy cried with a fake whine as she started the engine, “I missed you, that’s all. And I couldn’t wait
to tell you that we’re going to have the Halloween party at the tavern and Charlie’s put me in charge of the whole thing. Do you have any connections with Elvira, Mistress of the Dark?”

Jill laughed. “Afraid not. Addie might, though. But it’s not quite a good enough reason for me to reconsider. Sorry.”

Amy was silent a moment, as she steered the car out of the parking lot. “Addie Becker?” she asked quietly. “Wow. There’s a blast from the past.”

Jill looked over at her daughter. “I know. I can’t believe she called me.”

“God. What does she want?”

Despite the burgundy hair, Amy was no longer the same restless, out-of-control teenager she had been back when Jill supposedly could have had it all, back when Addie Becker was in charge of their lives.

“Don’t worry, honey,” Jill said. “I’m going to say ‘Thanks, but no thanks.’ ”

Amy was quiet again, almost remorseful, as if she were traveling not toward Edgartown but down the dark tunnel of time, back to a place she’d rather not go. “What are you saying no to?” Her curiosity apparently won the tug-of-war with her remorse.

Jill told her of Addie’s request to fill in for Lizette for a month during ratings sweeps. “My guess is that the show needs a boost. Someone decided a reunion between Christopher and me would give them just that.”

Amy wrinkled her nose. “If you’d stayed on the show and we’d moved to L.A., Mom, I’d probably be dead. I probably would have gotten into drugs. And sex. Oh, God,” she added with a shudder, “my experience with Kyle would probably have seemed tame.”

Though Jill knew it was healthy that Amy felt free to talk of the past—and Kyle—she had never quite forgotten the long-ago shock of walking in on her fourteen-year-old
daughter having sex with that boy. It was a sordid, piercing picture that the dusting of time had not yet erased.

“Well, it’s not going to happen. And don’t mention it to Ben, okay? He doesn’t know.”

“Not to worry,” Amy said. “But does this mean you have no connections for the Halloween party?”

Jill smiled. As much as she wished Amy had chosen to go to college, it was good to have at least one of her children around to keep life in perspective. “Was that the real reason you picked me up? To see if I could procure the Mistress of the Dark?”

“No. I wanted to ask you if I can take a winter rental.”

Jill reminded herself that a minute ago she’d been eager to get home. Before she could say a word, Amy quickly continued.

“I’m eighteen, Mom. It’s time I started learning how to take care of myself. Before you say no, remember that this is an island. It’s not Boston or L.A. I just want a little independence practically in your backyard. I’ve saved some money and can almost pay for everything myself. I wouldn’t need much financial help, and the way I figure it, if I’d gone away to college, it would have cost a whole lot more.”

All that said, Amy planted both hands on the wheel and fixed her eyes on the road in responsible-driver posture.

Responsible, but still young.

“Not yet, honey,” Jill said firmly. She sensed Amy’s grip tighten on the wheel. Then she closed her eyes and wished they’d get home where Ben would restore the peace she’d just felt slide away.

•   •   •

Jill had spent twenty-five years living off-island and had traveled around the world, but she’d come to learn that, teenagers aside, there truly was “no place like home.” And there was no more comfortable place to eat a meal than at the 1802 Tavern in Edgartown, where she’d grown up waiting for her father to close up for the night.

Though George Randall had been dead many years, the familiar aromas of clam chowder and dark beer still filled the restaurant, the hand-hewn ceiling beams and whaling prints on the stucco walls still sculpted the interior, and the sounds of thick-Boston-accented voices like Rita’s and Charlie’s told her that she still belonged there, then, now, and forever.

She had thought Ben had understood all that, but tonight he’d said he didn’t want to go out. Oddly, she’d found him home when she and Amy arrived: it was only four-thirty in the afternoon, a time when Ben would usually be at the museum.

“I wanted to be here to meet you,” he’d said.

She delayed phoning Addie because he suggested they go up to the widow’s walk to the Jacuzzi.

She’d thought that they’d make love, but they did not.

With uncharacteristic remoteness, he’d answered her questions about life while she’d been away: about the museum, about the Sea Grove project, about Amy. Then she told him about Addie and Christopher and
Good Night, USA
. She could not tell if he was surprised that the offer had been made, or if he was pleased with her decision to say no.

She could not tell, because he seemed so distant. Oh sure, he’d responded; he’d acknowledged her and made appropriate comments once or twice. But he was not himself, and they had not made love.

She had no idea why.

And when he’d finally acquiesced to go out, he acted like a stranger, with a familiar face but a phony smile.

“My table tonight,” Rita said as she approached, pad in hand and pencil tucked in the red curls over her ear. “I wouldn’t mind, but your daughter says you’re a lousy tipper.” It might have been funny, but Rita had said the words mechanically, as if it were a stock waitress joke. Besides, Rita looked pasty and forlorn and in not very good humor.

“Are you okay?” Jill asked her longtime best friend, who replied with a pause, then a lifeless nod. Jill fiddled with the menu. “Amy’s upset with me,” she continued. “She wants to move out. I say she’s too young.”

“Yeah,” Rita managed to say. “She told me. She said, ‘As usual, Mom won’t let me breathe.’ ”

Whether it was Amy’s comment or Rita’s bluntness in relaying it, Jill didn’t know, but something caused anger to rise up in her. Maybe it seemed misplaced that Amy had confided in Rita, Jill’s best friend, not Amy’s. “How did you respond?” the mother of the nonbreathing daughter asked.

Rita made small doodles on her order pad but looked neither at Jill nor at Ben. “I said she’s eighteen now and can probably do just about everything legal except drink or vote.”

“Rita!” Jill blurted out. “I thought you were my friend!”

She stopped doodling, tucked the pencil over her ear, and folded her arms. “I also told her that the law expects one should pay one’s own way. Then I reminded her that once we close the tavern for the season, she—like most of us—will have a hard time finding work. That seemed to shut her up on the subject.” She plucked her pencil, again with indifference, and poised it over the pad. “So what’ll it be tonight?”

Jill looked to Ben. But he seemed lost in the menu as if he were making a monumental decision, as if he didn’t know the menu by heart. “I’ll have the turkey and cranberry sauce on wheat toast,” he said without looking up.

Jill’s eyes met Rita’s, who seemed not to notice Ben’s remoteness. Jill shook her head. “I’ll have the same.”

Rita nodded. “Two gobblers,” she scribbled. “Chowder?”

“No,” Jill replied, but Ben just handed Rita the menu as if he’d not heard.

“So,” Rita asked, “how long are you home for this time?” The question seemed more dutiful—a “How are you” or a “Have a nice day”—than caring. Without making eye contact, Rita took their menus.

“A couple of weeks,” Jill replied. “I’m going to do a story on Cranberry Day.”

One of their “traditions,” when Rita and Jill were young, had been to bicycle out to Gay Head on the second Tuesday of October for the annual Wampanoag festival, the celebration of Thanksgiving for a fruitful cranberry harvest. Once they had even tried to pretend they were Indians.

“My great-great-grandmother was a descendent of Chief Chippewausett,” Jill had told a tribal leader when she and Rita were about eleven. To her knowledge there had never been anyone with such a name, let alone one of her ancestors. But the tribal leader was kind and invited Jill and “Little Red” (the name they gave Rita) to join them in the encampment for the storytelling around a large bonfire.

So now when Jill mentioned Cranberry Day, she expected more than a nod and a remark of “that’s nice” from her faithful Indian companion, Little Red. It didn’t come.

She took a sip of water. Had the whole island gone insane while she’d been away? “I’ll have a glass of Chardonnay, too, Rita.”

“What about tomorrow?” Rita asked suddenly. “Are you working?”

Jill frowned. “Yes. For a while. I have to do the voice-overs for the piece on Vermont I’m finishing.”

“Can you do lunch?” Her voice had moved from flatly indifferent to openly needy.

Jill knew she should say no: she’d been gone so long and had too much work to do, and if she ever wanted to make it on her own, she’d have to get down to serious business. That, of course, was the workaholic Jill thinking, the one who’d struggled on her own with two small children rather than remain a trophy wife for Richard McPhearson, her first husband, the cad. But the workaholic Jill was definitely the “old” Jill. And the “new” Jill was trying to be a more complete, better-balanced woman. Part—a big part—of her new life was a commitment to be there for those she loved. Rita included.

“Sounds great,” she said.

Rita nodded. “Call me here when you’re ready.” Then she went off toward the kitchen, the disconnected waitress, to put in the order.

Jill looked at Ben, who merely smiled that fake smile again. If there had not been so many others in the tavern, she might have run screaming from the room.

“I’m sorry,” Ben said as they walked the three blocks toward North Water Street and home. “I had planned to give you a nice welcome home. A romantic dinner. A memorable evening.” He linked his arm through hers, wondering how or when he would find the courage to tell her what had happened, to prepare her for what was ahead.

He hadn’t thought he needed to rehearse what he would say. This was Jill, for God’s sake. His wife, his second chance at a soul mate. Surely she would see the hideousness of it all, surely she would believe him.…

Jill put her hand on his and stopped walking. “What’s
going on, Ben? First you, then Rita. You’re both acting so strange.”

His palms began to sweat. Could Rita know?

Oh, God, did everyone already know?

“Ben?” Jill moved her hand up to his cheek.

He touched her fingers and drew them to his mouth. He kissed them. “I love you,” he said.

She didn’t move. He knew that she knew there was more, that he was holding on to something.

He cleared his throat. “Something’s happened.” She stiffened. Quickly, he added, “Everyone’s okay. Don’t worry. No one is sick or anything.”

She relaxed a little, but still she did not speak.

“I don’t know what’s wrong with Rita, but I don’t think it has anything to do with me. There’s no way she could know.”

A few leaves stirred in the breeze. Ben looked up at the lamppost. He thought of simpler times, when lamplighters lit the town at night, when men were not …

“Know what, Ben?” Jill interrupted. “What is it Rita doesn’t know?”

He’d rather be home, safe inside, but he had started it here. And he had to finish it now.

“Shit,” he said, feeling sick. He rubbed his stomach. “While you were gone, I was arrested.” His eyes dropped to the ground so he couldn’t see her face or sense her anger.

But instead of being angry, Jill laughed. “You were arrested?”

He closed his hand over hers again. “Yes, I was.”

In the quiet that followed, the night air grew silent.

“Ben?” Jill asked, her voice no longer laughing but disconnected and worried.

“Ben?”
Her tone changed to firm.

He sucked in a short breath. “It’s all a mistake. Ashenbach is behind it.”

“What mistake, Ben.” It was not a question this time, but a sentence with words that clearly needed answering.

Ben looked around to assure himself that no one was nearby. “Dave Ashenbach’s granddaughter. Mindy. I’ve mentioned her to you.”

“The little girl who helps out at the museum?”

The acid in his throat might have dissipated if she hadn’t called Mindy
the little girl
. Tears—tears?—formed in his eyes. “God, Jill, I didn’t do it. She said I touched her, but I didn’t do it.”

Jill must have heard him wrong. “She said what?”

It took a few heartbeats—hers—before Ben answered.

“She said I touched her breast, Jill. The charge is ‘indecent assault and battery on a child under age fourteen.’ What it really means is child molestation.”