IT MIGHT SEEM that I lived for the sole purpose of trying to find out the answer to Chris’s presence on Robin Island, but really the better part of my time was taken up by Ruby and Olivia. My first occupation and preoccupation was being a mother. How did I do it, then? How did I make time to do all the snooping I was doing? Sincerely, I don’t know. When Olivia was born, I only had energy for her. I couldn’t concentrate on anything else. The first six months, I was plunged into an overflowing current of feelings and responsibilities. I was immensely happy, but exhausted, overcome, and my hormones were through the roof. I lived with permanent jetlag, unable to even sit down to read a book or watch a movie, let alone paint. When Olivia was asleep, I slept; I unplugged. When she was awake, I was awake, with her, for her. Nothing fit into my world that wasn’t breastfeeding, diapers, boogers, burps, looks, fingers, cooing, bottles, crying, smiles, rattles, first purees, vomit, kisses, lots of kisses and love.
So when Ruby was born and I decided temporarily to abandon my mission, it was because I thought I was going to enter a phase of life like the one I’d already lived through. Even more so, since Chris wasn’t there to help me, spoil me, take care of me, and I was in the midst of mourning, emotionally numb and deeply traumatized. But against all expectations, my grief, combined with the uncertainty and anger provoked by his secret/lie/mystery, ended up fueling my determination. It was as if I had made a partition in the hard drive of my life, a parallel universe to maternity.
I was mulling over this as I sat in the waiting room of the psychologist’s office. I then wondered why I had taken so long to make an appointment for Olivia. I had tried so hard to deny the evidence of her strange behavior and growing obsessions, concluding they were the logical consequence of losing her father. I wouldn’t forgive myself if this was something irreversible that would mark her for life. But then a powerful opposing force convinced me that it was absurd being there and that the girl would be perfectly fine and that this was a waste of time and money. Luckily, before that notion drew me out of the waiting room, the psychologist came out to greet us. Dr. Ruth Poulton specialized in treating children and had an office in Sandwich, next to the Montessori school. I chose her after an exhaustive quest on the internet with the search terms: Best child psychologist in Cape Cod.
I went in first with just Ruby, who was sleeping. The therapist wanted to speak to me before meeting Olivia. I glanced at the diplomas hanging on the wall: Middlebury College in Vermont, graduate studies at Bowdoin College in Maine, certificate in childhood development from Saint Joseph’s College, also in Maine.
“Tell me in your own words, Alice, how would you describe Olivia’s problem. Why did you decide to bring her here?”
“When her father died, she seemed like she was OK. Really sad, of course, but more or less able to handle the situation. The summer passed calmly. She had fun, played, ate and slept well except for occasional nightmares. The only thing was she had a slight aversion to cold. But it didn’t turn into anything else, not even now, when it really is getting cold.” See? If she’s fine, what are you doing here? “But since we moved to the island, little by little, she’s started acting a little obsessively, as if her routines were turning into compulsions.”
“Why did you move to Robin Island?”
“I needed a change of scene. I thought it would be good for the three of us.”
“I understand. Obviously it’s a marvelous island. Can you tell me something about those routines/compulsions?”
“Order. Her dolls, her books, her candy, her toys are all arranged in her room by height, color, shape . . . and she’s gotten into the habit of counting things out loud. The wheels of the car every time she goes out, the steps on the stairs when she goes up . . .”—She’s a kid; she’s learning to add. It’s normal, Alice, not a disorder. She’s a genius! Ask the doctor to give her an intelligence test and that’s that. You’ll see how it’ll turn out.—“I tried to get her to learn the piano, I bought her one, in fact, but she’s not interested in playing music because she says the songs are out of order; they skip from one key signature to another for no reason. She likes to play scales, from do to te, low to high. And you can’t get her to do it any other way.”
For the half hour Olivia was inside with Ruth Poulton, to calm my anxiety over whatever the psychologist might find out about her, I looked for John Rushlow on Facebook. I found him and considered friending him, but that would mean he’d have access to my posts—even though I didn’t write anything. I’d been tempted to erase my old account, but that would have led to such an uproar in the family that I decided to leave it as it was—Chris’s cemetery. Because there were dozens of posts that I hadn’t read, let alone answered, offering condolences and good wishes after the terrible event. I always liked to leave my wall open for people to write things. Serious mistake. And even though you can adjust your Facebook profile however you like, I decided it was better to make a new one, with my maiden name, and just put up photos from the present, with my kids on the island. An island profile, far away from the rest of my existence. That way I could make contact with the other neighbors and snoop around naturally and safely. Then I thought it would make more sense—and be less suspicious—to add Karen rather than John, since I’d had more contact with her. And that was how I discovered that Karen and Mark were cousins, which surprised me because I didn’t remember ever seeing them interact or mention one another.
When Olivia came out, Ruth asked me to come back in by myself. She showed me a picture my daughter had drawn with crayons. She had asked her to draw now, what the word meant for her just then. What a spacy thing to ask a kid, I thought. It seemed that Olivia had understood the concept perfectly. She, her sister and her mother were in the center of the paper, all holding hands, floating in the air; underneath, an island (a green and brown oval) surrounded by the sea, the lighthouse (a red and white stick), the mill (a brown circle with an X in the middle for the blades) and something that looked like Puchi Puchi the raccoon. There were boats—one of them a pirate ship—whales, fish and a few seagulls to round it off. And a cross in the sky nailed to a threatening dark blue, almost black cloud. Undoubtedly her father’s tomb. She had painted us suspended in the air, with me holding on to—or pulling—my daughters’ hands. In limbo. Yes, now looked a lot like now. By the way, not a trace of Pony.
Ruth didn’t comment on the drawing, at least just then. She just pointed to the crayons Olivia had used.
“She didn’t select the black crayon because it was more worn down than the others. She grabbed the rest and used them just enough so that each of them measured the same length and the tips were the same rounded shape. And when that was finished, she was done with her now.”
“Right . . .” I said, with the adhesive tape of guilt muzzling me.
“I think it’s possible she has obsessive-compulsive disorder. We call it OCD.”
“Is it because of her father?”
“Everything seems to suggest that.”
“But it’s been more than five months”—173 days, I count them—“and until recently, she hadn’t started doing . . . weird stuff.”
“Sometimes these things remain latent and then come to the surface. Anyway, it’s important not to call them weird or bad, or punish her or make her feel uncomfortable about them. She’s just trying to bring some order to her life. To the exterior at least. Because there must be a great deal of chaos inside.”
I didn’t say anything because my voice would have cracked and I wouldn’t have been able to keep from bursting into tears. Was I the one who needed to go to a psychologist? Was I mentally ill? And worst of all: Was I passing it on to my daughter?
“Children in general mimic a great deal of what they see, what they live through. And it’s clear Olivia is an intelligent girl, sensitive and empathetic. These are things that need to be followed up on, and we have to take it one step at a time, but she’s probably following a model of conduct similar to someone close to her, someone who has a big influence on her life.”
“I don’t waste time drawing with crayons until they all have the same length,” I defended myself, thinking she was alluding to me.
“I imagine not. With age, our mechanisms become more sophisticated . . .” And before I could bare my teeth, she added, very softly, “Sorry, Alice, I don’t want you to feel attacked or guilty. That really isn’t my intention. I’m not suggesting you have OCD either. Just as I told you it’s important that Olivia not feel bad or guilty for what she’s doing, neither should you. I know you have a lot to deal with right now, and I’m sure that the well-being of your daughters is your top priority. But you also need to worry about yourself. Olivia is a healthy, happy girl, and she’s going to be even happier and healthier. In the past six months, she’s been through the most traumatic and painful thing a person can experience: the death of her parent. Along with that, her new sister was just born. She has had to reconfigure everything about her surroundings. What she’s doing is simply an attempt to control it and manage it in an appropriate way. To channel her fears. She’ll be fine, you’ll see. But for that to happen, you need to be fine too.”
While Olivia, Ruby and I were waiting for the ferry at the Hyannis terminal, I felt a force tugging at me, something that wanted to pull me away, take me back to Providence. Forget everything for my daughters’ good, and my own. It was true that Olivia wasn’t going to get completely well unless I got well too. And there was no point in pretending—which I did frequently—because she could tell; she could sense it. And me? What did I need to get well? Closure. To solve Chris’s mystery/secret/lie. I needed to know the truth. I didn’t know if what I was doing, and what I was going to do, was the right thing or the best thing. It almost surely wasn’t. But I did know it was the only thing that would help keep me afloat and capable of hope. And maybe I was deceiving myself, but that deception at least gave me the necessary positive vibrations to transmit to my daughters.
Anyway, I wanted to be completely sure, before we got on the ferry to go back home, that that’s what we were doing: going back home.
“Hey, Oli, I’ve got a question. Now that you’ve been on the island for two months, do you like it?”
“Yeah, of course.”
“More or less than when we came?”
“More, because I met Oliver and I like going to school in the hydroplane even though it scared me at first.”
“So where do you like living better, Providence or Robin Island?”
“Can you take an island somewhere else?”
“What do you mean?”
“Like could we take the island to Providence and put it all together? So I have my friends from both places together.”
“No, islands don’t move. I’m afraid you have to choose.”
“If we go to Providence, can we leave Shesnotapony on the island?”
“No, Oli, if we leave, Pony goes with us.”
“Then Robin Island. But there are three things I’d like to change.”
“OK, well, tell me what the other two are, because I already know one is Pony.”
“The other two things I’d like to change are, I want Puchi Puchi to be alive and Papa too. And for them to live with us.”
A pinch in my soul. My heart ran and hid.
“Yeah, me too, Oli . . .” I said as I hugged her. “And if you ever decide you want us to go back to Providence, you tell me and we’ll go. Deal?”
“Deal . . .”
I kissed her on the cheek.
“Mommy, are you still sad about Daddy?”
“Yes, honey. Very much.”
I could see that Olivia was trying to hold back her tears, maybe because I was too.
“You want us to cry for Daddy now?”
“Sure,” I said, unable to hold back any longer.
So we cried together, and then, yes, we went back home.