After my mom was killed, after I got over the shock of it, I discovered parts of me I wish I hadn’t. I didn’t know I had it in me to be mean. I didn’t know that I could turn away from someone trying to help me, and not even care. I didn’t know I was capable of so much anger at the world.
I look back on that time, when I shut the door in my grandmother’s face, when I told my best friend in Maryland that she was stupid, when I hated Shay whenever she smiled or laughed, hated her for breathing when her sister was dead… Well. I’m just grateful that everyone forgave me.
Of course my friend Jessie back in Maryland may have forgiven me, but our friendship will never be the same. Still, I’m grateful to her for trying. Grateful to her for sending me e-mails, photographs of the friends I used to have, so I don’t feel completely lost in the world.
A river of pain still cuts a path through me. Sometimes I get pulled under. When the people who love me say “it’s okay,” I feel lucky.
I stare down at the thirteen birthday cards I’ve laid out on my bed.
I get that my father did a very bad thing. But part of me remembers that time in my own life, and part of me wonders: When everyone has forgiven me, why can’t I take even one tiny step toward forgiving him?
He waits for me again after school. Hands in the pockets of his jacket, looking like another teacher, a new history teacher who all the girls have secret crushes on. I notice how the other students are trying not to watch as I come up and we fall into step together.
There is no problem with rhythm. Even though his legs are long, he matches my stride. I look down at us, our legs, both in jeans, walking. Is there a secret rhythm that fathers and daughters have, no matter what?
“Want me to carry your backpack?”
“I’ve managed to do it myself since I was seven.”
He breathes in and out. “I just have to make a personal observation,” he says. “When you’ve screwed up as badly as I have, there’s about a million minefields in every ordinary conversation. And I keep triggering every single one. Pow.”
“I’ve noticed that,” I say.
“Do you admire me at least for trying?”
“Actually, no.”
“Pow. There goes another one.”
We’re quiet for a while, but it’s a better silence.
“I thought I’d leave,” Nate says. “I think it’s better for now. You have my address and phone numbers and e-mail. Can I write you once in a while?”
“I guess so.”
“Gracie.” Nate stops, so I stop, too. On him, my unruly hair makes sense. He looks so ordinary, a handsome guy who’s just a little careworn, who’s seen a little too much sun and hard times. I see that his eyes aren’t quite as dark as mine. They aren’t the same color, after all. I note a thousand details of his face in one small moment, and the living reality of him makes me feel disoriented, as though I’d made him up and he suddenly appeared. “What I would really, really like is to take you to dinner tonight.”
Everything I’ve been thinking, everything I’ve been feeling, tugs me into different directions. But there is one through line: I’m hungry to know him. If he leaves tomorrow and I don’t do this, I’ll regret it.
He sees the answer on my face, and he smiles.
“It occurs to me that I didn’t tell you that I loved your mother,” Nate says. “I should say those words out loud. Just because they hurt doesn’t mean I shouldn’t say them. I let her down so badly. But she was the love of my life.”
We’re sitting in the restaurant that’s in the Greystone Inn. We have a quiet table against a wall. Candles are lit. The potato-leek soup was awesome. My dad is nursing a glass of wine. We both have ordered the lasagna.
Just a father-daughter dinner.
“It was love at first sight,” Nate says. “That old corny thing. I was about to back out of the deal to buy the house with Shay, to tell you the truth. I don’t know why I agreed to go in on it in the first place. I inherited some money from my aunt, and I was afraid if I didn’t invest it, I’d blow it, I guess. I was regretting it until Carrie walked through the door. I even remember what she was wearing, that sweater…the color of cornflowers.”
He isn’t here anymore. He’s back in the past. His eyes suddenly have a light in them.
“What was it like, that summer?” I ask.
“Crazy fun. I have to admit, I went to Beewick because it would be free. The group back in Seattle was picking up expenses, and we were camping out in summer. We’d swim at midnight—man, it was cold. I’m not much of a swimmer, so splashing around made sense, just to keep warm. We had some wicked softball games. One night, I crashed a big society party at the country club. One of the locals sneaked me in. It was all such a blast. And then it all went bad. Billy disappeared, and we were all worried about him. Shay thought Hobbs had done something to him, but I thought it was more likely that Hobbs paid him off. Billy hated his family—I wouldn’t blame him for disappearing.”
“You think that’s a solution? Disappearing?”
He comes back to the present and looks at me across the table. He doesn’t flinch. “Honey, I didn’t hate you. I didn’t hate your mom. Sometimes you leave because you love your family so much. You don’t want to keep hurting them.”
I push my food around, not answering. It’s not enough, and he knows it.
“Ohh-kay, maybe I should stick with the past. Shay just couldn’t believe that Billy would run out on her without a word. She was in love with him, after all.”
“Shay was in love with Billy?”
“Well, sure. They were a couple. They came up to Beewick together. Then she broke up with him, and he was destroyed. I guess Billy thought he didn’t have anything to lose, confronting Hobbs.”
This was news to me. Shay had never mentioned being in love with Billy. What else was she concealing?
Nate doesn’t notice my surprise.
“Did you ever meet Hank Hobbs?” I ask him.
He shakes his head. “We were fighting this abstraction—the Big Evil Corporation. We didn’t know any of the executives. Billy was the one who found out somehow that Hank Hobbs was leading the cover-up—or that’s what he thought, anyway. Then, for a brief period, Shay herself was under suspicion,” he says. “That’s why Carrie came out. It wasn’t just to help with the house. She wanted to protect Shay. When Carrie and I fell in love, Shay wasn’t crazy about it. I guessed at the time that she had feelings for me. She was upset about Billy, maybe she was looking for something to help her…maybe she wanted something to happen with us, and I fell for her sister instead.” Nate shrugs. “She didn’t come to the wedding. Carrie was devastated. They were very close, and Shay’s disapproval really hurt her.”
“Of course,” I point out, “it turned out that Shay was right.”
“Yeah, that’s the irony, isn’t it? Shay was right. Maybe I suspected that she was, even then. I never felt good enough for Carrie.”
“You weren’t good enough for her.”
“Believe me, muffin, I know.”
He keeps talking, but I’m not there anymore. The word muffin spirals me out, away from the table, into a past. His past. Or is it his present? His future?
The light is so bright, summer light. I see him handing something to a little girl, a stuffed rabbit. “There you go, muffin,” he says. “Good as new.”
The girl is blond and wearing a white dress. I am her negative image. I am a dark spot and she is shining light.
When I return to the now, he’s talking, and I struggle to focus. “I’m betting that Shay wasn’t devastated when I left. I’m sure she thought you two were better off. I’m not good enough for Rachel, either. I’m just lucky she sticks around.” Nate grins. “The woman loves a project.”
He leans over the table. “I look at you, my beautiful daughter, and I think—everything you are is perfect.”
I’m not about to buy that. I’m still thinking of the pale little girl. “You don’t even know me.”
“But I know it’s true. I want you to know that I told Shay that I’m signing over my half of the house to her as long as you can inherit it.”
I guess I’m supposed to gasp and say thanks. But it means so little to me. Half a house? Is that payback? Is that what it’s all worth to him?
I think he realizes what I’m thinking, because he leans back, and suddenly, it’s like, pull up a chair, because sadness just walked in the door.
There isn’t anything he can say, anything he can give me, that will make up for not having him. He knows it. I know it.
I just don’t know what to do with it.
Nate drives me home. I get out. He gets out. I wonder if we’re supposed to hug when we say good-bye, and if I want us to.
But suddenly, a shadow moves across the lawn and forms into a person, rushing at us, and I gasp.
It’s Mason. He looks bigger in the dark.
Nate moves in front of me so quickly, I don’t have time to think.
Mason points a finger at me. “Stay out of my business, Kenzie, or you’ll be sorry!”
“What are you talking about?” I ask. “I’m not in your business.”
“Just keep your freaky nose out of it, freak!”
“Hey!” Nate moves smoothly forward and puts his hand on Mason’s shoulder. He must have applied a nice amount of pressure, because Mason steps back as though he’s propelled.
“Good night, friend,” Nate says. “That’s enough.”
Mason shoots me a dirty look as he goes.
“What was he talking about?” Nate asks.
“I don’t know.”
“Do you want me to stick around?”
What a question. Another wrong step in the minefield. Of course I want him to stick around. I’ve wanted him to stick around since I was three years old.
I say what I always told myself on all those days I missed him, on all those times I wondered about him, on all those nights I dreamed of him.
“I’ll be fine.”