Elise and Fern met Marco on the boatyard dock as they’d said they would the previous night. Of course, they hadn’t anticipated their day would start at the pediatrician’s office and that the visit would create so much tension that they were scarcely speaking to each other when it was time for the meeting. But one thing Elise and Fern both agreed on was that it would be wrong to cancel.
“Besides,” Fern said, “we can’t let all this paralyze us.”
Elise bristled at the sentiment, because it was something Fern had said again and again when their attempts at pregnancy kept failing and Elise had been unable to focus on anything else. She didn’t want Fern equating this new baby with the way things had happened with the IVF. She couldn’t let her turn something with possibilities into something doomed and then use that as an excuse to reject it.
Marco was crouched down, tying a skiff to the dock. He spotted them and motioned them over. It was a perfect day to be out on the water, sunny but with little wind. The bay was slate-colored and filled with boats of all kinds. The air smelled like the sea.
Even after five years, when Elise walked on the docks and piers of the town, she still marveled that they lived so close to such natural beauty. She particularly romanticized the three-mile-long breakwater just off Pilgrim Park that stretched out into the water like a bridge to infinity. She and Fern used to take a picnic dinner to the park and then walk out onto the rocks, Elise skittish and unsure of her footing, Fern holding out her hand and leading the way. They should do that again sometime soon.
“You ready for a little sightseeing?” Marco said, smiling. Despite the bumpy start to the day, Elise couldn’t help but smile back. Marco was a good man. It wasn’t surprising that a few years ago, that wealthy young woman from Chatham had fallen for him. Of course, anyone could see from a mile away that the relationship would never last. But how sweet, how absolutely romantic it had been for Marco to propose to her. The Barroses—and everyone else who cared about Marco—had to pack away their doubts and hope for the best. Only Lidia continued to sound the alarm, confiding in Elise and Fern that the woman was all wrong for her son, that she was already trying to change him, and when she realized that would fail, she would leave and break his heart. And that’s exactly what happened.
“We’re ready. Is this our ride?” Fern said, looking at the skiff.
“No, we’re over here.” A larger powerboat was tied on the other side of the dock. It had a metal pole topped with a hook-like contraption near the bow. Elise and Fern climbed onto the stern, where there was a long bench and a few scattered egg crates and coils of rope. Two pairs of protective gloves were tucked into the side of the bench.
“I’m taking you out to where I have my bottom cages,” Marco said over the loud rumble of the motor.
Elise had questions, as she was sure Fern did. But once they picked up speed, it was too loud for conversation. Now that they were physically out on the water, the color of the bay was a deeper blue tinged with green. White foam kicked up around the perimeter of the boat, and Elise’s hair whipped around her face in the wind.
They were ten minutes out when Marco cut the motor. They were in an area of the water marked by white buoys in horizontal rows.
The stillness made Elise feel off balance the way the motion had when they’d left the dock.
“This will just take a few minutes,” Marco said. “I’m not trying to be mysterious, it’s just easier to show you instead of explaining.”
Marco cast the hook-like contraption at the end of a line down into the water, then set to work rotating a lever on the metal pole. It made a loud cranking sound as it slowly raised the line to the surface of the water and then above. When it was a few inches higher, Elise saw it was pulling up a horizontal rope that was covered in something light brown and slimy.
Marco cranked the lever, lifting the rope higher and higher, and Elise realized it was elevating seaweed. The seaweed hung like a sheet, yellow-brown with a ridged texture, glistening in the sun. The fronds had to be twelve to fifteen feet long. Maybe longer.
Marco leaned over with a knife, sliced off a few pieces, and dropped them into a white plastic bucket.
“Marco, what is all this?” Fern said.
He smiled and wiped his brow. “I’m cultivating seaweed,” he said. “Specifically kelp.”
The long fronds reminded Elise of crimped hair.
“We can see that,” Fern said. “But…why?”
“A few reasons. I’m worried about the future of fishing. The past two seasons have been rough. And every year, I know one hurricane could wipe out the oysters and I’m done. But seaweed gets planted after hurricane season. And since I already have the infrastructure for the oysters, it really cost me nothing to get this up and running.”
“Is there a big market for seaweed?” Fern said.
“Good question. It’s a growth industry. As a cooking ingredient, it’s sort of adventurous right now.”
“Have you eaten it?”
He nodded. “I have. Kelp noodles have a very mild flavor. Plain, dried kelp has a sea-salt, nutty taste. There’s a lot of variety. It’s high in protein, low in calories, and a truly sustainable crop. And remember, not many people were eating kale ten years ago.”
“True,” Elise said.
“But aside from using kelp as a food source—because I admit it could be a little while before it catches on—I think ethically, we need to grow it. You know excess nitrogen in the water is a major problem here on the coast, and the oysters filter it, but so does seaweed. And a bigger problem is the rising acidity of the oceans. The ocean is absorbing all the excess carbon in our environment and the resulting rise in acidity is threatening shellfish—they can’t develop their shells. Seaweed and kelp absorb the carbon dioxide.”
“It sounds great,” Fern said. “But what does this have to do with us?”
“Instead of sitting around and waiting for kelp to catch on, I was thinking about ways I could be proactive in getting it out there. And then I read about this guy in Maine who’s doing kelp teas.”
Elise and Fern looked at each other. “Really? I can’t imagine that flavor would be palatable at all,” Fern said.
“I know—it doesn’t sound like something that should work. But he mixes the kelp with green teas and some herbals, and somehow, it does work. I know you guys have your own Tea by the Sea blends, and I thought maybe if I gave you some kelp, you could experiment with it. And by the way, I know you’re really into the mind, body, spirit of the whole thing, and seaweed is full of antioxidants and vitamins. I just think this could be an interesting offering.”
Elise could tell by the look on Fern’s face that she thought it was interesting too. Maybe it was. Maybe two weeks ago she would have been excited about trying something new. Now she didn’t want to get involved with anything that might require her to take time away from Mira.
“We’re willing to give it a shot. Right, Elise?”
“Sure,” Elise said.
“Great!” Marco said. Behind him, the sheets of kelp waved in the breeze. The aroma of salt water and something distinctly of the sea wafted over them. If she could capture it, it would be summer in a bottle. She thought, then, about how the scent of the Strawberry Meadows tea blend filled the shop, how every customer commented on it. The kelp blend could do the same thing. Really, it might not be a bad idea.
“I have one more small request—actually, it’s not that small. It’s about that size,” he said, gesturing toward the kelp.
“Shoot,” said Fern.
“I need to dry the kelp and the best way to do that is to hang it from a line in the fresh air—like laundry. But I can’t do it outside of my apartment and there’s too much foot traffic and debris behind my parents’ house where my dad works on the boat repair. Can I use your backyard at Shell Haven?”
“I wouldn’t mind but you know we have a tenant this summer. You would have to discuss it with Ruth,” Fern said.
“I don’t know if we should bother Ruth with this. I feel like we’ve pushed things way too far as it is,” said Elise.
Fern looked at her like, And whose fault is that?
“Let me just run it by her,” Marco said. “If she has any hesitation, that will be the end of it. I’ll find someplace else. Either way, I’m very happy you two are on board with trying out the tea. I love how open you are.”
“Yeah, well. Maybe we’re a little too open sometimes,” Fern said.
Marco looked at Elise, and she shook her head with an expression that said, That was directed at me.
He lowered the kelp back into the water.
By late afternoon, Olivia had determined that sitting was worse than standing, and so she paced in the backyard.
It was more rustic than the manicured front lawn. Along with the hydrangeas, Olivia saw bunches of wildflowers and a patch of tall weeds. She found herself gravitating toward the weeds in all their messy abundance. The orderly beauty of the flowerbeds felt like a rebuke when her own life was unraveling.
The light started to shift, the slightest downgrade from bright sun to something gentler. In one corner of the yard, a patch of shade. She stood in front of a stone bench and stared at her phone. It had been buzzing all day with texts and messages from her former coworkers and clients, all of them offering their sympathy while subtly (or, in most cases, not so subtly) asking what had happened and where she was going next, so she was relieved to find it silent.
The one person she had not heard from was her assistant—former assistant—Dakota. She wondered, cynically, how long it would be before Dakota moved into Olivia’s office. It was possible Peter had just been looking for an excuse to fire her. At thirty, she was already old for the company. They could pay one of the kids just out of college a fraction of her salary, and those new hires had three times her social media presence.
Yes, she’d given them cause to push her out the door. But that didn’t change the fact that she’d been headed out to pasture anyway.
She looked at her Instagram profile, considered editing HotFeed out of her bio, then decided against it. Why rush to downgrade herself to irrelevant? She had to think of her next move. She could still start a company. It would just be that much harder to get it off the ground.
Without thinking, she bent down to sit on the bench. Pain rippled through her lower back.
How could she think of starting a company when she couldn’t even sit down? She was stuck in that town and dependent on her mother after swearing to herself she would never ask the woman for a thing. In that moment, Olivia was as far from independent as she could imagine. And there was only one person she wanted to depend on.
She dialed her father, and he answered on the first ring.
“You made it back home?” he said cheerily.
“Not exactly,” she said, then felt the tears start again. The circumstances of the afternoon came out in a jumbled, sniffling rush. By the time she was finished talking, she could not have felt any sorrier for herself.
“Just try to stay calm,” her father said. “You always push yourself too hard. This happened for a reason, as difficult as it might be to see that in the moment.”
“I never should have come out here,” she said.
“I don’t think that’s the real issue. You need to deal with stress better. So take some time to regroup. Is there anything I can do?”
Olivia glanced back at the house and hesitated only a few seconds before saying, “It’s just—I don’t want to be here, dependent on Mom. It’s awkward. And I don’t know when I’ll be able to make the drive back to New York. Dad, this is asking a lot, but is there any way you can come for a night and I’ll go back home with you?”