Chapter Twenty-Seven

Olivia felt guilty for asking her father to come visit. It had not been a very adult thing to do. But something about living under the same roof as her mother for the first time in twenty years had reduced her to a less-evolved version of herself. She knew this stress was what had originally triggered her back spasms, and losing her job had compounded the problem. This was what the back pain was all about.

And yet this understanding failed to make it go away. She didn’t know what to do.

She stared at the ceiling of her makeshift first-floor bedroom. She’d awakened to the sound of Elise and Fern bickering in the kitchen before Amelia arrived to pick up the baby. Just as she was drifting back to sleep, her mother had knocked on the door to announce she was headed out. Olivia had somehow managed to lose a job and gain three roommates. Four, if you counted the baby. This was her life—headed in the wrong direction.

“Anyone home?” The voice, female, seemed to be coming from the kitchen.

What now? Olivia sat up slowly, then swung her legs over the side of the bed and inched into a standing position while holding on to the nightstand. She looked out into the hallway just as someone with a familiar face rounded the corner of the living room. Jaci Barros.

“Jaci,” Olivia said, leaning against the doorframe. “What are you doing here?”

“I won’t bother you. I’m just going to hang out.” She waved a library book she was carrying.

Olivia sighed. “No offense, but ever hear of a coffee shop?”

“Here’s the thing—I’m sort of hiding from my mother, but everyone in town knows me and will narc me out if she tries to find me. I swear, if I have to spend one more minute trapped on a sandbar with my brother digging through boxes of oysters, I’ll die. Please just let me sit here and read for a few hours. Once the tide goes out again I’m off the hook for another day.”

Olivia sighed. “How did you even get in the house?”

“The back door’s open.”

Olivia walked past her into the kitchen and closed the back door and locked it. When she returned, Jaci was settled on the couch opening her book.

“It’s safe here, you know,” Jaci said. “My cousin owned this house for a decade and she didn’t even have keys.”

“Well, I’m from New York, and when I’m alone in a place, I like to remain alone unless I invite someone over. At the very least, I’d appreciate a doorbell ringing.”

“Sorry,” Jaci said sheepishly. “I didn’t think anyone would be home.”

And that made it better? “Jaci, if you don’t want to work with your brother this summer, why don’t you just tell him? I mean, you’re, what, nineteen years old? You’re in school. You don’t really live at home anymore, right? You’re basically just visiting for the summer.”

“It’s complicated,” Jaci said. The expression on her face was pure misery.

“Is it a financial issue? Like, they pay for school so you have to work for them or something like that?”

“No, I have pretty much a free ride at school and I make up for the rest working during the winter.”

“So just tell them you’re doing your own thing.” Olivia didn’t understand what the problem was.

“I can’t let my mother down. It’s hard enough on her that I went away to school. No one in the family has ever left. I’m the first woman to go to college. And everyone is really proud of that but they want me to be the girl who goes to Princeton and the girl who works on the oyster farm.” Her eyes filled with tears.

“Look, mothers get disappointed sometimes,” Olivia said. “And they disappoint us. It’s just life. Tell her the truth. Tell her what you just told me. When I was your age I told my mother that I didn’t want to work with her.”

It was the last month of her freshman year at Vassar and her mother called to offer her a job at the cosmetics company for the summer. She told Olivia she could work in any department she wanted. “I know you’re interested in PR and we have a lot going on for Liv Free. You could really run with it.” Olivia didn’t consider it for a minute even though it would have looked great on her résumé. She spent the summer waiting tables.

“Did your mother need you to work for her?” Jaci said.

“Well, no. But she wanted me to.”

“Yeah, well, Marco needs me. My uncle Tito gave him the water grant a few years ago, and Marco started the oyster farm thinking I’d be in it with him someday. My family has made a living off the water for generations and it’s not something that works without a group effort or at least a partnership. It’s a really big deal for me to walk away.”

“Jaci, you’re entitled to live your own life. Besides, it’s better to just pull the Band-Aid off and say you’re not doing it instead of hiding out here. They’ll get over it.”

“That’s easy for you to say.”

“Why is it easy for me to say?”

“Because you’re not close with your mother. I mean, you don’t understand what I have to lose.”

“How do you know about my relationship with my mother?”

“You told me before. The day I met you. You said, ‘I try to avoid my mother most of the time.’”

That’s right. She had said that. “Well, I have a close relationship with my father,” Olivia said defensively. She heard her phone ring in the other room. “Excuse me.”

She walked back to the foldout couch and saw that the incoming number was her father’s. “Hey,” she said. “I was just thinking about you.”

“Just checking in,” her dad said.

“One second, okay?” Still rankled by Jaci’s comments about her family ties, or lack thereof, she marched back into the living room and pointed to her phone. My father, she mouthed.

Jaci nodded, looking confused.

Olivia returned to her room and closed the door. “Have you thought about maybe coming out here?” Olivia said.

“I have. But it’s a long drive so I want to stay over at least one night. Maybe two. I looked into hotel availability and there’s really nothing in town this week or next. I get the sense things are booked up far in advance around there.”

“You can stay here,” she blurted out. “There’s an extra room on the third floor because I’m sleeping in the den.”

“Stay at your mother’s house? Olivia, you know that’s not possible.”

“Why not? Honestly, it’s not even like it’s her house. There are other people staying here.”

“What other people?”

“The women who own the house. And a baby they’re taking care of. It’s a long story. Anyway, this place feels like a hotel. Or a weird bed-and-breakfast. Trust me.”

He didn’t respond, and she knew he was considering it. She wondered if he was lonely, if maybe he wanted to make the trip as much as she wanted him to come. Or maybe she was just trying to justify her own neediness.

“Have you discussed this with your mother?” he said.

“She’s fine with it,” Olivia said quickly. And she would be—just as soon as Olivia spoke to her.

“Okay,” her father said. “I’ll come for a day or two and then drive you home. I don’t want you stuck out there indefinitely.”

“Thank you!” Olivia said, relief coursing through her. “You’re the best. Call me or text me when you decide what day you’re coming. I love you.” When she hung up, she marched back into the living room.

“My dad is coming to see me,” she said to Jaci, who looked up from her book. “We’re very close.”

  

Elise had been initiated, in a trial by fire, into the distinct club of working mothers. Did other women, she wondered, spend every minute of their nine-to-five jobs thinking more about their children than the task at hand? Maybe her preoccupation was exacerbated by the uncertainty of her situation. Regardless, she could not enjoy—could barely deal with—the robust business at Tea by the Sea. It was keeping her from Mira.

“We need to hire someone,” she said to Fern during a brief lull. “Let me reach out to Cynthia Wesson. If it’s like this now, in early June, what will we do in July?”

“I’ll call her today,” Fern said.

This small bit of progress sustained Elise until she was able to duck out in the late afternoon and pick up Mira from the Beach Rose Inn. The sight of Mira, wide-eyed, buckled into her stroller and ready to go home, warmed her heart.

Back at Shell Haven, she poured four ounces of formula into a bottle. She was feeding her every three or four hours around the clock. So far, she was doing all the night feedings. Fern hadn’t volunteered, and Elise didn’t feel the climate was right for her to ask for help. She was exhausted.

She kicked off her Converse and settled into the couch with Mira nestled in one arm. Elise found a bookmark wedged between the cushions, moved it aside, and set the diaper bag next to her. There were so many supplies involved in baby care, and managing them was, if not half the battle, certainly a good quarter of it.

Mira sucked on the bottle, her hands curled in tight little fists. Elise brushed her finger over one of them and smiled. She felt she could exhale for the first time all day. The only blight on the otherwise perfect moment was the persistence of the rash on Mira’s cheeks. She knew now that it was harmless, but it did look terrible and she was frustrated she couldn’t do anything to make it go away.

She heard the back door open and close and then the sound of someone in the kitchen putting away groceries, cabinets opening and closing and the distinct click of the refrigerator door. Elise was tempted to call out hello but didn’t want to startle Mira with a loud voice. The baby’s eyes were closed, and Elise marveled at the delicate translucence of her eyelids.

“Looks like you’ve got the hang of things now.”

Elise looked up to see Ruth smiling from across the room. “Some things, yes. Others are still a work in progress.”

“It’s always a work in progress,” Ruth said, looking pointedly at the room Olivia had moved into.

“Can I ask you something?” Elise said. “Do you remember if Olivia had baby acne?”

“Baby acne?” Ruth said, walking closer. “I don’t think so.” She peered down at Mira. “Is that itching her?”

“No, it just looks awful,” Elise said. “The doctor said it will go away on its own.”

“Maybe she has sensitive skin. You know, you really have to watch what products you use. A lot of things are labeled all natural but they’re not. I’m very aware of that sort of thing because I was in the cosmetics business for years.”

“Oh,” Elise said.

“I’ll make some soap and lotion for you,” Ruth said.

“Really?”

“Sure. It’s what I do. Or used to do.”

Elise knew Ruth had owned a cosmetics company and sold it for a lot of money. Fern had made a big deal about the fact that she’d paid all the rent for the house up front and in cash. “Were the products organic?”

“Not initially. That came later. My sister got breast cancer ten years ago, and I became much more aware about the potential toxicity of everyday beauty products. I created a nail polish that was free of the five major toxic chemicals, then started a line of organic skin-care products.”

“That’s really impressive, Ruth.”

“Oh, well, it sounds more complicated than it was,” she said. “Really, it just happened gradually. Ingredient by ingredient. But I do miss it. So I’m happy to whip up something for little Miss Mira here.” She reached out and gently stroked the baby’s dark hair before heading up the stairs to her room.

Elise felt, for the umpteenth time since the baby’s miraculous appearance, that she was incredibly fortunate to be surrounded by women she could count on. She’d never imagined that Ruth—someone she’d tried to push away—would become part of her support system.

She just wished her own wife could become more of a part of it too.