| |
“I think we should stick to the old standard. Rosé, rosé, all day,” Olivia grumbled as she assessed the wine list at the nearby Edgartown Wine Bar. They’d forced her through five itchy vintage gowns, including one with a veil that weighed approximately ten pounds. When she’d insinuated that she was just their clown for the afternoon, they’d howled with laughter and decided to try again another day. They had nothing but time— and now, she needed a drink. Stat.
“Let’s get two bottles,” Camilla announced. “That fitting nearly destroyed me. Andrea got so finicky lately. She’s not exactly bridezilla, but she’s merging into villa-territory.”
Jennifer chuckled inwardly. In truth, it had been almost shocking to witness Andrea’s occasional sharp-edged remarks toward her mother throughout the fitting. Andrea and Camilla had had their hardships over the years, especially the previous year or so when Camilla had kicked Jonathon to the curb. Since then, they’d patched up their family to near-perfection— with the occasional hanging string of resentment. That was what families were: imperfect.
“Still no sign from Mila?” Amelia sipped her bubbly water timidly and eyed Jennifer.
“Nothing. We might have to count her out for the day,” Jennifer cautioned.
Amelia’s eyes watered. Hurriedly, she wiped them away and muttered, “Gosh, I’m just a barrel of emotions lately. So what? Mila can’t come. Why does it feel like the end of the world?”
“Because you’re worried you won’t see us when you have your baby,” Camilla offered. “Which is silly— we’ll be there at your beck and call, just like you were when we all had our babies.”
“One by one, I watched you all become mothers and thought...” Amelia trailed off as another round of tears took hold of her. “Oh boy. I’m just pathetic.”
The waiter arrived to take their wine and small-plate orders.
“Remarkable that I can be hungry again after yesterday,” Olivia noted with a laugh. “The human body is amazing.”
“I know! I ate two pieces of pie last night and now I’m like, ‘Yeah, I could probably eat that whole cheese plate,’” Camilla returned, chuckling.
The wine arrived along with a selection of stinky cheeses, various types of freshly-baked bread, olives, vegetable dips, hummus, and stuffed mushrooms. Amelia moaned as she bit into a stuffed mushroom.
“Do you think kids like stuffed mushrooms?” she asked as she chewed. “I’m getting nervous about a life filled with chicken nuggets and juice boxes.”
“I don’t think you can train children to automatically like small plates at wine bars,” Jennifer teased.
“I think if anyone could do it, it’s Amelia,” Camilla countered.
Outside, the light had dimmed to a strange and sinister greyish purple. Five-thirty p.m. and only weeks until Christmas crafted a festive spirit within the wine bar, with friends and relatives gathering for boisterous conversation as the speakers hummed Christmas music. Jennifer checked her phone for some sign from Mila, but found only a text from Joel, whom she hadn’t heard from over Thanksgiving.
JOEL: Hope you had a wonderful holiday with your fam!
JOEL: And I hope you and the girls are having your traditional Black Friday shopping spree.
JOEL: All my love.
“Who are you texting?” Camilla asked.
“Joel,” Jennifer responded instantly.
“Gosh, you two are like the poster children for divorce,” Camilla returned. “As a woman who nearly got divorced myself, I can’t imagine it. Jonathon was like my number-one villain.”
“And now look at you two. All lovey-dovey all over again,” Jennifer teased.
“He’s just smitten about the wedding. He can’t believe his little girl’s all grown up. He told me he’s terrified about walking her down the aisle because he had a dream that he tripped on the way and ruined the ceremony,” Camilla continued.
Just then, Camilla’s own phone began to buzz. She grabbed it from her purse, muttering that she’d “forgotten to turn it off.” But a brief glance at the screen gave her pause.
“What’s wrong?” Olivia asked as she placed a square of cheese on her tongue.
“I have to get this.” Camilla placed the phone to her ear and changed her tone to a harsher one. “Rita? What’s up?”
Shock poured over Camilla’s face. She grew rigid and strange as she listened. Jennifer’s heart dropped into the acid of her stomach. Something was very wrong. With Andrea? Jonathon? What? Hadn’t Camilla been through enough?
“I’m on my way now,” Camilla blared to whoever was on the phone. “I’ll be right there.”
Camilla’s eyes filled with tears. She threw her phone into her purse as her limbs shook.
“That was the hospital. Mila... Mila’s there.”
Jennifer’s ears began to ring. “What? What happened?”
“I don’t know. Car accident? Car accident.” Camilla said the words as though they were a different language. She scuttled up to stand and gaped at the window, where the violent late-November winds tore through the trees that lined the street.
“We need to pay!” Amelia hollered at the passing waiter before shuffling through her wallet to grab two fifty-dollar bills. “This should cover it. Let’s go.”
The four-some raced out into the street, where they crammed into Amelia’s car. Traffic was horrific, as everyone who was everyone wanted to nibble on the sights and sounds of Holiday in Edgartown. The radio kicked off with a speech from some local politician, wishing everyone happy holidays. Amelia pressed the OFF button to leave them in silence as she eased out of the parking spot and into traffic. Everything seemed to move in slow motion.
“Did they say anything else?” Olivia asked, her voice clearly panicked.
“Just that Mila has to go into surgery,” Camilla returned firmly.
“Surgery?” Jennifer and Amelia cried in unison.
“I’m not there. I don’t know anything else,” Camilla blurted angrily.
“Should we call her parents? Liam?” Jennifer asked, not know what to do. “Were her kids with her?”
At this, her heart surged with fear. Isabelle and Zane were Mila’s entire universe. If they’d gotten into an accident together...
The potential of that was too difficult to think of.
“I don’t know anything else,” Camilla continued. “Let’s just get there, for goodness sake.”
“Let’s not be angry with each other!” Amelia cried from the driver’s seat.
Silence fell as they stopped and started their way through the streets of Edgartown to finally buzz along the main road between Edgartown and Oak Bluffs. Although they’d driven this route perhaps a hundred and fifty thousand times, this particular time felt haunted and slow, like a road that would stretch on and on into the distance without giving them their destination.
“I can’t believe this,” Olivia breathed, saying what they all clearly thought.
They’d already lost one of them— Michelle, on that fateful night when they’d only been seventeen years old.
They couldn’t afford to lose anyone else.
It wasn’t fair. None of this was fair.
As they surged toward the hospital, Jennifer tried Mila’s mother’s cell. It went straight to voicemail. Mila’s mother’s recorded voicemail explained she and her husband were away for the week on a trip to Europe, where they didn’t have cell service.
“I forgot Mila mentioned that,” Jennifer breathed as she ended the failed call. “What a horrible time for them to be away.”
“Contact her through social media?” Camilla suggested. “They’ll want to come back as soon as they can.”
The hospital emergency waiting room was just as busy as the Edgartown Wine Bar but with a far different, much darker energy. A family of four waited in the corner with red-tinged eyes. A toddler screamed from the arms of his mother as she wandered up and down the aisles of chairs—a ten-year-old kid with a bright mop of blonde hair held onto his clearly broken arm, awaiting care.
Camilla charged directly for the on-hand secretary, who greeted her immediately while the other three waited behind, shifting their weight. Olivia suggested Amelia sit down, but Amelia gave no indication that she heard her.
Camilla’s conversation was held in low, earnest tones. When she turned back, her eyes were hollowed out. She whisked the girls to a far corner as she described what she now knew.
“Mila and Isabelle were the only ones in the car,” she explained. “Zane left the island this afternoon, but apparently, Isabelle stuck around for some reason. They crashed into a pole outside of Edgartown. Mila didn’t notice a car coming and had to swerve at the last second. Isabelle has some injuries but nothing major. She’s receiving care right now.”
“I’m one of her emergency contacts,” Jennifer blurted.
Camilla nodded. “Then I think you’ll be able to head in to see her shortly.”
Jennifer dug her teeth into her lower lip and stared at the doorway between the waiting room and the rest of the white-washed halls of the hospital. Amelia finally did stagger to the nearest chair, where she splayed a hand over her stomach and focused on her breathing.
“Maybe we should take Amelia home,” Olivia murmured.
“I heard that,” Amelia called. “And there’s no way in hell I’m going anywhere.”
“Does anyone have Liam’s number?” Camilla muttered.
“Maybe the police station would have it?” Jennifer suggested. She dialed the non-emergency number and received the secretary, who explained that Liam was off-duty and off the island for the weekend visiting family in Boston. Jennifer explained it was an emergency and imperative that she reached him, and the secretary gave her his information with reluctance. When she dialed Liam’s number, however, she again reached his voicemail.
Instead of leaving a voicemail with the potential to be ignored, Jennifer texted him.
JENNIFER: Hey Liam. It’s Jennifer Conrad. Could you give me a call tonight? It’s an emergency.
An hour had already passed when Camilla disappeared to the break room to grab them coffee, tea, and granola bars, which they ate slowly just for something to do. Finally, a doctor appeared to tell Camilla that Isabelle’s emergency contact could enter the room to visit her. Jennifer leaped up and traced the path down the menacingly bright hallway, all the way into the belly of the hospital.
Isabelle tried to sit bolt-upright as Jennifer entered but soon collapsed back onto her pillow. The nurse in the room scolded her.
“I told you. No quick movements.”
Isabelle grumbled inwardly as tears formed in the corners of her eyes. There were minor scratches across her cheeks and forehead, and her left arm was wrapped in a cast. There, so small upon the bright white hospital bed, she seemed the spitting image of her mother at her age. Mila had been something else: the most beautiful, long-legged, long-tressed cheerleader, who’d had all the boys wrapped around her finger.
“Oh, honey.” Jennifer stepped forward and tried to hug Isabelle tenderly without mussing her bandages.
“Jennifer...” Isabelle’s voice broke. “I don’t even know...” Cries erupted from her throat as she crumpled into herself.
“It’s okay, honey. It’s okay. You’re okay,” Jennifer whispered. She perched on the chair beside the bed and peered up at Isabelle as she stroked her hand lovingly. How perfectly she remembered the day when Isabelle and Zane had been born! Peter, their father, had been nothing but nervous energy, skittering across the hospital telling everyone he’d had twins.
“It’s not. It’s all my fault.” Isabelle’s voice was thick with tears.
“What happened?”
Isabelle clenched her eyes tightly closed. “We fought all week. I told her that I didn’t want to go back to school. I was head-hunted by a major model agency in New York City and dammit, that’s what I want to do. I already went to look at apartments. But Mom told me that was out of the question. I even planned to go to the city tonight to meet with the agency. She wouldn’t let me get on the ferry.”
Jennifer could hear the strain in Isabelle’s words. They sizzled with anger and fear and sorrow. She was a whirlwind of emotion.
“She wanted to keep me here this weekend to talk some sense into me, I guess,” Isabelle continued. “We dropped Zane off at the ferry and then drove back to Edgartown. And then— I don’t even know what happened. She was ranting about something. She was so angry. I’d never seen her like that. Telling me that I owe it to myself and to Dad to go back to school...” Isabelle stuttered. “And then, that car came out of nowhere, and we crashed... I don’t remember much after that until the ambulance came.”
Jennifer’s heart shattered. She continued to stroke Isabelle’s hand as a way to remind her she remained on solid ground.
“They told me she’s in surgery,” Isabelle breathed. “And I remember what she looked like before they strapped her into the gurney. It was so awful, Jen. I’ll never forget it. Not ever.”
All the blood drained from Isabelle’s face. Jennifer willed herself to keep her sanity, just for Isabelle’s sake. In reality, this was a nightmare from which she prayed they would soon wake.