CHAPTER ELEVEN

I had to grab a rail and hang on. The wind was stiffening, the radio antenna lashing back and forth. I couldn’t help feeling a stab of compassion for Cindy, below deck, half out of her bunk.

Dad shook his head happily and shouted something about not being able to get the maximum out of the Queen today. Or maybe he was yelling merrily that he was going to plunge us all deep into the Pacific. Dad had always driven the forty-eight-foot Super Sport toward its limit, thirty knots when a swell wasn’t running. The boat tore through the moderate seas, and a large ship, a coursing building, loomed down on us.

I was aware of how much I had been looking forward to conversation, chitchat, how snorkeling had been. I had been wondering if Dad might want a kitten in a couple of months—maybe two kittens. He often took in strays, although he had terrible luck with them, always having to drive them to the vet. Myrna’s kittens still looked like dirty socks, but they were at the crawling stage, their eyes beginning to open.

I suspected it was against some law to slash through the water in shirtsleeves, none of the passengers equipped with life vests. The tanker made a subtle adjustment, the faceless bulk steering by telepathy, and when the giant vessel was past us, Dad swung the helm to slice across the wake.

The container ship loomed, so breathtakingly close I felt the cool damp of its shadow, but this was pure Dad, grinning as our bow wave plastered the windshield with salt water and drenched my silk scarf so it hung on me chilly and wet. Dad had ordered the Queen custom crafted from a boatbuilder in Egg Harbor, New Jersey, and in the four years since he had first eased her out of the berth he had always looked forward to pounding his way through choppy water, forgetting all about fuel efficiency.

“How’s your tennis?” he shouted over the thrum of the engine, and it sounded like he was calling, How’s your dentist?

Dad eased off on the throttle, gulls capering along the lacy trough in the water. Some of the gulls were gray, drab, a year or two old, and some were older, elegant and pristine in their adult uniforms. I said something about not having much time to practice.

“I’m going to give Cindy lessons,” he said. “We’ll make a threesome.”

In his den Dad had a shelf of nothing but Wimbledon on videotape. “The two of us against your forehand smash,” I said, playing along, just to keep him in such a good mood.

“Why not?” There were little flecks of water on his sunglasses. They would dry there, leaving brine spots, so I stooped into the galley for some paper towels. Cindy was a huddled thing, boneless, beyond the bulkhead. I gave the towel a squirt of Windex and wiped his glasses for him. I was stalling, giving myself some time to remember the last time I had picked up a tennis racket, Rowan and I not even bothering to keep score.

“Tell me why not?” he persisted, allowing me to hook the aviator glasses over his ears.

I lifted one shoulder, let it fall, happy but unwilling to commit. My family takes sports like a religion. I was scheduled to see Dr. Breen on Friday before lunch.

“You’re chicken,” he said offhandedly.

Dad used a set of old-fashioned epithets when he teased or when he stubbed his toe on one of his own briefcases. You were “chicken” if you insisted on donning a life vest, or “a heel” if you didn’t send someone a get-well card, or “a piker” if you bought the cheapest meal on the menu. I don’t know where he got these words, and no one else I have ever met used quite this vocabulary. When he stubbed his toe he said “Judas Priest,” the closest he ever came to swearing.

But there was a trace of challenge to the sidelong glance he gave me. Dad owns tennis, possesses it entirely—he might have invented the sport personally, down to the sweet spot in the rackets and the fuzz on the balls. He has two serves. Serve One is a gunshot, blinding fast. If that attack is long or wide, Serve Two is a lob, gentle and spooky, with a magical backspin. Every time I’d seen him play Jack Stoughton, the big red-haired man ended up reaching for his wallet, another bet lost.

“Friday night,” he called, gunning the engine. Then he hit the side of his head, an exaggerated “I almost forgot.”

He slipped a velvet box from his pants pocket.

The box alone was luxurious, my fingers leaving silvery prints on the lavender plush.

He gave me an open it lift of his chin.

“They dive three hundred feet down for those pearls,” he said. “Holding their breath.”

“No they don’t.” I laughed.

“You could.”

We headed toward the Golden Gate, back in toward the harbor. The shadow of the bridge was cool as we surged through it, and the wind from behind whipped the knot ends of my scarf up around my lips.

Mom didn’t ask, not in so many words. She did inquire how everything was, that inclusive Everything that means the weather, human life, my father. She didn’t take the pearl out of its box. She said it was nice.

But it was only when we were in her shop very early Friday morning that she said, “They won’t have kids, will they.” A statement, a definite assertion, as she fastened her green smock, bending to her most recent shipment.

I could have said, How would I know. But the question was hard-edged, a consideration I had avoided. The last years of my parents’ difficulties had taken place behind the closed door of their bedroom, but I had overheard my dad’s whiplash whisper and his upbeat laugh: There, I’ve made a point. Mom can deal with tax accountants, and she can fire a cashier if the till is fifteen cents short, but in an argument she gets a stubborn, feline expression and just waits for the disagreement to pass.

Tropical plants often arrive wrapped in bright-colored plastic, customs stickers and aphis-control tabs stuck on randomly. Mom stops talking when she unwraps a special order, using a tiny knife blade and a quiet, peering manner as she works, as though if the plant inside is blighted she can catch just a glimpse and stop right there, and not have to expose herself to full disappointment.

“This is supposed to be a white bird-of-paradise,” she said, palpating the plastic wrapper, scarlet OVERNIGHT and RUSH taped over the seams. A photographer for the Sunday Examiner was shooting a spread at Dunsmuir house, a historical mansion on the bank of Lake Merritt.

I stood by with a pair of iron shears, like someone ready to kill the specimen if it proved monstrous. If a bird-of-paradise is anything less than perfectly healthy it turns into black slime. I said something encouraging, and Mom continued to worry the shipping tape, unpeeling plastic.

When the shipment was completely undressed, Mom peered at it through her half-lens glasses, examining each blue spike. I didn’t want to be late to see Dr. Breen, but I knew how fussy photographers can be. They insist that even the most rare exotics show up garden fresh—the hot lights kill blossoms in a few hours.