Willem
WILLEM STARED OUT the ferry’s porthole at the flat gray water that resembled a vast lake more than a sea with waves and tides. On the horizon, the island of Wexalia looked like a submarine, its cigar-shaped hull a shade darker than the sky.
He vowed to make the most of the next four weeks because the shit would hit the fan when Louisa arrived. She would punish him for driving the Mercedes—as if banning Bas from the holiday weren’t punishment enough. He would have to tell her about getting kicked off the hockey team before she heard it from someone else.
But he couldn’t help finding a silver lining in Bas’s absence, which must make him the worst friend ever. Willem wouldn’t have to compete for Katja’s attention, an idea as thrilling as it was frightening. Bas was the expert on getting girls, once comparing it to fishing. If he didn’t use the right bait and technique, the fish got away—but Willem had no idea what those were. He had no sexual experience unless he counted kissing Deborah. The arousal he had felt had been quickly extinguished by the odor of mothballs wafting from her clothes.
The ferry docked at noon.
Willem couldn’t keep his eyes off Katja’s swinging hips as he trailed behind to the parking deck. Her cargo pants were snug enough to show the curve of her rear. Because he wasn’t watching where he was going, he smacked hard into Jurriaan, who had stopped to tie a shoelace. Louisa’s voice rang in his head: “Klutz! Watch where you’re going.” Heat flooded his face.
After they piled into the car, Hendrik drove down the ramp and turned onto the dike road.
The road ran parallel with a fifteen-mile-long dike protecting the island from the Wadden Sea in the south. Giant basalt boulders lined the dike to the mudflats. In the village of Oerd, they passed a pub and a handful of shops before turning onto a wooded lane. To the North, clouds gathered, but overhead the sky was smoky blue.
The summerhouse was at the end of the lane, screened from view by trees and vines, the property encircled by a narrow ditch like a miniature moat. Willem recalled trying to jump over it when he was a kid. He had plunged into the stagnant water more than once while Jurriaan watched, cheering him or doubling over with laughter.
A bridge spanned the ditch, and on the other side was a gate. The car stopped and Jurriaan jumped out. He knew the combination of the padlock by heart. Beaming, he rode the gate as it swung open, and they drove up the gravel drive to the carport.
They lugged their suitcases to the porch, where they waited while Hendrik fumbled with his key chain until he found the right key. The door swung inward, and they entered a dark, musty hall lined on either side with closed doors. They filed up the stairs to the bedrooms to unpack.
After unpacking, Hendrik and Jurriaan took the car to the village to buy groceries. Katja sat down at the kitchen table and opened a book. Willem paced. They were alone, but he didn’t know what his next move should be. It felt as if a golden opportunity was slipping through his fingers.
Katja laid her book on the table. “You’re going to wear out the linoleum. What’s up?”
“Do you want to cycle to the beach?” he blurted out.
Her eyes raked over him. “It might rain.”
“You won’t dissolve.”
She laughed. “Okay. I’ll leave a note for Hendrik.” She found paper and pen in a kitchen drawer, started writing, then stopped. “What time will we be back?”
“Um … in time for dinner.”
“Won’t they mind if we’re gone the entire afternoon?”
“Nah. Dad won’t care and Jurriaan brought his PlayStation.”
“We had better take our raincoats.”
While Willem stuffed bottles of water into his backpack, his thoughts turned guiltily to Bas. He wondered if Mr. and Mrs. Debose had arranged for him to stay with a relative or if they’d canceled their holiday. Bas might not have told them he’d been uninvited, and could now be home alone, angry with Willem. Shit. Once they had fallen out over something stupid—not as bad as this—and hadn’t spoken to each other the entire summer vacation. It had been the worst summer of his life.
“Ready?” Katja asked.
She had changed into short shorts, and the sight of her legs and the faint scent of her jasmine perfume drove thoughts of Bas from his head.
They left the house through the mudroom and crossed the terrace to the shed. Inside, the bicycles leaned against the wall under a shelf.
“Shit,” Willem said. “The tires are flat.”
“We can walk,” Katja said, as if it was no big deal.
The beach was on the north side of the island, through woods that were crisscrossed at odd angles by hiking trails and cycling paths. The route markers were confusing, but it didn’t matter because Willem knew the way. The trail was carpeted with copper-colored pine needles the color of Katja’s hair, and under the trees grew bright green ferns the color of her eyes.
“Are you looking forward to university?” she asked.
“I can’t wait. I’m going to share an apartment with Bas on the Vrolikstraat.”
“That will be fun. What will Jurriaan do in September?”
“His school found him a job at a bakery. He’s thrilled.”
“I’m glad for him. And you? What do you want to be?”
He tensed, waiting for her to add when you grow up, but she didn’t.
“Mom wanted me to be a concert pianist, but since that’s not happening, she wants me to be a doctor.”
Her face grew earnest. “It’s your life. Not Louisa’s.”
“I know that. I’m not a kid.” He kicked a pine cone and watched it spin into the bushes.
“I didn’t mean to sound condescending. It’s just that Louisa forced me to study accounting my freshman year. I flunked out. Because of university policy, I couldn’t enroll in the same degree program again, thank goodness. Louisa let me switch to journalism. But I wanted to study literature.”
“What are your plans now that you’ve graduated?”
“I’m writing magazine articles freelance. And I’m writing a novel,” she added. “Don’t tell Louisa.”
“Is it a secret?” he asked, feeling honored.
“She thinks I ought to pound the pavement looking for a job.”
“What’s the novel about?”
“It’s about two girls who live on opposite sides of the Amstel River in the 1950s. One girl is rich, the other poor. They become friends, but it’s an unequal relationship, with the rich girl calling the shots.”
“Oh … interesting.” He read little fiction, only the required reading in school, though he had gone through a science fiction phase when he was twelve.
They hiked in silence for a while. Where the path narrowed, Willem dropped back and let Katja take the lead, picking her way nimbly over the tree roots. Her shorts rose up, revealing the edge of her panties. After a half hour, the woods gave way to heather, and a little farther, dune grass and sand replaced the flowers.
“Let’s walk to the shipwreck house,” Willem said.
“What’s that?”
“It’s a wooden hut on stilts. In the old days, it was a refuge for shipwreck survivors.”
“How far is it?”
“An hour walking.”
“That’ll work.”
The wind was behind them, and Katja’s hair blew forward, hiding her face. He measured their progress by the beach markers placed at regular intervals. The shipwreck house was in sight when the sky darkened and cold needles of rain stung their faces. Showers happened nearly every afternoon, lasting from fifteen minutes to an hour. He grabbed Katja’s hand, and they raced, laughing and whooping, to the hut.
Katja scrambled up the metal ladder first and waited for Willem on the narrow porch.
“The floor won’t collapse, will it?” she asked.
He tested his weight on a board. “It’s solid.”
The hut was empty except for a wooden bench that ran around three sides. Graffiti covered the walls and the ceiling: initials, dates, times.
Water dripped off the end of Katja’s nose. Willem sat on the bench to remove his wet shoes and socks. Katja followed suit. Her slender feet were shapely, the nails polished green, a shade that matched her eyes. She tucked her coppery hair behind her ears.
The rain clattering on the roof was deafening.
Katja hugged herself.
“Are you cold?” he asked.
“Freezing.” She huddled against him and her touch was like an electric shock. Did she feel it too? His heart bonked against his ribs.
“A penny for your thoughts,” he said.
She raised her eyes, mesmerizing him. Her lips moved, but he couldn’t hear over the rain.
“Sorry. What did you say?”
“I wonder how Louisa is getting on at Lake Como.”
“I’m sure she’s fine. Why do you ask?” he said, trying to hide his disappointment about where her thoughts lay.
“Oh nothing. Forget I said anything.”
An image floated into his head of Louisa sipping wine on a terrace, the lake shimmering under a broiling sun. He felt sorry for her students, but he was glad she was there and not here.
He had to know if he could trust Katja.
“Are you and Mom close?”
She shifted away from him. “What do you mean?”
“Do you confide in each other? Are you close like me and Jurriaan?”
“She tells me things. Why?”
“Did she ask you to watch me and report back to her?”
Katja said nothing for several moments, her chest visibly moving up and down.
“Yes, she did. Louisa is a bitch.”
Willem blinked in surprise.
“I hate her. She’s tried to control me since I was little. After my father and stepmother died, Louisa was the only family I had. I was dependent on her. I had to do what she wanted.”
“And now?”
She hesitated, blushing. “Not much has changed.”
A silence fell, filled only by the rain and the wind buffeting the shipwreck house.
“Willem … I’ve wondered. Does Louisa hit you?”
“God no. What made you ask a thing like that?”
“I saw bruises. And you broke your arm.”
“I fell out of a tree. A hockey stick once hit me right between the eyes. You should have seen the goose egg. I’m not the cautious type.” The last thing he wanted was for her to think of him as a boy who needed her protection.
“I guess not.” She smiled and rested her head on his shoulder.
He sensed a change in the atmosphere, as if the air had been sucked out of the hut. He couldn’t breathe. Then the air rushed back in, pure and sweet, making him giddy. His heart raced. He wanted to lay his hand on her chest to check if her heart was beating as fast as his own. He pictured Bas cheering him on. He settled for stroking her wet hair and letting his fingers glide over the delicate bones of her neck. He turned her face toward his and bent forward.
She shoved him away and jumped up, her head swiveling from one side of the hut to the other. There was no escape unless she wanted to get drenched. She sank onto the bench and for a long time said nothing.
“Willem, I’m sorry if I gave you the wrong impression.”
He waited for her to say she didn’t find him sexy, or she was too old for him, or she thought of him like a little brother. But she didn’t say any of those things. At least she spared him the humiliation of an explanation.
When the rain stopped, they headed back under patches of pewter-gray sky between cloud banks, Willem walking a yard ahead. The surf splashed, fizzled, and drummed on the shore, all but drowning out Katja’s soft voice behind him, chatting about nothing important. In his mind, he kept replaying his clumsy attempt at a kiss and her rejection. He had ruined everything.
Overhead, seagulls wheeled and screeched. A half mile farther Willem spotted a seal resting on the sand. It lifted its head and began dragging its muscular body toward the sea in an inelegant rocking motion, like an injured animal carving a trail in the sand.
They followed the same path through the woods, but everything was different. A muggy stillness settled around them. There was no birdsong. No wind to rustle the tree tops. The only sound was the squish of their shoes on the soggy pine needles. A drop of water from a branch splashed on his eyelid. As they emerged from the path onto the lane, Katja grabbed his arm.
“It can’t happen again, Willem. Louisa would kill me.”
It took a second for her words to sink in. Then he tried to suppress the grin that wanted to spread across his face; inside, he was cartwheeling up the lane. Her rejection had nothing to do with his age or his physical attractiveness.
“Mom’s going to be in Lake Como for four weeks,” he pointed out.
Maybe the best four weeks of his life.