I went today to the cemetery on Abel’s Hill, to choose Mommy’s special place. She was just thirty-seven when she died. How sad, how completely unthinkable to me, and everyone else who knew her. What a shame; what a waste. Some- times, it makes me so angry—and I get this strange, irrational urge to break glass. I don’t know where it comes from, but I want to break glass!
Tonight, I sit in your nursery and watch your clown lamp throw happy shadows against the walls in the half-light. The oak rocking horse I made for you reminds me of the Flying Horses Carousel. Remember when we all went there on our vacation and rode the colorful horses? Nicholas, Suzanne, and Matt.
I held you in front of me, and you loved to stroke the real horsehair mane. I can see Mommy riding ahead of us on National Velvet. She turns— and there’s that famous wink of hers.
Oh, Nick, I wish I could turn back time to last week, or last month, or last year. I almost can’t bear to face tomorrow.
I wish this had a happy ending.
I wish I could say, just one more time: Isn’t it lucky?
Dear, sweet Nick,
There is one image that keeps coming back to me about Suzanne. It captures who she was, and what was so special and unique about her.
She is kneeling on our front porch one night. She wants my forgiveness, even though there is nothing to forgive. If anything, I should have been seeking her forgiveness. She had gotten some sad news that day but, in the end, could only think about how she might have hurt me. Suzanne always thought about other people first, but especially about the two of us. God, did she spoil us, Nicholas.
I was startled out of my thoughts and reveries this afternoon by an unexpected phone call.
It was for Mommy.
Obviously someone had no idea what had happened, and for the first time, those strange and awful words passed through my lips like heavy weights: “Suzanne has passed away.”
There was a long silence on the other end, followed by quiet apologies, and then nervous condolences. It was the man from the frame shop on the other side of the island, in Chilmark Center. Mommy had never made it there, and the pictures she had framed for you were still at the store.
I told the shop owner that I would come around for the photos. Somehow, I would manage to do it. I feel so out of it all the time. I have a hollow feeling inside me, and it seems I could crumble like old tissue paper and blow away. At other times, there is a stone column inside my chest.
I never used to be able to cry, but now I cry all the time. I keep thinking that I’ll run out of tears, but I don’t. I used to think it wasn’t manly to cry, but now I know that isn’t so.
I walk aimlessly from room to room, trying desperately to find a place where I can feel at peace with myself. Somehow, I always end up back in your room, sitting in the same rocker Mommy so often did when she talked to you and read to you and recited her goofy rhymes.
And so I sit here now, looking at the pictures of us I finally picked up this afternoon in Chilmark.
We are all sitting in front of the Flying Horses Carousel on a perfect, blue-skied afternoon.
You are wedged between us, Nick. Mommy has her arm around you and her legs crossed on mine. You’re kissing Mommy, and I’m tickling you, and everyone is laughing, and it’s just so beautiful.
Nicholas, Suzanne, and Matt—Forever One.
It’s time to tell you a story, Nick. It’s a story that I will share only with you. It’s just between the two of us.
Man to man, my little buddy.
Actually, it is the saddest story that I’ve ever heard, certainly the saddest one I’ve told.
I’m finding it hard to breathe right now. I’m shaking like a leaf. I have goose bumps all over my skin.
Years ago, when I was just eight, my father died very suddenly while he was at work. We didn’t expect it, so we never got to say good-bye. For years, my father’s death has haunted me. I’ve been so afraid of losing someone like that again. I think it’s why I didn’t get married earlier, before I met Suzanne. I was afraid, Nicky. Big, strong Daddy was so terribly afraid he might lose someone he loved. That’s a secret I never told anyone before I met your mother. And now, I’ve told it to you.
I pull the cord on your music box in your crib, and it begins to play “Whistle a Happy Tune.” I love this song, Nicky. It makes me cry, but I don’t care. I love your music and I want to hear it again.
I reach into the crib and I touch your sweet cheek.
I tussle your golden blond hair, always so soft and fragrant. I wish I had listened to Mommy and never cut it.
I do a nose to nose, gently touching my nose to yours. I do another nose to nose and you smile gloriously. One of your smiles is worth the universe to me. That’s the truth.
I place an index finger in each of your small hands and let you squeeze. You’re so strong, buddy.
I listen to your beautiful laugh, and it almost makes me laugh.
“Whistle a Happy Tune” continues to play.
Oh my dear, darling little boy. Oh, my darling baby.
The music plays, but you aren’t in your crib.
I remember Mommy leaving on her errand that morning. I called out “I love you,” and she blew me a kiss. Then she crinkled up her nose the way she does. You know what I mean. You know that look of hers. Then she gave me her “famous wink,” and I can see it right now. I can see Suzanne.
Her arms were full, because she was carrying you, sweet baby. She wanted you to be the first to see the beautiful framed photographs. That’s why she took you with her to town on your birthday morning.
Suzanne carried you outside and carefully strapped you in your car seat. You were in the
Jeep with Mommy when she crashed on Old Pond Bridge Road. The two of you were together. I still can’t bear to think about it.
I should’ve been there, Nicholas. I should’ve been there with you and Mommy! Maybe I could have helped; maybe I could have saved you somehow. At least I could have tried, and that would have meant everything to me.
Oh sweetness, I need to hear your laugh one more time. I ache to look into your bright blue eyes. To nuzzle your soft cheek next to mine.
Oh my dear little boy, my innocent little sweetheart, my baby son forever. I miss you so much, and it destroys me that you will never know how I feel, that you will never hear how much your daddy loves you. I miss you so much, I miss you so much, sweet baby. I always will.
But isn’t it lucky that I knew you, held you and loved you, for the twelve months before God took you away?
Isn’t it lucky that I got to know you, sweet little boy, my darling, darling son?
KATIE
KATIE SLOWLY raised her face toward the bathroom ceiling and shut her eyes as tight as she could. A soft moan rose from her throat. Tears squeezed under her eyelids and rolled down both cheeks. Her chest was heaving. She wrapped both arms around herself.
Merlin was in the doorway, whining, and Katie whispered, “It’s okay, boy.”
A column of pain rose inside her like a hot poker cutting into her lungs. Oh God, why would you let something like that happen?
Finally, Katie opened her eyes again. She could barely see through her tears. There was an envelope taped inside the diary, on the very last page.
It said, simply, Katie.
She wiped away her tears with both hands. She took a deep, calming breath. And another. The breaths didn’t help much. She opened the plain white envelope that was addressed to her.
The letter inside was in Matt’s handwriting. Her fingers trembled as she unfolded it. The tears started again as she began to read.
Katie, dear Katie,
Now you know what I haven’t been able to tell you all these months. You know my secrets. I wanted to tell you, almost since the day that we met. I have been grieving for such a long time, and I couldn’t be comforted. So I kept my past from you. You, of all people. There are words from a poem about the local fishing boats and their crews that have been carved into the
bar of Docks Tavern on the Vineyard. The longed-for ships / Come empty home or founder on the deep / And eyes first lose their tears and then their sleep. I saw the words one night at Docks, when I couldn’t cry anymore, and couldn’t sleep, and I was almost crushed by the awful truth in them.
Matt
That was all that he wrote, but Katie needed more. She had to find Matt.
Seven
SHE HAD always been a fighter. She’d conquered her fears to come to New York by herself. She’d always had the courage to do what she had to do.
Katie took the shuttle to Boston first thing in the morning. At Logan Airport, she was met by a car service that would take her to Woods Hole and the ferry to Martha’s Vineyard.
She entered the Steamship Authority terminal in Woods Hole, bought her ticket, and got on a two-decker ferry called the Islander.
She had to talk to Matt. It was wrong not to let him know everything. It was just plain wrong, and she couldn’t live that way. Matt needed to know about the baby.
During the seven-mile, forty-five-minute ride, she thought of Suzanne, and her arrival on the Vineyard after she left Boston. She wondered if Suzanne had been on board the Islander, too. She remembered the last words Suzanne had written to Nicholas: I can’t wait to see you in the morning.
Katie realized she hadn’t brought a manuscript to read on the plane or the ferry. Work is a rubber ball, she thought. Yes, it is.
God, look at what she would have missed if she had brought along paperwork: the rhythmic chop of the waves against the ancient ferry’s bow, the picturesque island of Martha’s Vineyard getting closer and closer, the queasiness in her stomach every time a big wave splashed into the ship.
Matt was a glass ball. He had been scuffed, marked, damaged, but maybe he hadn’t been shattered. Or maybe he had been.
The mystery would never be solved unless she found him.
As the Islander got closer and closer to the Vineyard, Katie couldn’t take her eyes off the old Oak Bluffs ferry terminal. It was a gray clapboard building, a one-story structure that looked a hundred years old if it was a day. She could see a beach on one side of the terminal, and the small town of Oak Bluffs on the other.
Her eyes searched the terminal building, the beach, the town—looking for Matt.
She didn’t see him anywhere.
Eight
THE TOWN buildings of Oak Bluffs were across the street from the ferry terminal. There were several odd-colored taxis parked out front. And, of course, Matt wasn’t waiting there for her to appear. He didn’t know she was coming, and even if he had, he might not have come.
Katie spotted Docks Tavern as she started toward the taxi stand. Her heart skipped a beat. This had to be a sign, no? Had to be something. She walked toward the bar instead of searching for a cab.
Was Matt in there? Probably not, but Docks was where he had read the lines carved into the bar, which he had included in his note in the diary.
It was dark inside, a little smoky, pleasant enough, though. A Bruce Springsteen song played from an old Wellington jukebox. About a dozen patrons were at the bar, and several people were seated in the weathered wooden booths on either side. Most of them looked up at her as she entered. She knew she was having a bad hair day, bad clothes day, bad life day.
“I come in peace,” Katie said, and smiled.
She was incredibly nervous, though. She had decided she was coming to Martha’s Vineyard about three in the morning. She had to see Matt again. She wanted to be in his arms and to hold him, even if that might not happen. Katie needed a hug badly.
Her eyes roamed slowly over the faces, which seemed right out of The Perfect Storm. Her heart sped up some. She didn’t see Matt. Well, thank God, he wasn’t a regular at least.
She went looking for the poem carved into the bar. It took her a few minutes to find it at the far end, near a dartboard and a public phone. She read the words again:
The longed-for ships.
Come empty home or founder on the deep.
And eyes first lose their tears and then their sleep.
“Help you with something? Or is your interest wholly literary?”
She looked up at the sound of the male voice. She saw a bartender, mid-thirties, red-bearded, ruggedly good-looking. Maybe a sailor himself.
“I’m just looking for someone. A friend. I think he comes in here,” she said.
“He has good taste in taverns, anyway. Does he have a name?”
She took in a breath and tried to keep the tremor out of her voice. “Matt Harrison,” Katie said.
The bartender nodded, but his dark brown eyes narrowed some. “Matt comes in here for dinner sometimes. He paints houses on the island. You say you’re a friend of his?”
“He also writes books,” Katie said, feeling a little defensive now. “Poetry.”
The bartender shrugged, and continued to look at her suspiciously. “Not that I know of. At any rate, Matt’s not here today. As you can see for yourself.” The red-bearded man finally smiled at her. “So what will it be? You look like a Diet Coke to me.”
“No, nothing, thanks. Could you tell me how to get to his place? I’m a friend of his. I’m his editor. I have the address.”
The bartender thought about it, and then he tore a sheet off his order pad. “You driving?” he asked as he began to write down a few directions.
“I’ll probably take a cab.”
“They’ll know the place,” the man said, but didn’t elaborate. “Everybody knows Matt Harrison.”
Nine
KATIE SLOWLY climbed into a rusted, sky blue Dodge Polaris cab at the ferry terminal. Suddenly, she was feeling tired. She said to the driver, “I’d like to go to the Abel’s Hill Cemetery. Do you know it?”
By way of an answer, the cabdriver simply pulled away from the curb. She guessed he knew where everything was on the island. She certainly hadn’t meant to offend him.
Abel’s Hill was a good twenty minutes away, a small, picturesque place that looked at least as old and historic as any of the houses they had passed on the way there.
“I won’t be too long,” she said to the driver as she struggled out of the backseat. “Please wait for me.”
“I’ll wait, but I have to keep the meter running.”
“That’s fine. I understand,” she told him, and shrugged. “I’m from New York City. I’m used to it.”
The cab waited while she slowly and reverently walked from row to row in Abel’s Hill, checking all the headstones, but especially the newer ones. During the ride over, the cabdriver had told her that John Belushi and the writer Lillian Hellman were buried here.
Her chest felt tight, and there was a lump in her throat as she searched for the grave. She felt as if she were intruding.
Finally, she found it. She saw the carved lettering on a stone set on a hill, Suzanne Bedford Harrison.
Her heart clutched again, and she felt dizzy. She bent and went down on one knee.
“I had to come, Suzanne,” she whispered. “I feel as if I know you so well by now. I’m Katie Wilkinson.”
Her eyes traveled across the inscription. Country doctor, much loved wife of Matthew, perfect mother of Nicholas.
Katie offered up a prayer, one that her father had taught her when she was only three or four.
She turned to the smaller stone right beside Suzanne’s. She sucked in a breath.
Nicholas Harrison, a real boy, cherished son of Suzanne and Matthew.
“Hello, sweet baby boy. Hello, Nicholas. My name is Katie.”
She began to sob uncontrollably then. She clutched her chest with both arms, and her whole body shook like a weeping willow in a storm. She mourned for poor baby Nicholas. She couldn’t begin to understand how Matt had survived this.
She imagined him in Nicholas’s room, playing the music box on the crib over and over, trying to remem- ber how it had been with his baby son, trying to bring Nicholas back.
There were flowers, daisy poms, carnati
ons, and gladiolas at both of the graves. Someone has been here recently, maybe even today. Matt had always given her roses. He was a good man, sweet and kind. She’d been right about that. She hadn’t made a bad choice, just an unlucky one.
And then Katie noticed something else, the date that was carved into the two headstones.
July 18, 1999.
She felt a shiver vibrate through her, and her knees were weak again. July 18 was two years to the day of the party she’d had planned for Matt on her terrace in New York, the night she’d given him the copy of his book of poems. No wonder he ran away. And now, where was Matt?
Katie had to see him—one more time.
Ten
IT TOOK another twenty minutes for the creaky island cab to bump its way from the cemetery to the old boathouse that she immediately recognized as Suzanne’s.
It was painted white now. The barnlike doors and the trim were gray. There was a flower garden full of hydrangeas, azaleas, and day lillies.
She could see why Suzanne had loved it so much. Katie did, too. It was a real home.
She slowly got out of the cab. An ocean breeze played with her hair. She felt the wind gently pat her face and her bare legs. Her heart was back into its pounding routine again.
“Should I wait?” the driver asked.
Katie nibbled her upper lip, crossed and uncrossed her long arms. She looked at her watch: 3:28. “No. Thanks. You can go this time. I’ll be here for a while.”
She paid the driver, and he sped off.
Her heart was stuck in her throat as she walked up the gravel path to the house. Her eyes did a once-over of the property. She saw no sign of Matt. No car. Maybe it was in back.
She knocked on the front door, waited, fidgeted, then used the old wooden knocker.
No one answered.