Before the Storm (34 page)

buildings. In the beginning, I hated everything about it: the

forced structure, the food, the exercise, the group sessions, my

assigned individual therapist. I was surrounded by addicts and

crazy people with whom I had nothing in common. They

allowed no one to visit me, not even Jamie. They gave me the

Prozac I’d resisted a couple of years earlier. I was there a full

month before I began to feel a change come over me. I broke

down during therapy, crying a river of tears that had been

locked inside me, perhaps since the deaths of my parents so

many years earlier. I remembered Jamie telling me, so long ago,

If you don’t deal with loss, it could come back to bite you later.
Was

that what had happened to me?

One memorable day, I laughed at a commercial on television and it was like hearing the voice of a stranger in my ears.

I couldn’t remember the last time I’d laughed.

And one morning, almost two months into the program, I

woke up caring. I cared how Maggie and Jamie were doing. I

cared about my newborn son whose face I’d barely noticed and

wished now I could see and touch. I had a picture of him that

Jamie had taken at the hospital and I kept it in my pocket

during the day and on my night table at night. A palm-size,

dark-haired baby, he lay in an incubator, his head turned away

from the camera, hooked up to more wires and tubes than I

could count. I knew he was now in a foster home, and I prayed

he was with people who were holding him and loving him. It

felt extraordinary to care about him and Maggie and Jamie. It

felt extraordinary to care about
myself.

By then, I knew the names of the addicts and crazy people

and I knew they were not all that different from me. Some of

them had lost their children for good. I wouldn’t let that

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happen. I was going to fight to get well and then I would fight

to get my baby back. And once I had him in my arms again, I

would never, ever, let him go.

BEN LEANED UP ON HIS ELBOW AND STRUCK A match to

light the joint he held between his lips. In that quick f lash

of light, I saw the smooth, dark hair on his chest. I put my

hand on his belly and rested my cheek against that hair.

Sometimes I couldn’t get close enough to him. Even when

he was inside me, it wasn’t really quite enough. What was

wrong with me? He gave me so much and I still wanted

more…though I wasn’t sure what it was, exactly, that I

wanted more of.

He held the joint to my lips and I pulled the smoke into my

lungs, holding it there as long as I could before letting my

breath out across his chest.

“I’m worried about Andy,” he said suddenly.

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“Me, too.” I knew Mom was still upset we’d given the cops

the wrong clothes, but I was glad. I wished I could tell Ben. I

wanted to tell
someone
about that split-second decision Mom

and I had made. That weird, sudden connection between us.

That no-turning-back moment. I couldn’t lay that on him,

though. There were so many things I wanted to tell him but

couldn’t. “Everyone’s turned against him all of a sudden.”

“Well, you haven’t. And I haven’t. And I’m sure as hell your

mom hasn’t.”

“True.”

Ben took another hit on the joint. “Your mother’s made

Andy her life’s work,” he said when he finally exhaled. “I

figured that out the first time I met her at the pool, when she

gave me written instructions on the best way to deal with him.”

He laughed. My head bounced on his chest.

“That’s my mom,” I said.

“She doesn’t mother
you
much, though, does she?”

“Well, I’m seventeen.”

“But has she ever?” he asked.“Has she ever taken care of you

the way she takes care of Andy?”

I felt a hurt inside me that I didn’t want to feel. “I never

needed taking care of the way Andy does,” I said.

“Everybody needs to be taken care of.”

“That’s why I’ve got you,” I said.

He didn’t say anything, and the hurt expanded inside my

chest. He held the joint to my lips again, but I shook my head.

I felt a little sick from it now. I tried to think of a different

subject we could talk about. His daughter. He loved talking

about her. I could ask him when he’d see her again. I opened

my mouth to speak, but the alert tones suddenly rang out

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from his fire department pager, which was buried somewhere

in the pile of clothes on the floor.

Ben jumped to his feet, as I knew he would.

“Are you getting up?” He pulled his T-shirt over his head.

I stretched beneath the covers. “I’m going to stay here a

while.” The long window in front of the bed was full of stars.

I could sit outside and try to make contact with Daddy’s spirit.

It had been so long since I’d been able to reach him, and all

that talk about needing to be taken care of really got to me.

“I don’t like you being here alone at night.” He had no idea

how often I came to The Sea Tender alone.

“I’ll be okay,” I said.

I listened to him walk through the living room and close

the front door. I heard the
thump
as he jumped from the steps

to the sand. I tried to hear his van start, but he must have

parked too far away.

He’d handed me the joint before he left. I held it between

my lips without inhaling as I pulled on my shorts and top. I

blew out the candles, then walked outside to sit in my favorite

spot on the edge of the deck. I dropped the rest of the joint

to the sand below.
Wasteful,
Ben would say.

Closing my eyes, I took in a deep, salty breath as I tried to

still my mind.

At least the fire had been good for Ben, I thought. He was

happy in the department now. He wouldn’t leave.

Stop thinking!

I took in another deep breath, and my mind was on the brink

of clearing up when those damned posters from the memorial

service popped into it again.

I groaned. “Daddy,” I whispered in frustration.
“Please come.”

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What if he was just as frustrated as I was? Maybe he was

waiting on the other side for me to quiet my mind long enough

for him to break through. Maybe I was failing him like I was

failing everybody else.

I thought I heard a sound from inside the house. I turned to

listen through the screened door, but all I could hear was the

ocean.

A flash of light bobbed on the railing next to me. I jumped

to my feet.

“Maggie?”

A woman’s voice. I felt so busted and was glad I’d dropped

the joint.

I tried to block the beam of the flashlight with my hand to

see who was aiming it at me, but it was impossible. I was dizzy

from standing up too quickly. I grabbed the deck railing.“Who

are you?” I called.

“Oh my God, I don’t believe this!”

Dawn.
She pushed open the screened door. Her flashlight

blinded me.

“What are you doing here?” I asked as I backed against the

railing, shielding my eyes with my arm.

“I could ask you the same question.”

What did she know? The light was trapping me. I had to

get away from it. I pushed past her and into the house. She

followed me inside.

“This is the cottage where I lived when I was little.” My voice

shook. “I visit it sometimes. I was just going to leave.”

Dawn scanned the living room and kitchen with her flashlight. I could just make out that her hair was in a ponytail and

she had frown lines like stripes across her forehead. She sat

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down on the arm of the sofa and put the flashlight on the floor,

aiming it toward the corner of the room. She was too quiet.

I wanted to get my pocketbook out of the bedroom so I could

escape, but what if she followed me in there and saw the

unmade bed? Did she have a clue what was going on? Why was

she
here?

I picked up my bottle of water from the breakfast bar and

started talking to fill the silence.

“I’m sorry I didn’t call you about the fund-raising yet,” I said.

“I was waiting till I worked out details, but we’re going to have

this massive makeover event at the high school, with—”

“Why was Ben here?” she asked.

Shit.Shit.Shit.
“Ben?” I asked.“What makes you think he was

here?”

“Don’t play dumb,” she said. “D’you think I just happened

to show up here tonight? I followed him. I wanted to know

where he disappeared to so many nights without explanation.

When I saw him leave this cottage, I decided to see what was

so…so
alluring
to him about it. Now I get it.”

I opened the water bottle and took a sip to give me time to

think. “We meet here sometimes to talk about the swim team,”

I tried.

“You can do better than that,” she said.

“Dawn, it’s really not like—”

“Don’t give me that crap.” She sounded harsh, not like the

Dawn I thought I knew. “How long’s this been going on?”

I sighed. Gave in. I felt my shoulders sag. “A while,” I said.

“I can’t believe he’s cheating on me with a
teenager.
A
kid.

It’s sick.”

“He’s
not
cheating on you!”

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“What do you call it?”

“You’re just friends.”

“Oh, cut me a break,” she said. “Did he tell you that?”

I was afraid of getting Ben in more trouble by saying the wrong

thing,but I was so nervous I couldn’t think straight.“I know when

he first moved in, he…the two of you…you slept together, and

I know you hoped you’d be more than just friends, but—”

“That goddamned son of a bitch.” She rubbed her neck. “I

thought he was different, but turns out he’s like all the rest.

He wants the thrill of doing something forbidden, behind

closed doors. With a tight little body.” She motioned toward

me, toward my body.

“Ben’s so not like that.”

“Don’t tell me what Ben’s ‘so not’ like!” she snapped. “I
live

with him, sugar. I know him better than you ever will.”

I twisted the cap of the bottle back and forth, afraid of her

anger and what she might do. Who she might tell.

“Does your mama know about this?” She was a mind reader.

“She can get him for statutory rape.”

“The age of consent is sixteen.”

She let out a nasty laugh. “You’ve figured this all out, I see,”

she said.“Even if it’s not illegal, it’s
immoral
for a twenty-eightyear-old man to sleep with a seventeen-year-old girl.”

“Age is just a number.” I wrinkled my nose as the cliché

popped out of my idiotic mouth.

“And it’s immoral to sleep with two women at once and lie

to them about it.”

“It’s not at once.You are so
yesterday
to him!” I felt like a

bitch, but she deserved it. “You think he’s your boyfriend, but

he’s not.”

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She stared at me, then started laughing again. “Lord have

mercy,” she said, “I’m going to give that bastard one hell of a

talking-to.” She tilted her head to the side.“Was he your first?”

“None of your business.”

“I just bet he was. Men love that, don’t they? Popping the

cherry.”

“Don’t talk that way about him!” I said. “Don’t lump him

together with all the losers you’ve been—”

“Does your mama know you’re smoking weed?”

“What?”

“Don’t play innocent with me, Maggie. It reeks in here.”

Oh God.
Now she had two things on me. My hand twisted

the bottle cap back and forth. Back and forth.

Suddenly, she stood up. When she spoke again, her voice

was totally different. She growled like a tiger. “Lay off my

man, girl,” she said. She picked up the flashlight and walked

to the door. “If you don’t, I’ll have to tell your mama what

you’re up to, and she’s got enough to worry about right now.

You sure don’t want to add to that now, do you, sugar?”

I threw the bottle hard—
really
hard—before I knew what

I was doing. It caught her on the side of her neck and she

screeched, dropping the flashlight.

“Bitch!”
she said.

“I’m sorry!” I pressed my hands to my face. “I didn’t mean

to do that, Dawn! Honest!”

She picked up the flashlight and I thought she was going to

come after me with it, but she opened the door and ran onto

the front deck. I listened to the creak of the stairs and heard

her jump to the sand.

I slammed the door shut and turned the lock. Then I

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pulled my phone from my pocket and hit the speed dial for

Ben’s cell. No answer.

As fast as I could, I typed a text message into the keypad.

D knows.

“HAVE A SEAT, PLEASE.” DENNIS SHARTELL led me into his

office and gestured toward one of the leather chairs in front