The Deep Blue Sea for Beginners (10 page)

“It was
his
idea?” I asked.

“I believe so,” Max said.

“Why?”

“He must have needed to let her go, so he could live his life. And perhaps it was a kindness to her, as well. Allowing her to live hers.”

I thought that over. It would be so like my father to be thinking of her, setting her free so she could get better, do whatever it was she’d needed to accomplish by leaving us. Yes, that was my father all over. I felt just a tiny bit better. I gave Max a look of gratitude, for helping me to see the situation this way.

I thought of asking him if we could take the funicular down to the Marina Grande—I wanted to walk the docks, feel the buzz of the waterfront, the connection to Newport and Travis, let the salt water wash away the shocks of this day and return me to feeling close to my boyfriend. But something stopped me in my tracks. Straight ahead: the Grand Hotel Quisisana, old, elegant, and venerable. I recognized it immediately; Lucy and I had received a postcard of it.

“My grandmother stayed here,” I said, staring at the façade.

“Yes,” he said. “I met her when she came. She visited your mother only once.”

“They never got along,” I said.

“I believe your grandmother had certain ideas about how your mother should live her life.”

“Lots of mothers and daughters disagree,” I said.

“Christina took note of your mother’s great talent,” Max said. “She loves the garden, and exhibits true artistry. It became obvious quickly that all forms of self-expression were stifled from a young age. When I met your grandmother, I mentioned your mother’s love of flowers. And Edith said—”

“Let me guess,” I said. “‘That’s why we have gardeners.’”

“You know her well.”

“I guess I do,” I said.

“She told Christina that she wanted to be an artist when she was a young girl.”

“My
grandmother?”
I asked.

Max nodded. “She told Christina her mother said that art was for bohemians. Christina could have been insulted, but chose not to be; she heard great wistfulness in your grandmother’s voice.”

“My grandmother isn’t known for being wistful,” I said.

“No,” Max said. “It was a fleeting moment. But enough to see that her dreams had been thwarted. Instead of gaining insight, and nurturing your mother’s talent, Edith passed on her own parents’ lessons.”

“Ghosts of the nursery,” I said, using a phrase I’d read in a psychology text.

“Pell,” Max said, “you’re very young. And you and Lucy have been through so much. I find the fact you want to understand and forgive your mother to be touching beyond words. But do you really want to understand?” he asked.

“Of course,” I said, shocked by the question.

“Then, as you spend time here this summer, notice her life and ask yourself what it must have been like for her at home, as a young woman, being held back, imprisoned by her mother’s ideas of how life should be lived.”

“My grandmother didn’t force my mother to leave us,” I said. “Leave our home in Michigan.”

“No,” Max said, sadly and with deep love in his eyes. “She didn’t believe your mother should have gone to Michigan in the first place. Your grandmother devalued her own daughter. Lyra came here, came alive through her garden.”

“Her garden,” I said.

“It brings her solace,” Max said.

“Solace?” I asked. Not only because the word is odd and old-fashioned, but because of the way Max said it: I’d swear his voice was filled with longing. For my mother? I felt stunned by what I saw in his eyes.

“We all need it,” he said. “And search for it. Your sister, through math and a connection with your father’s ghost. You, by coming here to Capri, rightly wanting more from your mother. My grandson, walking the tide line as he did long ago with his father.”

“Rafe,” I said.

“Yes,” Max said. “I wish I could help him more.”

“I think you’re the reason he gets up in the morning,” I said. “Walks the beach, and saves the starfish.”

“Because I want him to keep busy?”

“No,” I said. “Because you love him and you’re saving
him.”

Max gave me a long look, as if I’d shown him a new way to see something. He smiled. We walked along a little farther, then came to an ice-cream shop. We went inside, and he bought me a cone, one scoop of dark chocolate. I ate it slowly as we continued our walk.

Solace.

Nine

L
yra got up early the next morning, looked in on Pell. She slept on her side. Long hair covered her face. Lyra sat on the edge of the bed, stared at her for a long time. Dawn light slanted through the east window, clear and bright. It fell on Pell’s open backpack. Books were spilling out. A photograph. Lyra reached for it.

Her wedding photo. Lyra looked at herself and Taylor. He looked so happy and protective; she looked elusive. She wore the famous Nicholson family veil, two hundred years old. She remembered her mother saying “Don’t rip it” perhaps ten times through the wedding day, as if the fabric of the veil were more important than that of the marriage.

Lyra’s gaze drifted from the picture to her daughter. Why was Pell carrying it with her? The idea of a happy family had never left her. But formal photographs are funny things. They capture a moment, and not necessarily a real one, but an arrangement directed by a photographer to create a mood.

Lyra and Taylor had had the wedding of the year; it was literally called that by the style editor at the
New York Times
. Four hundred guests, high nuptial mass at church, Pachelbel’s Canon and the Prince of Denmark’s March, limousines home to the Nicholson estate on Bellevue Avenue, a candlelit path to the tent—the candles in hurricane lamps to protect against the fresh sea breeze, vintage Krug champagne, Lyra in her white gown and family’s heirloom veil.

A storybook wedding. The wedding guests included the governor of Rhode Island, two senators, European royalty, all friends of her mother. Sitting in the limousine with Taylor as they arrived at the reception, she’d stared at the sprawling house she’d grown up in and had had a panic attack. She’d been unable to breathe. Taylor’s hand on the back of her neck, easing her head down, his calm voice telling her everything was wonderful, they were married now, about to start their lives together.

“I’ll tell the driver to just keep going,” he’d joked. “We’ll skip out on the party and go straight to Bermuda.”

“Could we?” she’d asked, not kidding.

Lyra stared at the photo another minute. She replaced it in the backpack, returned to the edge of Pell’s bed. She touched her daughter’s shoulder. Fine-boned, vulnerable. She felt a lump in her throat. Ten years missing.

“Pell?” she said.

“Mmm.”

The last time she’d done this, Pell had been a little girl. But she slept the same way: facing the wall, fists drawn up beneath her chin, hair tangled over her face. Lyra shook with emotion. After all these years, her daughter was right here, sleeping in her house.

“Could you get up? I’d like you to come with me.”

And Pell did, without question. She rolled out of bed, washed her face, threw on jeans and a sleeveless shirt. Together they walked through the garden, down to the driveway she shared with the villa. Glancing up, Pell saw Max sitting on his terrace, writing. He waved, and looked so happy to see Lyra and Pell together, it hit her in the heart.

They drove to the market, shopped for white flowers. Lyra watched Pell walk up and down the rows of long tables, choosing the best flats of white impatiens and geraniums. She was beautiful, caught the attention of the shopkeepers. Lyra introduced her as her daughter.

“I didn’t know you had a daughter!” some of them said.

“You’ve kept her hidden away!”

“She has your eyes….”

Lyra felt proud. They loaded the plants and flowers into Lyra’s old Alfa, pulled out of the parking lot, and drove toward Amanda and Renata’s house. White flowers, fragrant herbs, lush greenery, an archway, a curved gate.

“Lyra!”

She waved at Gregorio Dante, a stonemason she’d hired. He stood by a half-built structure, piles of concrete and white rock beside him, two columns rising on either side of the four-foot-wide garden path. Curly dark hair, deep tan, muscles bulging in his T-shirt. He came toward her, teeth gleaming in a wide smile.

“Ciao, Lyra,” he said, kissing her on both cheeks.

“Ciao, Gregorio,” she said.

“It’s a beautiful day,” he said. “Always, when I see you. And who is this lovely girl?”

“My daughter, Pell,” Lyra said.

“How do you do?” Pell asked.

“Pleased to meet you,” he said, smiling.

“Pell,” Lyra said, “Gregorio is building a moon gate for Renata and Amanda’s garden.”

“Very romantic,” Gregorio said. “To capture the moon as it rises in the east.”

“I’ve seen pictures of one,” Pell said.

Lyra tingled; this was why she’d wanted Pell to come to the job site. “From our honeymoon,” she said. “Your father’s and mine.”

“Yes,” Pell said. “I still have your wedding album.”

“I saw the photo you brought,” Lyra said.

Pell didn’t answer. She walked back to the car, started unloading the garden tools. Lyra watched her carry them to the flower bed she’d staked out.

“It was right there, in your room,” Lyra said. “I didn’t go through your things.”

“I didn’t think you had,” Pell said. “I’m just surprised you mentioned it. I don’t know what you think about him—about your marriage. I had no idea you were divorced.”

“I didn’t know it would make that much difference to you,” Lyra said.

“It does,” Pell said.

“Then will it also make a difference to know that when I think of love, I think of your father?” Lyra asked. “Renata and Amanda wanted their garden to reflect their love. I gave that a lot of thought, and came up with the moon gate. It honors your father’s memory, and also the dreams we once had.”

“Dreams?” Pell asked.

“Yes,” Lyra said. “Your father and I had dreams.”

“What were they?” Pell asked.

“Let’s work first. Then I’ll tell you.”

They began to dig. When they came to deeply embedded rocks, bits of calcareous stone, they heaved them toward Gregorio, and he washed and set them into the white columns. The ground gave way, and they got into a rhythm. Sun beat down on their heads; ribbons of sweat ran down Lyra’s back.

“There’s a problem,” Gregorio said, walking over to Lyra and Pell. “The sides of the gate are coming along. But the arch, overhead. I need more information.”

“What kind of information?” Pell asked.

“It needs to be a half-circle. But I don’t have the proper calculations. Let me take a break, see what I can figure out.” He walked away, sat in the shade of an olive tree, started making notations on the back of an envelope while the fine silver-green leaves rustled in the breeze overhead.

“Will you tell me now?” Pell asked. “About your dreams?”

“I will. You saw pictures of the moon gate in our wedding album. Do you know the story?” Lyra asked.

“No,” Pell said.

“In 1860, in Bermuda, a sea captain brought the idea back from a voyage to China. He had one built of island stone; the simple arch symbolized peace, joy, and long life. When a couple passed through holding hands, their future would be blessed.”

“Yours wasn’t,” Pell said.

“It was for a while,” Lyra said.

Pell stopped, looking at her.

“We had you,” Lyra said. “You and Lucy. You were our dreams.”

“We were
real,”
Pell said quietly. “Not dreams. We’re flesh and blood. We needed you, but you left.”

“I know that, Pell. This is hard for me to say. I wanted to be a great mother. I loved you—there was no shortage of love. But I wasn’t good at what I’d set out to do.”

“You weren’t good at being a mother?” Pell asked. Her eyes flashed with anger and skepticism. “You are
wrong.”

Lyra stared at her; she could see Pell believed what she was saying. But Pell was still so young—sixteen. Her own life had barely started unfolding yet. What if she discovered things about herself that made her take a path she couldn’t see yet?

“I talked to Max yesterday” Pell said.

“What about?” Lyra asked, surprised.

“You. The divorce. Grandmother. Lucy. Talking to him, I can be so rational and kind. I want to understand you. But being here—sitting with you … it makes me feel crazy. You have no idea what it’s been like. And not so much for me—for Lucy.”

“Tell me,” Lyra said.

“I’m worried about her. She’s so restless. She doesn’t sleep well, sometimes she sleepwalks. I’m supposed to go to college next year, but how can I leave her? She’s relied on me all this time. But she really needs you.”

Lyra stared at Pell. How could she explain how this made her feel? She felt she’d abdicated the right to be needed by her kids. There was a sacredness about being a mother. Everyone expected devotion and sacrifice. A woman leaving her family shocked people more than if she committed murder for them. If she became a prostitute to take care of them, it would be more acceptable.

She remembered being held in Grosse Pointe for a psych evaluation, before going to McLean. One of the women on her unit had dealt drugs to afford a house for her and her two children. She’d sold crack and heroin, slept with her supplier to pay him. One day she had to go to Detroit to pick up supplies; her three-year-old daughter was home from preschool with a fever. The woman left her in the car while she went inside to have sex and get the drugs. When she came out, there were two men trying to break in to her car, to get her daughter.

The woman had gone crazy, literally lost it. She’d grabbed a baseball bat off the porch, come off swinging. She cracked the skull of one man, broke teeth and the nose of the other. She’d jumped into her car, grabbed her shrieking daughter. She’d been arrested, sent for psychiatric help; her children taken by the state until she completed her sentence. Lyra thought of her now—a madwoman wielding a baseball bat to protect her kids.

The idea of Lucy suffering ripped Lyra apart. She’d done nothing to help her girls; she’d walked away from them instead. She saw Pell staring at her. The hostility drained from Pell’s eyes.

“Do you know why I want to become a psychologist?” Pell asked.

“Because I’ve caused so much damage?”

“No,” Pell said. “Because of this, right here.” She tapped her forehead just above her right eyebrow. Then she reached across the dirt and touched the same spot on Lyra’s head.

“Is that the site of craziness?” Lyra asked.

“No,” Pell said, shaking her head. “It’s the right frontal cortex,” she said. “And something happened there, for both me and Lucy, when we were four months old.”

“What?” Lyra asked. She had never dropped her, never shaken her. She felt stunned by the idea of an injury. Could she have forgotten, blocked out an incident? Is this why Lucy couldn’t sleep?

“At that age, a baby’s need for her mother becomes so intense—not just for survival, as it is right after birth—but for emotional connection. The baby needs her mother to show her the way.”

“And I didn’t do that,” Lyra said. “I didn’t show you the way.”

“Oh, you did,” Pell said. “That’s why it made me so mad, when you said you weren’t good at being a mother.”

“But, Pell—” Lyra started.

Pell talked right over her. “You and I were so connected. I felt you with me every second. I remember how it felt to have you hold me, sing to me, whisper stories to me as I fell asleep. You rocked me when I cried. When I was teething, you rubbed my gums with your finger.”

“But your … head … What happened, did I hurt you, did …”

Pell shook her head. “No. You didn’t hurt me—the opposite. You were there, and that’s all that mattered. See, things happen in a baby’s brain, all having to do with her mother. Neurons firing, synapses sparking, just as if there’s lightning flashing between mother and child. It’s so real, and so energized, the baby’s brain literally grows toward the mother’s.”

“And the mother’s?” Lyra asked.

“Grows toward the child’s. It’s the realest connection there is. I felt myself being part of you, and you part of me. It’s how I made sense of the world. Lucy too.”

“As babies?” Lyra asked.

“Always,” Pell said.

“Even after …”

Pell nodded. “Even after you left.”

Lyra dug her hands into the dirt. She felt the ground’s heat. Pell stared at her; Lucy couldn’t sleep. Lyra tried to hold tight, as if she could keep from flying off the planet.

“This is how it works,” Pell said. “The way mothers and children navigate life together.”

“And it all happened when you were four months old?” Lyra asked.

“Not all,” Pell said. “It continues until the child is twenty-five.”

“‘It?’” Lyra asked.

“Activity in the right frontal cortex. The child looking to her mother to show her the way. Their brains growing toward each other’s.”

Lyra nodded. She felt a zinging sensation in her head, just above her right eyebrow. The feeling was familiar; she’d had it all along. She just hadn’t realized it was her brain not just yearning for her daughters, but actually reaching for them. It was biological.

“So much time has gone by,” Lyra said.

“It doesn’t matter,” Pell said. “We have until Lucy and I turn twenty-five.” She smiled.

“You’ve taken such good care of Lucy,” Lyra said. “She must miss you now.”

“She’s staying with the Shaws,” Pell said. “My boyfriend’s family. His sister Beck is Lucy’s best friend. Their mother is … kind of like a mom to Lucy.”