Chapter 12 #2
I imagine you’re handling this much better than I am, but aren’t you angry with Mom?
I hung up on her when she told me the news.
Sure, she’s sacrificed a lot for Dad’s business, but that was her choice.
No one forced her to do anything. I just don’t see how she can do this to him.
I know he’s far from perfect, and yes, he’s probably the most stubborn person I’ve ever known, but he doesn’t deserve this.
What about the vows they took? When I told Mom I was marrying Devin, she couldn’t shut up about how a good and stable marriage was the best way for a woman to secure her future.
And now look at what she’s done. I just keep thinking about Dad trying to make himself dinner every night.
Maybe that was part of the problem, but it’s not his fault.
Men of his generation just never learned how to do that sort of thing.
Now what’s he going to do? Subsist on grilled cheese sandwiches?
What are we going to do, Cece? Sooner or later, he’s going to need help.
And no offense, but you’re still figuring things out, and Devin and I have our hands full.
The boys just finished up summer camp, and it’s pure madness here.
I can’t stand the idea of him being alone in that big house.
He isn’t the perfect father, but whose father is?
Whatever his shortcomings, they don’t justify Mom’s behavior.
I hope you’re taking all of this okay. I’ll call when I’ve calmed down. Maybe I shouldn’t be this angry, but I can’t help it. I feel like she’s been lying to us the entire time. I’m sure you have a much more enlightened perspective, but for now, I’m just angry.
Love, Wynonna
Cece wouldn’t call her reaction more enlightened.
Realistic is probably the better word for how she sees the world lately.
She understands how Wynonna feels. Kim had always heralded the virtues of marriage, the importance of finding a good match and worthy partner to propel you through life, someone who would stand by you when waters grew rough, and they always grew rough, she used to say.
Maybe Wynonna feels the impending separation of their parents more acutely because she’s the only one of them who’s taken the plunge, followed through on their mother’s advice.
For Wynonna, Kim’s departure is an admission that she was wrong—and what might this truth reveal about Wynonna, or the entire enterprise of marriage?
Betrayed…it’s not how Cece feels, exactly.
And even while she worries about her father, she can’t help but be impressed by her mother’s fortitude and unrelenting optimism…
or maybe it’s something closer to cold pragmatism.
After all, isn’t she following the same advice she used to drill into her daughters all those years ago?
Kim seems determined to deny her fate, stuck in a stale marriage with a man who has little interest in evolving or maintaining, even improving, their current financial state.
It is a terrible thing, Cece thinks, growing to the age when you can see your parents for what they are: frail, imperfect creatures who once spoke with confidence and authority because that is what their children required.
On the television, Diane Lane is standing on a dock staring out to sea and looking exceptional in a worn flannel shirt. Cece finds her beauty distracting. She’s a fisherman’s wife, after all!
“You’re cool with this?” Jonathan asks from the kitchen.
The microwave whines, the pop of kernels fragrant and urgent. “With what?”
He emerges from behind the half wall, a questioning smirk on his face. “Staying the night. I told you. I’m fine with easing back in. Taking our time.”
“Totally,” Cece says, louder than she means. “It’s not a big deal.”
“Great,” Jonathan says, over the beeping.
Jonathan had wanted to eat out, but Cece had convinced him to order in from their favorite Thai place.
She’d made sure to eat light in anticipation of something happening.
If she’d had any doubts about whether she was doing the right thing by trying to make this work with Jonathan, the implosion of her parents’ marriage has only reinforced her reasons for coming back.
There’s always going to be risk, of course, but with Jonathan, the percentages are just better.
Plus, Jonathan is a good man, a kind man.
A man who forgave her, even if Cece never did come clean about everything.
A small, unimportant detail, she thinks, while they settle into the couch.
By the front door, Bernard eyes them with suspicion, and she wonders what he thinks about all this.
Cece doesn’t dare mention anything about her parents’ marital problems. Nothing ruins the mood like divorce and family dysfunction.
Cece has plans. She resists shoveling popcorn in her mouth and drinking too much wine while the movie drags on, pondering the best way to initiate things.
It’s odd—strategizing like this, like Jonathan’s a stranger, like they don’t know the rhythms of their bodies.
The AC kicks on and Cece pulls a blanket over them.
In the dark room, the television flickers: Bearded men in orange rubber waders.
Green ocean spray. The boat’s heaving prow.
Of all things, must they watch this? All she can think about is the grumble of Morgan’s pickup truck, his baseball cap pushed back on his pale forehead.
It’s nothing, Cece thinks to herself. It’s a silly thing.
It doesn’t matter. Soon they’ll retire to the bedroom, where Jonathan’s bed is the perfect height for him to stand and pull her to the edge, hands grasping her hips.
She hopes the months apart have made him hungry and a little bit mad.
She needs him to lose himself with her; otherwise, what’s the point?
Cece turns to kiss Jonathan only to find him asleep, snoring lightly.
Disappointment and relief flood her chest, and she laughs silently to herself at the absurdity of it all before resting her head on his shoulder and closing her eyes, the movie playing out on mute.
When they wake in the early hours of morning, they look at each other bashfully and pick stray popcorn from the folds of the blanket while an infomercial flashes electric blues across the walls.
They shuffle to bed. Even with the lights off, Cece knows her way around the bathroom, the hand towel in its usual place, the toilet handle requiring an extended depression in order to flush fully.
Jonathan is half-awake when she comes to bed and slides in next to him, the smell of freshly laundered sheets nostalgic and familiar.
“I fell asleep,” he says to the room.
“You were tired.”
“Work’s been killer.”
Cece hears Bernard out in the kitchen, his anxious whine and slow walk to his foreign water bowl where he drinks noisily.
Oh, to be an animal! A thoughtless beast!
A sweat breaks out on her neck, lungs full, heart working hard, blood in her belly, blood in her toes.
She can’t will herself to move, but she would, she will, if only he touches her first. That will do the trick!
Jonathan rolls onto his back and rearranges the sheets.
He clasps her hand in his. “It’s good to have you back. ”
Cece finds herself sinking, gloriously, into the mattress. She’s forgotten how nice it is to sleep on a Tempur-Pedic bed…and on these six-hundred-thread-count Egyptian-cotton sheets. “It’s nice to be back.”
“I’ve been thinking about attending my high school reunion,” Jonathan says, “in August. Any chance you’d join?”
Cece is somewhere else, the memory foam pillow cradling her heavy head, the central air-conditioning washing over her body in waves of snowflaked cool.
Outside, the dim hum of streetlights and the occasional faraway siren.
Hips loosen, and the knots in her shoulders melt.
She will sleep well tonight. “Sure,” she hears herself say, “I’d love to. ”
Jonathan only squeezes her hand softly, his breath going quiet and deep. In the apartment, only the drone of energy-efficient appliances. Even Bernard has settled in for the night.
In the morning, Jonathan’s possessed with the idea of visiting Rayburn Oyster Company. “I’ve never seen an oyster farm,” he says over toasted whole wheat bread and orange juice. “At least show me where you guys are planning to expand. I wanna see the site.”
Cece can’t tell if his interest is earnest or manufactured, but she realizes it doesn’t matter. He’s trying—that’s what matters. “When would you like to go?”
“How about this morning? I’ve got nothing. We can take your car up and I’ll catch the train back.”
The idea makes so much sense Cece has trouble finding an answer other than yes.
It’s Sunday, so Santiago and Davi won’t be in Noank, which is perfect.
It’s not that she’s embarrassed for them to meet Jonathan; she just wouldn’t know how to introduce him.
Ex-fiancé now friend / potential fiancé again? Either way, they would give her shit.
It’s midday when they get to the docks in Noank.
The Sunday crowd is already out on the water, leaving dozens of empty slips, squares of placid water reflecting the clouds above.
Before taking Jonathan down to the water, Cece shows him the warehouse where all their equipment is stored.
She can’t help brimming with pride as she points to the towering stacks of oyster cages she’s cleaned, the meticulously organized buoys, and the enormous floor-to-ceiling pegboard wall she reorganized to hold all their shop tools.
A musty aroma—dried seawater and motor oil—lingers in the stale air.