Chapter 7
Arielle knocked on her aunt’s door, praying she’d open before someone saw her. She didn’t want anyone to know where she was.
Just as her aunt opened the door, Arielle could see her mother’s name flash across the screen on her aunt’s phone. She reached out and held on to her aunt’s hand. “Please don’t answer that.”
Thea’s eyes widened when she registered Arielle’s tear-stricken face. “What’s wrong? Is everyone alright?”
Arielle nodded, walking inside. She hadn’t been there for months, but the second she stepped into the small space, she felt a nostalgic wave of childhood sweep over her.
“I broke up with Jason,” she said, stepping deeper into her aunt’s apartment. “Can I stay here with you tonight?”
Before Thea could respond, Arielle noticed her aunt’s splotchy red face and swollen eyes. “Have you been crying?”
Arielle had never seen any of the Manus women cry.
She couldn’t even remember her mother crying when her father had been arrested.
Or when they’d lost their house. Or when her mother had to beg her parents to take them in.
Never once had her mother broken down during any of the horrible things that had happened to their family over the past few years.
“I’m sorry. I should’ve called first,” she said, turning back around toward the door.
“Stop,” her auntie commanded. She fell into the slightly worn chair in her living room—her obvious spot in the room.
Arielle walked over to the couch and sat with her backpack still hanging on her. “I’m sorry for intruding.”
“You’re my niece,” Thea said, patting the spot on the couch next to her. “There is always an open-door policy when it comes to you and your brother.”
She noticed she didn’t offer the same policy to anyone else. “Are you busy?”
Thea shook her head. “Tell me. What happened between you and Jason?”
Arielle could see the shock. The same shock she felt about it all. “He asked me to marry him.”
Thea’s eyes sprung wide open. “He proposed?”
Arielle nodded, still reeling in disbelief herself. She looked around her aunt’s apartment. Her apartment. Not her husband’s, or her friend’s, or her parents’—it was hers. No one could take that away from her aunt. No one could rip it out from underneath her.
No one.
“He’s just afraid because I’m leaving, so he thinks proposing is the answer.” Arielle knew it to be true. They were too young. He’d just begun working as a sternman for a reputable lobsterman crew. He was just starting his life.
The tears fell before she had a chance to hold them back. Just like the wrenching in her stomach. “I can’t stay here. I just can’t.”
She wiped her face with the tissue and blew her nose, but the tears continued to fall. She reached out to hold her aunt’s hand. “I never want to be beholden to a man.”
Thea nodded slowly at Arielle, as though she understood what she meant completely.
“My mom lost everything because of my father.” Arielle would never forget what happened to her mother when Arielle’s father went to prison.
Crissy had been happy to rely on her husband to support them, but when he went away, everything they had went too.
“I love Jason. I really do, but I’m never getting married. Ever.”
“Oh, I don’t know,” Thea said, faking a smile. “Sometimes people are really meant to be together. Look at Jason’s dad and Sophia. They’re really happy. And now your mom and Dr. Grant. Dean’s like the nicest guy for your mom. And?—”
“Ok, then why didn’t you get married?”
Thea shifted her position in her chair, stuffing her feet underneath a fuzzy blanket. “I guess he never asked.”
Arielle changed the subject back to her predicament. “I just want to get off this island and never look back.”
“Really?” Thea seemed surprised Arielle felt so boldly about leaving. “You really want to get off the island.”
She shook her head. “I want to get as far away as possible. Somewhere no one knows who I am and who my father is. Boston College is too close. The cheer team will definitely find out as soon as someone looks me up.”
The word “father” hit like a tritone.
Her aunt lifted her eyebrows. “Ah.”
“No one will forget.” Arielle teared up again. The only reason she was going to the stupid college was to get away from the rumors and the gossip. She couldn’t stay, but she couldn’t ask Jason to leave, either.
Jason was only proposing because he knew she wasn’t going to come back.
He knew the fate of their relationship. She wasn’t coy about it.
She had been honest since they’d started dating.
She wasn’t sticking around, and the minute she could leave the island, she would. She’d never led him on about things.
“Does your mom know where you are?” Thea asked, pulling out her phone.
Arielle shrugged. Crissy probably thought she was with her new friends from school that she’d made up.
In reality, she’d made no friends at the school orientation.
All the other girls had seemed to click right away, whereas Arielle hadn’t had any urge to get to know any of them, because she didn’t want to explain her situation—where was she from, what her parents did for work, what school she went to.
All the typical freshman getting-to-know-you questions that Arielle wanted to avoid.
She didn’t want anyone connecting the dots to her and her father.
She didn’t want the whispers and the rumors to plague her college years too.
She’d keep to herself to keep others from knowing she was Scott Gagnon’s daughter.
That’s why she’d gone to the courthouse on her eighteenth birthday.
She pulled out her identification and handed it to her aunt.
“Arielle Manus?” she read aloud.
“I don’t want to carry that burden anymore.” She hadn’t told anyone up to that point. Not even Jason.
Arielle hadn’t blamed her friend’s parents.
After all, her father had stolen from all of them.
Of course they had feelings about him, whether they tried to hide it or mumbled it in front of her.
People tended to show their true feelings about her father with her friends.
They’d tell their children what had happened, even though they had no clue about anything.
The lies and misinformation in the news spread quickly through the island’s children.
“I heard your dad might have been involved in worse crimes, like murder, to cover up his stealing,” one of her friends had confessed at a party that past year.
“I heard he was a drug lord,” another one had said in math class.
Arielle needed to find a place where she could be someone other than Scott Gagnon’s daughter.
“I just need to stay tonight.” She had missed the last ferry into Portland’s downtown harbor. “I’ll leave tomorrow. Please, just don’t tell anyone I’m here.”
She could tell she was putting her aunt in an uncomfortable position. “Please, Auntie Thea. I just need to be away from everyone’s opinion right now.”
“I don’t think your mom wants you to be married.”
But what Thea didn’t understand was that Arielle wasn’t bothered that they wouldn’t want her to get married.
Their opinions could be the opposite. But they’d be just that—opinions.
She didn’t want any of it. She didn’t want to hear it because the minute they shared their opinions, she would have to break their hearts.
Nothing they said would change her mind.
She was leaving tomorrow morning, and she was never returning to Isabel Island again.
After what felt like forever, Thea exhaled. “Alright, but you have to tell your mother you’re okay. I don’t want her to worry.”
Arielle wrapped her arms around her auntie’s neck. “Thank you, Auntie Thea. Thank you so much. I promise you won’t even notice I’m here.”
“I don’t mind you being here,” Thea said. She moved closer to Arielle and hugged her. “I love you. I want to be here for you.”
“I just feel horrible.” Arielle couldn’t stop seeing Jason’s face. She could feel his pain when she rejected his proposal, even though he said nothing. “I never wanted to be so serious.”
But she’d never used him. Never. How he could say such a thing was beyond her. Or, if she had used him, she had no idea what she was doing. She rolled back through her mind’s rolodex of memories of their relationship. Had she led him on?
“What about the wedding?” Thea shook her head. “You can’t miss Sophia and Patrick’s wedding.”
“I can’t show my face in front of them either.” Tears idled on the edge of her lids. “I just need to get to school, and then he will forget about me.”
Thea squeezed Arielle, holding her niece against her. “Don’t leave like this. Your mom, Brady, Sophia, me. We don’t want you to just leave without saying goodbye.”
“Auntie.” Arielle buried her face in her hands, letting the tears go. “I never want to see any of them again.”
Thea rubbed her back. “Call your mother. Let her know you’re okay.”
Arielle promised, but she texted a white lie instead. “Sleeping over with Auntie one last time! XOXO!”
No one would suspect her bedroom had been packed up that afternoon. Jason wasn’t going to tell anyone, being on the boat all day in the middle of the Atlantic Ocean. He told her all he wanted was for her to be happy, but he’d left without saying anything more.
“What did I do?” She began to sob. The one person who loved her for her had asked her to be with him forever, and she’d broken his heart.
But the truth was, she didn’t trust anyone. Even Jason. And if she couldn’t trust him, then she definitely shouldn’t marry him.
A wrenching pain escaped from her lungs as she sobbed harder.
“Arielle,” her auntie whispered into her ear. “You have to follow your heart, not your head.”
“Is that why you’ve been running after Mr. Westbrook for years?” She never understood why her beautiful aunt chased the weird man. His halo hairline made him look even older than she suspected he was. But no one would be good enough for her auntie.
“That’s why I stopped chasing him.” Her aunt removed her arm from her shoulders.
“Oh, Auntie.” Arielle had barged into her aunt’s house and dropped her problems on her. She looked around the room. All of her aunt’s art supplies were skewed around the place. Unusual, for sure. “Your heart is broken, too.”
Thea slowly exhaled a deep breath. “You could say that, but more embarrassed at this point.” She squeezed her hands together, rubbing her palms hard. “I’m sure everyone saw what a joke our relationship was.”
“I think we knew he wasn’t that into you,” Arielle said truthfully. Her mother had said it as much every time they had them over as a couple. Johnny barely talked to her auntie, who would dote on him, getting his drinks and picking up his dishes.
Another sigh, but louder this time. Heavy like she had given up. “He is going to expand.”
“That’s good.”
Thea rubbed her palms on her pants. “He’s going to buy my building and add it to his coffee shop.”
Arielle saw moisture build up in her aunt’s eyes. She put her hand on her aunt’s knee. She didn’t have to go on. “Come with me.”
“What?” Thea looked at her.
“Come with me to Boston.”
“Stay here with me until you have to leave,” Thea suggested. “Jason doesn’t even need to know where you are. He never comes to the shop. Don’t miss the wedding, not after what Sophia did for you.”
That’s when Arielle wanted to scream. Why did everyone make her feel guilty for the kindness they were shown? She understood what Thea meant, but why did she have to show up for everyone just because her father was a crook? She wasn’t the crook!
“I am grateful for Sophia.” Sophia, Nora, and Brady had opened their lives for Arielle and her family.
Sophia herself had became the subject of some gossip and rumors, having the island’s criminal family staying with her.
Would skipping the wedding be worse than showing up and hurting Jason?
Wouldn’t disappearing forever be better for everyone, once they found out about the rejected proposal?
She looked around the small apartment. All she wanted was to get off this god forsaken island, but if she skipped the wedding…
“Sophia and Nora are expecting you to be part of the wedding.” Her auntie looked at her. “It’s not right to leave without fulfilling your promise.”
Arielle was supposed to read the poem of the fallen hero in honor of Nora’s dad. It would be too hard for Marc’s family to read it. Arielle had been the perfect person to read the poem, especially after everything Sophia had done for her and her brother, Brady.
Thea was right, it would hurt more people than just her. If she didn’t read it, who would?
She would let down a lot more people than just Sophia. Her mom, Brady, and mostly her friend Nora. What would Nora think if she blew off her mom’s wedding? Nora had opened her home as much as Sophia had.
“Okay,” Arielle said. “I’ll stay here until the wedding, but I’m leaving the second that cake is cut.”
The discussion ended after Arielle promised to talk to Crissy about staying there.
“Thank you,” Arielle said as Thea carried out the oven-warm hummus with roasted summer vegetables, Greek olives drizzled with extra virgin olive oil, and handmade feta cheese served with fresh pita. “For letting me come tonight.”
Thea placed two plates down on the table and poured sparkling water into two mason jars. The whole presentation was a charcuterie designer’s dream, but just a regular Wednesday night at her mother’s family’s home.
Arielle picked up a heated piece of pita and scooped hummus and roasted eggplant with crumbled pieces of feta.
This was when she loved her heritage’s traditional finger food the most. When she felt down.
Dark purple Kalamata olives pitted and placed on top of the hummus made her slow down, take in the flavor.
“This is delicious.” Arielle dipped a second piece of pita into the spread, taking an artichoke and sautéed spinach with it.
Thea drank from her water. “You can stay in my little cupboard of a closet.”
She got up from her couch and walked down a short hallway. Turning the knob of the first door on the right, Thea opened it to a small space. It looked more like a walk-in closet than a bedroom without a window. “I call it the inside cabin suite. She turned on a lamp. “But there’s a futon.”
Arielle hugged her auntie without saying anything, just held her.
“You have to do what’s right for you, Arielle, and that may not be what others want, but that’s okay,” Thea said in her ear.
And that’s when Arielle’s emotions resurfaced.
Not just about Jason, but her father and all the problems that had followed his arrest. Everything poured from her heart onto the front of her aunt’s shirt.
But her aunt just held her, shushing her, gently brushing her hair with her hand. “Just let it all go.”