Epilogue One Year Later
July
We return to the cottage and our Secret Island in the summer. A wild garden greets us, a rainbow of flowers in vivid reds and purples and yellows. A looming willow shades the grassy knoll, the years having nourished our sapling. Two hammocks are pitched in front of the old cabin. We finally have the reading nook we dreamed of as children.
Wes is eager yet shy as he tells me about how he worked on it in the years we spent apart. At first as a way to heal, and then later, with the hope that I would come back to see it. “Being here helped me feel close to you,” he says simply.
“I am so grateful to be back here.” I kiss him in thanks and then lie down on one of the hammocks, book in hand. “Thank you for making our place even more special.”
The fluctuations between conversation and silence flow steadily like the wind over the water. I relax into the anticipation of early summer, of knowing that I have endless long, hot days of sun and Wes to look forward to.
As the day drifts to noon, I tell Wes, “We should probably head home.” Foreseeing his face falling, I add, “But we’ll be back again tomorrow, and the day after and the day after that.”
His lopsided grin is a shot of joy to my chest, as we make our way back down the knoll, slipping into our trusty orange pedal boat to make the journey back to the cottage.
We’d arrived at the cottage yesterday and it was a frantic day of cleaning since our short-term tenant left. The chairs needed to be realigned, my dad’s blanket pulled out of storage and the barbecue refreshed.
Last summer, I ended up putting our cottage up for rent to help supplement my mother’s income while I took a leave from work to figure out what I wanted to do next. The answer came quickly. It had been there, in the back of my mind, all along.
Thanks to Jake’s referral, I took a new job at a boutique family law firm. Stops and starts filled the year while I acclimated to being back at what felt like a starting point. Eventually, though, things clicked.
I like my boss, a middle-aged Caribbean woman with a penchant for funky dresses, an eagle eye for contracts and an intimidating court presence. She likes me too. Even when she’s critiquing my work, it’s with an eye to my growth and potential.
Nothing is perfect. There are still the odd sixty-hour work weeks, and the difficult clients, but now I like what I’m doing.
Wes gives me a side look. “I’m a little nervous,” he confesses when we pull up to the dock.
“Don’t be,” I say, even though I am as well.
Norah, Mel, my mom, Ciji and Shehla are coming up to the cottage today. We’re going to spend a week together as a family, the way we did when we were growing up.
It was Mel’s idea. On the day she announced her engagement to Norah, my mother burst into tears. Harsh words were shared with both Mel and me about how neither of us were respecting our culture or our elders’ sacrifices and how we were wasting our futures.
But Mel lit the way out of the darkness with her ostentatious diamond and the love she was confident in. She emphasized that we could not be a happy family if we couldn’t grow to love each other for who we are, and I stood by her side reinforcing her message. My mother, initially reluctant to accept both Wes and Norah into our family, backtracked, promising she would try if it would keep our family together. We started small—dinners at my mother’s place with Norah and Wes, eventually growing to include Ciji and Shehla.
After the summer math course, Ciji had joined Shehla in Toronto to be with her during chemotherapy, moving into my mother’s home and filling the gaps in our family.
Eventually, while Shehla recovered, we started pulling out board games and movies after dinner. The time spent talking to each other instead of at each other, and laughing rather than criticizing, helped us build a new foundation.
This week will test the lay of the bricks.
“My mom said she could help us prep dinner,” Wes says, his brow lightly creased. He ties the boat to the dock, then hauls himself up, reaching a hand back for me. “She can leave before your family gets here.”
I take his hand, letting him pull me up. “I’d love your mother’s help. She’s obviously invited to dinner,” I say firmly. “It is a family dinner, after all.” Wes relaxes against me. He worries about his mother still. During the year, we often came up on long weekends or she would come down to visit us in Toronto, in the two-bedroom condo we now live in together. We would sit at the kitchen table, Wes grading stacks of essays, me pondering thick files, and Ms. Forest baking in the background. When we would look up at her, she’d tell us that she always loved a happy ending.
In truth, I love them too. Especially ours that we fought so hard to achieve.
Sometimes I forget I don’t need my family’s approval to love someone, and sometimes Wes worries he isn’t good enough for me or for his students. But we’re not children anymore. We now know the signs of when to push and when to step away. And most importantly, we know how to repair and come back together.
Our evenings together after we’ve put the day to the side are the best parts. We read books salvaged from Wes’s grandmother’s old collection, and new ones we pick up from our local bookshop during long, ambling walks on the weekends. The evening hours pass with my feet in his lap, his legs reclined on my old oak coffee table, the soft rumble of his voice over mine as we draw each other into our own worlds.
We have plans, soon and distant. A beach trip over winter break, and then next year, across the ocean for a family vacation with Shehla and Ciji.
I’m proud of Ciji’s hard work. But most of all, I’m amazed at how she now readily turns to her loved ones for help when things get tough, and I’m grateful to be one of her chosen allies.
Finally, Mel and Norah are getting married next summer. Wes and I will be up front, standing with them as they promise to love and cherish each other forever.
Hope for the future is bright. So many possibilities and dreams are on the verge of coming true. But I’m not focused on what’s coming. I’m here for the now.
“I should go marinate the meat,” I say. We’re going to have mishkaki with our barbecue to celebrate our family coming together. I know that our father would have made this for us if he were here. Because he can’t, this is something I can do for us in his honour.
Wes doesn’t miss the glimmer in my eyes. “He would be happy,” Wes reassures me, his voice kissing my ear. “Happy that you’re happy.”
I turn towards the cottage, the breeze ruffling my hair, tickling the leaves of the trees. Standing tall and proud, I say, “You’re right. It would have taken time, but he would have gotten here too.”
Wes squeezes my hand as I swallow down a lump. I will always carry the past with me, but now, most days, the good outweighs the bad. Memories of warm family evenings in the cottage, my parents’ laughter entwining over hot meals, and my sister and me reading cartoons flow through my mind as we ready ourselves for the week.
I encircle my arm around Wes’s waist as we walk off the dock back to the cottage. We pause and I take one last look at the water over my shoulder. Wes’s presence is a solid support at my side, ready to weather whatever comes for us in the future, be it the crests of a storm or the gentle wind over a blue bay. I take heart in knowing that we will always have each other.
The End