Chapter 9
Chapter Nine
Summer 1975
I t was hard to believe Esme Rainer was in the front seat of Victor Sutton’s car, still parked on the outskirts of a party that was getting progressively wilder. It was harder still to believe that she’d helped him there after her ex-fiancé punched Victor straight in the nose. Victor felt as though his nose hung on by a string, as though it was apt to float off if a violent Nantucket wind came through the car window.
Esme had torn a bit of fabric from her dress to help him with his nosebleed, and she was speaking aloud about whether or not they should go to the hospital.
She knows how to take care of people, Victor thought. She’s not afraid to love.
And then he remembered, But she told me she didn’t want to love me.
Victor decided he didn’t want to go to the hospital. Esme took it in stride. But then she surprised him when she said, “Let’s go back to my place. My parents aren’t there. We have plenty of first-aid equipment.” She paused and then added, “I know how your father gets. You don’t want to go home looking like that.”
Esme also insisted on driving, saying she could drive him back to his car. “Maybe you have a concussion. We don’t know,” she said before getting out of the passenger seat, running around, and pulling him out of the driver’s side. She helped him stagger to her car. Victor’s head rang. Maybe I do have a concussion. Who knows?
Victor had never been driven around by another woman besides his mother and his friends' mothers. He sat in Esme’s passenger side, pressing the fabric of her dress to his nostrils, watching her sure hands as she guided them through the Nantucket night. He wanted to ask her about Hank; he wanted to ask her if she’d missed Hank the past year; he wanted to ask her if she was still planning to go to school. But something about her profile was tragic just now. It was as though she was on the verge of weeping all over again.
Victor had had an okay semester. After Esme rejected him fully and completely at Christmas, he’d thrown himself back into his studies, read books, attended meetings with potential bosses or mentors, and thought long and hard about his career. His father maintained that Victor was to be a doctor, and Victor had decided he was all right. He certainly didn’t have any better ideas.
Esme parked in the driveway of her parents’ place, and they sat in the dark as the car cooled. “Why are you back?” she asked. “I mean, I assumed you’d have an internship or something.”
“I do have an internship,” he said.
Esme turned to look at him. She looked slightly disappointed. Why?
“Where?” she asked.
“In Boston.”
Esme bowed her head, then got out of the car and hurried around to help him to the door. Victor waved her off.
“I’m feeling better,” he said. “I can walk.”
Esme walked behind him as though prepared to catch him if he fell. But Victor was solid and sure of himself. It wasn’t the first time he’d been punched, and it surely wouldn’t be the last. Very soon, he was seated at the kitchen table with an ice pack on his nose and a stiff glass of whiskey in front of him. Esme had fetched it from her father’s study, saying Thomas wouldn’t notice.
Victor watched her with quiet curiosity as she walked around the kitchen, filling glasses with water and wiping her face with a towel. She was different than he remembered her. Sadder. Her eyes sunken back. It wasn’t the act of aging, he didn’t think. It was something else.
“You’re going to college in a couple of months.”
Esme’s chin quivered. She sat across from him and wrapped her arms around herself. It was clear she was at a loss for words.
“Don’t tell me you didn’t get in?” Victor asked, confused.
“I got in.”
“Of course you did. I bet you got into every school you applied to,” Victor said.
Esme flinched.
Victor prohibited himself from reaching across the table to touch her. “Where are your parents? Where’s LeeAnne?”
Esme dropped her face in her hands. Heavy silence crept across the kitchen. Victor knew, in an instant, that something was wrong. He went through the back alleys of his mind, trying to remember if his mother had mentioned Esme and if his father had delivered any island gossip. But Victor had been immersed in university drama. A girl wanted to date him; another girl asked him why he was being so stand-offish; another girl asked him where he saw himself in five years. I don’t know. I don’t know.
Esme explained that her half sister had leukemia, that they were moving her to Boston, and that she was out of her mind with worry. And then she struck the final blow. “I can’t go to Rutgers. I have to be there for her.”
This time, Victor couldn’t restrain himself from reaching across the table and taking her hand. Esme didn’t flinch. He filled his lungs and said, “How long is chemotherapy?”
“A couple of months,” Esme said. “But we won’t know if it worked until after.”
They won’t know until after the semester starts.
“LeeAnne basically asked me not to go,” Esme said, sniffling. “It feels too selfish to go after hearing that.” She pressed the back of her hand against her eye. “I just can’t help but think…” She shook her head violently. “I can’t help but think these are her last months. I can’t just go to college and hope for the best. I don’t even know what I want to study.”
Victor flared his nostrils. “You’re good at everything. You could study anything you want.”
Esme rolled her eyes but didn’t protest.
“Listen,” Victor said. “Why don’t you take this one day at a time? Get through the summer. Figure out how LeeAnne is feeling. You can always ask Rutgers to take you next semester or even next year instead. There’s no rush.”
A woman aged twenty-one during her freshman year of college? Was it too late? Victor didn’t know. But he wouldn’t say anything to that effect right now.
Esme sniffled but remained wordless. She watched him like a cat.
Victor still had his hand over hers. He marveled that he’d longed to be here, by her side, alone like this, ever since last summer. Finally, it was happening. But it wasn’t anything like he’d planned.
“You said your sister is in Boston this summer?” Victor asked.
Esme nodded.
Victor’s heart lifted. “I told you already. I’m in Boston this summer.”
Esme’s eyes glinted knowingly.
“I assume you’re going to visit her,” Victor said.
“All the time. I’m thinking of moving there for the rest of the summer,” Esme said. “We can hire someone to manage the Book Club. I don’t want any part of Nantucket. Not this summer. Not without LeeAnne.”
She’s so loyal, Victor thought. I wonder if she’ll ever be that fiercely loyal to me.
Victor raised his shoulders. His gaze was heavy. He couldn’t look away. “Let me give you my number,” he suggested. “Maybe you can look me up.” He paused. “Only if you want to. Only if you feel like you can.”
Esme pressed her lips together. Her hand shook beneath his. “I think I’d like that,” she finally managed. “But don’t expect anything from me. I’m in terrible shape.”
“We don’t have to do anything but sit in silence,” Victor said. “I can make you a grilled cheese to pass the time.”
That night, Esme made up the sofa in the living room and lent Victor a big T-shirt to sleep in. Victor stretched his long legs out across the brown cushions and felt another splitting headache coming on.
Had Hank not punched me, I wouldn’t be here , he thought. Thank you, Hank.
Esme poured him another glass of water and swept a blanket over his frame. “You’re sure your parents won’t mind that you didn’t make it back?”
“I’m twenty-one years old, Esme,” Victor said. “They’ll be fine.”
The truth was, of course, that Jeremy Sutton would take issue with it. Filled with rage, he would demand of Victor why don’t you respect me or this household? Why do you think you can just run around and do whatever you want? But Victor wouldn’t be able to hear his father fully. After sleeping in the living room of Esme’s house, dreaming of her, all he could do was think, This is the first day of the rest of our lives.
It turned out he was right.