Chapter 23
TWENTY-THREE
ELEVEN YEARS AGO
Ian
When I finally pull the car into the driveway at home, I have to lean over to the passenger’s seat and shake my mom’s shoulder to get her to wake up.
She passed out the minute I turned onto the Garden State Parkway headed north from Cape May where we spent the last three days at the regatta.
We weren’t expecting to leave until tomorrow since tonight is the awards ceremony, but here we are.
I check the time on the car’s display. My sailing team is probably receiving their first-place trophy right now.
It would have been nice to be there, to take a minute to savor all my hard work, especially since this was my last competition.
I’ll be leaving for Stanford soon, and the kids in the junior program will move up to take my place.
But Mom had a few drinks at lunch, and then a few more at the Cape May Sailing Club in the afternoon, and I’m pretty sure she even grabbed a couple of single bottles of white wine from the mini fridge and tucked them in her purse while I was in the shower this morning.
So, by 3 p.m., she was slurring her words and slumping backward in her chair.
I could tell a couple of the other parents were starting to notice.
Nobody would say anything, of course, at least not to our faces.
But the longer we stayed, the more fodder we’d give them for their gossip behind our backs.
So, I’d blamed Mom’s behavior on her non-existent migraines and asked my teammates to collect my trophy for me. And then I’d checked us out of the hotel.
As I put the car in park, Mom wakes with a snort, sitting up in her seat and looking bleary-eyed at the house.
“We’re home,” I tell her gently.
“Oh.” She takes her phone from the dash in front of her and checks it. “Did you hear from your father?”
I shake my head. I’d called him when we decided to leave early, but he didn’t answer the phone. About halfway into the drive, I’d tried again, but still no answer.
A cold dread drifts over me as we climb out of the car and I grab our luggage from the back. Dad wasn’t expecting us back until tomorrow. What if he has a woman over? They could be in the pool, or worse—in bed—and that’s why he didn’t answer.
I thought he and Mom were working things out.
It seemed like Dad was spending more time with her and might even convince her to go to rehab.
He’d even agreed to drive down to the regatta to meet us on Friday afternoon, and Mom was so excited he was coming.
Hell, I was even a little bit excited. But then he’d texted to back out at the last minute.
Work is too busy right now.
I know what that really means.
As Mom and I slowly approach the front door, it hits me that I could be walking Mom into a minefield.
A small part of me considers suggesting that we leave and go to the club for dinner.
We haven’t eaten in hours, and judging from her slightly green-tinged appearance, the alcohol she consumed earlier has worn off.
I’m sure it wouldn’t be hard to convince her to go to the club if it meant she could get another round of drinks. But something stops me.
I’m so tired of this. Tired of hiding Dad’s secrets, tired of tiptoeing around Mom.
Tired of the incredible weight of it all.
What if Dad has a woman in there, and Mom is finally forced to face the truth?
Maybe she’ll fall apart, but then, maybe that wouldn’t be the worst thing.
Maybe she’ll finally yell and scream and refuse to take Dad’s poor treatment of her instead of passively going along and letting him disappoint her again and again.
Maybe she’ll finally kick him out.
Maybe she’ll finally get the help she needs.
I keep walking.
Inside, the house is quiet. There’s no sign of Dad, and I’m vaguely relieved to see that there’s no sign of a woman either.
No shoes by the door, no purse left on the couch.
Mom calls Dad’s name, but he doesn’t answer.
In the living room, I find a bottle of gin on the bar counter and half of a sliced lime on a cutting board.
Mom spots it too. “It looks like your father is enjoying a cocktail. I’ll bet he’s in the study. I’ll join him.”
She mixes herself a drink while I go to the window to look out over the property.
The patio is empty—also a relief, since that’s where I often spotted Dad drinking with his “friends” when Mom was out of town in the past. I look beyond it to the pool sparkling in the late afternoon sun.
My dark mood momentarily lifts. Soon, Josie will be hanging out there with me.
She texted last night to tell me she’s excited about it, and then again today to ask how far away I am from her.
Maybe she’s counting the miles and hours, too.
Mom glides past me to head upstairs to the study. I let her go, bracing myself as the tap of her high heels drifts in my direction. A familiar mix of dread and anticipation settles over me. I should stop her. Dad might be in the study—with another woman. Or in bed with one.
I stay right where I’m standing.
A minute goes by, and then another, and I don’t hear Mom gasp or scream. She reappears in the living room, the clear liquid in her glass gone now. “He’s not here. I’ll try to call him again.” But before Mom even touches her phone, she reaches for the gin and tips a healthy splash into her glass.
I need to get out of here.
“I’m going outside for a little fresh air,” I say, as if I wasn’t outside on a sailboat all morning with the wind and salt blowing in my face. But Mom just nods absently, dialing her phone and sipping her drink.
I head as far away as I can, all the way to the end of the dock. When I step onto the gazebo, the first things I notice are the two cocktail glasses on the coffee table in front of the couch, mostly full of clear liquid.
Nothing about the sight of those two glasses surprises me.
Dad did have a “friend” over this weekend.
He’s usually good at cleaning up and hiding the evidence, but then, he thought he had another day before we got home.
The housekeeper is probably booked to come tomorrow morning to change the sheets and wash the glasses.
That’s always how he’s handled things in the past.
I sink onto the couch, my body heavy with the weight of his secrets and lies. He wants me to come back to Sandy Harbor after graduation, but I’m never coming back again. I’d never work for a man like him, for a company like Langley Capital.
My hand drops down onto the cushion beside me, and I feel something cold and metallic slip against my fingers.
I turn to investigate and find a thin gold necklace with a starfish pendant.
It’s delicate, pretty, unlike the sort of flashy diamonds that are usually dripping from the necks of the women my dad gravitates toward.
But I know immediately that it must have belonged to one of his girlfriends.
It occurs to me what they were probably doing on this couch, and I lunge to my feet and walk to the railing at the end of the gazebo.
I think it’s really, truly time to tell Mom what’s been going on. I’ve just been enabling Dad by protecting her. But I can’t do it anymore.
My gaze slides out across the water, and all thoughts fly from my head.
I reach out blindly to grab something, but my hand fumbles in the air.
Everything goes hot and my vision blurs at the same time my heart stops beating.
Because there, floating face down in the water is a body gently rising and falling with the wake of a far-away boat. It’s a man’s body.
It’s Dad.