Chapter Ten Mallory
June 2022
Winthrop Island, New York
In my dreams, when Monk and I meet again, we’re sitting in the booth at the dive in Provincetown, where we sat the night of that long-ago pub crawl.
The reason for this reunion varies.
In the early months, when I was pregnant and miserable, it’s because he’s been searching for me and finally found me and begs me to let him put things right.
Later, when Sam was little and Monk suddenly famous, it’s because he’s realized all the fame in the world means nothing without the girl who loved you before you made it big.
Then it’s because he’s read that article on page 12 of the Boston Globe (“Provincetown Woman Dies at Machu Picchu”) and wants to comfort me.
Then it’s because he’s stumbled on that article in the Daily Mail (“Boy, 10, Eats death cap mushroom at Summer Camp, Remains in coma”) and anonymously donated a large sum of money for Sam’s care, but I’ve uncovered our benefactor’s identity and written to thank him, and now he’s asked, humbly, for this reunion.
All of these scenarios are, of course, impossible. Because in each dream reunion, Monk has already learned the truth. He knows everything I couldn’t say in the note I left behind. He understands me and forgives me and wants me to forgive him.
In my dreams, I walk into this dive bar and he’s waiting for me at our booth. I stand in the doorway for a second or two, soaking up the sight of him—the slope of his shoulders against the booth’s battered wooden back, the way his hands are clasped together as if he’s praying. A pitcher of beer sits on the table, next to a stack of Splenda packs, ready to be released into swirls of abstract art. He looks up and sees me and the old grin splits his face. He slides out of his seat and stands—oh, the unconscious grace of him. He opens his arms and I walk into his embrace. I smell his shirt, his skin.
“I’m sorry, Pinks,” he says to my hair, my ear. “I’m so sorry.”
But this is not a dream. This is real. The real, living Monk Adams stands a few yards away in the ankle-deep water, mouth open, eyes wide. A wave kicks against the backs of his legs. The breeze rattles his swim trunks.
I can’t seem to get my feet under me. I stagger upward, totter, catch myself.
Finally I gather enough breath to speak. “I’m so sorry! Oh my God, I thought you were away. I never in a million years would have—”
“Mallory, hold on—”
“I only came for the day. Honest, I thought you were gone. My sister’s friend. Over at Summerly? We brought our kids to hang out for the day and I went for a walk and I’ll just go now, I know the way up.”
I’ve already turned to flee. I flounder a couple of steps in the cushion of sand before a hand grasps my arm.
“Wait. Mallory. Please. It’s okay.”
“It’s not okay, actually. I don’t know what I was thinking.”
He steps around to face me. Bends a few inches and peers into my face. Holds up his hands, palms out. “Hey. Look at me, okay? Not gonna bite.”
I anchor myself on the space between his eyes. “You should. Trespasser and all.”
“You’re not trespassing. You’re always welcome here.”
“Well, that’s nice of you to say.”
The water’s starting to dry on his shoulders. A few goosebumps rising. He plants his hands on his lean hips. His abs are like a carton of eggs. Only Monk Adams could reach his middle thirties in even better shape, apparently, than he was in his early twenties. Personal trainer, personal chef, I have no doubt. Kid-free mornings for working out and drinking protein shakes. I have the feeling he’s studying me, looking me in the eyes, even though I’m only pretending to look into his. I mean, how could I look right into his eyes, the way he’s looking at me? I would scorch to a crisp.
“So how do you know the Peabodys?” he asks.
“Um.” I push my hair away from my face. “I don’t know the Peabodys. My sister does. She went to Yale with Lola?”
“Oh, that’s right. I forgot Paige went to Yale.”
“Tale of two sisters, right? Again, my apologies. I just remembered the view from the point, and Mike told me you weren’t coming back until tomorrow—”
His mouth splits into a smile. “You saw Mike?”
“Lola dragged us to the Mo for drinks.”
“In the middle of the afternoon?” He laughs. “That’s our Lola. Come on, come into the house. Call them over, I’ve got some rosé in the fridge.”
“Since when do you drink rosé?”
“It’s been growing on me. My—” His voice catches on the word. “My fiancée’s into rosé? So I tried a glass and realized, hey—”
“It’s not just for chicks?”
“Is that sexist?”
“Kidding. Rosé is great. Love it. But I can’t. Super nice of you? But they’re waiting for me back at the house. And I have definitely intruded on you enough already. So, you know, I’ll be going. Leave you in peace.”
“Wait. Mallory. Don’t go. It’s okay, it really is. I’m—I’m glad to see you.” He folds his arms across his chest and heels some sand. “The truth is, I’ve been wanting to look you up for a while now. See how you’re doing.”
“Not quite as spectacularly well as you, obviously.”
Monk shrugs that off with one luminous shoulder. “Tried looking online, but I couldn’t find your socials.”
“Yeah, I’m not on any of that stuff.”
“Seriously? No social media? Woman of mystery?”
“Crazy, I know.”
“No, you’re smart. It’s a cesspit. Wish I could sign off myself, honestly.”
I fidget with my bracelet and shift my gaze past Monk’s ear to the flat, hazy horizon. “I’m so happy for your success, Monk. I mean, I always knew. But still, it’s been amazing—sort of surreal, honestly, but great—to see all your dreams come—”
“Nice bracelet,” he says.
I look down. “My mother left it to me.”
“Oh, shit. Pinks, you’re kidding me.”
“It was a while ago. Freak Machu Picchu accident.”
“A what?”
“She fell.” I stare at my feet in the sand. “That’s all. She fell and hit her head.”
“Pinks. Oh God. Mallory. I am so sorry. I don’t know what to say.” He makes a motion like he’s going to touch me. I step back, the way you step back on the sidewalk when you see a bus barreling down in the bus lane. He drops his hand and says, “She was such a—she was such a force. I loved her to death. I really did. She was the one who—after you left, when I was trying to find out what happened, to get some kind of news? I reached out to her. Did she tell you that?”
I nod.
“She was the one who told me you were okay, you’d gone to live with your dad. Said she would let me know if you—if you changed your mind or anything.”
“I know,” I say.
“She was special, Mallory. You have so much of her in you. I always thought…” He palms the back of his head and looks to the side. His eyes blink a few times. “And she left you that bracelet?”
I hold it up. “Yep. Her mother gave it to her, so…yeah. She wanted me to have it.”
“I’ve never seen anything like it. A snake?”
“Cobra. See, the hood?”
Monk takes my wrist with a couple of gentle fingers so he can examine the intricate metalwork, the tiny gems. “This is incredible, Mallory. It’s a treasure.”
I pull my arm away. “You never noticed it on her?”
“I don’t remember. But I was just a kid, I guess.”
“We were both just kids,” I say.
He glances up the bluff and runs a hand through his wet hair, sending the droplets flying. How magnificent he looks. Older, leaner, more honed. All of that. Like a grown lion. “I can’t believe I’m standing here, talking to you,” he says.
“Weird, huh? You almost gave me a heart attack, coming out of the water like that.”
“You gave me a heart attack, sitting there on the beach when I came out. I thought you were a hallucination for a second.” He grins the old grin. “Come on, Pinks. Let’s make it a reunion. Bring everyone over, there’s plenty to drink. Be great to see Lola again. She and Thayer used to be tight.”
I shake my head firmly. “I can’t. Really, really can’t. Besides, you must be busy with all the wedding prep. I don’t think Lennon—”
“Lennox,” he says.
“Lennox. Sorry. I don’t—like I said, I live in a cave?”
“Hey, it’s okay—”
“But I do know that this is not the right time for an old flame to turn up in your life. It’s just bad form.”
“No, she’d understand. Seriously. She’s pretty centered, you know? She’s in the city right now, unfortunately. She won’t be here until the weekend.” He catches himself. “But what about you? Kids, you said?”
“One.” I twist the bracelet. “My son. Sam.”
“That’s awesome, Mallory. I’d love to meet him. I really would. And your—” Monk glances down to my left hand. “I mean, Sam’s dad?”
“Actually, it’s just us.”
“Ah. Shit. Sorry.”
“No worries,” I say, a couple of keys higher than my normal voice.
“Still, it’d be great to meet the little guy. Is he going to be around tomorrow evening?”
“For that thing at the Mo, you mean?”
“What? How’d you—”
“Mike,” I said.
The grin breaks back out. “Oh, right. Mike. Loose-lip bastard. He’d better not be telling the whole damn world.”
“He’s not. He swore us to secrecy.” I zipped my lips. “But unfortunately, Sam…um, Sam has a doctor’s appointment on the Cape tomorrow morning. So we have to leave first thing.”
“You’re staying on the Cape?”
“My mother’s old place. Paige inherited. Fixed it up, you wouldn’t recognize it.”
Monk looks to the water, looks back to me. A drop of water trickles from his temple; he reaches up and brushes it away. “You look well, Mallory.”
“That’s nice of you.”
“I mean it. It’s good to see you. I hope now the ice is broken, we can—”
“No,” I say.
“No, what? I didn’t even finish.”
“No, I don’t think that’s going to work. Anything that starts with we. It’s nothing personal. But our lives are so different now. Different worlds. You’re—you’re who you are, and I’m who I am. Plus you’re getting married. You’ll have a wife, kids. It’s good to see you. I wish you well, I do. So, so well. You can’t imagine how well. But no. We is not going to work.”
I stride past him toward the path at the base of the bluff, and I swear to God it’s like someone’s dug in a set of claws and ripped a patch of skin from my back. Tears hot in my eyes.
I hear his footsteps behind me, scrambling up the path. “Mallory, wait. Don’t be mad.”
“I’m not mad.”
“That’s total bullshit, what you said, by the way. I live a pretty normal life. Under the circumstances.”
“I don’t care what kind of life you lead, Monk. As long as you’re happy.”
“Well, maybe I care about your life! Maybe I want to know if you’re happy. If there’s anything I can do to—”
I whirl around so fast, he falls back a step. We’re standing at the switchback, halfway up. He lifts his hand to shade his eyes from the glare of the sun.
“Don’t you dare offer me anything, Monk Adams. Don’t you dare. If I wanted a single thing from you, a single cent of yours, I would have asked for it a long time ago.”
“I know,” he says. “I never expected you to.”
“Then what do you want? Closure? Explanations?”
“I just want you to know that it’s okay, Mallory. It’s all okay. I understand everything. Why you left.”
The sun burns the back of my neck, the breeze comes off the bluff in an unruly gust, and for a moment it’s all right back in front of me, it’s all happening again, the anguish. My limbs are too heavy to move. My thoughts freeze in place.
Monk continues, as if I’m not paralyzed in front of him. “I mean, it took me a while to get there. You left me bleeding in the grass, let’s face it. I was a mess for a pretty long time. For years, the only decent thing coming out of me was the music. And then one day I was kind of reflecting and I started writing this song that…Look, can we go somewhere? I can’t say all this stuff just hanging off the side of a cliff.”
I shake my head. I’m coming unclenched, tendon by tendon. My thoughts thaw out. “You don’t need to say anything. I’m sorry for hurting you. I was sorry then and I’ve been sorry since. I can’t even tell you how sorry I am.”
He steps forward and takes me by the arms. “But, Pinks, I understand now. This song. I don’t know if you’ve ever heard it. Snowbirds Fly? I was kind of hoping you might. When I sent it out into the world.”
I manage a nod.
“See, everyone thought that song was about me, breaking up with some girl. But it was you, Mallory. I kind of put myself in your shoes. Started hearing your voice in my head. I got to talking with my dad about it, right before he died, and he worked things out with me, how you had your own art, how you were afraid of living in my shadow and not being yourself, not being able to focus on your own talent, how you needed to be free.”
“Your father said that?”
“You were right about him, Mallory. What you said before you left. I mean, in the end, we worked it out.”
“Oh, damn it, Monk—”
“Don’t feel bad. That’s what I’m trying to say. I get it now. I do. Hey. It’s okay, I’m in a better place now. Lee’s introduced me to all this therapy, this wellness stuff. She’s really into all that. I just want you to know that you shouldn’t regret what you did. You had to do what was right for you. That’s all I wanted to say. I’ve been wanting to look you up and tell you…and then I thought, that’s the last thing she needs, the Monk show riding into town…and now you just appear on the beach like…like…”
He frowns. I realize he’s looking over my shoulder now, to the top of the bluff. I spin around, lose my balance, crash into Monk behind me. He grabs me by the waist and sets me back on my feet.
“Careful,” he says.
A pair of figures stands at the edge of the bluff, looking down. The sun’s behind them, so I can’t see their faces, but you can tell it’s a woman and a teenage boy. The woman waves and calls my name.
“Mom!” calls the boy.
“Wait, is that your kid?” asks Monk.
But I’m already sprinting up the hill. I’ve left my flip-flops behind on the beach. The pebbles scour the soles of my feet, as I will discover later. I will also reflect, later, that maybe I should have played it cooler. Have waved them away and continued my conversation with Monk on the side of the bluff, where he couldn’t see Sam’s face.
On the other hand, at this point, it’s too late. The die’s cast. Nothing left on earth can prevent Monk Adams from coming face-to-face with Sam.
He follows me up the bluff. I call out cheerfully, “Time to head back! Let’s go!”
But Paige stands her ground. She puts her hand on Sam’s shoulder. Her expression, as the two of us thunder toward her, is bemused but also fierce. She’s not going to let me get away with it. She’s not going to let me run away.
She’s getting what she came for.
“Pinks, hold on!” Monk calls behind me.
I arrive at the top of the path. I have time to shoot Paige a single pleading glance before Monk steps next to me. I imagine him grinning, though I can’t seem to raise my eyes to his face. He stands there barefoot, wearing nothing but his swim trunks, casual as hell, and holds out his hand.
“Hey, there. Monk Adams. Old friend of Mallory’s. You must be her sister.”
“Paige Powell.” She shakes his hand. “You know, you look kinda familiar. Have we met?”
He laughs. “Nah, I get that all the time. Just one of those faces, I guess.”
Then Monk turns to Sam.
“Hey, buddy. Monk Adams.”
Sam stands tall. I think he’s a little shaken, the way his eyes are blinking, but you would never know just to look at him. I want to put an arm around his shoulder, but he’d just shrug it off. His expression is friendly, determined. “Mr. Adams. I’m Sam. Sam Dunne.”
“That’s a good Irish name, all right. You can call me Monk. I was just…I was just telling your…”
You can see when it hits him, bit by bit and then all at once. His voice trails off. His eyes widen and furiously blink, just like Sam’s. His jaw wobbles. He looks at me, shocked, then back at Sam.
“Sam,” he says, in a voice like he has a bad cold. “Sam Dunne.”
“Yes, sir.”
Monk turns back to me. The color’s fled his skin. He looks as if he might pass out. His eyes beg me for something, I don’t know what. Say it’s true. Say it’s not true.
“Monk, I…”
I…what? I can explain?
Maybe my grasping silence tells Monk what he needs to know. He looks down at the grass, lays his palm on the back of his neck, exhales. Looks up again, blinking. “Hey. Sam. Can I ask you—Ijust—Do you mind if I—” Another deep breath. In a calm, controlled voice, he says, “How old are you, buddy?”
Sam is nobody’s idiot. He knows what’s being asked here. I’m proud and a little annoyed that he doesn’t look at me to query how he should reply. He folds his hands behind his back, straightens his shoulders, and says, “Thirteen last month.”
The two of them, they just stare at each other. Like you do in the morning when you arrive before the mirror in the bathroom and examine the ravages the night has wrought.
I reach for Sam’s shoulder, but he shrugs me off. “Honey, I—”
“Sam,” says Monk. “Sam Dunne. Samuel?”
“I go by Sam.”
“I am…I’m glad to meet you, Sam.”
“Yes, sir.”
“Monk,” I say, “I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to—this isn’t how I—”
“Mom, stop it,” Sam mutters.
Monk keeps on staring at Sam. Staring and blinking. “It’s all right, Sam. It’s good. It’s—I had no idea, that’s all. I swear to God. No idea. So—I just need a second to—gather my—I’ll be in touch, Sam. Soon. I swear. We’ll—speak soon. I promise. After I’ve had a word with your mom.”
“Monk, please—”
He holds up his hand. Keeps his eyes trained on Sam’s eyes. On his own face the color starts flooding back. Too much color. His cheeks and nose are red with emotion. The skin of his chest is mottled pink.
“I’m—I’m happy to meet you, Sam. I am. I just need to speak to—I need to think—if you’ll just give me a second to—gather my thoughts and—please, just excuse me. I’m sorry.”
He turns and walks fast across the lawn, in a direct line toward the Monk house, hidden by a profusion of sea grapes. The sun turns his broad, triangular back to gold.
I call out his name.
He holds up his hand again and keeps on walking.
Sam doesn’t say anything on the way back to Summerly. Fixes his eyes on the path and marches a few paces ahead of us.
“He just walked away. Can you believe that?” says Paige. “Walked away.”
“He’s in shock, Paige. Wouldn’t you be in shock?”
“I wouldn’t walk away from my own son.”
“He didn’t even know he had a son until five minutes ago. We’re lucky he didn’t have a heart attack or something.”
“I should have run after him. Asshole. After I’ve had a word with your mom. Yeah, right. He’ll probably have his lawyers call or something.”
“Paige, do you mind?” I angle my head toward Sam’s back.
“Sorry.” She drops her voice. “But I said what I said.”
When we arrive back at Summerly, the sun is shimmering around the peaks of the rooftops and Lola’s manning the grill on the terrace. The air smells of hamburgers. The kids are setting the teak table, fighting playfully. I ask Lola if there’s anything I can do to help. She says no, everything is under control, have a seat and pour yourself a glass of wine.
I tell Sam to wash his hands for dinner. Find my way to the small white guest bedroom and pull my phone out of my handbag.
After I’ve had a word with your mom.
I don’t know whether I expect to find a message there or not. Monk doesn’t have my number, obviously, and I’m not on any socials. Not even a private account. Even my Etsy storefront exists under a brand name. Woman of mystery, Monk called me.
More like a woman who doesn’t want to be found.
Whatever I’m expecting, there’s nothing from Monk on my phone. Just the usual alerts.
I sit on the bed and close my eyes.
Through the walls of the house comes the laughter of kids. A shrill squeal. Pipes running water somewhere. Everyone going about their business, the world spinning placidly on its axis. A silent howl rises from deep in my chest—the rage, the rage. A hot ball of it, electric with pain and locked in its box until (all the time in the early days, every so often now) the lock explodes and the rage buoys up to choke me.
I know from experience that you can’t fight this rage. It’s been locked in a box, for God’s sake. It wants to get out and make its presence felt. I used to fight back and it only made things worse. Blocked my throat, left me unable to breathe. So I keep my eyes closed and let it rise. Sizzle and boil its way into my head, down my limbs, sparks on my toes and fingers. Breathe it out through my mouth. Counting one, two, three.
Then I swallow the remains back down. Imagine Mom’s arms around me, her voice.
It’s going to be okay, Mallory.
No, Mom. It’s not. I should have reached out, like you said. Long ago. I should have put on my big-girl pants and faced him. For Sam’s sake.
We all make mistakes, she tells me. He’ll understand. You just have to explain.
Every time I try to get a word with Sam, he shrugs me off. At dinner, he eats about three bites of his hamburger and excuses himself for bed. I put down my fork and follow him upstairs to the bunk room Lola’s assigned to the kids. He’s lying on one of the top bunks, staring at the ceiling.
“Mom, seriously,” he says. “Go away. I’m fine.”
“Oh, sure. That’s why you didn’t finish your dinner for the first time in your whole entire life.”
“I just want to be alone, okay?”
I climb a couple of rungs on the bunk ladder and wrap my hands around the posts. “Honey, it’s a shock, that’s all. You heard him. He just needs to get his head around this. He’ll reach out. I promise.”
“How do you know that?”
“Because I know Monk.”
Sam snorts. “Sure you do.”
“Okay, fine. It was a long time ago. But people don’t change that much. He’s a good man. He’ll want to be a father to you. He’ll want to be a good father to you.”
Finally Sam turns his head to look at me. “Then why haven’t I met him until now?”
The words kick me in the chest. The eyes that meet mine have never looked more like the eyes I abandoned fourteen years ago. A smear of green swirled into that high, clear blue, that’s all. For a heartbeat or two I have the strange feeling that it’s Monk asking me this question, Monk demanding to know why I kept the two of them so painstakingly apart until now.
Until the inevitable collision.
I let go of the post and reach to lay my hand on Sam’s shoulder. “So how do you feel about it? Meeting him for the first time?”
Sam rolls his eyes to let me know he’s aware of my redirection. But he answers the question anyway. “Weird, I guess.”
“Weird how?”
“Mom, stop.”
“Come on, Sam. I know you have feelings stuck inside that head of yours. Talk to me.”
Sam heaves a giant adolescent sigh. “Like I don’t know. How am I supposed to feel? He’s my dad, right? But he’s a total stranger. So it’s like I’m supposed to love him, but I don’t know him. Except that he’s, like, Monk Adams. Which makes it even weirder. Like, it’s him. But not the same guy on the magazine covers. A real person.”
“Do you love him?”
“Mom, please.”
“What, then?”
“I don’t know. I don’t know what to call it. It just is. I mean, it’s him. My dad. I’ve thought about him my whole entire life. Knew he was out there somewhere. Like, felt him in my heart or whatever.” Sam turns back to the ceiling and folds his hands together on his chest. “He seems cool, I guess.”
“He is cool.” I turn my hand into a gentle fist and knock Sam’s shoulder. “He is one cool dude. But so are you.”
“I guess the weirdest thing is, like, he’s over there right now. In his house. Thinking about me. I mean, me. Probably wondering the same thing I’m wondering.”
“Which is?”
Sam shrugs. “What we’re supposed to do next.”
I lay my hand on top of Sam’s hand. His heart thuds underneath. “Honey, I’m sorry. I’m so sorry it had to be this way. I should have done things better. I just—It’s just that I couldn’t go back. I had my reasons. And maybe there was a point when I could, or maybe should have gone back, but I didn’t know how. You know how you get stuck in something and you can’t figure out how to get out? But I should have tried harder. I should have found a way.”
“?’Sokay, Mom,” he says, about a hundred years wise, sole child of a single mother. “You did the best you could.”
“Gosh, thanks, kid.” I give his hand a last pat and wrap my palm back around the ladder post. “But seriously. I want you to hold on to one thing, okay? No matter what happens. Good or bad.”
“Yeah?”
“I love you more than anything in the world, Sam Dunne. We all do. We’ve loved you from the moment you were born. And whatever came before, and whatever comes next?” I lean forward to whisper in his ear. “You’re worth it.”
At dawn the next morning, Lola drives us back to the harbor. She and Paige sit in silence, baring their teeth against the soprano chatter of the kids in back. I’m guessing a couple of bottles of rosé happened last night. I look at Sam’s heavy eyes, puffy skin, and reach to pat his knee.
“Mom, stop,” he says. “I’m okay.”
When the Club Car lurches to a stop at the dock, Paige swings painfully to her feet and shoos the kids out. I gather up my things, check for stray items, and turn to thank Lola for her hospitality. She’s on her phone, checking messages. She looks up and raises her eyebrows at me.
“What the hell,” she says. “Did I miss something?”
“Excuse me?”
Lola turns the phone toward me. An older iPhone model, single camera lens, giant font.
“Monk Adams. He wants your number.”