Chapter 21
Chapter Twenty-One
It was the Sunday after Thanksgiving, and Lily was over at her grandparents’ place, playing board games with the Suttons and Liam, finding beauty in the coziness of being together as a snowstorm swirled outside.
This was what Thanksgiving weekend was all about: family, connections, and plenty of food.
And it wasn’t that they’d focused only on her family.
Last night, she and Liam had gone out to dinner with a few of Liam’s old friends from Nantucket, men and women who had big-time careers in Manhattan and Los Angeles, who spoke excitedly about Liam’s upcoming television show and wedding.
Lily was pretty sure they liked her, although they’d hardly asked her a single question and had focused intently on Liam, on what he’d been up to since they last saw him, on how good he looked.
Now, as Grandma Esme howled with fake sorrow, Liam was announced the winner of Monopoly.
“I almost got you!” Esme said, shaking her fist.
Liam laughed like a cartoon villain and waved his fake cash in the air. “I haven’t lost that game since I was fifteen,” he explained. “My dad taught me everything I know.”
Lily felt her smile wane. Slowly, she shifted forward in her chair and helped her grandma and aunt clean up the Monopoly pieces and board.
By the time the table was clear, Aunt Bethany had suggested the next game—one more accommodating for her younger children—and Grandpa Victor was recruiting his soon-to-be adopted son, Kade, for a round.
But Liam got up from the table and announced he had to head home. “I have a few interviews tomorrow morning,” he explained, “and I hate that my mom’s home alone tonight.”
“It’s cold out there,” Grandma Esme said, getting up to fill a Tupperware with sweets for Liam and his mother. “I hope you and your mom get cozy tonight!”
“What’s the plan?” Aunt Valerie asked.
“She likes to watch old Japanese films,” Liam said. “I like them, too. They remind me of my childhood.”
Lily decided to head back to the house with Liam.
She was frightened by how much she didn’t want to go with him and decided to push through it, forcing herself.
She said goodbye to all the Suttons, donned her coat, and hurried through the snow to the car.
Liam drove slowly, tapping his palms on the steering wheel, until they reached the mansion.
Despite the lateness of the hour, every single window was black. Lily had never seen it like that.
“Did your mom go somewhere?” she asked.
“Where would she go?” Liam parked the car in the garage, closed the garage door behind them, and hurried inside, flicking on lights as he went. “Mom?” he called, before switching to the Japanese version of “mother.”
But something in Lily’s chest pounded with recognition.
As she followed Liam inside and inspected the kitchen, living room, and study, she saw nothing out of the ordinary.
Everything was clean; everything had its special place.
The television gleamed, and the plants frothed from their pots.
The fridge was just as stocked as it had been the last time they’d been here, with a mix of Japanese ingredients, vegetables, and things Lily had picked up for herself from the store.
But Yoko wasn’t there. It was almost as though she’d evaporated.
Lily tried to call her, but her phone went immediately to voicemail. Lily didn’t know what to think. She pictured Yoko’s phone at the bottom of the sea.
Liam collapsed on the sofa and put his face in his hands.
Lily felt uncomfortable in the quiet and searched her mind for something to say, something to ease the tension. “Maybe you should call your dad?”
Liam scoffed, but then reached for his phone and did exactly that. He put his father on speakerphone so Lily could hear, which surprised her. Or maybe he was too lazy to put the phone to his ear, too lazy to hold it up.
“Liam, hey! Happy Thanksgiving!” Kendall sounded happy to hear from him. Lily knew they’d fought the last time they’d talked, that Liam and Kendall had both said things they now regretted.
“Hi.” Liam’s voice was thick with a mix of fear and anger. “I wanted to know if you’ve heard anything from Mom?”
Kendall’s tone deepened. “I haven’t, no. She’s not too happy with me right now.”
“I wonder why,” Liam said.
Kendall let out a long, low sigh. “She’s probably at the store. Or out with someone.”
“Who would she be out with?” Liam demanded.
Kendall was quiet for a moment before saying, “We talked about it, Liam. We’re going to stay together. Maybe we’ll even go to therapy and try to work things out.”
Liam’s face was a scrunched tomato. Lily sat on the sofa beside him and touched his shoulder, but he yanked it away. Lily’s tongue tasted like sand and sugar. She felt sick.
“You don’t want to work things out,” Liam said to his father. “You want to run away. You want to alienate Mom. You want to make her feel even stranger here than before.”
“All I’ve ever done, I did for you and your mom,” Kendall said, speaking an old cliché that was hard to believe.
“That’s not true,” Liam shot back. “I wish it were, but it isn’t.”
Lily got back up and tried to block the sounds of Liam and his father beginning another argument.
She went into the kitchen and started hunting around for some sign that Yoko had recently been there, that she’d not been a figment of everyone’s imagination.
It felt bizarre that she’d left without saying anything to anyone.
It felt bizarre that she hadn’t left a note.
Finally, out of the corner of Lily’s eye, she spotted a Post-it, slotted under the fridge.
It looked as though it had fallen. She bent to pick it up and realized it was written in Japanese and meant for Liam’s eyes only.
But Liam was in the next room, howling with rage at his father.
He was less and less able to control his emotions ever since he’d returned to Nantucket.
Lily couldn’t remember him acting like that throughout their past year of dating.
But maybe she hadn’t known him very well at all.
Rather than bother Liam, Lily used an app on her phone to translate the Japanese text to English.
She watched, incredulous, as her beautiful drawings transformed into words she recognized.
I have flown to Osaka for a tennis charity event.
I love you with all my heart. Please, search your own heart before you marry someone you don’t love. Yours, Mom.
Lily sat cross-legged on the floor with her back against the humming fridge.
She inhaled deeply and searched her stomach for signs of her own sorrow.
If anything, Yoko’s note demanded more from her than it did of Liam.
Did Lily really want to be in this family?
Did she really want to find herself like Yoko, running away at the age of fifty?
Lily loved Liam. Or she’d always thought she did.
She thought back to the day she’d first met him, how swept up she’d felt, how sure she’d been that the rest of her life was about to begin.
They’d gone on long walks through Central Park.
They’d kissed with the Manhattan skyline at their backs and eaten burgers and fries and gone dancing all night.
They’d talked of the children they wanted to have.
But ever since the engagement, those conversations had dried up.
She’d stopped thinking of the future as a sure thing—maybe because she could no longer see herself in the one she was planning for.
Liam hung up on his father and stormed into the kitchen, gasping for breath. He looked on the verge of tears. When he found Lily on the floor, he collapsed beside her and pressed his forehead against his thighs. “I hate him,” he said.
“You don’t,” Lily said.
They were quiet for a moment. Lily had dropped the Post-it back on the kitchen floor, hoping that Liam would find it himself. She didn’t want to reveal that she knew what it said. Finally, she had to point it out, faking it. “Look! What’s that?”
She watched as Liam flipped the Post-it over and read it, his red face dimming to green. It was impossible to comprehend his emotions. He crumpled the note in his fist. “She went to Japan for some tennis thing.”
“Oh! Cool.” Lily frowned. “Did she say anything about this?”
“I think she mentioned it, maybe,” Liam said. Lily knew it was a lie. But Liam didn’t want to feel that both of his parents had abandoned him on Thanksgiving weekend.
“Is that true what your dad said? That he wants to make it work with your mom?” Lily asked. She hated how tentative her voice sounded.
“I don’t know,” Liam said. “Honestly, my dad only ever does what he wants. So I guess if he wants to get back together with my mom, that’s what he’ll do.”
“What about what your mom wants?” Lily asked.
Liam blinked at her and raised his shoulders to his ears. “I can’t pretend to know what it’s like to be married for that long.”
Lily chewed her lip and thought about their own impending marriage, the fights they’d have, the affairs Liam would probably think about having, especially if his career continued.
She thought about the fear Yoko had lived with for years and years.
And she remembered herself at the wrap party for Liam’s show, watching from the outside as Liam celebrated his life and his art.
She’d known then what she fully knew now.
She did not fit into his future. Liam didn’t fit into hers, either.
It was devastating. But maybe it was the kind of thing that happened all the time.
“Liam,” she breathed, reaching for his hands. “You know that I love you, right?” Tears filled her eyes and drifted down her cheeks. “You’re the first man I ever really and truly loved.”
Liam looked at her with bright and earnest eyes.
“But I’ve been thinking about marriage,” Lily said.
“I’ve been thinking about your career, and how well you know yourself and what you want, and how little I know myself and what I want.
I’ve been thinking about matchmaking and how silly it is, as well, especially when you think about what a ‘soulmate’ even means. ”
Liam croaked. “What does it mean?”
“I think it’s just about choosing someone and trying to be as honest and open and accepting as you can,” Lily said. “I don’t know. I don’t know! But I do know that neither of us is being honest about our relationship right now. And that scares me.”
For the next two hours, they hashed it out.
They talked about what their relationship had been and what they’d wanted it to be.
They talked about their fights, fears, and feelings.
They talked about what love felt like right now—“Sort of suffocating,” Liam said with a laugh—and what they hoped love would feel like in the future.
“Like opening a window,” Lily said.
Liam laughed at that. “You’re too much of a poet for me,” he said, wiping tears from his cheeks. “My mom was right. We aren’t compatible.”
Lily raised her hands over her head and cried out to the state-of-the-art kitchen, “We’re not compatible!”
Outside, the wind railed fast and hard against the mansion.
The moon poked its head through the swirling clouds.
Lily burst into tears of relief and sorrow and burrowed her face in Liam’s chest, and he held her, cuddling her and crying himself.
They stayed like that for another half hour before Lily went upstairs, packed her things, and took her car back to her mother’s place.
When she walked through the door with her suitcase and red-tinged eyes, Rebecca burst into tears and ran over to her.
“I knew it. I knew it. Thank goodness. You’re free. ”