Chapter 6
Chapter Six
Late that night, Ada felt the shift of a body on the other side of her bed and reached over to touch Peter’s shoulder.
It was warm and muscular and naked against the sheets.
Her eyes smarted with tears, perhaps because of whatever she’d been dreaming about.
It was so hard to know where the brain was going to take you and how it was going to affect your waking life.
When Ada shifted closer to Peter, he shifted more toward his side of the bed, making Ada feel like she was in a chase she couldn’t win.
She drew herself back and glanced at the clock on the bedside table.
It was two in the morning. Why had Peter been out till two in the morning?
Before she could make sense of it, she drifted back to sleep and hardly remembered it when she woke up.
Peter was up and around by six thirty, throwing clothes into a small backpack and padding gently from the bathroom to the closet and back again.
Through slitted eyes, Ada watched as he pulled a T-shirt and the sweater she’d gotten him two Christmases ago over his shoulders.
He’d put gel in his hair to make it look thicker than it ordinarily did when he went to work.
She wondered if it was because he was going into the city, where people cared more about appearances.
She pulled herself up so that she was leaning against the pillows, her arms crossed.
Peter brightened when he saw her and dropped down to kiss her on the cheek.
“I wasn’t sure if you were going to wake up before I left,” he said.
“You said you’d wake me up,” she reminded him, flipping the sheets from off her legs.
Peter zipped his bag and gestured toward the dark hallway. “I made a pot of coffee already. But it can always be reheated if you want to get some more sleep.”
But Ada wasn’t tired in the slightest. She dropped to the pads of her feet and put her hands on her hips, sweeping her nightgown across her thighs. “So, Abby left Max?”
Peter nodded, his face darkening. “We called it, remember? At their wedding?”
Ada remembered. They’d said that a wedding so expensive couldn’t possibly last more than ten years, that it was a romantic performance for show.
That, plus the pressures of the city, plus Abby’s love of going out, plus Max’s love of flirtation with younger women, didn’t make a believable concoction for a forever marriage.
But even as Ada had said so, back at the wedding, she’d wanted to bite her own tongue.
Who was she to say which marriages would work and which wouldn’t?
“I mean, you’re a therapist,” Peter said now. “Maybe you can help me figure out what to say to Max? How to help him through?”
Ada reached for her glass of water and held it aloft, waiting for an answer to come to her. “Sometimes it’s good to go and sit and listen rather than offer advice,” she said. “Sometimes people just need space to sit quietly with people they know care about them.”
Peter’s smile was slightly crooked. “You’re a genius, honey.” He dropped down to kiss her on the forehead again, then slung his backpack over his shoulder. “I have to run.”
Ada wandered through the dark hallway and down the staircase, following Peter all the way to the door that led to the garage.
She swallowed down her rage, her insistence that he stay for Hannah’s game, her reminders that Hannah would be out of the house soon.
None of it would keep him here. She remembered how hard her mother tried to cling to her father when he was leaving.
She recalled how that seemed to hasten his departure from the house.
But no. This was different. This was Peter, helping out a friend during his time of need.
About five years ago, when her children were mostly old enough to take care of themselves, Ada added a few patients to her Saturday morning roster.
It was essential for those whose jobs were impossible to leave during the week, or for those with young children at home, or for those who couldn’t find the time otherwise.
After the last of Peter’s headlights filtered into the darkness, Ada forced herself into action: pouring coffee, making toast, and going for a brief yet explosive run.
By the time she jumped in the shower, her mind was already on her patients.
It was time to give them her all and abandon her own anxious thoughts.
Her first patient that morning was Bernie, an older gentleman who’d started coming to Ada when his wife had passed away.
He struggled with loneliness and was having a crisis regarding his own purpose, now that he didn’t have anyone to take care of.
Ada adored him, although she was careful never to let it show.
For an hour, they talked about Bernie’s progress, about the tactics he’d tried the previous months to dig his way out of his dark spells.
He’d even made a friend, apparently, with a guy who also liked watching baseball and drinking light beer.
Incidentally, he was also a widower, which meant they were there for each other for conversation and the occasional dinner.
Ada saw a spark returning to Bernie’s eyes.
She remembered what her mother had said about friendship.
Why had Ada dismissed it all these years?
When Peter had first brought her to live in Nantucket, she’d been pregnant with Hannah and distracted from her opera failures.
She’d felt like all her friends were back in Manhattan, waiting for her to join the party once more. But she never did.
Was she going to regret it?
After Bernie left, Ada took notes about his session and prepared for the next one.
Her nine thirty was brand new, a man who’d recently moved to the island from New York City.
Nick Willis was forty-four and, like Bernie, a widower.
According to his file, his Manhattan-based therapist had recommended Dr. Ada Wagner for the next stage of his talk therapy journey.
Natalie opened the door for Nick and made the introduction. “This is Dr. Ada Wagner,” she said. “And Dr. Wagner, this is Nick Willis.”
The man who walked through the door was slender yet strong, with long, trim legs, perhaps a result of years of running long distances.
His cool, middle-aged style spoke of many years in the city: corduroy pants, a button-down shirt, and hair on the shaggier side.
He was pale, clean-shaven, and slightly shaky, as though he were nervous.
Ada got up to shake his hand and pour him a glass of water.
“It’s a pleasure to meet you,” she said, sitting back down.
“Thank you for taking me on,” Nick said. “My old doctor said you were the best on the island.”
Ada tried not to blush. “How long were you seeing your old therapist?”
Nick took a sip of water. “Since my wife died. I guess about four years. To be honest, I don’t think we were getting anywhere the past two years, though.
I felt like I said the same thing over and over again, and he said the same thing over and over again.
But we couldn’t figure out a way to get past it. ”
“That can happen,” Ada said, remembering her own experiences with patients who had run into brick walls. “Sometimes it’s good to switch up therapists in that case.”
Nick set down his glass of water and looked at her with his big blue eyes.
They were striking and honest in a way that gave Ada pause.
She felt as though she could ask him any question, and he’d give her the truth, no matter what.
It made her wonder if her other patients were being completely honest with her. Maybe they didn’t know how to be.
Nick explained that he’d moved to Nantucket in January of this year.
“What was the reason for the move?” Ada asked.
“The city was wearing me down,” Nick said.
“I had an apartment in the Upper West Side, and my daughter was in a pretty good school and had okay friends, but we were just worn out. We came on vacation to Nantucket Island last summer, and both fell in love with it. It was Carleigh’s idea, actually.
She suggested we come for the final semester of her senior year.
I never would have sprung for it otherwise.
You know, they say never to take a teenager out of their high school. Especially at the end!”
“They do say that.” Ada nodded. “How curious that your daughter wanted to leave.”
“I think there was a friend breakup and maybe a boyfriend breakup,” Nick admitted, scuffing his shoes together. “She was spending a lot more time at home. Her eyes were empty. I felt like those were experiences she wanted to share with her mother. I tried, but she wouldn’t really open up.”
“Does your daughter go to therapy as well?”
“She does, yeah. She’s still with her old therapist. They talk on the phone once a week,” Nick said. “I feel like kids these days don’t need as many face-to-face encounters.”
Ada smiled. She’d thought the same about her own children, who were so much more tech-savvy than she’d ever be.
“She already got into college,” Nick said, a jolt of pride to his voice. “She’s going to Yale.”
“Wow. Yale. That’s incredible,” Ada said, feeling a surge of jealousy that she immediately regretted. But Hannah hadn’t gotten into Yale. (Did that make Ada a worse parent than Nick?) “You must be really proud,” she added.
“I am. So very proud,” Nick said. “I didn’t get to Yale when I was younger, although I really wanted to go. I was at NYU. It was a great experience, obviously. I don’t regret it.”
“So you were in the city a long time.”
Nick nodded. “I moved there when I was eighteen. It’s where everything in my life happened to me, I feel. It’s where I earned my master's degree. It’s where I published my first few poetry collections. It’s where I met my wife and had my daughter.”
Ada’s lips parted with surprise. “You’re a poet.”
“Yes,” Nick said, looking momentarily bashful. “I know it sounds silly, but it’s honestly my only job. I lucked out. I think you can’t just ‘be a poet’ anymore, not in this economy, not if you’re young.”
Nick Willis. Ada furrowed her brow, trying to recall seeing that name at any of the bookstores she frequented. In truth, she hardly ever bought poetry and primarily fixated on fiction when she had time to read.
“It’s quite an accomplishment,” she said.
Nick raised his shoulders and turned his attention to the window.
In the beautiful morning light of May, he looked like a catalog model posing as a father.
“I should have reached out to you as soon as we got here,” he said.
“It hasn’t been easy. The new school was more painful for Carleigh than she thought it would be, and I think she’s been really lonely.
I’ve been really lonely. However, it doesn’t mean I want to return to the city. I’m able to breathe here.”
“You want to stay in Nantucket for the long haul?”
“I want to be one of those writers who previously lived in New York,” he said with a wry laugh.
“I want to walk along the ocean and feel expansive and alive and filled with hope. I don’t want to smell the city's smells anymore. I want my next poetry collection to be about all the fresh life I’ve found out here, so far from all the pain I left behind. ”
Ada’s eyes smarted, but she blinked fast to correct.
The last thing she wanted was for her new patient to know what a sap she could be.
But the truth was, she’d never heard a patient speak so eloquently about a future he saw for himself.
She wondered what it had been like to be Nick’s wife, if he’d written little poems for her and left them around their apartment.
He and his wife had had the city life she’d assumed she would have, with her opera career and the swarming streets and the exotic foods.
Instead, they were both here in Nantucket.
“I’m here for vague reasons,” Nick said finally, bringing his eyes back to Ada’s.
“I need help managing my daughter’s emotions, because I want her to feel safe and protected, and I want her to feel like she wants to come home to visit me often when she’s gone.
But I’m also here for myself. I still haven’t figured out how to be in the world since Samantha died.
I’ve had writer’s block, which is embarrassing to admit. ”
“It’s not,” Ada assured. “After such emotional turmoil, it’s easy for the brain to misfire. But it doesn’t last forever.”
Nick sniffed. “I hope you’re right.”
It was time for Nick to go, and nearly time for Ada’s next and final patient of the morning to arrive. Ada got up and thanked Nick for his time, surprised that her heartbeat was so frantic, like the wings of a hummingbird. She walked Nick to the door and said she’d see him next week.
“It doesn’t have to be on a Saturday,” he said. “I can meet almost any day of the week. Whenever you have time for me.” He hesitated. “I really want to get better. I want to make up for lost time.”
“Talk to my secretary,” she said, forcing herself to scowl so that she didn’t smile too much at this handsome, creative man. “We can work something out.”
Nick thanked her and disappeared through the door, leaving her with her hands at her sides and her mouth dry.
Before her next patient arrived, she quickly checked her phone and googled Nick Willis, a poet, reading the first poem that came up.
It had won a literary prize with numerous accolades.
There had been a ceremony, where he’d performed a reading of his poem in front of three hundred people.
In several articles, people were calling him the freshest face in the world of poetry, a man who could wrangle the English language and transform it into whatever he needed it to be.
Not all of it made sense to Ada, but she found his use of words and phrases beautiful, so much so that tears filled her eyes again.
Some of his poems were about
It was then that she remembered Peter. Now that it was nearly eleven, he was probably almost in the city. She dialed his number, her hand shaking. It rang and rang, but he didn’t answer.