The Days Between

CHAPTER SIXTEEN

Monday, May 1

Kathryn

“You look lovely this morning, honey,” Kathryn told Emmy as she reversed into the street. Emmy had curled her hair and donned a pale-blue dress dotted with delicate flowers.

The back of Emmy’s neck flushed pink, but she smiled. “Thanks. You do, too.”

Kathryn considered her own fitted dress, the way her perfume blended in the small space with Emmy’s—was that Chanel? Maybe, like Harper had, Emmy bloomed when she escaped Nora. “I have an after-hours meeting today.” Kathryn cleared her throat. “Then I’m meeting a friend for dinner.”

“Busy day,” Emmy mused.

Excitement brewed when Kathryn thought of meeting with Andrew that evening. They’d agreed to a late dinner after her dreaded networking event. She preferred when Andrew drove. Sure, she didn’t want nosy people like Regina seeing her come and go late at night, but she’d originally asked because she needed at least two glasses of wine at their meetings, and driving home with a buzz was ill advised for someone whose son had totaled his car just a few months earlier. But there was something about sitting in silence beside him as he cruised home down the highway, the streetlights strobing the intimate space between them. It was a tiny sliver of the life she’d imagined with him that she hadn’t lost. “You’re right—I do have a lot on the agenda today. And we both look good—want to grab an iced coffee before I drop you off?”

Emmy’s smile lifted. “Yeah, sure.”

With coffee on the horizon, Kathryn accelerated up the street.

Emmy turned to Kathryn. “I have a weird question.”

The engine purred. “Okay.”

Again, Emmy flushed. “I don’t remember anything about when you lived with my family. And my mom isn’t exactly ... open to talking about it.” Kathryn gripped the wheel. This could go in a million different directions, all of them painful. “Anyway ... I ...”

“What is it, Em?”

Emmy’s grip tightened on her phone in her lap. “Max and I, we’re not like ... related or anything, are we?”

Of the millions of directions Emmy’s questioning could have gone, this was one Kathryn hadn’t anticipated, and adrenaline pulsed through her. “Did Harper suggest that?”

Emmy’s eyes widened. “No—never. I just ...”

Kathryn narrowed her gaze on the road. Of course Harper had. “No. You and Max are absolutely not related.”

Emmy faced the window. “Okay. You guys, you and my mom, you just never talked about what happened.”

Kathryn’s mind reeled. The girl was right. It had been nearly two decades of this. It had gone on too long. It was time to have a talk with Harper, even if that meant loosening a stone on the wall they’d constructed so long ago.

Emmy

Guilt bloomed in Emmy at the secrets she held from Kathryn. Kathryn was nice, shuffling her to school, buying her iced coffee, but the way she’d tensed when Emmy brought up Kathryn’s falling-out with Harper left Emmy with more questions about her past than before.

On the nights Kathryn came home with takeout in tow, the three ate dinner together at the kitchen table, like three actors on a stage, each playing their parts. The three developed a silent cadence to their parallel secrets. Kathryn asked Emmy about school and danced around inquiring about Max’s daily activities. Then, after Kathryn loaded the dishwasher and they retired to their respective bedrooms, Max and Emmy shot each other flirty texts from their separate worlds, just yards away. But as the weeks slipped by, a new blooming concern: What would happen with Max when her time in Florida was up? And Emmy’s thoughts shifted when it came to her mother. Now she answered Harper’s messages with short answers. I’m fine , just enough to keep Harper from asking her to come home.

Because being with Max was more than she could have imagined. And, though she continued her countdown to her eighteenth birthday, she no longer felt like a prisoner hashing her days until freedom. On the nights Kathryn went out, the world was theirs, a blur of long drives up the winding, blue coast, of Max’s limbs intertwined with hers in the back seat of his car, and late nights sprawled on the trampoline beneath a starry sky. Their secret spot, beneath the line of catamarans that rested in the sand on the beach, their masts rising into the moonlight, the waves crashing with the rhythm of their bodies, cloaked in darkness.

When they were home alone, they found each other. Whether it was their clandestine afternoon hours in one of their bedrooms, or passing the time in idle ways—her delicately painting her fingernails at the kitchen table while Max chopped vegetables at the counter—his presence made her feel complete. The day after Emmy had asked Kathryn about her mother, she and Max were stretched on the couch together, and Emmy had dozed on Max’s chest. The rattle of the garage door woke her and they shuffled to opposite sides of the couch just as Kathryn came through the door.

“Hey, kids.” Kathryn kicked off her shoes and let her bag and jacket fall in a heap on the floor. “What smells delicious?”

Max’s brow dipped when he eyed her mess. “I made pasta sauce.”

“Wonderful, we all get to share dinner.” Kathryn beamed and raked her fingers through Max’s hair as she passed. He jerked his head from her reach. In the kitchen Kathryn flipped the light switch, and Emmy pressed her shoulder into the sponge of the couch cushion, observing Kathryn’s movements as she lifted the lid on the saucepan, a cloud of steam rising around her. A tight skirt hugged her curves, and her cream blouse was unbuttoned just enough to show a subtle hint of cleavage. Her gold necklace swung like a pendulum near the surface of the sauce. Kathryn reached into the cabinet above the stove for a bottle of wine and a glass, then fished in a drawer for the wine key, which she used to expertly uncork the bottle. Kathryn moved with a grace that struck a chord in Emmy—something she’d never seen in her own mother, a confidence in who she was.

Emmy considered this woman and her secrets. Guilt pulsed inside her; three weeks had passed since the encounter with the man in the car. When she’d woken the morning after, at her father’s beach house with Max, she’d questioned her own sanity. It had been dark in the car; how closely could she have seen the man?

But his image was imprinted in her brain.

When they’d left her father’s house after that stormy night together, the morning had been sky blue and bright. Max cruised north along the winding road that hugged the coast, the ground still wet from the rain. They settled at a café on the water, where wicker fans churned the air above aging bamboo furniture, the windowpanes blurred with salty sea spray. “Do you have any idea who your father is?” Emmy dared.

Max had been looking at his menu, drawing circles on her open palm, and his finger stilled. “Nope.” He folded his arms and leaned back in his chair.

But the man’s face returned to her mind. She couldn’t let it go. “Have you ever asked Kathryn?”

“Of course.” There was an edge to Max’s voice. “First, when I was ten or so. That time, she sat me down and said he was someone she’d dated. That was pretty much it.” Max’s eyes fell to his lap. “Then when I was sixteen. It was one of those fights that started about one thing—me staying out all night or something—and then we were yelling about everything. She accused me of keeping things from her. I threw that right back in her face, that she’d never told me anything, not why we moved out of your dad’s house, not why she practically kept me locked inside the house while I was growing up.” Max’s face shadowed, and Emmy saw a ghost of the hurt little boy he harbored inside him. “Then I asked her who the hell she’d slept with, if he even knew about me or not. I kind of accused her of being ... promiscuous.” His jaw tightened. “She got weird after that. Distant. She’d never done that before. That was when I started drinking a lot. Enough that she might notice. One day I ditched class. I was a straight-A student. But that day I got wasted, then decided it was a good idea to go to my afternoon classes. That’s what got me kicked out.” His face shadowed. “Zero out of ten, do not recommend.”

“God, Max.” Emmy reached out, and he let his hand fall into hers. Emmy thought of Kathryn passing through the house. Some days Kathryn was buoyant, giddy even. Other days it was as if the weight of the world sat upon her, but she was always distracted. Kathryn rapped on Emmy’s door to check on her; she sent texts. Emmy pictured the elastic tension between Kathryn and her son, the way they moved around each other. If she told Max what she suspected and he confronted Kathryn, only to find out the whole thing was a misunderstanding, it could be catastrophic for Kathryn and Max’s relationship. And if she was right about what Kathryn was hiding—it could be worse.

“Then ...” Max scratched his nose. “The morning after my car accident, she woke me up and gave me this weird look and said, ‘I think I know what this is all about, and I want you to know you came from two people who loved each other, and there’s nothing wrong with you.’” His face screwed up. “Like what the hell does that mean?”

Emmy took this in. “That’s it?”

“I just assumed he’s dead, or a drug addict or something.”

She hated the weight she saw settle on Max’s shoulders.

In the kitchen, Kathryn balanced her wineglass between her fingers, and Emmy again considered Kathryn’s evasiveness when it came to Harper. And the way she dressed up for whomever she was meeting for dinner after work. All of it had to be connected. Max hid his secret with Emmy in plain sight, and Emmy realized, maybe that was something he’d learned from Kathryn. And that insight told her all she needed to know: Kathryn was hiding a secret, too. A big one. One that could hurt Max. Emmy suddenly wished it weren’t true.

“Max.” Kathryn approached. “What have you been up to?”

“The usual,” Max mumbled. “I had my appointment with Dr. Hennessey this morning.”

Kathryn sipped her wine. “How’d that go?”

Max didn’t take his eyes off the TV. “We had a breakthrough. I’m cured.”

Kathryn scoffed, then looked to Emmy. “Sweetheart, can I talk to you for a moment?”

Panic pulsed. The man in the car had to have told Kathryn about the incident. Was Kathryn about to confront her? Or, worse, had Kathryn noticed anything between Emmy and Max? Was the blissful bubble she was living in about to burst?

She followed Kathryn as she padded up the stairs and into her bedroom, where Kathryn closed the door. Kathryn’s bed was placed squarely in the middle of the far wall, littered with throw pillows, and above it hung three white-framed pictures of Max as a small child. A paper fan in a wooden frame hung on the opposite wall. “Sweetheart, I spoke with Harper today.” Kathryn’s expression hardened. She set her wineglass on her nightstand and worked her hair into a bun. “She said you’ve been ignoring her texts.”

“Kathryn,” Emmy snapped. “She’s never been a mother to me. Not like you are to Max.” Kathryn swallowed. “So, yes, I got tired of it and ran away. But she didn’t try to stop me from leaving. She hasn’t come back for me. She hasn’t done anything to make up for seventeen years of being a shitty mother, of letting Nora talk to me like I’m trash. So she’s going to have to try a lot harder than a few texts.”

Kathryn’s intense eyes narrowed as she processed this information. “That”—Kathryn wrapped her arms around herself—“makes me sad to hear.” Kathryn sighed. “But being a parent, it’s tough, Em. Life changes people. What happened to your dad and your mom and me—we’re different people than we once were, okay?”

It wasn’t okay, and Emmy ached to know what Kathryn was referring to. Something shifted in Kathryn when she wasn’t near Max, a vulnerability Emmy didn’t see when Max was present. But now, Kathryn stiffened. “I know Harper’s difficult to talk to, believe me. But she cares for you more than you realize. She just isn’t equipped to show it. Do you understand?”

Emmy broke Kathryn’s penetrating gaze and didn’t respond. Kathryn strode away, working the buttons on her blouse, and stepped to her closet. Hangers rattled.

“She wasn’t always like this, you know?” Kathryn said as she returned in her black lace bra. “Harper was ... she was so happy to be your mom.”

This prodded a nerve. Another piece of her life just beyond the periphery of Emmy’s memory, of Harper’s gentle kisses, of bedtime stories. A different person than the one Emmy knew. It occurred to Emmy that she’d been dressing and undressing in a locker room full of girls her entire life and never gave it a second thought, but she couldn’t remember a single instance of Harper going about the private parts of her day in her presence the way Kathryn did. She didn’t know her mother at all.

“So then why doesn’t she like me now?” Tears thickened Emmy’s voice.

“She loves you. And she loved Luke.” Emotion snagged Kathryn’s tone. “Losing you, too, might be more than she can handle.”

Emmy couldn’t answer. She tried to swallow past the knot in her throat.

“My house is yours, Em,” Kathryn said, and her tone dropped. “Now and always. But under one condition: you need to talk to your mom.” Kathryn turned, and Emmy saw her brush a tear from her cheek before she disappeared into the bathroom, then the rush of the shower severed their conversation.

Kathryn’s guilt and prodding worked, and the next afternoon at lunch, Emmy concealed herself in a shady spot outside the cafeteria doors and called her mother. “Emmy?” Harper answered on the second ring.

“I’m just calling to say I’m fine,” Emmy hurried. “If you care.”

“Of course I care.” Harper’s tone was raspy. Relief. And a sadness that mirrored Kathryn’s. How had these women hurt each other so deeply?

Emmy squinted into the line of palm trees in the distance. “Well, I’m okay, so you can stop harassing Kathryn.” So much had changed since Emmy had left Nora’s house. Her magical moments with Max bloomed in her mind. She’d started having sex. She felt like an adult, wondered whether Harper would recognize her when—or if—they saw each other again. She ached for a mother she could share these things with.

“I didn’t call her, she called me,” Harper said. So her mother hadn’t tried to woo her back home via Kathryn. “But you can come home if you’d like.”

It was laughable. Emmy couldn’t imagine being away from Max for a moment.

“We can go shopping, we can get you a new car.”

A wave of disappointment. Harper hadn’t changed. “I don’t want a new car—you can’t fix everything with money,” Emmy snapped. “I’m not going anywhere—Kathryn’s so nice, she cooks, she eats dinner with us, she’s involved in Max’s life.” It was a stretch from the truth, but that wasn’t the point. “I love it here.”

“Okay,” Harper said, resigned. “Could we maybe have lunch someday?”

Emmy sighed. She had to give Harper just enough that she wouldn’t cut her college funding and wouldn’t make her go home. “Maybe. I’ll think about it.” Guilt stroked her, but she hung up, and pushed her mother, and Kathryn, from her mind. With her time ticking by, she wanted to enjoy it with Max.

The following evening, Kathryn returned from work shortly after five. “I’m going to dinner. Use my card to order pizza?” she said as she passed by Max and Emmy, seated in their designated places on the couch, then traipsed up the staircase. Max leaned forward to meet Emmy’s eye, his lips lifting into a smile that held the promise of the world, an evening of freedom, as they’d become accustomed to each evening when Kathryn ducked upstairs to shower, when the house filled with the whir of her blow dryer and a hint of spicy perfume.

Max pressed Emmy into the couch cushions, and her hand snaked across his back. When he was close, all thoughts of her mother evaporated. “Want to go out tonight, or stay in?”

Emmy thought. She wanted to put on a dress, curl her hair. Girly things. “Out,” she said. He kissed her, deep, and she nearly changed her mind. “We’re going to get caught.”

Max’s breath was warm on her ear. “No, we’re not.” A ripple ran through her.

But there was a tug of apprehension in Emmy when Kathryn reversed out of the driveway and disappeared. She had to tell Max what she suspected. She couldn’t keep things from him, but she didn’t want to hurt him, either.

That evening, Emmy found herself beside Max and Javi at a table on the lawn of an old house, renovated into an artsy restaurant. The bartender was buddies with Javi and slid their drinks across the bar, his eyes panning the crowd for the manager. Inside, reverberation from an electric guitar cut the night before the band found their rhythm, and music carried out onto the lawn. An ancient banyan tree reached its arms protectively overhead, strands of twinkle lights wrapped in its branches. Max sailed beanbags effortlessly through a cornhole board, while each of Javi’s slapped against the wood. Emmy sipped her third mojito—cold and strong—and Max caught her gaze, and his smile widened. In her rum-induced haze, she found herself overwhelmed with happiness; her life had melted into a sort of dream.

Afterward their mismatched footsteps scratched the brick sidewalk of Atlantic Avenue, Max’s and Javi’s laughter booming off the dark storefronts as they passed, orange neon CLOSED signs glowing on the boys’ faces. Max’s arm was draped loosely around her waist, and Emmy struggled to follow the story the two boys recanted in alternating bits. A group of them had gone out on a boat, and they’d been drinking all afternoon, and one of them had tried to pee off the back of the boat—their story lost in the boys’ overlapping voices. Javi stopped in the middle of the sidewalk, doubled over, one hand clutching Max’s arm. Tears spilled from Max’s eyes as he struggled to deliver the final words of the story—something about the direction of the wind—before they both melted into hysterics, and their laughter rang out into the nearly deserted street.

Their energy faded as they walked the few blocks home through the stillness of their neighborhood. Under the yellow cone of a streetlight, while a cloud of bugs circled beneath the dome of glass, they said good night. Javi pulled Emmy into a hug. “I’ve never seen him like this,” he whispered into her hair. “You make him happy.”

Emmy squeezed Javi’s hand gratefully before he walked away. “I don’t think you realize how lucky you are to have a friend like Javi,” Emmy said while Max unlocked the front door.

Max’s crooked smile lifted. “He’ll do, I guess.”

Emmy didn’t want to break that smile, never wanted to be the bearer of news that would hurt him.

The following Saturday, Emmy slipped behind the wheel of Max’s car, and he climbed in beside her. She cruised up Ocean Avenue, beside the stretch of rippling blue water, testing the engine’s response. When she was comfortable, she cranked the radio and floored the gas. The car was effortless, elastic, as it zoomed up the narrow, winding stretch of road, the trees hugging a canopy above them. Max gripped his seat and shouted, “Damn, girl. Take it easy.” Emmy laughed and accelerated again, her hair blowing out the open window as she whipped around hairpin turns. “Be careful at this bend,” Max cried over the wind and music.

“You think I can’t handle this?” Emmy punched the gas as she approached the turn, and the tires screeched, clearing the narrow curve. Her heart thudded, sea air salting her lips, and Max turned to face her. He shook his head and, without a word, Emmy continued up the road, sailing over a bridge, where she peeked at Max. His eyes had drifted to the horizon, and wind whipped his hair back. Emmy took him in, the smoothness of his forehead without its usual worry lines.

She made a sharp, illegal U-turn at the Palm Beach County line and headed back the same way they’d come, rolling at the speed limit, their faces dewy with sea spray. The sky was a dusky lavender when Emmy pulled into the vacant public lot and parked, letting the clicks of the settling engine fade before they climbed out of the car.

Max’s fingers laced hers, and they made their way through the dunes and dropped into the sand a few yards from the water. The breeze stirred the warm night, and the moon rose in front of them, glowing against the watercolor streaks of sunset at their backs. Emmy worked her toes into the sand. “I talked to my mom this week. She hasn’t changed at all.”

“I’m sorry.” His frown was genuine, knowing.

“Not that I’d go home anyway. But ... I have a question.” She wrung her hands, and met Max’s eyes, glowing in the iridescent twilight. “Would you consider coming to Washington with me?”

Max’s stare locked on her face.

“I mean, you don’t have to,” she rushed. “We could see where this goes ... but I thought maybe you could look for a culinary school.” It was stupid, embarrassing. They’d been dating only a few weeks.

A pensive breath drained from Max, and light flickered in his eyes. “Yeah—I mean yes. If you’re okay with that. I’d—it would be awesome to go with you.”

Emmy’s heart soared. Max didn’t plan to let her leave with nothing but a loose promise he’d visit. They weren’t going to swap a few awkward texts, then let their love reduce to an awkward exchange if they ever saw each other again. He was serious about her, serious enough to move across the country. It was happening. Really happening. To her . “I can’t think of a better birthday present than to pack up your car and get out of Florida.” The warm bubble of excitement swelled in her chest, blotting the sting of her conversation with Kathryn, of her tangled feelings about Harper. “Wait—we’re really doing this?”

Max draped an arm over her shoulders. “Yeah. I mean, it’ll be strange to leave Javi. Before you, I just assumed I’d spend my life ... well, like my mom does, dating people, but not seriously. But you made me realize I don’t want to be anything like her. You made everything make sense. So, hell yeah, we’re doing this. I want to go wherever you go.” When he pulled back, a childlike grin grew across his face. “How many weeks?”

“Five weeks and four days.” Emmy pulled her phone from her pocket, and the screen glowed to life at the tap of her finger: 9:14 p.m. “And three hours. Not like I’m counting or anything.” They giggled, and she nestled her head beneath his chin and watched the waves crash on the sand, safely in his grasp. The world was warm. Peaceful. Right. Max had articulated her feelings with precision: all she’d ever known was solitude. In him, she’d found a partner. Promise. “If Harper wants to find me, she’s going to have to come all the way to Washington.” The minimal likelihood of that happening prodded Emmy, but she wasn’t going to let anything spoil her buoyancy.

“Forget our parents.” Max shifted in the sand. “They’ve had so much control over our lives. We don’t need them. Let’s figure it out on our own. I have money, you have school. We have this.”

This . Emmy closed her eyes and soaked in his words. Max was right—nobody mattered except the two of them. Their future was wide, theirs to navigate together.

But that word parents niggled her. Emmy didn’t want to pop their bubble, but she couldn’t plan a future if she was hiding things from Max. She pulled away to look at him, anxiety coursing through her. “I need to tell you something.”

Max’s brows narrowed. “What?”

“Something weird happened. I don’t know how to explain it.” Emmy hesitated, sorting her thoughts. “The day we went to the beach house, a man came to pick up Kathryn, and I got into his car. I only saw him for a few seconds, but it was obvious—he looked exactly like you.”

“What does that mean?”

“It means he looked exactly like you. The same eyes, the same nose—like, everything.” Emmy nibbled her lip. “I freaked out and ran back into the house. But a few seconds was enough. Whoever Kathryn’s been going out with at night, I think he’s your father.”

Max’s brows knitted. “Why didn’t you tell me?”

Shame surged. Emmy dropped her gaze. “I didn’t know how, and I second-guessed it. But I had a conversation with Kathryn, and she totally locked up—”

“I remember.” Acid laced Max’s tone. “I saw that car.” His forehead narrowed into an M. “Kathryn’s been acting squirrely. I knew she was hiding something.”

“But wouldn’t she say something to you if he’s going to come so close to the house?”

Max fell silent, and Emmy couldn’t imagine the thoughts churning in his mind.

“Of all the fucked-up shit she’s done, this is the worst.” His voice was raw.

Emmy thought of Kathryn’s green-eyed gaze, the way Emmy had watched her heart break when she’d urged Emmy to make peace with Harper. “She must have her reasons, Max.”

Max didn’t answer. He pushed his toes deep into the sand, his gaze hard.

“Are you upset with me?” Emmy asked. Their future had held promise just moments ago. Would this ruin it?

“With you? No.” Max reached for her hand, pulled it close.

Emmy hated the idea of Max hurting, hated that she could read it on his face. Night blanketed the landscape. Over the cobalt water, the moon reflected off the rippling surface in a long V, and the only sound was the low boom of the waves.

“This is just so ... her.” The venom in his voice thickened. “She gives me shit about what I do, while she’s running around keeping secrets. It’s been like this my whole life—you’ve been in our house for weeks and she doesn’t nag you. Instead, all of her attention goes to this dude, whoever the fuck he is.”

Emmy let Max’s anger settle. This was the reaction she’d dreaded. “I didn’t mean to come between you and your mom.”

Max faced her, squeezed her hand. “You couldn’t, Em. This has nothing to do with you. It’s all on her.”

Emmy absorbed this. He was right, but she was still desperate to soothe him. “I’m not going to tell you I know how you feel. But I know what it’s like to wonder about the other half of you, to feel like a missing puzzle piece nobody talks about. I don’t know what made my mom the way she is, and ... you don’t, either.”

Max gave a small nod.

“It’s crazy that decisions they made—decisions we may never understand—affect all of us, decades later.”

Max’s gaze fell, unfocused for a pensive beat.

“What are you thinking?” She watched him return to the moment.

“I’m thinking there has to be a way to catch them, so they can’t lie anymore.”

Emmy drew a circle in the sand, mulling his words. “We could.”

“I can.” Max’s eyes narrowed. “I will—I have to. I don’t have any other choice.”

“We. Whatever we do, we do it together.”