Chapter 22
Chapter Twenty-Two
Present Day
I t was five days since Victor’s return to Nantucket. Since he’d dropped off the moving van at Valerie and Alex’s cabin, he’d kept to himself, nursing his wounds after a drive that had quite literally changed his life. He spent his time cleaning up the house he’d rented on the beach and reading book after book. For reasons he didn’t fully understand and maybe never would, he removed all of the books he’d written about family psychology from his bookshelf and left them on a bench at the Nantucket Harbor. He didn’t want to see his face on the book jackets; he didn’t want to pretend that he knew anything more than anyone else. He was very close to throwing them in the trash but hated the idea of them rotting in some landfill.
Valerie arrived on the fifth morning with freshly baked banana bread and worry creased across her brow. She’d written more notes for their “collaborative family book” although Victor found himself increasingly uncreative and worried that he was and had always been a very bad man.
He knew Esme was back because he’d seen Esme in the back corner of one of the photos Bethany sent a couple of days ago. He knew not to bother her. She wants nothing to do with me. And that’s okay. It has to be okay.
Bree had told him he’d never really gotten over Esme. Perhaps Victor had always known that about himself. Maybe it would always be his truth.
Valerie sliced the banana bread, asked Victor questions about his days and, told him what was going on with the wedding planning and the moving in with her husband.
“We’ve been married for six years!” she said with a laugh. “And apart for way too long. But we’re getting used to each other again. It’s been fun. It’s like we get this second shot at something we always really wanted.”
“I’m happy for you, honey. I always loved Alex,” Victor said. He was sitting at the kitchen table with his arms crossed over his chest. He hadn’t yet touched the banana bread, and his beard was unkempt, and he felt as though he was transforming himself into a mountain man rather than a supposedly smart professor and psychologist. Look how far I’ve fallen.
Valerie pressed her lips into a line. There was a pause. “Dad, are you okay?”
It had been a long time since anyone had asked Victor that. He flinched and looked his youngest daughter in the eye.
He wondered if he would ever be okay again.
“We’re just worried about you,” Valerie said. “Rebecca and Bethany and me. We know something happened on the road trip. But we hope there’s a way that we can all come back together as a sort of family. A modern family, as the kids are saying.”
Victor chuckled sadly. “ You are the kid who’s saying that.”
Valerie bowed her head. She looked bright-cheeked. Eager.
“I don’t know how to tell you this,” Valerie said. “And maybe it’s too early. But I’m pregnant.”
Victor was on his feet. His heart thumped hard and fast. “You’re pregnant.”
Valerie beamed.
Victor thought, None of my children ever told me they were pregnant. I wasn’t around for that to happen. Not till now.
Victor’s face broke into a wide grin. He thought he was going to burst into tears. Instead, he hugged his youngest daughter and said, “I’m so happy for you, honey. I’m so happy.” He could see how much she wanted this in her eyes. They echoed light.
He had the sense that everything would be all right going forward in his three daughters’ lives. Victor promised himself he would do everything he could to make it so. He needed to pick up the slack when they needed it.
He and Esme could be their forever cheerleaders here in Nantucket, just as they’d started out.
Valerie didn’t stay long that morning. She had a doctor’s appointment and work to do for the wedding. Victor understood. He hugged her a final time and watched her go. Tears streaked his cheeks.
She’ll know all the magic of parenting.
She’ll know all the heartache, too.
Victor took a slice of banana bread to the back porch and sat in contemplative silence. He wondered what Esme thought of the baby. He wondered what she was thinking now about their argument. It was thousands of miles away from here, left back in Colorado, but it still echoed.
He wondered, too, where she’d gone after the hotel. Had she flown directly here?
Maybe he would never know. He’d made a promise to himself not to beg his daughters for details of Esme’s life. She had a right to privacy. They all did.
But perhaps because he was reckless, lonely, or stupid, Victor sent Esme a text that afternoon. He felt so happy with the news of the baby. He couldn’t help it.
VICTOR: We’re going to be grandparents all over again.
VICTOR: I’m thrilled.
That was all he said.
But these messages were received, unlike those he’d written the past week and a half. He raised his eyebrows with surprise and stalked across the back porch. Based on his research, he was pretty sure Esme had blocked his phone number in Colorado. But now she’d apparently unblocked him.
He pitied modern daters. Things hadn’t been this complicated when he and Esme had gotten together.
Or had they?
Victor paused and thought back to 1975. He remembered Esme’s move to Boston. He remembered her falling into his arms despite her protestations that she’d wanted something else, that she’d wanted a career and academia and so much more. He remembered telling her that she needed to have children. He remembered them falling in line as husband and wife.
Victor’s heart thundered as he sent one more text.
VICTOR: I just want you to know I heard you on our trip. I know I messed up. I know I can never give you back the years you lost. But from the bottom of my heart, I apologize.
VICTOR: I know we can never fall in love again. Not really. But know that I will always love you. Forever. Despite what we went through, and because of what we went through, too.
VICTOR: We had an incredible story. But it was a messy and heartbreaking and devastating story, too.
VICTOR: I do not want to manipulate you into friendship, romance, or anything else. I want you to want to know me. If that’s too much, I will step back. Forever.
Victor returned to his novel. It was The Book of Disquiet by the Portuguese writer Fernando Pessoa, which quickly broke his heart. He’d never read it before. But he had a hunch that Esme had. She was the most well-read person he knew.
It should have been her to have a prosperous career. It should have been her walking the halls of Harvard.
Eventually, she made it. But it had nothing to do with me.
She did it despite me.
The knock on the door came that evening.
Victor was still on the back porch with The Book of Disquiet. He was filled with dread because Esme had read his message but still hadn’t responded. He’d given himself plenty of pep talks, including, you are seventy years old and need to get over yourself. But nothing had helped his anxiety.
Victor had no idea who would be behind the door.
He hesitated before he opened it. He wasn’t sure he wanted anyone to see him like this: exhausted, worried, strange.
But that was when Esme spoke from the other side of the door.
“Just let me in, Victor. Please.”
Victor’s spine straightened. He wouldn’t let Esme wait out there alone. Quickly, he pulled open the door to find her. She wore a sleeveless button-down dress and a pair of sandals, and her hair was in loose curls to her shoulders. Her smile was pretty, if uncertain, just as it had been on their wedding day.
Is that how she looked at Larry on their wedding day, too? he wondered. But he dismissed the thought.
“I got your texts,” Esme said.
Victor flared his nostrils. He assumed the girls had told her where he lived. He didn’t mind. In fact, he saw it as an act of generosity from his girls, all of whom didn’t want their parents getting back together.
Unless they changed their mind?
Victor had been to Esme’s old place innumerable times since his return to Nantucket in late spring. He’d been amazed by the changes, by the fact that Larry Gardner clearly had an immaculate sense of style. He’d been a true artist. As he watched Esme scan through his little house, he felt a stab of annoyance at himself for not having decorated it better. Larry would have done much more.
Stop comparing yourself to someone who died, he told himself.
“It’s not much,” he said.
“It’s nice.” Esme pressed her fingers into her pocket and then removed them.
“Would you like some tea?”
“Maybe something stronger,” Esme admitted. “Do you have whiskey? Or wine?”
It was five thirty in the early evening. With their drinks, Esme and Victor silently sat on the back porch, watching the water. Victor hadn’t seen her since she’d run out on him, but the memory of that seemed like a dream now. She was here, which meant she wanted to forgive him. Maybe.
But Victor had decided that he would let Esme speak first. He’d sent the text message; she’d come without responding. He didn’t want to overload her. He wanted her to know he respected her above everything.
“I went to see LeeAnne,” Esme said.
Victor raised his eyebrows. “Wow. How long had it been?”
“Not long.” She paused. “She came to Larry’s funeral.”
Victor bowed his head. Of course.
“But it was strange,” Esme said, “because Fran was there.”
Victor perked up. He remembered the complicated relationship Esme had always had with her stepmother; he ached for her. It was bizarre to hear that Esme and Fran had been able to breathe the same air and not have issues with one another.
“It was like everything hadn’t happened. Or it was like everything had happened, and it didn’t matter,” Esme said with a shrug. “Maybe when you reach your midnineties, that’s how it goes. You gloss over the bad parts of your life and focus on the good.” She wet her lips. “Because there really is a lot of good, you know? Life is kind of beautiful.”
Victor couldn’t help but smile at that sentiment. This was a woman whose son had died. This was a woman whose husband had left her for his secretary. And still, she said, life is beautiful.
“I was worried about you,” Victor said. “But I knew it was foolish to worry.”
“It was.” Esme sighed. “But I’m sorry I left you like that.”
“I’m sorry,” Victor insisted. “I’m the one who should apologize. I should spend the next several weeks apologizing. No. It should be the next several years.”
Esme snorted and pressed her hand to her nose. “You don’t have to say that.”
“I know.”
Esme turned and looked at him. Her eyes were stern yet beautiful.
“I can’t believe it,” Esme began, “but this has been the strangest year of my life. It doesn’t make sense. There were so many other strange years. But now? When I’m sixty-nine years old? How can this be the strangest?”
Victor wet his lips and thought back to a text he’d received from Bree that morning, telling him what the doctor had said. The world is upside down, he thought.
But he was so grateful for the love he’d shared.
“I don’t expect anything from you,” Victor said.
Esme set her jaw and bowed her head. “I know that. I mean, I know that now.”
“I know I came on really strong when I was twenty years old.”
“You really did,” Esme said with a laugh. “But it was cute, sort of.”
“The difference is that I’m not very cute now,” Victor said.
“No,” Esme said. “You’re still cute.”
Victor laughed. He couldn’t believe she’d said that.
But Esme wasn’t done. “The difference is that we’re both really different. Thank goodness we’re different. Right?”
Victor pressed his hand to his beard, a beard he would take care of that would be gone by tomorrow.
“I know exactly what you mean,” he said.
Getting older meant looking at the great tapestry of your life and deciding what elements you wanted to maintain.
It also meant letting things go along the way.