CHAPTER SIXTEEN
Chelsea
The air was warm on my face, but I knew summer had left. It felt like fall was on the way. I had taken my coffee to the porch and watched the boats steer out of the harbor. I missed that odd combination of diesel and salt drifting off the water.
My mother had left at seven for her drive to Nags Head to meet the attorney. She refused to let me ride with her, even after I tried to bribe her with shopping and lunch. I realized I probably wouldn’t see her until suppertime. With a ferry ride and a trip north on Highway 12, it was almost half a day of traveling.
After last night, I didn’t know what to think about my parents. My mother was determined to seek legal separation and vengeance. This was a version of her as a person that I didn’t know existed.
My father—I had no idea. What if he was planning a similar attack? Or what if he was completely heartbroken and remorseful? I knew I was grasping at nostalgia, but I wanted him to be regretful. Maybe he was working on a way to salvage his marriage. I decided I better get dressed and find out. I finished my cup of coffee, showered, and walked to the store.
The screen door creaked like it always did, and there were boxes in the hall from a recent delivery. My first instinct was to try to haul them into the storage room and start the inventory process, but I reminded myself I didn’t work here anymore. Bertie was still recovering from her surgery and Derek was at Wave On, so I didn’t know who my dad had hired to run the register during the day. Something that had once been ingrained in my existence was suddenly foreign to me.
I tiptoed down the hall. My palms were clammy, my breath quickened. Dad. This was just Dad.
I tapped on the office door and closed my eyes when I heard him call out, “Come in.”
Slowly, I stepped inside the office, knocking as I pushed on the door. “Hey, Dad.”
“Chelsea? What in heavens are you doing here?” He pulled the glasses from his face and laid them on the desk. He looked tired and older than I ever remembered seeing him.
“I—uh—I came to check on Mom.” I closed the door behind me. No matter who was out in the store, this conversation needed to be kept private.
He nodded. “Ahh, and how is she?”
“How is she?” I moved into the foldout chair in the corner.
“Yeah, how is she? She won’t return my calls. She locked me out of the house. Won’t answer the door. How is she? Seems like a reasonable question.”
“Dad, I don’t think you can ask me that.”
He stood from his chair and walked to the front of the desk where he rested against the edge. “Then why are you here?”
“I don’t know.” I expected my eyes to sting and my throat to clamp shut, but it didn’t happen. Now that I was talking to him, looking at the worried lines on his face, the dark circles under his eyes, the apprehension was gone.
“I couldn’t not come see you.”
He stared at me, and I wanted to slug him and hug him. He was still my father, but he was the man who had destroyed my mother’s life. Ruined our family.
“Chelsea, I don’t know what you know.” He paused. “But no matter what happens, you’re still my daughter. You’re my only child, and I don’t want you to be hurt by all of this.”
“Don’t you think it’s too late for that? I’ve already been hurt. You cheated on Mom.” There. I said it. I finally said the words that had been clawing to get out for months.
He exhaled deeply. “I did.”
“And that’s it?” I expected a big apology, or groveling. Something. Anything. “For months this has been going on and that’s all you can say?” I glared at him.
He opened his mouth to speak, but instead closed his eyes. “You’ve known, haven’t you?”
“Yes,” I replied sheepishly.
“So, that’s what happened.” He sighed. “All summer I tried to figure out why you suddenly couldn’t stand to be around me. You knew.”
I was determined not to feel guilty about the way I had treated him. I clamped my tongue to the bottom of my mouth.
“I thought you resented the store, being stuck here, but I was way off.” He shook his head. “I don’t know how you found out, but it was never my intention for you to get hurt.”
“And what about Mom? Did you care about her feelings when you were with Eileen? Did you ever think what would happen?”
My throat tightened and I looked around the office for bottled water. I didn’t know if I could keep this up much longer, but something was fueling me. Months of hostility. Regret that I could have stopped the vengeful path my mother was on. Hurt from feeling betrayed.
“I still care about your mother. I will always care about her. But, things have been different between us for years. I don’t expect you to understand the complications of marriage.”
“I’m not ten. Don’t try to tell me this is too much for me to handle.”
“I’m sorry. This isn’t the most comfortable conversation we’ve had.”
“I just don’t know why you did this, Dad. Why?”
“I think maybe it’s best your mother and I start living our own lives. Lives we really want to live.”
I shrank in my seat. He had already given up. “But don’t you want us to stay a family?”
“Honey, it’s not that simple. You’re right. You’re not a little girl. You’ve moved out. You’re living your own life. Walking your own path. We have to do the same. We’ll always be family, but I don’t think your mom and I can patch this up. And if I’m being honest, I don’t know that I want to.” He rubbed his tired eyes. “Chelsea, it’s not just an affair.”
He was supposed to fight for Mom, fight for the family. Fight to spend Christmases together and birthdays, fight to be there when I got home. Just fight. I blinked before standing to leave. I didn’t want to admit what his words meant. He had found something with Eileen, something he wanted. Something he couldn’t get any more at home.
“I-I don’t know what else to say, Dad. It sounds so final.” Just saying that made it seemed cemented, as if I had been part of ending the relationship.
“I’m afraid it is.”
“I’ll let you know when I’m leaving the island.” I pulled on the doorknob.
“Chelsea, you can call me. You know that.”
I nodded and walked out of the office.
***
It didn’t feel like there was much I could do to glue my family back together. My father was resolved to let things fade away into a new life, and my mother was hell bent on taking him to the bank.
I climbed the stairs to the wraparound porch and sat on the swing. The tomato plants my mother always touted had withered, and only a few shriveled brown leaves hung from the vines. A white cabbage moth landed near the top of the plant and rested its wings.
It was only last night I had taken the ferry home, but it didn’t feel like home anymore. I wasn’t needed. And what was worse, I wasn’t wanted.
The rope that tied my anchor to the ship had unraveled. It wasn’t all at once or with the sharp tug of a storm, but it had been wearing the fibers threadbare over time. Months, and if I really thought about it, for years. But this week, the last strand had torn free. There was nothing holding me to Brees Island, except that my heart knew it was home. It would always be home. But now that home wasn’t my parents’ house. It was the big old cottage by the water that Ben had bought for me. That’s where I wanted to be now.
My legs drifted over the herb garden and then along the wooden planks of the porch. I stopped in mid-swing.
I knew how to make this trip worthwhile.
I hopped in the rental car, turned the key, and drove around the cove. I pulled up into the garage under my house. I still couldn’t believe it was all mine. Technically, I knew it was Ben’s, but he had put it in my name.
I jogged up the steps and opened the bottom apartment. One day, I wanted to combine all four units into my dream house. But that seemed like a lifetime away. I reached under the bed, pulled out my extra suitcase and a duffle bag, and started packing pictures and books. I stuffed my graduation album from Carolina into the bottom of the suitcase.
The sky started getting dark when I looked up from my task. I realized I had spent the entire day organizing. I had sorted everything into three piles—one to take with me on the jet, one to toss out, and one to keep here.
I was surprised the pile to take was the largest of the three. But the longer I stayed at the ranch, the more I wanted to weave myself into its fabric. I wanted pictures from college and my favorite candles. My master’s diploma on the wall. I wanted my old poetry notebook and the dried bouquet from my cousin’s wedding. They were small things, but they were enough to make the master suite feel like it was my room too, not just Ben’s.
I wanted to be back at my parents’ house when my mother got home, so I left the mess I had made and locked up.
I would head back to the cottage tomorrow and continue the process.
Mom’s car was already in the driveway when I pulled up. I opened my purse to toss in the keys and heard my phone ringing.
“Hey.” I squeezed the phone against my ear as if Ben would feel it.
“Hey, darlin’, how’s everything going out there?”
I dropped my head to the steering wheel. “Terrible, but not really.”
“You ok? How’s your mama doing?”
I smiled at his accent. It always had a way of making me feel warmer. “She just got back from seeing an attorney. I was getting ready to go in and talk to her.”
“Attorney? Sounds like things are moving fast.”
“They are. I don’t think there’s any chance they’re going to reconcile.”
“I’m sorry to hear that. Is there anything I can do? You want me to try to make it out there this weekend?”
“No, you can’t do that. I’m probably not staying long. I’ll head back Sunday.”
“You sure? I bet I could call up Flora and rent Silver Sand Dollar out.”
A smile slipped across my face. I would have to drive by the campground on my way off the island. Maybe text him a picture of his summer paradise.
“Or,” he continued. “We could just hang out at your place all weekend and listen to the waves crash. Open all the sliding doors.”
I considered telling him about my secret packing project, but decided to keep it to myself for now. It wasn’t as if I had completely decided we should move in together. I was just packing up some things. Making my space at the ranch more familiar. For now, I’d think of them as little touches of home.
“Ben, it’s really sweet and I do want to hang out with you here, but don’t go through all that trouble when I’m just going to turn around and leave. It’s too far for you to fly coast to coast like that.”
“Darlin’, no distance is too far to travel if it means putting a smile on your face.”
I sighed into the phone, knowing he meant every word he said.
“That’s sweet, but…”
“All right. I get it. But I do have a surprise for you.”
“What is it?”
“I think I’m going to get a break next weekend.”
“Really? As in the kind of break you can take time off?”
“Yeah. We’ve been pushing it pretty hard here so we’re getting a four-day break. How about I meet you at the ranch?”
I closed my eyes and counted how many days it would be until next weekend. “Yes, that would be awesome.” There were squeals desperate to come out, but I wanted to act somewhat rational.
“I heard it might be a special weekend for you.”
“And who told you that?” I teased.
“I might have a few connections. You don’t think I’d miss your birthday do you?”
I hadn’t wanted to say anything, thinking it was impossible for us to spend my birthday together. But secretly I was dying to make plans with him.
“I can’t wait to see you, baby. I have missed you since the second you left L.A.”
“Me too.”
“Look, they’re calling us back in to wrap up the last scene for the day, but I can text you later.”
“Ok, I’ve got to help with dinner anyway.” I stepped out of the car.
“Bye, baby.”
“Bye.” I tucked the phone into my pocket. There were at least some good things on the horizon. I smiled to myself as I climbed the stairs.