“What? Where did you hear that?”
“I was hiding in the eaves. I wasliterallyeavesdropping.”
“And?”
“It’s true. Mom and Aggie were talking. I knew Mom had never left the island, and Grandma, but I didn’t realizenoneof us...”
“Well, I guess that’s going to change. Because I’m leaving the island tomorrow. And you.”
Again, in the darkness, Mary was quiet.
“Poor Mildred Miller,” she whispered. “Robbed of the distinct pleasure of sharing a very small cinder block dorm room with me.”
“You’re not going? Because of what Mom and Aggie said?”
“It feels like I was never going,” Mary whispered. “And it doesn’t have anything to do with... Peter or what happened or... There are just some things I need to do now. Here.”
“Like what?”
“Like, I dunno. Could you actually picture me at college? Could you picture me away from this weird little island? Plus, it looks like I’m going to have to raise some babies.”
“You aren’t talking about the eggs, are you?”
“Of course I am. Although if those little fuckers thinkI’m going to chew worms and then vomit them back up, they’re sadly misinformed about how far I’ll take my maternal hen duties.”
“Disgusting.”
“Yeah, well. Somebody’s gotta do it.”
She stretched herself out on the bed, taking up all the room. I kissed the side of her face, and she pretended to barf.
“I’m going to miss you so much,” I said.
“Don’t worry. I canfly. I’ll come and visit.”
Mary was gone in the morning.
I thought I might actually scream if I found one more feather in my bed, but...
Nothing.
I got dressed and left the house early. The ferry left at noon, but I had one little thing left to do.
The island was quiet and warm in the soft morning light. I filled a thermos with coffee and set out down Bottle Hill wearing my rainboots, even though the ground was dry and hard by now. The island was back to its usual self, heavy with the thick heat of another summer’s end, a mugginess that could be picked up in your palms and saved for a later day. I filled my pockets with it and kept walking.
Oh, By-the-Sea—how the place you grew up could feel at once so safe and so much like a trap. I had never wantedto leave it, but here I was, my bags packed and my good-byes all ready and waiting in the back of my throat.
“I’m not abandoning you,” I whispered to the island, my island, but of course it didn’t respond. Islands were like that. Always listening. Never replying.
The graveyard was orange and crisp and autumn as usual. I slipped a fleece button-down on and wandered through the graves. It was the place I’d miss most, I knew. The always-autumn graveyard.
And although I knew now that I must have been the one controlling the weather, I had no idea how I might reverse the effects.
Not that I wanted to.
It had always been perfect, this graveyard. It had always been empty and autumn and mine.
And now I was leaving it.
