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If only we could try again.
If only.
Dorothy stared down at the words; they danced and blurred in front of her. She’d always thought of herself as the only victim in that house. Maybe there had been two of them.
Three if you counted Tully, who had certainly been ruined by her grandfather’s evil, not directly, perhaps, but ruined just the same. Three generations of women broken by a single man.
She let out a deep breath and thought: Okay.
Just that, a simple, single word. Okay. This was her past.
Her past.
She looked at her daughter, who looked like a sleeping princess, made young by her fuzzy new growth of hair. “No more secrets,” she said—whispered, really. She would tell Tully everything, including the regret in her mother’s letter. That would be her Christmas gift to her daughter. Dorothy would say the words at this bedside, begin from where she left off at the hospital. Then she would write it down, her entire story, so that Tully would have it all for her memoir, whatever she needed. There would be no more secret shame, no more running from the things that were her fault or the things that weren’t. Maybe then, someday, they could heal.
“Would you like that, Tully?” she asked quietly, praying hard for an answer.
Beside her, Tully breathed evenly, in and out.
Twenty-seven
That year, winter seemed to last forever. Gray days followed one another like dirty sheets on a line. Swollen clouds darkened the sky, releasing intermittent rain until the fields turned black and viscous and the cedar boughs drooped like wet sleeves. When the first sunny days of spring came, green swept across the fields in the Snohomish Valley, and the trees straightened again, straining toward the light, their tips lime-green with new growth. The birds returned overnight, squawking and diving for the fat pink worms that poked up from the damp earth.
By June, locals had forgotten all about the dismal winter and the disappointing spring. In July, when the farmers’ markets started up again, there were already complaints about how hot it had grown in the summer of 2011.
Like the flowers in her yard, Marah had spent the long gray months gathering strength, or finding that which had been in her all along.
Now, though, it was late August. Time to look forward instead of back.
“Are you sure you want to do this alone?” her dad asked, coming up behind her. She closed her eyes and leaned back against him. His arms curled around her, held her steady.
“Yeah,” she said, and it was the one thing in all of this about which she was sure. She had things to say to Tully, things she’d held back, waiting for a miracle; but there was not going to be a miracle. It had been almost a year since the accident, and Marah was preparing now to go off to college. Just last night, she’d helped her dad with his street kids documentary—and the images of those poor lost kids with their hollow cheeks and empty eyes and fake bravado had chilled her to the bone. She knew how lucky she was to be here, at home. Safe. And that was what she’d said when her dad filmed her. I’m glad to be back. But still, she had something left to do.
“I promised Mom something and I have to keep that promise,” she said.
He kissed the top of her head. “I’m really proud of you. Have I told you that lately?”
She smiled. “Every day since I got rid of the pink hair and the piercing in my eyebrow. ”
“That’s not why. ”
“I know. ”
He took her hand and walked her out of the house and to the car parked in the driveway. “Drive safely. ”
It was a sentence that meant a lot more to her these days. Nodding, she climbed into the driver’s seat and started the car.
It was a gorgeous late summer day. On the island, tourists thronged onto and off the ferry, filling the sidewalks of downtown Winslow. On the other side of the water, the traffic was typically bumper-to-bumper, and Marah followed the crowd north.
In Snohomish, she turned off the highway and drove out to Firefly Lane.
She sat in the driveway for a moment, staring at the gray Nordstrom bag beside her. Finally, she picked it up and went to the front door.
The air smelled fresh and crisp, of apples and peaches ripening in the sunshine. From here, she could see that Dorothy’s small vegetable garden was teeming with growth: bright red tomatoes, green beans, rows of leafy broccoli.
The door opened before she knocked. Dorothy stood there, wearing a flowery tunic and baggy cargo pants. “Marah! She’s been waiting for you,” she said, pulling Marah into a tight hug. It was what Dorothy had said to Marah every Thursday for nearly twelve months. “She opened her eyes twice this week. That’s a good sign, I think. Don’t you?”
“Sure,” Marah said in a tight voice. She had thought that a few months ago, back when it started to happen. The first time it happened, in fact, it had taken her breath away. She’d called for Dorothy and waited, leaning forward, saying, Come on, Tully, come back …
