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“Right. And it’s all helpful for me to know,” Dexter says. “You know—for the book.”
Right. For the book. Ruby swallows hard. “Okay, shifting gears.”
Dexter stays still, but even from two feet away, Ruby can feel the change in the energy between them; he’s aware that he’s altered the chemistry of the afternoon, and that the only way to fix things is to be quiet and see what Ruby says next.
“Actually, I don’t know whether he did or didn’t,” she says after giving it some thought. “And I’m not sure that it even matters. The fact that Jack carried on a full-fledged relationship with another woman and fathered a child with her so completely supersedes anything else that he might have done that it’s…kind of a moot point. At least to me.”
Dexter nods, listening. “Do you feel like you can ever forgive him for his transgressions?”
“I don’t know. I’d like to, if only for the fact that I think it’s unhealthy to live the rest of my life holding on to any type of anger. That can’t be good, can it?”
“Probably not. But people have different capacities for forgiveness, and you have to decide for yourself what you can live with and what you can’t.”
“Of course.” Ruby watches a crew row past on the river, their upper bodies covered with long-sleeved white jerseys, but their strong legs visible from under matching red shorts. “I think the hardest part was feeling that I might not have known who Jack truly was at all. It was the first time I ever felt like I might be married to a stranger. That he was part of a machine that I had no understanding of. Here I’d been thinking all along that I was married to a man who believed in his stances and his politics, but who came home at night to his wife and daughters and switched off the Jack Hudson Persona to just become Jack, or Dad. I was wrong though. So, so wrong.” Her voice gets quieter. “He was someone else entirely.”
Dexter lets that sit there for a long moment and then taps his fingers gently on the bench behind Ruby’s back, as his arm is still resting there. “I’m not just blowing hot air up your skirt because I’ve grown to really like and respect you, but I think it’s fair to say that one of you was putting your true, authentic self into this marriage, and it wasn’t Jack.”
Ruby is pulled from her reverie; she turns her head to look at Dexter. “Are you allowed to interject that way?”
Dexter blinks in surprise. “You mean, am I allowed as the interviewer to put in my two cents? To have a personal opinion?”
“Yeah, I guess.” Ruby squints at him like she’s forgotten that someone is even listening to her recollections. “I mean, does that taint the material in any way?”
“Well…” Dexter turns his body to face the water, pulling his arm off the bench behind Ruby. “Journalists have their own code of ethics and two of the important rules are to be objective and impartial.”
“And are you?” It’s Ruby’s turn to stare at the side of his face as she waits for an answer.
Dexter stays quiet for a long moment. “I will be when I write the book,” he says carefully. “But am I actually impartial?” He finally turns his head to look at her again. “Let me be as honest as I can with you: no.”
Ruby holds his gaze. "I'm not impartial about you, either."
Without another word, they both look out across the Hudson and let their eyes settle on the foliage and the natural beauty that this gorgeous day has to offer, disappearing into their own thoughts.
After hours and hours of productive late-night Zoom calls, forty-eight hours together on Christmas Key over the summer talking about serious topics, and just four hours together in New York City today, Ruby and Dexter have come to an impasse: neither one of them is completely objective about the other, and while the conversation isn’t going to go any further than it already has, they’ve inadvertently turned a corner in their working relationship, and neither one of them knows how to go back.
So instead, they just look at the leaves.
Sunday
It’s just as arduous a journey to Tangier Island as Sunday remembers, and she takes it this time with a sense of foreboding, fearful of what could possibly happen.
With her on the ferry for the hour-long ride from the banks of Onancock are her daughters—one happily along for the ride, and the other sullen and withdrawn. The ferry stops running for winter by mid-October, which adds a sense of urgency to the trip for Sunday: it’s now or never. She either goes to Tangier and shows her daughters her tangled roots, or she waits for spring, giving Peter ample time to drag her life out for the entertainment of the public at large.
“This is gorgeous,” Olive says, her long, dark hair blowing out like a silky fan behind her as the ferry traverses the water.
And it is lovely to look at: the water isn’t quite a dark, Atlantic Ocean navy blue here, but a prettier Yale blue that almost feels exotic. In the distance, Tangier looms like a giant floating marsh, so flat that Sunday remembers the feeling of walking around on the ground and wondering if Tangier might someday squish like a wet sponge beneath the feet of all who tread on its sandy shores. It’s always felt to her like the island itself is sinking, being swallowed up by salty water, drowning in its own fluids while people stand on the mainland watching, thankful that they aren’t living on an island lost in time and waterlogged by the sea. Its tiny island feel is entirely different and a world apart from the warm, tropical vibe of Shipwreck Key, and Sunday gives a shiver of gratitude for her new home as the ferry approaches the dock.
She hasn’t told anyone that she’s coming, and she prefers it that way. The only chance she has of showing her daughters Tangier Island and of giving them a view of her early life is if she does it entirely on her own terms, with no obligations to visit anyone else. As the ferry pulls in and people start to shuffle off the boat, Sunday turns around to look for Cameron, who chose to ride inside rather than out on the bow of the ferry with her and Olive. Sure enough, Cameron is coming through a rusted door, her camel colored wool trench coat wrapped around her tiny waist, and a pair of dark sunglasses covering her eyes.
“You ready, babe?” Sunday asks her, motioning for Cameron to follow her.
Cameron sighs audibly.
“Welcome to Tangier Island,” a man in a pair of paint-splattered overalls greets the ferry passengers with a tip of his head. His eyes land on Sunday and linger there for just a moment longer than she likes. “Well, well, well. The prodigal daughter returns.” For Sunday, he gives not just a tip of his head, but he lifts the sweat-stained green cap off the top of his nearly bald head and bows his chin reverently. “Welcome home, Mrs. Bond.”
Sunday cringes at the word “home”; it’s been years since she thought of home as anything but the place she lives with Peter or her daughters. She’s gotten used to thinking of Shipwreck Key as home just about as quickly as she shed the skin of a Tangier Islander on the ferry the last time she left this place, so to see it now through the eyes of a woman who is entirely different than the girl who’d left this place is unsettling.
“Mom!” Olive says, tugging at her right arm. “I can’t believe this is your home. I always felt like you just grew up in Washington.”
