CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE
I hear the pop of sand and gravel beneath car tires. Joni is pulling her Subaru into the driveway. I hold the door open and smile as she and Michael walk to and enter the house. It’s been half an hour since going in the lake and my hair is still damp. I’ve been able to think of little else since seeing those words carved into the boathouse wall, of how they must’ve gotten there. But I have to pick my moment.
I’m just not sure when that is yet.
“How you guys doing?”
“Good,” Joni says. She stops and eyes the bruise on my cheek. “How are you?”
“I’m fine. Come on in. Did you guys eat?”
“Yeah, I took Michael to the diner in town.” She walks deeper into the house.
The two of them are the picture of summer: he wears a black V-neck T-shirt and brown shorts. She’s wearing a bathing suit, with a breezy pink shirt over top, jean shorts, and brown sandals on her feet. Her blonde hair is pulled back into a loose bun. This is the Joni-look I’m used to.
“Anyone seen my white sweatshirt?” She’s looking around in the living room.
“Fished it out of the lake,” I tell her.
“Really?” She comes closer for scrutiny. Practically sniffing me as she looks me over. “You went swimming?”
“Just so I could get it. It must’ve blown off the dock. It’s hanging on the line now. Up by the shack.”
Finally, she breaks eye contact. “Thank you.” I’m struck, for a moment, by how lovely she is.
When she was in her mid-teens, Joni did some modeling, mostly for clothing catalogues. It wasn’t something I ever would’ve sought for her, but Paul’s secretary had a sister at an agency.
Her nose wrinkles with a question. “Where’s Dad?”
“You probably went right by him. Where else? Working on the boat.”
She nods. I smile at Michael. I feel like a psychic reaching for his thoughts, but I ask about their morning, their breakfast. Joni remarks about the diner being redone and about downtown being crowded, and I zone out, thinking about — (I want my mommy back) — how Joni hated modeling when she was young. Mostly, it became the perfect cause for rebellion. Only, the rebellion lasted after the last photographer refused to work with her and we called it quits. It went on through two private schools, multiple attempts at running away from home, and sudden disappearances. Times she would venture into the city on her own.
When she was fifteen, we sent her to see someone for her anxiety and depression. She hated that, too. Like Maggie Lewis, Joni didn’t want to be on any medication. But when the doctor prescribed Effexor, we decided to try. It was gut-wrenching to me. She was so young, so troubled, but SSRIs such as Effexor had shown efficacy, even in teens.
In the end, she wasn’t on it for long. She seemed to grow out of her funk naturally. It doesn’t mean everyone does.
Joni walks into the kitchen and opens the fridge and asks Michael if he wants a drink. He takes a can of iced tea. We continue chatting. Every now and again, I catch Michael looking at me. Or maybe I’m looking at him. Either way, it’s like we’re having this sub-perceptive side conversation. Like telepaths.
Me: I know.
Him: And I know you know. . .
I sit at the counter extension, where we have a couple of stools. Watching the pair of them slurp their canned drinks and stand around like teenagers, I ask them what they’re planning to do next.
“Not sure,” Joni says. She glances at Michael, who lifts his eyebrows in deference to her.
The way to do this, I think, is to keep it as calm and pleasant as possible.
“How about dinner? You guys gonna be here for dinner?”
“Um, I don’t know.” Joni continues looking at him.
“Okay, well . . .” I take a breath. “Sean is coming.”
Joni’s gaze swivels to me. She’s always adored her older brother. “Yeah? You heard from him?”
I check my phone. My last text to him is still there: Hey kiddo. ETA?
His response arrived about a half hour later. Inbound. ETA 7:30 p.m. Sorry for the delay, Ma!
I show it to Joni.
“Uh-huh,” she says, looking. The utterance is meant to demonstrate her lack of faith.
I give her a stern look at first, but then soften. “Listen, this is your vacation, too. I’m not trying to pin you guys down to anything. But we still owe you a celebratory dinner.”
“No, you don’t,” Joni says. “We don’t need that.”
Michael and I share another quick glance. Who looked at who first?
“Of course you do. You’re engaged. The least we can do is take you out.”
“You mean ask us a bunch of questions.”
“No . . .”
“About the future, about where are we going to live, about what are we going to do for money. About how much is the wedding going to cost, et cetera.”
There’s marginal humor in her voice, but mostly, she’s being petulant. Even Michael seems to sense it. He puts a hand on her back and murmurs something too low for me to pick up on, but she shrugs him off. The most likely explanation is probably the right one: Joni is edgy because she’s brought her fiancé to the lake house for our annual family get-together, someone we’ve never met, and so far, we’ve been pretty frigging cool about it.
If you discount my antics or what I’ve discovered, all of which she’s unaware of.
So she’s defensive, waiting for the other shoe to drop.
At that moment, Paul comes in from outside, breaking the tension.
“Daddy,” she says, and trots to him and gives him a big hug. Paul is holding a paintbrush in one hand and a rag in the other, so he’s unable to properly hug her back. But she makes a big show of affection for him — letting everyone know he’s the preferred parent right now.
I cast my gaze at Michael, who gives me a sheepish smile and looks down, like he understands.
Welcome to the family. You’ll fit right in.
“So, Michael,” I say. “I have a confession to make.”
When he raises his eyes to me again, they seem to dance in the light filling the floor-to-ceiling windows behind me. That incredible green-blue, like a lagoon.
“I checked you out on Facebook.”
“I’m not on Facebook,” he says.
“I guess that explains why I couldn’t find you. There were quite a few Michael Rands, though. I was going through them for a while.”
“Sorry,” he says. “I should’ve told you.”
I make a face and wave at the air. “No, not at all. It’s not something you have to tell people. ‘Hi, I’m not on Facebook.’ And I’m admitting to snooping.”
Joni has let go of Paul. She is not exactly glaring at me, but close. Giving me the stink-eye, anyway. Paul continues toward the sink, where he starts to wash out his brush. “Paul, honey,” I say. “What are you doing? Kitchen sinks are for dishes and food preparation, not oily paintbrushes.”
“I’m going to put a sink in the garage,” he says, still rinsing the brush.
“I’m actually not on any social media,” Michael says.
Joni moves toward him, tentative. It’s clear she has mixed feelings whether he should talk to me.