Heroes Are My Weakness: A Novel

Chapter Twenty-three

TO ANNIE’S RELIEF, LIVIA HADN’T fallen back into muteness, and she happily showed Annie a turtle she’d made from Play-Doh. “I don’t know what to say to her,” Jaycie whispered while Livia was occupied. “I’m her mother, but I don’t know how to talk to her.”

“I’ll get Scamp,” Annie said.

Annie fetched the puppet, grateful for the distraction from her own painful thoughts and fervently hoping Scamp could guide the conversation Jaycie needed to have. She propped the puppet on the kitchen table across from the two of them and turned her attention to Jaycie. “You are Livia’s beautiful mother. I don’t believe we’ve formally met. I am Scamp, otherwise known as Genevieve Adelaide Josephine Brown.”

“Uh . . . Hello,” Jaycie said with only minimal self-consciousness.

“I will now tell you about myself.” Scamp proceeded to lay out her accomplishments, calling herself a talented singer, dancer, actress, housepainter, and race car driver. “I can also catch lightning bugs and open my mouth really wide.”

Livia giggled as Scamp demonstrated, and Jaycie began to relax. Scamp continued chattering before finally tossing her yarn curls and saying, “I, Scamp, love free secrets because they help me talk about bad things. Like the bad things that happened to you, Livia, and to your mommy. But . . . Your mommy doesn’t know about free secret.”

As Annie had hoped, Livia butted in to explain. “Free secret is when you can tell somebody something, and they aren’t allowed to get mad at you.”

Scamp leaned toward Jaycie and said, in a stage whisper, “Livia and I would very much like you to tell us a free secret. We want to hear about that awful, terrible, horrible night you shot Livia’s father and he died dead. And since it’s a free secret, nobody can get mad.”

Jaycie turned away.

“It’s okay, Mommy.” Livia spoke as if she were the adult. “Free secrets are very safe.”

Jaycie hugged her daughter, tears filling her eyes. “Oh, Liv . . .” She pulled herself together. At first hesitantly, then gradually gaining strength, she talked about Ned Grayson’s alcoholism. Using language a four-year-old could understand, she explained how it made him violent.

Livia listened raptly. Jaycie, fearing the effect her words were having, kept stopping to ask if Livia understood, but Livia seemed more curious than traumatized. By the time they were done, she was on her mother’s lap getting kissed and demanding lunch.

“First, you must promise to keep talking to each other about this whenever you need to,” Scamp said. “Do you promise?”

“We promise,” Livia said solemnly.

Scamp stuck her head in Jaycie’s face. Jaycie laughed. “I promise.”

“Excellent!” Scamp exclaimed. “My work here is done.”

After lunch, when Livia wanted to ride her scooter on the front porch, Annie went out with Jaycie and settled on the top step next to her. “I should have talked to her from the beginning,” Jaycie said as the scooter bumped over the floorboards with Livia struggling to keep her balance. “But she was so young. I kept hoping she’d forget. Stupid of me. You knew right away what she needed.”

“Not right away. I’ve been doing a lot of research. And it’s easier to be objective as an outsider.”

“Not a good excuse, but thanks.”

“I’m the one who’s thankful,” Annie said. “Thanks to Livia, I know what I want to do with my life.” Jaycie cocked her head, and Annie told her what she hadn’t yet confided to anyone. “I’m going to start training to be a play therapist—using puppets to help traumatized children.”

“Annie, that’s wonderful! It’s perfect for you.”

“Do you think so? I’ve talked to some play therapists over the phone, and it feels right.” This career fit her better than acting ever could. She would have to go back to school, something she wouldn’t be able to afford for a while, but she had a good academic record, and her experience working with kids might help her get scholarship money. If it didn’t, she’d apply for a loan. One way or another, she intended to make this work.

“I admire you so much.” Jaycie got a faraway look in her eyes. “I’ve been locked up as tight as Livia—feeling sorry for myself, fantasizing about Theo instead of getting on with my life.”

Annie knew all about that.

“If you hadn’t come here . . . ” Jaycie shook her head, as if she were getting rid of cobwebs. “I’m not just thinking about Livia but about the way you’ve taken control of your life. I want a fresh start, and I’m finally going to do something about it.”

Annie knew all about that, too.

“What are you going to do about the cottage?” Jaycie said.

Annie didn’t want to tell her what the grandmothers had done or admit that she’d fallen in love with Theo. “I’m moving out right away and leaving the island on the car ferry next week.” She hesitated. “Things with Theo have gotten . . . too complicated. I’ve had to end it.”

“Oh, Annie, I’m sorry.” Jaycie displayed no schadenfreude, only genuine concern. She’d meant what she’d said about Theo being a fantasy and not her reality. “I was hoping you wouldn’t leave so soon. You know how much I’m going to miss you.”

Annie gave her an impulsive hug. “Me, too.”

Jaycie was stoic when Annie told her she needed to find someplace to stay until the car ferry arrived. “I can’t keep running into Theo at the cottage. I . . . need some private space.”

She intended to talk to Barbara about finding someplace temporary. Annie could ask for a golden unicorn, and the grandmothers would come up with a way to find it for her. Anything to buy her silence.

But as it turned out, Annie didn’t need Barbara. With a single phone call, Jaycie found Annie a home.


LES CHILDERS’S LOBSTER BOAT, THE Lucky Charm, was temporarily moored at the fish house dock while its owner waited for a crucial engine part to arrive on the same ferry that would take Annie back to the mainland next week. Les took good care of the Lucky Charm, but it still smelled of bait, rope, and diesel fuel. Annie didn’t care. The boat had a small galley with a microwave and even a tiny shower. The cabin was dry, a heater provided a little warmth, and, most important, she wouldn’t have to see Theo. In case she hadn’t been clear enough yesterday, she’d left a note for him at the cottage.


Dear Theo,

I’ve moved into town for a few days to, among other things, adjust to the depressing (boo hoo) prospect of no longer having mind-blowing sex with you. I’m sure you can find me if you try hard enough, but I have stuff to do, and I’m asking you to leave me the hell alone. Be a pal, okay? I’ll handle the Witches of Peregrine Island, so stay away from them.

A.

The note struck exactly the breezy tone she wanted. There was nothing maudlin in it, nothing to make him suspect how long it had taken her to compose, and absolutely nothing to signal how deeply she’d fallen in love with him. She would e-mail him her final kiss-off from the city. You’re not going to believe this, but I’ve met the most amazing man. Blah . . . Blah . . . Blah . . . Curtain down. No encore.

Between her emotional turmoil, the noisy squeak of ropes against the moorings, and the unfamiliar rocking of the lobster boat, she had trouble falling asleep. She wished she’d brought her puppets with her instead of leaving them with Jaycie at Harp House for safekeeping. Knowing they were nearby would have been comforting.

Her blankets slipped off during the night, and she awakened at dawn shivering. She rolled out of the berth and pushed her feet into her sneakers. After she’d wrapped Mariah’s red wool cloak around her, she climbed up to the pilothouse and walked out onto the deck.

Peach and lavender ribbons streamed in the sky above a pearl gray sea. Waves slapped the boat’s hull, and wind caught her cloak, trying to turn it into wings. She spotted something in the stern that hadn’t been there the night before. A yellow plastic picnic basket. Holding her hair away from her face, she went to investigate.

The basket held a jug of orange juice, two hard-boiled eggs, a slab of still-warm cinnamon coffee cake, and an old-fashioned red thermos. She knew a bribe when she saw one. The grandmothers were trying to buy her silence with food.

She unscrewed the thermos, releasing a cloud of steam. The freshly brewed coffee was strong and delicious. Sipping it made her miss Hannibal. She’d gotten used to the cat cozying up to her as she drank her morning coffee. Gotten used to Theo—

Stop it!

She stayed in the stern, watching the fishermen in their orange and yellow gear set out on their day’s run. The seaweed that grew from the dock’s pylons floated in the water like a mermaid’s hair. A pair of eider ducks swam toward the wharf. The sky grew lighter, a brilliant crystal blue, and the island she’d resented so much became beautiful.


THE LUCKY CHARM WAS MOORED at the fish house dock, but Theo spotted Annie standing at the very end of the ferry wharf dressed in her red cloak and gazing out at the open water like a sea captain’s widow waiting for her dead husband to return. He’d left her alone all day yesterday, and that was long enough.

She could have stayed at Harp House. Or at the cottage, for that matter—the island witches hadn’t been within a mile of it. But, no. Beneath all of Annie’s goodness lay an evil streak. She could couch it any way she wanted, but she’d moved onto Les Childers’s lobster boat to get away from him!

He stalked down the wharf. A crazy part of him enjoyed his anger. For the first time in his life, he could be totally pissed off at a woman and know she wouldn’t collapse into a sniveling heap. Sure, he’d been relieved that things weren’t going to get complicated between them, but that had been an instinctive reaction, not reality. Their relationship hadn’t expired, as she’d put it. That kind of closeness didn’t simply go away. She’d made it clear this wasn’t some deep love affair, so what was the big deal? He got the fact that she wanted a family—more power to her—but what did that have to do with them? Sooner or later they’d have to keep their clothes on, but since she wasn’t going to find the father of her kids here on this island, she had no reason to end it now, not when it meant so much to both of them.

Or maybe it was just him. He’d always been guarded, but that had gone away with Annie. He never knew what the hell she was going to say or do, only that she was tough instead of fragile—that he didn’t have to watch what he said or pretend to be someone he wasn’t. When he was with her, he felt as if . . . he’d found himself.

She wasn’t wearing a hat, and her curls ran amok as usual. He went badass. “Enjoying your new house?”

She hadn’t heard him approach, and she jumped. Good. Then she frowned, not happy to see him, and that hurt in a way that made him want to hurt her back. “How’s life on a lobster boat,” he said with something he hoped looked like a sneer. “Cozy as hell, I’ll bet.”

“The views are good.”

He wouldn’t let her flip him off like that. “Everybody on the island knows that you’re living on Les’s boat. It’s like you’re handing the cottage over to those women free and clear. I’ll bet they’re getting bruises from giving each other high fives.”

Her small nose shot up in the air. “If you came here to yell at me, go away. As a matter of fact, even if you didn’t come here to yell at me, go away. I told you I had things to do, and I’m not going to be distracted by your”—she flicked her hand at him in a dismissive gesture—“ridiculous gorgeousness. Do you ever look as though you haven’t just stepped off the cover of a paperback novel?”