The Last September: A Novel

I turned a stiff, glue-stained page, and a picture of a childhood dog, a slender-nosed collie, reminded me that I’d forgotten to insert Lightfoot into my imaginings. Where had she been? In the open doorway, watching Eli do it? Or maybe on the lawn, in Eli’s arms as he watched someone else. She would have struggled against his grip, broken free, run to the spot beneath the front porch where I’d found her. At the base of my skull, the headache started to form, not far from the location where Charlie had received his first blow. Enough. I started to slide the album back into its place, then changed my mind. One day Sarah would want to have it.

Walking down the beach with the photo album tucked under my arm, I looked out at the water. To my left, the Huber’s beach steps, in great disrepair, whole slats missing, some clearly rotten in the middle. Charlie used to sneak up and slide their kayak from underneath the deck, sometimes hauling it over to our house for months at a time, always returning it before Memorial Day and the family’s annual return. No doubt the Hubers wondered about the new pings and scratches. Or maybe they didn’t—judging from the steps, they didn’t pay too much attention to light maintenance. Or heavy maintenance, for that matter. I imagined Charlie walking up the stairs, his foot slicing through any one of the sagging, rotting boards. And then I noticed a step toward the top, sliced clean through, its innards only a pale brown—whereas the other splintered boards were black with months or years of exposure. I put the photo album down on the bottom step and headed up, walking very carefully, placing my feet on the edges so they wouldn’t break through. Kneeling by the broken step, I pressed my fingers against damp and splintered wood. Then I stood and headed up to the house.

The Huber place was much like the Mosses’, gray-shingled and modest, standing low to the ground. Wide windows facing the water for lovely views. It also had the look of a house shut up for winter, all the outside furniture gone, curtains drawn, the driveway empty of vehicles. Days upon days of quiet gathered, settling in around me. I walked over to the deck and peered beneath it. In the wide, dusky space, I saw a few scattered beach toys, a disrupted pile of life jackets, and a rusty old hose attachment. But no paddles and no kayak, only a white smooth space where once it had rested, now slid away from its winter resting place.

BY THE TIME I got back to Daniel’s house, Sarah was wailing and protesting my long absence. I could hear her from down on the beach. When I got up to the lawn, it wasn’t Mrs. Duffy but Daniel holding her in his arms, walking her back and forth while jiggling her in an inexpert attempt at calming. Sarah cried with deep, shuddery sobs, stating the problem over and over: “Mommy, Mommy, Mommy.”

“I’m right here, baby,” I said, throwing the photo album onto the grass and holding out my arms.

Daniel couldn’t hand her over fast enough; he looked almost as despondent as she did. “I think she’s tired,” he said as she wrapped her arms tightly around my neck, her sobs growing louder instead of subsiding. Her diaper was heavy; Daniel wouldn’t know to change her.

I yelled over the noise. “I don’t think Eli did it.”

Daniel’s hand was raised, about to smooth his disheveled hair back into place. Instead he stopped and just placed his hand on top of his head, a perplexed what do I do next expression crossing his face.

“Something you don’t know,” I yelled over Sarah’s crying. My voice was so loud that she stopped, abruptly, leaning back in my arms to examine my face. She wouldn’t understand anything I’d say next. Still, I tried my best to say it in code. “Ladd and I. The day Charlie left. We were together. Here, in his cottage.”