“Boon. What’s going on? Tell me what’s going on.”
“I don’t know, Hope.” He paused. “There’s some blood on his boat. On the deck.”
There was silence on the phone while I thought.
“Oh. It’s probably from the cut. He has a cut on his hand. He said he hit it on the engine.”
“A cut?” he asked. “That’s it?”
I frowned. “Not like a paper cut. His knuckle is split open.”
“His knuckle? On which hand?”
“I don’t know. The right, I guess. Why?”
“It’s just, well. It’s not a drop or two. It’s probably the cut, though,” he reassured, but he sounded doubtful.
“Is there a lot of blood? I don’t understand.”
He paused again. “Don’t worry. You know how blood mixes with water and it looks like a lot. More than it is. That’s all. Keep him in bed. He sure as hell needs the rest.”
He said he had to run, that he was swamped, but I knew he was rushing me off the phone. I hung up and went back to the bedroom. Jack was still sleeping, and I pulled back the sheet, uncovering his body, my eyes searching for another injury. Boon’s voice in my head. Blood mixes with water and it looks like a lot.
There was nothing on him out of the ordinary. Bumps and bruises that were always there, with his line of work. Two large bruises on each shin. A rope burn on his forearm. A gash on his knee that had scabbed over already.
I pushed gently on his shoulder, once, then again, and he turned on his side, snoring, pulling the sheet with him, the back of him now uncovered.
There was the mole on his left shoulder, and the scar that ran from the back of his knee to his ankle from a clumsy stern man who’d dropped a trap on him years ago.
I sighed and took the sheet from under his arm, snapped it until it spread out in the air and landed over him. I smoothed it out and looked at the bandage on his hand. The cut had been deep. It would have bled. But how much?
I walked to the dresser and dug out my swimsuit, slipped it on, and threw a T-shirt and shorts over it. I moved slowly, telling myself that it was because I didn’t want to disturb Jack.
But every inch of me was dreading going to the house. I thought of the last time we’d been to the Salt House as a family. Last June. Not long before we lost her.
Jack and I had decided to stay at the Salt House for a few days before the girls got out of school. The kitchen needed to be packed up, and Jack had a list of things he wanted to work on. But by lunch every day, we’d end up on the beach in front of the house with Maddie, lounging on the blanket, watching her crawl to the water as fast as she could.
Jack would leave in the afternoon to pick up the girls from school, and I’d spend the hour he was gone rocking with her in the chair on the porch while she napped.
I hadn’t wanted the week to end, with Jack around as much as he was with the week he’d taken off of work. But I remember feeling worried that we were behind on renovations. That we wouldn’t be ready to move into the house by September.
Looking back now, it’s hard to believe this was my only concern. My biggest fear.
Now I went to the kitchen, and Kat skipped over to give me a hug. Her excitement filled the room. I saw that she was dressed, her bathing suit strap peeking out from under her shirt. She had her backpack on her shoulder, and when I reached to take it, she stepped back, away from me.
“We have things to do before we leave, Kat. That’s going to get heavy.”
“I don’t want to forget it. Besides, Grandma’s ready. And Jess is kind of grumpy because I woke her up, but she’s getting dressed too.”
“I need a cup of coffee. And there’s breakfast too.”
“Can we just eat there?” she whined.
There was a bagel shop on the way. It was probably just as well to get out of the house. With Kat jumping around like she was, I was afraid she’d wake Jack.
It was a half hour before we were finally in the car. I’d packed us lunch, and Jess and Kat had loaded some cleaning supplies in the trunk. Jess was quiet, but less sullen than she had been all week. I knew that Alex was away for the weekend. Peggy had mentioned that he was going back to his hometown, but she’d been busy in the last weeks with looking for a new place to live, and the one time we’d managed to talk on the phone had been cut short when the Realtor came up on her call-waiting.
I hoped visiting the house today would be a good thing for Jess. She’d always loved our summers there. But unlike Kat, she hadn’t said a word about how much she missed it.
Kat, on the other hand, could barely contain herself, fidgeting in the seat. I smiled at her in the rearview mirror, and she waved at me, giggling. Even though her excitement was contagious, my stomach flipped.
There’d been days in the past year when I’d pointed the car in the direction of the Salt House and told myself to just go. Get it over with. But I’d change my mind and end up turning around.
But there was no backing out now. There couldn’t be anyway.
Lying next to Jack this morning, I’d felt him slipping away from me. Maybe it was the hollow spot where my hand had rested on him that made me feel that way. Or the thought of his blood on the deck. But there was something else. Something in his voice last night. I can’t. It wasn’t just the words. It was his voice when he said it. How it sounded empty. Indifferent.
Now I was thankful for my mother’s company in the car. She turned in her seat, the seat belt cutting across her hip, and played the alphabet game with Kat, each of them picking out things they saw outside of the car, working their way down to Z. Jess joined in eventually, and the chatter kept my mind occupied.
We were barely stopped in the driveway at the Salt House when Kat clambered out, her sneakers crunching the crushed shells as she ran to the front door. Jess followed, her long legs striding across the lawn.
My mother looked at me, rested a hand on my forearm. “Take your time. I’ll get the girls to help me drag the picnic table out of the basement. We can eat outside.”
I handed her the keys, and she joined Jess and Kat on the front porch.
I waited until they were inside the house before I got out of the car and looked at the front porch.
I let the moment wash over me. Months ago, I would have fought the flood of emotion, pushed it away, let it overwhelm me.
The rocking chair on the front porch was in the basement now, put away since Jack had closed up the house last year.
But I looked at the spot where it sat, remembered the last time we’d rocked in the chair. I felt the weight of her in my lap, felt her hand snaking up to curl a strand of my hair as she drifted off to sleep. I didn’t move until the memory of it faded enough that I could breathe again.