What I don’t tell her is that this is going to be an unmitigated disaster. No way we come out of this anything other than soaked and tangled in knots, but probably laughing hysterically. A gust of wind passes, and Holly yells “Now!” I hear the door open, the first of the rain spitting against the cover, popping it like a thunderstorm hitting a camping tent, and then we are outside, shuffling our feet, the wind whipping the car cover all around us.
The cover clings to our ankles, presses against our bodies. I nearly topple from the force of a gust, and it takes some fumbling and both of us working together to get the door pulled shut against the storm.
Holly is already laughing. It isn’t quite pitch black under the cover now that we’re outside—just a dismal, deep shade of gray. “This way,” she says, full of confidence. We stay huddled together, hands fumbling through the fabric to stay in communion with the wooden rail, the cold of the wind and rain penetrating through our shroud, but so far, no moisture getting through to us. I take up a fold of fabric in front of me to keep from tripping, leaving our boots exposed to the driving rain and the wet deck.
“Steps!” Holly cries. “Twelve of them!”
Halfway down the flight of steps, buffeted by the storm, this begins to feel like a very bad idea. Our legs could get tangled; we could have a nasty fall; and suddenly I see myself driving Ness’s daughter to the hospital with a broken arm, her crying hysterically in the passenger seat, me in the emergency room in hip waders and a robe trying to explain to Ness what in the hell I was thinking.
We reach the bottom of the flight of stairs, but there are two more to go. And long lengths of boardwalk between.
“Maybe we should ditch the cover and just make a run for it,” I suggest, my voice muffled.
“Not a drop shall touch us!” Holly cries. She has one arm around my waist, and I have an arm draped over her shoulder. We shuffle as one, like we’re running a three-legged race where our feet don’t go in the same sack, our entire bodies do.
The fabric no longer whips around as angrily as before, thank goodness. The rain is soaking it and weighing it down. It trails behind us like a leaden wedding dress. We lean into the wind and stagger down the second flight of stairs, Holly seeming to know where she is going, then we tackle the last flight.
“Almost there,” she tells me. And I feel like a climber who can see the crown of some inhospitable peak just a few steps away. One great push. So close—
We bang into the glass like birds. My forehead cracks against a window, and it sounds like Holly strikes her knee. The rain is no longer pelting us. We are pressed against the side of the guest house. I can’t believe we made it this far. And suddenly, this is an adventure the way simple challenges with made-up rules are life-or-death scenarios for kids with their active imaginations. Suddenly, this is important. And fun.
Holly whoops when she finds the doorknob. It’s a struggle to get it turned, but then the door flies inward, and we tumble along after it. The car cover finally claims us, tangling our feet, and I brace for impact, one arm around Holly and twisting her so she lands on top of me.
There’s an oomph and a grunt from both of us. The wind is knocked out of me, and we have to fight to dig our way out from the wet fabric. Rain courses down the folds in rivulets, getting all over the floor and soaking us as we scramble for the open door.
We slam it shut. Holly is panting and giggling. I fight with Ness’s robe to stay decent. The guest house is now a base camp, a temporary shelter against the storm, a small island at sea.
“I think we’re stuck here,” I tell Holly.
She pushes her hair off her face. We both got doused crawling out from under the car cover. She wipes her face and looks at her wet palms. “So close,” she says.
“I don’t think it qualifies as rain if it’s indoors,” I tell her. “Just tossing that out there.”
“I second the motion,” Holly says. And then: “Victory!” She dances around the room in her galoshes, leaving wet bootprints everywhere, while I gather the drenched cover and dump it in the bathtub.
After I change into dry clothes, and after Holly has explored the guest house—her house—I show her the book that was the subject of all our troubles.
“Read me a page,” she says.
And so we arrange ourselves on the big bed in the middle of the downstairs loft, a pile of cushions behind us, and I start to read the adventures of Long John Silver, a sea cook turned treasure hunter, and of pirates and sea chests and treasure maps. And I don’t stop reading aloud, even as Holly drifts off to sleep. I just lower my voice and keep reading, and the storm outside does not abate, but Holly mumbles something, snuggles closer, and I have to set the book aside for a moment. It strikes me that my daughter would be nine right now if I’d carried her to term, if my body hadn’t betrayed us both. She would be nine, and I would read to her like this.
I cover my mouth as the tears come hard and fast. The noise of the rain masks my sobs. Holly throws an arm across me and rests her head against my shoulder, and I fear she’ll wake up and ask me what’s the matter, and I’ll have to make something up. Something a bright girl like her will know is a lie.