Between Here and the Horizon(32)
“Excuse me?”
“Linneman told me what my brother did. That he wants you to hang around here on the island until I give in and decide to take care of his kids. I came over here to tell you not to bother. I won’t be taking them. He was crazy to think I’d ever be able to look after them. So you do what you have to do. I’m staying out of it.”
“Daddy?” From upstairs, Amie’s high, frightened voice echoed down the hallway. Sully’s eyes widened.
“Is that…that’s the little girl?” He looked like a rabbit trapped in headlights.
I nodded. Glancing over my shoulder, I tried to catch sight of her, but Amie was still making her way down the corridor, footsteps uncertain and timid. “I get that you’re a little freaked out right now. But…maybe you’d like to meet—”
I turned back to Sully, but he wasn’t there. The front door was yawning open, and the man was nowhere to be seen. Instead, a short woman in her late twenties, maybe early thirties with bright red hair and a black woolen hat was standing there in his place, an awkward look on her face. She glanced over her shoulder, scowling.
“I see you met Sully, then,” she said. Entering the house, she held out her hand, her scowl transforming into a small smile. “Hi, I’m Rose. Ronan hired me to help you take care of the children? Mr. Linneman came to see me yesterday. He told me what happened. I’m sorry I didn’t come straight over. To be honest, I was in shock. I’ve known Ronan all my life. I just…couldn’t quite believe what he’d done.”
“Tell me about it.” I shook her hand, blinking furiously. I must have looked very strange. “I’m sorry, I’m still reeling from…” I pointed out the door after Sully, trying not to look quite so stunned.
“Yeah. He has that affect on people. How about I make you a coffee, and we can go over a schedule or something? I can give you a little more information about the last remaining Fletcher brother while I’m at it.”
******
Rose was full of freckles. She was also full of hair-raising facts about Ronan and Sully. They’d both been troubled teenagers, both of them prone to fighting and inciting mayhem. In 2004, once they’d completed their degrees, they joined the military together as officers, and that seemed to calm them down a little.
She told me no one really knew what happened, but everyone had been shocked when Sully returned to the island and Ronan married Magda out of the blue. Sully had shut himself away and refused to interact with anyone on The Causeway unless they were ordering furniture from him, and Ronan hadn’t been seen again. Not until he’d shown up a week ago with no Magda and two children in tow.
“I used to envy Mags so much,” Rose said, taking a sip of her coffee. “She was my best friend in high school, y’know? She was so desperate to get out of here, so desperate to leave. She moved to New York when Sully and Ronan went out there to study, and she just never came back. I visited her once or twice before the whole mess with Ronan.”
“I’m sorry? The whole mess with Ronan?”
Rose blanched. “Oh, well, yeah. I mean, Magda didn’t start out with Ronan. She was dating Sully when they moved out to New York.”
Oh. Good. Lord. I supposed that explained a lot.
Rose continued, oblivious of the fact that the information she’d just imparted had blown me away. “Mags tried to get me to move out there with her. I couldn’t do it, though. I knew I wanted to teach here on the island. I studied English literature and language at Beal College in Bangor, and then I came right back here and got a job at the school. That was it for me. I still think about it, though. What my life would have been like if I’d upped and left to live in the city with her.
“The local newspaper ran a story on Ronan when he was awarded that medal from the army. That was probably the last time I spoke to Mags on the phone. I’d called her because the article said Ronan hadn’t even attended the ceremony to collect the damn thing. That they’d had to send it to him in the mail.” Rose shrugged, finishing her coffee. “I wanted to congratulate him, to tell him how proud we were of him here on the island, but he wouldn’t even take my call.”
CHAPTER ELEVEN
Journal
March 15, 2000
This journal smells like the tack shop we bought Topper’s bridle from. I love it. Dad said it was too boyish for me, but whatever. It’s my money. I can buy what I like with it. Sully says he’s going to wait until I’ve filled every single page, and then he’s gonna steal it and read it. Such a jerk. He’d better not. Sully James Fletcher, if you’re reading this, you’re going straight to hell. Do not invade my privacy or I’ll saw your balls off with a rusty butter knife!
Should probably make the same threat to Ronan, but why bother? He’s too busy plotting out his “Great American Road Trip” to think twice about anything I scribble in here. And good, too! At least I only have to worry myself with one of the Fletcher boys. So…I don’t know. I guess I’ll only write in here when I have something important to say. The book’s too nice to waste, and I’m a sixteen-year-old girl. Seems a shame to cover the pages in shit about boys and high school drama. I want to be able to look back through this book in forty years’ time and be proud of the moments I’ve recorded here.