Family of Liars(72)

“There’s not just one reason I took them. It’s a tangled-up mess of reasons,” I say. “And I can’t promise to be happy, and I can’t promise to be well, even, but I am telling you how I feel because telling you is showing you that I’m not trying to be numb anymore. I’m going to live with the sadness and the shame, and actually feel them or whatever, and somehow not hate and punish myself so much. I’m going to just go on, one day and then another day.”

“And then another day and another day,” says Rosemary.

“Yeah, you got it.”

I will go to New York in September.

I will find a job and live with Deja.

I will stay sober.

I will meet people. Learn to make jewelry.

This new life won’t redeem me. It won’t fix the world crises that still bubble and boil at the back of my mind, hot and sad. It won’t change the fact that I killed a man, a rotten man in many ways, but still a human whose life should not have ended. It won’t change that I covered it up, that we covered it up.

But still. I can see that I have a future. And maybe that is enough.

I do not love my father’s way of thinking, but much of it has become mine anyhow. Perhaps he and Robert Frost are right on this one: “No way out but through.”

“Okay,” says Rosemary. She blows her nose loudly. “That was all super mushy.”

“Yeah.”

“But all right. I won’t worry so much anymore.”

“You can go rest?”

“I think so.”

She climbs into my lap, smelling of suntan lotion and muffin. “Snuggle snuggle,” she says.

We sit there for a bit, not saying anything.

“Is this goodbye, buttercup?” I finally ask.

“Um-hm.”

We sit for a little longer, and then Rosemary climbs out of my lap. She takes my hand and I climb out of bed.

She leads me out of my room, down the hall, and up the stairs to my parents’ floor. Their bedroom door is closed.

We climb the steps to the turret.





82.


THE ROUND ATTIC room is still stacked with boxes of Rosemary’s books and toys. The rolled carpets are still there, and the trunks. “Do you know my stuffed lions live here?” she asks. “And my 8 Ball?”

“Totally.”

She opens a cardboard box full of lions and rummages through it. “I love them all,” she says, “but Shampoo is the best for sleeping with.” She holds up her favorite lion, washed so many times it is very floppy. “Okay, now I’m going to be able to sleep super well.”

“You can take Shampoo with you?”

“I don’t know for sure, but I think so.”

“And where do you go now?”

Rosemary walks to the turret window and pushes up the sash. It opens about a foot. She pushes up the screen.

“Oh no, buttercup,” I say.

“I could swim out to sea, but I don’t like swimming anymore,” she says. “This is the best way. And I have Shampoo with me.”

She pushes a box beneath the window and climbs onto the sill.

“Don’t go,” I say nonsensically.

Rosemary shakes her head and tears begin to fall. “I have to.”

I start toward her, wanting to hug her one last time, but she is through the opening and out the window in a flash. She stands on the ledge, Shampoo in one hand. “I love you, Carrie,” she calls. “Goodbye and good luck and be good.”

She jumps.

I rush to the window and thrust my head out, looking for her thin little body on the rocks below—but it isn’t there. I look into the sky and she isn’t there, either.

The island is peaceful in the morning sunshine.

Rosemary is gone and all I can do is keep my promises to her.





83.


NOW.

My son Johnny and I sit in the Red Gate kitchen. Between us are cups of cold cocoa and the remains of a blackberry pie Bess made.

One of Penny’s dogs, Grendel, has taken a shine to me this summer and lies at my feet. My sisters are here on the island with us, but they are nestled into bed in other houses, sleeping their agonized sleeps. They do not see ghosts.

Johnny cannot help me, except by listening. And I cannot help him, except by telling this story. But we have had some good last times together.

He is very tired, I can tell. He can’t keep visiting Beechwood Island much longer. His hands shake and his eyes are bloodshot. He moves slowly, as if in pain. It is nearly time for him to leave, and maybe my story has given him what he needs to say goodbye and rest.

I lay my head on the table. A wave of exhaustion runs through me. The clock reads 1:45 a.m.

Johnny stands and runs his fingers through his hair. “Thanks for telling me all that,” he says gently.

“Sure thing,” I say.

“It was kind of a lot.”

“I know.” I sit up to look at him.

“Can’t have been easy.” He picks up a spoon and eats a large bite of pie, straight from the plate. “I’m gonna have to think about it, I guess.”

“Okay,” I say. He drops his spoon back into the pie plate. “You done with that?” I ask.

“Yeah. Just eating for fun. I’m not hungry.” I stand and cover the pie with foil.