Golden Girl(75)

“She was a very smart kid and I was a very bad kid,” Brett says. “I used to smoke in the bathrooms and in the breezeway; I was into my music. I played in this band called Escape from Ohio.”

Willa barks out a laugh.

“I knew who your mom was. She wasn’t popular but she was very, very pretty and our freshman year, my locker was right across the hall from hers so I’d see your mom every day. She had long hair like yours and she’d braid it or put it in a ponytail or she’d wear it in a headband. I checked every day to see how your mom fixed her hair. Then I sort of forgot about her for a couple of years until she turned up in my detention. And I thought, This is my chance and I’m not going to blow it. So I asked if I could give her a ride home.”

“What did she say?”

“She said okay. Honestly, Willa, that surprised the hell out of me because socially, there was a very wide gulf between your mom and me. She was a goody-goody, a nerd, like you said on the phone, and I was a druggie. All I ever did was smoke cigarettes—and weed if it was offered to me. But you know what your mom and I did? We built a bridge. I started paying more attention to school. I played guitar in the pit orchestra for the high-school musical, and your mom loosened up a little, she bought some cute jeans and a pair of Chucks. She got the top of her ear pierced, and she came to my band practices in my buddy Wayne’s garage.”

“Did you know her parents? My grandparents?” Grandparents are something of a mystery to Willa. She has only ever had one: Lucinda. Lucinda is fine, though she has her own busy life both here on Nantucket and back in Manhattan, and she has never really paid attention to her grandchildren except as something to present to her friends at the Field and Oar Club. Willa longs for a kindly, white-haired grandfather who smokes a pipe and pulls nickels out of his ears.

“I knew Nancy a little,” Brett says, shaking his head. “Tough woman. And I met Frank once before he died.”

“You did? You met my grandfather?” Of Willa’s three dead grandparents, the one she’s most curious about is Vivi’s father, Frank Howe. The one who killed himself.

“He and Vivi had a standing breakfast date. Every Saturday, they went to the Perkins in Middleburg Heights. They never missed a week. So when Vivi and I started dating, I asked if I could join them. At first Vivi said no, it was their thing. Then she changed her mind and decided she wanted me to meet her dad without her mom around. I hadn’t met Nancy yet at that point. I used to pick your mom up and drop her off at the corner down from her house. It was pretty clear she hadn’t told her parents we were dating, but that didn’t bother me, I knew she was out of my league. I was just happy she liked me back.”

“So you went to breakfast?”

“Yep, I can remember it like it was yesterday. Your mom and grandpa always sat in the same booth and had the same waitress, and they’d order everything on the menu: French toast and omelets and sides of bacon and sausage. I remember I had the chocolate chip pancakes with a side of hash browns. Her dad asked me about my music. He sang in a barbershop quartet.”

“He did?”

“I never heard him sing. I was just happy he didn’t think my music was a waste of time.”

“Did he seem sad?” Willa asks. “Troubled?”

“No,” Brett says. “He seemed like a regular hardworking guy who loved his daughter. When Vivi went to the restroom, I remember he said, ‘Always be good to her.’ And I said, ‘Yeah, of course.’ I didn’t find it strange at the time; it just sounded like a dad-thing to say, like he wanted to be sure I wouldn’t leave Vivi at the football game to go out with my friends or pressure her into having sex. But then, a few months later when he killed himself, I thought about him saying that.”

Willa feels herself growing misty. “I’m starving. Do you mind if I make us some lunch?”

Brett laughs; he wipes at the corners of his eyes. “I’d love it, thanks.”



Over the BLTs and potato chips and peaches that are so juicy they drip and make an embarrassing mess, Brett talks about the stuff he and Vivi did in high school. They walked around the Parmatown Mall, they went bowling at Maple Lanes, they went to teen night at the Mining Company, they went to football games and then to Antonio’s for pizza. Vivi used to study on a brown sofa in Wayne Curtis’s garage while Brett practiced with his band. They did a fair amount of “driving around”—to the canal of the Cuyahoga River and along State Hill Road. They used to go to Sheetz to get Cheetos and hand pies and bottles of root beer. When the weather got warmer in the spring, they drove to Lake Erie and sat on the beach at Edgewater Park.

Willa feels like he’s building toward something. By now, they’ve finished their lunch and Willa has cleared their plates and gone to the bathroom twice. It’s twelve thirty and suddenly sand seems to be slipping through the hourglass faster than Willa wants it to. They have to leave for the ferry dock in an hour.

Why had she not insisted Brett spend the night? He hasn’t even set foot on the beach yet, although in jeans and Chucks, he isn’t dressed for it.

“I brought you pictures,” Brett says, reaching for his backpack. “I had copies made so you can keep these.” He pulls a packet of photographs out and flips through them for Willa.

Vivi in a pink Fair Isle sweater and a forest-green down vest sitting in the bleachers at a high-school football game next to Brett, who’s wearing jeans and a jean jacket and flipping off the guy behind the camera.