The Edge of Summer, page 22
“And the enema, too?” asks the cashier, raising her eyebrow at me.
“Oh yeah. Yeah, you should put that on there. The box was kinda busted.”
The man behind us snickers, and so does Mannix.
The cashier gives me my change, and she doesn’t even wish me a nice night. It’s like she knows I’m about to embark on the worst night. A night filled with awkward silences and rushed departures. There’s no way Mannix is going to stick around for long after this blunder.
He opens the truck door for me, and I climb in as he places our groceries at my feet. He starts to drive to Uncle Jack’s and we’re not talking, so I have plenty of time to stare out the window and dwell.
Not once. Not once the entire time that I was with Brent did I ever even suggest that I was in love with him. It wasn’t even an option. So why did I say it to Mannix? The guy who I basically had to convince to go out with me. The guy who didn’t want any strings attached. What a ridiculous thing. I am a ridiculous thing. What did I even mean by it, anyway?
Maybe I meant, I love you.
Mannix reaches to turn on the radio, gently tapping his finger on the steering wheel to the beat of whatever song plays.
Finally, Uncle Jack’s house glides into view. The sheets of rain curtain almost everything. Mannix follows me into the house, our grocery bag in his hands. Upon opening the door, we’re greeted by the rush of air conditioning that Uncle Jack insists on keeping at a steady sixty-eight degrees, but now it reminds me how soaked I am. My shivers come back with a vengeance, fully fortified by my anxiety.
“You should get out of those clothes,” Mannix says from behind the fridge door. He drops something, picks it up and examines it, and then puts it back on the shelf.
When he closes the fridge, I can see he’s just as drenched as I am.
“So should you. You must be freezing.”
A chill causes a tremor through his body as I say it. “Yeah, a little,” he admits. “But I don’t have anything to change into.”
“I’m sure Uncle Jack has something you can borrow.”
Mannix arches an eyebrow in my direction. Uncle Jack is at least four inches shorter than he is, and, let’s say, finer-figured.
“Well, we can at least look.”
I ascend the creaky wooden stairs, a quake of thunder rattling the house. The lights dim and then regather their strength.
“It’s getting bad out there,” Mannix says from behind me.
“Not supposed to let up until tomorrow.”
“Probably one of the first bands of that hurricane.”
This conversation is mundane and perfect for after you blurt out that you love someone and they don’t say anything in return. Maybe he really thought I was teasing. In jest.
“Uncle Jack’s room is down that hall.” I point in the opposite direction from the attic steps. “I’ll just get changed and come back down.”
“You want me to go through his things?”
“He won’t mind. Besides, how would he even know?”
Mannix begrudgingly follows my advice, and I climb the stairs to my attic room. The little lamp beside my bed casts the room in a warm yellow glow. I go through my dry clothes and pick out a pair of black leggings and a long-sleeved T-shirt.
A bolt of lightning illuminates my dim room, and the crack of thunder that follows makes me yelp. I step away from the window, closing the curtains, like that’s going to make the storm disappear.
The sound of Mannix’s slow, burdened footsteps on the attic stairs draws my attention to the door, and with a quiet creak, he pokes his head in. He’s found an oversize white T-shirt.
“I think that’s Chad’s,” I say. “He’s a little more your size.”
Mannix doesn’t say anything.
“I need to get changed,” I tell him, reaching up to put my damp hair in a bun. “So I’ll be down to help you with dinner once—”
“I love you.”
I blink, my hands dropping to my sides, my hair splayed across my shoulders.
“I wasn’t sure if you meant it back there, so I thought about it for a while, and I realized I didn’t care if you meant it at all. But I do. I mean it.”
My lungs can’t seem to fill with enough air to sustain me.
“I just wanted you to know that. I thought it was important that you know that. I never want people to think I take them for granted. Especially you.”
There are a thousand things running through my head, images of people I love, some people I thought I could love, only I didn’t quite know what the word meant yet, and people who I’ve loved who probably didn’t believe that it was true.
And then there’s Mannix Reilly, standing right in front of me. Waiting for me.
“You’re not saying anything,” he says with a sad smile.
“You surprised me,” I finally reply. “I thought I fucked up back in the deli, and it kind of spewed out of me before I could think about it, but I never have to think about it with you. I don’t sit up at night wondering how I feel about you.”
He takes a step closer to me, lifting my hand from my side and then frowning.
“What is it?” I ask.
“You don’t have to say it if it’s not true. Don’t feel obligated because I did.”
“Mannix, I’m not—”
“Because no girl’s ever said that to me before. And I’m thankful if it’s you. That matters to me.”
I stand up on my tiptoes, my hands resting on his shoulders. “Mannix,” I try again. “I love you, too. I wouldn’t say it if I didn’t mean it.” I press my mouth to his, my hands winding around his neck.
The tip of his tongue flicks my upper lip, then presses farther, and he tastes like peppermint gum. Taking a deep breath, he pulls me closer, tightly to his chest.
Another explosion of lightning and a crash of thunder steal what little light we had in the room. Something beeps three times: the fire alarm, protesting its lack of energy.
“Power’s out,” I say, but my lips hardly leave his mouth.
“I’m pretty sure I can find my way without the light.” His hands clutch the hem of my shirt, but he waits, quietly asking, “Is this okay?” And when I nod, he peels my shirt off my body, his hands cold against my warm belly, then steps back and does the same for himself. He grasps me again, his skin chilled and damp, and I shiver against him.
“Are you just cold?” he asks. “Or nervous?”
“Maybe a little of both,” I reply.
“It’s okay if you don’t want to do this,” he says, and he pauses, holding me against him, his mouth so close to mine, and his warm breath playing with my hair.
“I know,” I reply, tilting my head back and holding his face between my hands. “Only I want to. With you.”
Smiling, he kisses me softly. “I never expected you, Coriander Cabot,” he says. “When I saw you in that parking lot at the beginning of summer. I never expected you. I just wanted your attention.”
“What about now?”
“I just want you.”
Every feeling of drowning overwhelms me as he backs me against the bed, lowers me onto the comforter, and covers my body with his. I know I’m drowning, but I’m not kicking or fighting the inevitable. All the fear has drained from me. He unfastens the buttons of my shorts, and I shift out of them, then help him do the same. His hands on either side of my body, supporting himself, he hovers over me, waiting. I grasp his hips and guide him to me.
And I let him pull me under into the inky blackness that’s terrified me for too long.
Chapter Twenty
It’s hard to tell how early it is, if I should push myself to get out of bed, or if it’s acceptable to roll over and fall back to sleep. The storm still splutters against the window, trying its best to maintain its ferocity, but it’s moving out now.
I twist in the sheets, lifting them and readjusting below, then tucking my hands under my pillow. My eyelids flutter, my gaze coming to rest upon a sleeping Mannix beside me. The power’s been off since last night, and the room is chilly and damp.
Without opening his eyes, he murmurs, “Come here,” and reaches his arm out to pull me into his chest. I share his pillow now, his warmth.
“Thank you.”
“For what?” His chin rests on top of my head.
“This.”
“Mm-hmm.”
We’re quiet for a while, just the rhythm of our breathing, the pulsing of our hearts synchronizing to each other, to the raindrops, filling the void between rumbles of thunder.
“I learned something the other day about humpback whales,” Mannix says. His fingers trace up and down my spine.
“What’s that?”
His voice is groggy and soft. “They sing songs.”
It’s sweet, what he’s doing. Trying to learn more about something I love so much, but his newly learned fact makes me giggle into his chest.
“What?” he asks, laughing, but he’s not sure why. “Is it not true?”
“No, it’s true, but not something new.”
“Well, I learned that in school when I was little, but I thought it was, like, a pretty phrase the teacher was using to describe the noises they made. Like she was being poetic. But the other day, I found out they sing actual songs. Like the definition of songs. Like people do.”
“Only the males,” I tell him. “And each song is distinct for each region of humpback whales. Humpbacks off Australia don’t sing the same song as the humpbacks in the Caribbean.”
“What do you think they’re singing about?”
I inch back so that I can see his face, and he gazes down at me through his eyelashes. “Whale things.”
“That’s vague.”
“I dunno.”
“What if they’re singing about us?”
I prop my head up on my hand, leaning into my elbow. “Us?”
“Like sea shanties. Sailors sang about whales all the time.”
“Yeah, harpooning them. If whales are singing about us, I don’t want to know what they think.”
“Well,” he says, reaching out and twirling a lock of my hair around his finger. “Maybe they know there are people out there who care about them. Maybe they forgive humankind.”
“That would be very generous of them.” I smile, leaning into his hand. “So do you want to sing me a whale song? They’re used to attract mates.”
“I already did that last night,” he says, grinning. He leans in and kisses me, then rolls over to view the clock on the nightstand beside him. “I gotta get up,” he says, rubbing his eyes. “I’m at Cahoon Hollow today.”
“No, let’s stay in bed all day.” I lean over, kissing his shoulder.
“Tempting as that is right now, it’s not gonna happen. But…” He kisses me softly, his hand cupping my jaw. “I’ll make you an omelet before I go.”
“That’s an acceptable swap,” I decide.
Downstairs, Mannix raids the fridge for all the supplies he needs to make me a French omelet with cheese and chives, and I sit at the kitchen island sipping from my mug of coffee.
“This coffee tastes so much better than when Uncle Jack makes it.”
Mannix grins over his shoulder as he cracks the eggs. “It’s a secret.”
“Tell me.”
“Then it wouldn’t be a secret.”
“But I don’t count. I’ll keep your secrets. Your secrets are my secrets.”
He whisks the eggs in a speckled mixing bowl and replies, “Cinnamon in the grounds.” Then he adds, “I think I’d like to have a food truck of my own one day.”
“Is this part of the secret?”
“You’re the first person I’ve ever said that out loud to, so I think so.”
“But why is that a secret? You would have the most amazing food truck.”
Mannix shrugs, taking a pat of butter and dropping it into the heating skillet on the stove. “I dunno. I guess I’ve never thought of cooking as something you could make money doing. Maybe that’s why I never really followed through with the CIA.”
“Lots of people all over Cape Cod make money cooking. A whole lot of money. You can, too.”
Another shrug.
“I’m glad you told me.”
He glances up. “It’s easy talking to you.”
What he says makes me almost shy, exposed, and that doesn’t make sense. I slept with him last night. He’s seen all of me.
“It’s easy when we’re together. I don’t feel like you expect something from me. Want me to be someone I’m not.” He nods once, like he’s still thinking about what he’s said, and turns back to the stove, pouring the beaten eggs into the skillet.
“I know what you mean,” I say softly.
“Do you have work today?”
I scratch my head, thinking about my actual responsibilities for the day. “I’m meeting the journalists from the New York Times at the Nature Center with Mia. They want to talk about Fraction and her entanglement. We’re gonna go through some footage of other disentanglement efforts so that they can write about it for their feature.”
“You don’t have any footage of Fraction?” he asks, adding the cheese.
“There’s some. I wish I had more. She hasn’t been spotted for a while now, though.” I slouch down on my stool and stir my coffee, even though the cream is already thoroughly blended. There’s something soothing about the familiar clink of the metal spoon against the ceramic.
“Will the omelet make you feel better?” Mannix presents my eggs on a plate, sprinkled with sea salt and chives.
“It’s worth a shot.”
He seats himself next to me, the upper parts of our arms touching while we eat our breakfasts.
“Sorry I can’t stay longer,” he says. “But I need to go home and get my board shorts and stuff.” He crosses the kitchen and places his dirty dishes in the sink, then turns back to me. “When does your uncle get home from Boston?”
“Not till tomorrow night.”
He waggles his eyebrows. “That sounds like an invitation.”
“It is.”
Grabbing his keys from the hook on the wall, he stops at my stool and leans down to kiss me goodbye.
“I love you,” I say, my forehead pressed to his.
“I love you, too.” One last kiss, and he’s out the kitchen door, rounding the side of the house until he gets to his pickup truck. The storm is moving out, a thin thread of brightness on the horizon, a promise of a day different than yesterday.
I cross into the front sitting room, mug of coffee in hand, and open the front door to watch as he pulls out of the driveway. When he gets to the end, he flicks his headlights at me, and I wave.
At the Nature Center, Mia sits with the journalists, showing them our archive of humpback flukes, explaining how each whale’s pattern is unique.
I’m alone in the office, my door open so I can still hear the line of conversation. I’m supposed to be finding footage of disentanglements, but my mind keeps racing back to last night. Racing forward to tonight.
I think Ella would like Mannix. I think she’d like the me I am when I’m with Mannix, too. I try to refocus.
I do like him, Ella says. She stands at the door of my office, looking at the right whale hanging from the ceiling. But it’s never been about me liking him.
It’s strange that I forgot to remember. Strange that it’s only right now, in this very moment, imagining what Ella would think of Mannix, of the me I’ve become in her absence, that I realize what today is.
It’s been one year since Ella drowned.
I turn to the window behind me, and through the blinds, the sky is a brightening gray. I sit with this for a while, the way a year can feel as though it’s dragging on, and at the same time, flit by so quickly that you hardly notice its passing.
I don’t know if I should feel guilty or more sad than I usually do. If I should have prepared some way to honor her today.
From my crossbody hanging on the desk chair, my phone buzzes. There’s a voice mail from Mannix. We don’t really call each other, and if we do, we don’t bother to leave a message. I listen, worried.
“Cor, I’m… and I’m not sure if… the boat hasn’t been… and now the coast guard… no sign of him. He’s been gone… but we never thought… they said… his SOS call.”
My thoughts are scrambled. I can’t piece together what Mannix is trying to tell me. It sounds like something about a boat.
His dad. Somehow, his dad was out on the water during this storm, and he never made it back in. The major aspects of his message are obvious, but the finer details still elude me.
The phone rings, interrupting the half-finished message. My fingers fumble to answer. “Mannix?” I choke into the phone.
“Cor, it’s bad. It’s so bad—”
It sounds like he’s in a tunnel. “Mannix, I can hardly hear you. The connection is terrible.”
The sky trembles with thunder above me.
“They found his boat, but he wasn’t…”
I click to put him on speaker, but now he sounds even farther away. “Mannix, can you hear me?”
“I should have gone with him like he asked me to,” he says, his voice suddenly clear and uninhibited. “If I had gone with him, maybe he wouldn’t have…”
“Mannix, you keep fading out. Can you hear me?”
“I can hear you. I’m on my… to the hospital. Can you… please?”
“What?”
“Will you…?”
He fades out.
“Cor, can you hear me?”
“Mannix, I can hardly hear you. He’s at the hospital? Are you?”
“I’ll be there soon. Please come, Cor—” The connection goes dead.
“Shit!” I throw my phone down onto the desk and then swiftly retrieve it.
I try to dial him back, but it goes straight to voice mail each time. I wait, but he’s not calling back.
“Cor, you okay?” Mia appears in the door of the office, her eyes wide.
“No, I have to go. Can you tell Lottie I had an emergency if she comes back?”
“Yeah, of course. Can I do anything else?”
I grab my hoodie and throw it over my head, punching my arms through the sleeves but getting tangled in my rush anyway. “No, I have to go.” I dash out the side door and down to the parking lot.
