Odd Mom Out

The hike is followed by a swim, and then we all work together on a jigsaw puzzle we find tucked on a shelf inside the cabin before Eva reminds us we haven’t had lunch yet and it’s already three o’clock. Heading to town, Shey discovers a place where we order sandwiches piled high with tomatoes, avocado, sprouts, and more. Shey loves sprouts so much, Eva and I give her ours.

Wandering through the shops in Eastsound, we get ice cream and buy two freshly caught and cooked crab, a huge loaf of still warm cracked-wheat sourdough bread, grape soda for Eva, and a bottle of chilled white wine for us. It’s while I’m waiting for the crab to be wrapped up that I see a very tall man with an enormous pair of shoulders, and my heart does a crazy leap, and I think it’s that man, the one from my morning run.

Breathlessly I watch him, waiting for him to turn, waiting to see if he’ll recognize me, but when he finally does turn around, my heart falls. The man’s old, with a thin, weathered face and no chin to speak of.

I’m surprised by the depth of my disappointment, and as I take the paper-wrapped crab and tuck it into my basket, I give myself a hard talking-to. The guy I saw during my run probably doesn’t even exist, or if he does, he’s probably not half as gorgeous or interesting as I’m imagining. He’s probably dull and vapid. Slow, thick, and not at all charming.

Besides, I don’t want a man. I don’t need a man. I’m a single mom. End of story.

At the cabin, we work on the puzzle again before we can’t resist the crab. We all eat until we’re stuffed—Eva eating nearly as much as Shey, as she’s a crab and shrimp girl, has been since she was born—and then we collapse on chairs on the porch and talk until we can’t talk anymore.

It’s Eva who convinces us that since it’s our last night we have to sleep outside, beneath the stars. We carry out all our bedding, set it up on the porch, and try. Shey—the girl who grew up on a Texas cattle ranch—gives up after an hour, complaining she heard a mosquito.

Eva and I make fun of her as she leaves, and we vow to tough it out. We even come up with a pledge:

I, ——— Zinsser, am not a wuss and refuse to be afraid of the dark. I will not let other people’s fears and cowardly actions chase me back into the cabin.

We take turns reciting our pledge before we shake on it.

Eva falls asleep immediately. I lie awake and look at the sky, reminded of a book I loved when I was Eva’s age. The book was about a white pioneer girl kidnapped by Indians and taken captive. The girl grew up and married the son of the chief.

I used to want to be adopted by a Native American family, too, and I pretended I had animal spirits to protect me. My spirits were the eagle, the wolf, and the sacred buffalo.

Looking up at the immense sky with its sheath of stars, I like to think the eagle, wolf, and buffalo still protect me today.

The next morning while I start breakfast, Shey’s in her room doing yoga and then emerges in her swimsuit to go to the lake for a swim.

Eva quickly changes into her suit and tags along after Shey. Fifteen minutes later, Eva and Shey return to the cabin, shower, and change. Now they take their places at the small dining table, their wet hair still drippy but their faces glowing pink.

“That was great,” Shey says cheerfully, chomping on a strip of bacon. “What do you think, Eva? Did you have a good swim?”

“Great,” Eva echoes, matching Shey bacon for bacon.

“Get going on the pancakes,” I say, still standing at the stove and flipping the final batch. “Don’t let them get cold.”

Neither needs any encouragement, and by the time I pull the last pancakes off the griddle, Shey looks as if she’s ready for more.

“It’s not fair that you can eat so much,” I complain, passing her the platter after I’ve taken my three.

Shey smiles her dazzlingly white smile. “It’s payback for everyone making fun of me in sixth grade.”

Eva looks up, intrigued. “People made fun of you, Aunt Shey?”

“Heck, yeah. Stilts. Grasshopper. Giraffe legs.” Shey leans forward, elbows on the table, and whispers conspiratorially, “And Eva, it wasn’t just the girls making fun of me, it was the boys, too. You see, by fifth grade, I was the tallest kid in my class. By sixth, I was taller than nearly all the teachers. I hated how tall I was. I hated being so skinny and ugly.”

“You’re not ugly. You’re beautiful,” Eva protests indignantly.

“But I didn’t look the way I do now, back then. I was just plain skinny then, and awkward, and uncomfortable.”

I watch Eva’s face. She’s staring at Shey hard, as though she hoped to see something else, see something new. “Didn’t everyone know you were going to be a famous model?”

Shey chuckles, and it’s southern and comforting. “No, darling. I didn’t even know I was going to be a famous model. It just kind of happened.”

“How?”

Shey’s brows furrow, and she looks at Eva and then at me and then back to Eva. “I got confident,” she says. “And I learned to trust myself.”

Eva’s puzzled again. “But what does that mean?”

Shey’s lips curve. “It means I stopped listening to what other people said about me and started listening to myself.”

We take the ferry back to Seattle early afternoon. By walking on, we avoid the lines that have been queued up for hours.

One of my happiest memories of being a kid living in Seattle was taking the ferry. It didn’t even matter where we went or if we even got off at Bremerton or one of the islands. I just liked cruising around the sound in the big white-and-green boat.

Eva wants to stand outside at the rail and watch the cars board, so Shey and I take a bench against the side and let Eva watch the loading of the cars while we finish catching up. And now that I know Shey will be leaving soon—she’ll be catching a flight back to New York tonight—there’s suddenly so much to say.

Shey looks at me. “She’s going to be fine, Ta. She’s smart and kind. Sweet and sensitive—”

“And that’s what’s getting her hurt,” I grouse, leaning against the bench. “She’s too sensitive.”

“She’s stronger than you think. Stronger than you were.”

“No.”

“Yes. That’s why she wants to be in the in crowd, she thinks she can handle the in crowd. And you know, I think she can, too.”

&nbs

p; “But why this desire to be popular? What’s that about?”

Shey shrugs. “It’s about power. Dominance. Eva is confident enough, she wants to compete—”

“But on whose terms?”

“Her terms.”

“No.”

“Yes.” Her shoulders lift, fall, and in the sunlight I see a smattering of freckles on the bridge of her nose. “Eva can handle this. She’s not going to crash and burn. The person I’m worried about is you.”

“Me?”

“Running my own business has taught me that we don’t exist in a vacuum. We’re part of a community, something larger than ourselves, and we need to be involved in the community. Not just Eva, but you, too.”

“It’s not easy to make friends here. They’re not like you, Shey—”

“You don’t know that, though. You don’t really know who they are or what they think because you’re not giving them a chance.”

It dawns on me that my daughter has been talking to my best friend. “What did Eva say?” I ask grimly.

Shey just grins. “You can’t dislike women on the basis on their having nice things.”

“I’m not.”

“Just like they can’t dislike you for owning a motorcycle and an old truck.”

I adore Shey, but right now she seems more like a turncoat than a best friend. “Your point being?”

“You need to reach out more, find the people you have things in common with. They do exist, Ta. They’re out there.”

But I don’t know about that, and I fear I’ll have to slice off the best parts of me to fit in.

When I was growing up, Mom was always correcting me, criticizing me. Marta, not so loud. Marta, cover your mouth when you laugh. Marta, that’s not proper. Marta, behave. Marta, think of what others would say.

I hated it then, and I hate it still. I won’t be stuffed in someone else’s mold of good and proper woman. I’m good because I am. And that’s what I want Eva to learn. That she’s good and beautiful because she exists, not because she’s succeeded in earning someone else’s approval.