Good Harbor

Kathleen stood up and reached her hand out to Joyce. “Let’s go to your house.”

THE PHONE WAS ringing as they walked through the door. Joyce pointed to the answering machine and put her finger to her lips. What if it was Patrick? What if the police hadn’t raided the place? What if they had arrested him, and he wanted her to bail him out?

“Joyce?” Frank sounded frantic. “Where the hell are you?”

She picked up the phone and Kathleen turned away to give her some privacy, but turned back when she heard Joyce say, “Oh, God. Is she okay? . . .

“No. I just walked in the door. I didn’t . . . When? When did it happen? . . .

“Yes. I’ll be there as soon as I can. . . . Yes,” said Joyce. “Hanover. The medical center. Is she really going to be okay? . . . Yes Yes, I’m sorry. I’ll find you. I’m leaving now.”

“What happened?” Kathleen asked, trying to sound calm.

“Nina fell out of a tree.”

“What?”

“She was climbing a tree near her cabin this morning. She broke her collarbone. Frank’s been calling for hours. She lost consciousness for a minute, which means there was a concussion, so they took her to Dartmouth-Hitchcock for observation. Frank says there’s a map in the car.

“Oh, shit,” Joyce shouted. “My car is in Rockport.”

“Don’t be silly, I’m driving. Go use the bathroom, loan me a pair of sandals, and we’ll leave.”

As Kathleen eased the car into the first traffic rotary, she said, “Now tell me exactly what Frank said.”

Joyce ran through the few details she knew. “The break was on her left side, and she regained consciousness quickly, which is good. But I have no idea what she was doing up in a tree. Was she there on a dare? Was it an accident? Was she trying to, I don’t know, hurt herself?”

“That’s way too big an assumption,” Kathleen interrupted. “Kids do lots of stupid things for no reason at all.”

“I guess. But Nina doesn’t. Or she hasn’t.”

“Well, doing stupid things is part of adolescence, I’m afraid.”

They were past the second rotary and starting over the bridge. Kathleen gripped the wheel, anticipating panic. But there was nothing.

Exactly what had scared her so much about doing this? It was a twenty-degree rise up to the crest of the bridge, if that. And the whole span took two minutes, at most. Where was her terror?

“Kathleen?” Joyce’s voice was trembling. “Would you keep talking? It’s probably irrational, but I’m so afraid of what I’m going to find at the hospital, I’ll go nuts if I don’t have something else to think about. Or maybe it’s that I’m afraid to face Frank after what just happened. Could you keep talking to me? Would you mind?”

Starting with the first thing that came into her head, Kathleen described in elaborate detail a meal Jack had cooked the other night, including a mouthwatering pasta dish made with cabbage, of all things. The smell had gotten her remembering her grandmother’s house, which seemed saturated with the smell of cabbage, which made her think about how much Pat hated cabbage. When Pat announced that she was going to take vows, she said, “I asked them if I could have an exemption written into the vow of obedience if they ever put cabbage on my plate.”

“I felt like I was losing her when she went into the convent,” Kathleen said. “It felt like a repudiation of us, of our relationship. Like she was choosing those Sisters over me. I’m glad I never told her that, because it wasn’t so. We stayed close, even though we lived in different cities.

“We worked at it, you know, with letters, and phone calls. She came here every summer for her two-week vacation. Pat was devoted to Buddy and the boys. But I’m afraid I always compared other friendships to hers, which was unfair. But that’s how it is. Your family makes you who you are. And then she died.”

“How long ago was that?” Joyce asked.

“Fourteen years. I felt so helpless during her illness, especially at the end. All the nursing Sisters bustled around, bringing her medications, changing the bed, bathing her. I just sat there and held her hand, weeping. She sent me away the night she

died. She told me to go rest. And then she slipped away, so I wouldn’t have to watch. She was taking care of me, even at the end.”

Kathleen took a deep breath. “At her funeral I felt so strange, so out of place. The Sisters and the priest kept talking about how she was in a better place. They were all smiles — big, heartfelt smiles. But I was sobbing. I could barely stand up, much less smile back at them. I felt there was something terribly wrong with me, but Buddy told me that I was just being Jewish, and there’s just no pie in the sky like that for us.”

Kathleen shook her head. “After she died, I figured I’d get breast cancer, too. Every mammogram, I thought, this time it’ll be my turn. That first biopsy, I thought for sure, this is it. But it wasn’t. And this time, well, I got off easy.”

“Wait a minute.”

“I know,” Kathleen corrected herself. “It sucks. But it’s true that I’m not going to die from this — at least, it’s not likely. I’m going to be around for a while. I’m grateful. I am lucky. I know it.”