The day I left, Mom refused to get out of bed, claiming she had a migraine, the worst she’d had in over a year. Dad pulled the blinds to darken the room and sat with her for a while, reading a book as she dozed, another way to avoid talking.
When Dulcie arrived, Mom didn’t feel well enough to see her, so we said our goodbyes in her bedroom. “You don’t have to stay at the lake if you’re unhappy or homesick,” she whispered. “If anything scares you or worries you, call us. Your father will come get you.”
“Don’t worry. Everything will be fine,” I assured her.
Mom squeezed my hand. “I know you think I’m too protective,” she said, “but I want to keep you safe. You’re so young. You don’t know the terrible things that can happen, how quickly one’s life can change.”
“What do you mean?”
She closed her eyes. “My head hurts. I can’t talk anymore.”
I leaned over and kissed her gently. “I’ll be careful in the water,” I promised, “and I’ll take good care of Emma. Please don’t worry. I love you and I’ll miss you.”
Keeping her eyes closed, Mom said, “I love you, too.”
On the way downstairs, I asked Dad if the migraine was my fault.
“Of course not,” he said. “It’s tension, anxiety…”
Then it is my fault. I caused the tension and anxiety, didn’t I? I pushed the guilty thought away. Mom often had migraines. I couldn’t be blamed for all of them. Maybe this one, though.
Moments later, Emma was hugging me, squealing with delight, and Dulcie was assuring Dad she’d drive carefully and keep a close eye on me all summer.
Dad wedged my suitcase and bag of books into the van. I belted myself in the front seat, and Dulcie secured Emma in the back seat.
As I waved goodbye to Dad, I thought I saw a hand raise the blind in my parents’ bedroom. Mom must have felt well enough to watch her sister take me away for the summer.
The ride to Maine seemed to last forever—one boring interstate after another, dodging trucks, passing cars and motorcycles, stopping a couple of times at fast-food places for hamburgers and fries. Not what she usually ate, Dulcie assured me, but the quickest way to fill our stomachs.
Late in the afternoon, we left the last interstate and followed a network of roads, each narrower and more winding than the one before.
Emma leaned over the seat. “Are we almost there?”
Dulcie nodded. “See that tree? The one with the long limb like a trunk sticking out over the road? Claire and I called it the elephant tree. We’ll be at the cottage soon.”
A few minutes later, Dulcie slowed down and pointed out a little white store by the side of the road. Its windows were boarded up and a weather-beaten sign over the door said, olson’s. Weeds grew in the parking lot, and a row of seagulls perched on the roof.
“Claire and I used to ride our bikes all this way for home-made ice cream—the best chocolate I ever tasted.” Dulcie sighed. “Too bad it’s closed.”
Soon after, she said, “It’s the next left, just past that patch in the asphalt that looks like a bear. See? There’s the sign for Gull Cottage.” She pointed at a neatly lettered arrow-shaped board nailed to a tree. Below it was a mailbox, its door down, empty.
Dulcie turned onto a one-lane dirt road and we headed into the woods. The setting sun shot golden beams through the trees, but the light was dim and greenish, almost as if we were underwater.
We rounded a curve, and there it was, a small cottage sheltered by tall trees. The clapboards had a fresh coat of blue paint, and the steep roof was newly shingled. The lake itself was down a flight of wooden steps. I could see a dock and a small building beside it. Beyond a curve of sandy beach was the water, dark in the early evening light, stretching out to the horizon.
“It looks almost exactly the same,” Dulcie said. “Joe did a great job.”
With Emma close behind, I followed Dulcie across a deck and through the back door. I don’t know exactly what I’d expected—cobwebs and dust, stale air, maybe a gloomy, spooky atmosphere—but the cottage was bright and airy. Blue checked curtains hung at the kitchen windows, and the cabinets had been painted a sunny yellow, the walls pale blue, the table and chairs bright blue. The stove and refrigerator were a brand-new dazzling white.
“The old ones were antiques,” Dulcie said. “Plus they didn’t work.”
She led us into the living room, which was furnished with a pair of soft armchairs and a matching sofa sagging beneath faded flowered slipcovers. A big stone fireplace took up one whole wall, and windows with a view of the lake took up another wall. Shelves full of books and board games covered the third wall from floor to ceiling.
“The cottage was filthy when I saw it in April,” Dulcie said. “Joe hired a cleaning crew to scrub and vacuum. They got rid of spiders, squirrels, mice, and a family of raccoons living under the deck.”
“But they didn’t hurt them, did they?” Emma asked, her voice full of concern.
“Of course not, sweetie. They caught the mice and squirrels and raccoons in Havahart traps and let them go in a nice part of the woods, and they picked up the spiders very gently in tissue and carried them outside.”
“That’s good.” Emma looked pleased. “If they come back, they can sleep in my room. I won’t mind.”
Dropping her suitcases at the foot of a narrow flight of steps, Dulcie pointed down the hall. “Two bedrooms—one for Emma and one for me. Plus a brand-new bathroom.”
My room was upstairs, tucked snugly under the eaves. A faded patchwork quilt in shades of blue, yellow, and green calico covered the double bed. Its iron frame had been painted white to match an old dresser and a table and chair as well as built-in shelves, already holding books and toys. Fresh muslin curtains hung at the windows, and a rag rug covered most of the floor.
“This was your mom’s and my room when we were kids,” Dulcie said. “Same wallpaper, same furniture.”
She picked up a conch shell lying on the bureau and turned it slowly, studying its shape and colors before putting it back. “Our mother left everything here. I guess she thought we’d come back one summer, but we never did.”
Her voice had dropped so low, I barely understood what she’d said.
“Why didn’t you come back?” I asked. “Did something happen?”
Dulcie stared at me. “Of course nothing happened. Whatever gave you that idea?”
“Mom, I guess. The way she talks about the lake, like it’s a scary place.” Suddenly embarrassed, I picked up the shell Dulcie had been looking at. “This is really pretty.”
“Let me see.” Emma reached for the shell, and I handed it to her. She held it as carefully as if it were made of glass and pressed it to her ear. “I hear the ocean,” she whispered.
Dulcie looked at me over Emma’s head. “Everything scares Claire,” she said. “Deep water. High places, low places. Inside, outside. Upside, downside.”
Even though I’d often thought the same thing, Dulcie’s tone of voice stung. Mom was lying in bed at home, sick, in pain, while I’d traveled all this way without her. “She can’t help it. She worries, that’s all.”