My One and Only
I took it as a compliment. Yes, I was a very good divorce attorney. If that meant a larger-than-normal percentage of the population owned voodoo dolls with red hair and a tight gray suit, so be it. In fact, I’d met Dennis when my car was rammed by an angry wife and the MVFD had to cut me out (no injuries, and a nice damages award from Judge Burgess, who had a soft spot for me). “Wanna grab a beer? I get off in half an hour,” Dennis had said, and more shaken than I’d let on, I agreed.
He didn’t seem scared by my reputation as a ballbuster. Wasn’t intimidated by my healthy paycheck, funded by the dissolution of happily-ever-after dreams. So yes. Dennis liked me. Though I didn’t sigh with rapture when I looked in the mirror, I knew I was attractive (very, some might say), well dressed, hardworking, successful, smart, loyal. Fun, too. Well…sometimes I was fun. Okay, sure, there were those who’d disagree with that, but I was fun enough.
All in all, I thought we could be very content. And content was vastly underrated.
As I well knew, marriages were fragile birds of hope, and one in three ended up as a pile of dirty feathers. In my experience, the vast majority of those were the oh-my-darling-you-make-my-very-heart-beat variety…the type that so often ended in a pyre of hate and bitterness. Comfort, companionship and realistic expectations…they didn’t sound nearly as glam as undying passion, but they were worth a lot more than most people believed.
There was one more reason I wanted to get a commitment from Dennis. Soon, I’d turn thirty-four, and when that happened, I’d be the same age as my mother the last time I saw her. For whatever reason, the thought of being (alone, adrift) single…at that age…it felt like a failure of monumental proportion. In the past few months, that thought had been pulsing in a dark rhythm. Same age as she was. Same age as she was.
Dennis was silent, his napkin now confetti. “Dude, listen,” he finally said. “Harp. Er. Harper, I mean. Uh, hon…well, the thing is…”
At that moment, Audrey Hepburn’s whispery voice floated from my purse—“Moon River,” the song indicating a call from my sister. Like Audrey, my sister was lovely, sweet and ever in need of protection. She’d moved to New York recently, and I hadn’t heard from her much these past few weeks.
“You wanna take that?” Dennis asked hastily.
“Um…do you mind?” I said. “It’s my sister.”
“Go right ahead,” he answered, practically melting in relief. “Take your time.” He drained the remaining half of his beer and turned again to the Boston Red Sox.
Oh, dream maker, you heartbreaker… “Hi, Willa!”
“Harper? It’s me, Willa!” Though my stepsister was twenty-seven, her voice retained a childlike chime, and the sound never failed to bring a smile to my face.
“Hi, sweetie! How’s the Big Apple? Do you love it?”
“It’s so great, but Harper, I have news! Big news!”
“Really? Did you find a job?”
“Yes, I’m, um, an office assistant. But that’s not my news. Are you ready? Are you sitting down?”
A chilly sense of dread laced through my knees. I glanced at Dennis, who was focused on the ball game. “Okay…what is it?”
“I’m getting married!”
My hand flew to my mouth. “Willa!”
“I know, I know, you’re gonna have kittens, and yes, we just met a couple weeks ago. But it’s like kismet, is that the right word? Totally real. I mean, Harper, I’ve never felt like this before! Ever.”
Crotch. I took a breath, held it for a few seconds, then released it slowly. “I hate to be a buzzkill, Willa, but that’s what you said the first time you were married, honey. Second time, too.”
“Oh, stop!” she said, laughing. “You’re a total buzzkill. I knew you’d freak, but don’t. I’m twenty-seven, I know what I’m doing! I just called you because…oh, Harper, I’m so happy! I really am! I love him so much! And he thinks I walk on, like, water!”
I closed my eyes. Willa had married her first husband when she was twenty-two, three weeks after Raoul had been released from prison; the divorce followed a month later when strike three came after he robbed a bead store. (I know. A bead store?) Husband #2, acquired when my sister was twenty-five, had come out of the closet seven weeks after the wedding. Only Willa had been surprised.
“That’s great, honey. He sounds, um, wonderful. It’s just… Marriage? Already?”
“I know, I know. But Harper, listen. I’m totally in love!”
So much for live and learn. “Going slow never hurt anyone, Wills. That’s all I’m saying.”
“Can’t you say you’re happy for me, Harper? Come on! Mama’s totally psyched!”
This was not a surprise. My stepmother, BeverLee of the Big Blond Hair, lived for weddings, whether in the family, the tabloids or on one of the three soap operas she watched religiously.
“It’s just fast, that’s all, Willa.”
Willa sighed. “I know. But this isn’t like those other times. This is the real deal.”
“You just moved two months ago, honey. Don’t you want to enjoy the city, figure out what you really want to do for a living?”
“I can still do that. I’m getting married, not dying.”
There was an edge in my sister’s voice now, and I figured I’d dangle a carrot. “True enough. Well, this is exciting. Congratulations, honey! Hey! I’d love to throw you guys a big wedding out here on the Vineyard. All the good places are booked for this fall, no doubt, but next summer—”
“No need, but thank you, Harper! You’re so nice, but we already found a spot, and you’ll never guess where.”
“Where?” I asked.
“Glacier National Park, that’s where! In Montana!”
“Wow.” I glanced at Dennis, but his attention was still fixed to the screen above the bar. “So, um…when were you thinking?” Please let it be a long time from now.
“No time like the present,” she chirped. “September eleventh! You’ll be my maid of honor, right? It has to be you!”
“September eleventh, Wills?”
“Oh, come on! That day could use a little happiness, don’t you think?”
“That’s two weeks away.”
“So? When it’s right, it’s right. Will you be my maid of honor or not?”
I opened my mouth, closed it and bit my tongue. Two weeks. Holy testicle Tuesday. Two weeks to talk Willa out of another disastrous marriage, or at least to slow down and really get to know her potential groom. I could do it. Just had to play along. “Well, sure. Of course I’ll be your maid of honor.”
“Hooray! Thank you, Harper! It’ll be so beautiful out there. But listen, I haven’t told you the best part yet,” Willa said.
My heart stuttered. “Are you pregnant?” I asked calmly. That would be fine. I would support the baby, of course. Pay for college. Make sure the kid stayed in school.
“No, I’m not pregnant. Listen to you! It’s just that you know the groom.”
“I do?”
“Yup! It’s a totally small world. Want to guess?”
“No. Just tell me who it is.”
“His first name starts with a C.”
Men whose names began with C in Manhattan? “I—I don’t know. I give up.”
“Christopher.” Willa’s voice was smug with affection.
“Christopher who?”
“Christopher Lowery!”
I jerked back in my chair, my pinot noir sloshing dangerously. “Lowery?” I choked out.
“I know! Isn’t that amazing? I’m marrying your ex-husband’s brother!”
CHAPTER TWO
WHEN I CLOSED MY PHONE a moment later, I saw that my hands were shaking. “Dennis?” I said. My voice sounded odd, and Father Bruce glanced over, frowning. I gave him a little smile—well, I tried. “Den?”
My boyfriend jerked to attention. “You okay, hon? You look…weird.”
“Dennis, something came up. Willa…um…can we just…table our conversation for a little while? A few weeks?”
A tidal wave of relief flooded his face. “Uh…sure! You bet! Is your sister okay?”
“Well, she’s…yeah. She’s getting married.”
“Cool.” He frowned. “Or not?”
“It’s…it’s uncool. I have to run, Dennis. I’m sorry.”
“No, no, that’s fine,” he said. “Want me to drive you home? Or stay over?”
“Not tonight, Dennis. Thanks, though.”
I must’ve sounded off, because Dennis’s eyebrows drew together. “You sure you’re okay, hon?” He reached across the table and took my hand, and I squeezed back gratefully. Once you cut through Dennis’s thick outer layers, there really was a sweet man inside.
“I’m fine. Thanks. Just…well, the wedding’s in a couple weeks. A bit of a shock.”
“Definitely.” He smiled and kissed my hand. “I’ll call you later.”
I drove home, not really seeing the streets or cars, though presumably I avoided hitting any pedestrians and trees en route. Since the tourism season was still in full swing, I took the back roads, driving west toward the almost violent sunset, great swashes of purple and red, taking comfort from the endless rock walls of the Vineyard, the pine trees and oaks, the gray-shingled houses. The time I’d spent away from here—college, a brief stint in New York and then law school in Boston—had secured my belief that the island was the most beautiful place on earth.
Martha’s Vineyard consists of eight towns. I worked in Edgartown, land of white sea captains’ homes and impeccable gardens and, of course, the beautiful brick courthouse. Dennis lived in charming Oak Bluffs, famed for the Victorian gingerbread houses that made up the old Methodist enclave called the Campground. But I lived in a tiny area of Chilmark called Menemsha.
I waited patiently for a slew of tourists, who came down here to admire the scenic working class, to cross in front of me, then pulled into the crushed-shell driveway of my home. It was a small, unremarkable house, not much to look at from the outside but rather perfect inside. And the view…the view was priceless. If Martha’s Vineyard had a blue-collar neighborhood, it was here, at Menemsha’s Dutcher’s Dock, where lobstermen still brought in their catches, where swordfishing boats still ran. My father’s father had been such a fisherman, and it was in his old house, set on a hill overlooking the aging fleet, where I now lived.
Through the living room window, I could see Coco’s brown-and-white head appearing then disappearing as she jumped up and down to ascertain that yes, I really had come home. In her mouth was her favorite cuddle friend, a stuffed bunny rabbit that was slightly bigger than she was. A Jack Russell-Chihuahua mix, Coco was somewhat schizophrenic, alternating as it served her purposes between the two sides of her parentage—exuberant, affectionate Jack or timid, vulnerable Chihuahua. At the moment, she was in her happy place, though when it came time for bed, she’d revert to a wee, trembling beastie who clearly needed to sleep with her head on my pillow.
I unlocked the door and went in. “Hi, Coco,” I said. With a single bound, she leaped into my arms, all eight pounds of her, and licked my chin. “Hello, baby! How’s my girl? Hmm? Did you have a good day? Finish that novel you’re writing? You did! Oh, you’re so clever.” Then I kissed her little brown-and-white triangle head and held her close for a minute or two.
When Pops had been alive, this house had been a standard, somewhat crowded and typical ranch. Three small bedrooms, one and a half baths, living room, kitchen. He died when I was in law school and left the house to me, his only grandchild (biological, that was…he’d liked Willa, but I was his special girl). No matter how much I made as a divorce attorney, I would never have been able to afford this view on my own. But thanks to Pops, it was mine. I could’ve sold it for several million dollars to a real estate developer, who would’ve torn it down and slapped up a vacation house faster than you could say McMansion. But I didn’t. Instead, I paid my father, who was a general contractor, to renovate the place.
So we knocked down a few walls, relocated the kitchen, turned three bedrooms into two, installed sliding glass doors wherever possible, and the end result was a tiny, airy jewel of a home, founded on the hard work of my salty, seafaring grandfather, renovated by my father’s hands and funded by my lawyer’s salary. Someday, I imagined, I’d put on a second story to house my well-behaved and attractive future children, but for now, it was just Coco and me, with Dennis as our frequent guest. Sand-colored walls, white trim, spare white furniture, the occasional splash of color—a green oar from a barn sale in Tisbury leaning tastefully in one corner, a soft blue chair in front of the bay window. Over the sliders that led to the deck hung an orange lifesaving ring, the chipped letters naming Pops’s boat and port of origin—Pegasus, Chilmark.
With a sigh, I turned my attention back to my sister’s bombshell.
I’m marrying your ex-husband’s brother!
Holy testicle Tuesday.
Time for some vinotherapy. Setting Coco back down, I went to the fridge, uncorked a bottle and poured a healthy portion, oh yes. Chugged half of it, grabbed a bag of Cape Cod sea salt and vinegar potato chips and the bottle of wine and headed for my deck, Coco trotting next to me on her tiny and adorable feet.
So my sister was marrying Christopher Lowery, a man I’d last seen on my own wedding day thirteen years ago. How old was he then? Sixteen? Eighteen?
I took a sip of wine, not a gulp, and forced myself to take a deep breath of the salty, moist air, savoring the tang of baitfish (hey, I was a local). I listened to the sound of the endless island wind, which buffeted my house from two directions this night, bringing me strands of music and laughter from other places, other homes. Calm down, Harper, I told myself sternly. Nothing to panic about. Not yet, anyway.
“I’m getting a glass,” a voice said. Kim, my neighbor and closest friend. “Then I want to hear everything.”
“Sure,” I answered. “Who’s with the kids?”
“Their idiot father,” she answered.
As if summoned, Lou’s voice shattered the relative quiet as he yelled across the small side yard that separated our homes. “Honey? Where’s the box of Pull-Ups?”
“Find them your damn self! They’re your kids, too!” Kim bellowed back.
This was followed by a shriek and a howl from one of Kim’s four sons. I suppressed a shudder. Our houses were only a few yards apart, though happily, mine jutted out past hers, preventing me from having to witness their particular brand of domestic bliss.
“This house is a pigsty!” Lou yelled.
“So clean it!” his bride returned.
“How do you keep the magic?” I asked, taking another sip. Kim smiled and flopped down in the chair next to me.
“You’d never know we were screwing like monkeys last night,” she said, helping herself to the wine.
“And how do monkeys screw?” I asked, raising an eyebrow.
“Fast and furious,” she laughed, clinking her glass against mine.
Kim and Lou were happily (if sloppily) married. Not exactly my role models, but reassuring nonetheless. They’d moved in a couple of years ago; Kim appeared on my doorstep with a box of Freihofer’s doughnuts and a bottle of wine and offered friendship. My kind of woman.
“Mommy!” came the voice of one of the twins.
“I’m busy!” she called. “Ask your father! Honest to God, Harper, it’s a wonder I haven’t sold them into slavery.” Kim often claimed to envy my single, working woman’s life, but the truth was, I envied hers. Well, in some ways. She and Lou were solid and affectionate, completely secure in the happy way they bickered and bossed each other around. (See? I had nothing against marriage when it was done right.) Their kids ranged in age from seven to two. Griffin was the oldest and had the soul of a sixty-year-old man. Once in a while, he’d come over to play Scrabble and admire Coco. I liked him; definitely preferred him over the four-year-old twins, Gus and Harry, who left a path of chaos, blood and rubble wherever they went. The two-year-old, Desmond, had bitten me last week, but seconds later put his sticky little face against my knee, an oddly lovely sensation, so the jury was still a bit torn over him.
“So are you engaged?” Kim asked, settling in the chair next to me. “Tell me now so I can start my diet. No way am I going to be a bridesmaid weighing this much.”
“I am not engaged,” I answered calmly.
“Holy shitake!” Kim, who tried not to curse in front of her kids, had invented her own brand of swearing, which I’d latched on to myself. “He turned you down?”
“Well, not exactly. My sister called during negotiations, and guess what? She’s getting married.”
“Again?”
“Exactly. But it gets better. She just met him a month ago, and guess what else? He’s…” I paused, took another slug of liquid courage. “He’s my ex-husband’s brother. Half brother, actually.”
She sputtered on her wine. “You have an ex-husband, Harper? How did I not know this?”
I glanced at her. “I guess it never came up. Long ago, youthful mistake, yadda yadda ad infinitum.” I wondered if she bought it. Both of us ignored the screeches that came from her house, though Coco jumped on my lap, channeling Chihuahua, and trembled, cured from her terror only by a potato chip.
“Well, well, well,” Kim said when I offered no further information.
“Yes.”
“So Willa just…ran into your ex-brother-in-law?” Kim asked. “Sure, it’s a small world, but come on. In New York City?”
I hadn’t asked about that, a bit too slammed by the mention of…him…to properly process the information. After all these years of not thinking about him, his name now pulsed and burned in my brain. I shrugged and took another sip of wine, then leaned my head against the back of the chair. The sky was lavender now, only a thin stripe of fading red at the horizon marking the sun’s descent. The tourists who’d come to watch the sunset clambered back into their cars to head for Oak Bluffs or Edgartown for dinner and alcohol—Chilmark, like five of Martha’s Vineyard’s other towns, was dry. Ah, New England.
“So will you be seeing him again? The ex? What’s his name?”
“I guess so, if they actually go through with it. The wedding’s supposed to be in two weeks. In Montana.” Another sip. “His name is Nick.” The word felt big and awkward as it left my mouth. “Nick Lowery.”
“Yoo-hoo! Harper, darlin’! Where you at? Did you talk to your sister? Isn’t it just so exciting! And romantic? My stars, I almost peed my pants when she told me!”
My stepmother charged into the house—she never knocked. “We’re out here, BeverLee,” I called, getting up to greet her—bouffanted, butter-yellow hair sprayed five inches off her scalp (“The bigger the hair, the closer to God,” she often said), more makeup than a Provincetown drag queen, shirt cut down to reveal her massive cleavage. My dad’s trophy wife of the past twenty years…fifteen years younger than he was, blond and Texan. Behind her, my tall and skinny father was almost invisible.
“Hi, Dad.” My father, not one to talk unless a gun was aimed at his heart, nodded, then knelt to pet Coco, who wagged so hard it was a wonder her spine didn’t crack. “Hi, Bev. Yes, I talked to her.” I paused. “Very surprising.”
“Well, hello, there, Kimmy! How you doin’? Did Harper here tell you the happy news?”
“She shore did,” Kim said, immediately sliding into a Texas accent, something she swore was unconscious. “So excitin’!” She caught my eye and winked.
“I know it!” BeverLee chortled. “And oh, my, Montana! That’s just so romantic! I guess Chris worked out there one summer or some such…whatever, I can’t wait! Hoo-whee! What color’s your dress gonna be, honey? Jimmy, what do you think?”
I glanced at my father. He rose, put his hands in his pockets and nodded. This, I knew from experience, would be his contribution to the conversation…Dad was silent to the point of comatose. But BeverLee didn’t need other people to have a conversation, and sure enough, she continued.
“I’m thinking lavender, what do y’all think? For you, Harper, not me. I’m fixin’ on getting this little orange number I saw online. Cantaloupe-mango, they called the color, you know? And y’all know how I love orange.”
“I’d better go,” Kim said. “I hear glass breaking over at my house. Talk to you soon, Harper. Bye, Mr. James, Mrs. James.”
“Honey, y’all don’t need to call me Miz James! I told you that a million times!”
“Bye, BeverLee,” Kim said amiably. She tossed back the rest of her wine and gave me a wave.
“See you,” I said to her, then turned to my father and stepmother. “So. Before we pick out the dress, maybe we should talk about the, uh, wisdom of this event?”
“Wisdom? Listen to you, darlin’!” BeverLee exclaimed. “Jimmy, get your butt in that-there chair. Your daughter wants to talk!” She came over to me and pulled my hair out of its ponytail and started fluffing, ignoring my squirm. “Honestly, Harper, the man just doesn’t know what to make of this! His little girl getting married to his other little girl’s ex-husband! It’s just crazy.” With that, she took the travel-size can of Jhirmack Extra Hold that was attached to her keychain and sprayed my head.
“Okay, BeverLee, that’s great,” I said, trying not to inhale. “That’s enough. Thanks.” She put down her weapon, and I cleared my throat. “Now, first of all, Willa’s not marrying my ex-husband,” I said in my courtroom voice. “Just to clarify. She’s marrying Christopher. Christopher is Nick’s half brother. I was married to Nick.”
“Honey, I know that.” BeverLee fumbled in her purse and withdrew a pack of Virginia Slims. “I was there at your wedding, wasn’t I? I misspoke, okay? So try not to take my head off, won’t you, sugar? Just because your panties are in a twist since you’ll be seeing Nick again doesn’t mean you should—”
“My panties are not twisted,” I muttered.
“—bite the hand that feeds you. This is a happy day, all right?” The queen of mixed metaphors took a deep drag and exhaled through one corner of her mouth.
“You don’t feed me.”
“Well, I would if you let me. You’re right skinny. Anyway, Willard just loves purple, so lavender would be the way to go, sugar. You wanna make Willard happy, don’t you?”
I opened my mouth, then shut it. If I had a soft spot, its name was Willa. Specifically, Willard Krystal Lupinski James.
The summer after my mother had left us, my father went to Vegas for a two-week conference on green building materials…or so he said. I spent the fortnight with my friend Heather, calling her mother “Mom” and pretending it was a joke and not a wish. Dad returned with BeverLee Roberta Dupres McKnight Lupinski and her daughter, Willard.
I was stunned, horrified and absolutely furious at what my father had done. When he’d told me he was going out West, a little fantasy had played out in my brain—Dad would find Mom and beg her to forgive him (for whatever I imagined he’d done) and she’d return and we’d all be happy again. The rational part of my brain knew that wouldn’t really happen…but this? This I had never foreseen. Dad got married? To this…this Trailer Park Barbie? Were those boobs real? Did we have to see so much of them? And I was supposed to share my room with her kid? Was he out of his mind? But in typical Dad fashion, my father’s answer was brief. “It’s done, Harper. Don’t make it harder than it has to be.”
“Willard, go and give your new big sister a kiss, sugar pop. Go on now!” Willard only tightened her grip on her mother’s hand and refused to raise her eyes. She was pale and skinny, tangled hair and scabby knees. Please. I was still bleeding over my mother’s desertion, and now these two were living with me? I had a stepmother? A stepsister? My father was an idiot, and there was no way in hell I was about to make his life easier. I would hate them both. Especially the kid. The (dare I say it?) stupid kid.
My resolve lasted about eight hours. I went to my room to choke on the hot and bitter tears that even then I couldn’t seem to shed. I cursed my silent father and railed against the unfairness of life, my life in particular. Of course I skipped dinner. I would starve in my room before going downstairs and eating with them. Made plans to run away/find my mother/become famous/be killed in a horrible accident/all of the above, which would make everyone see just how awful they’d been to me, and man, they’d feel like absolute dog crap, but it would be too late, so there. My father was an ass. My mother…my mother had abandoned me, my father barely spoke, I had no siblings. This BeverLee caricature was ridiculous. Her kid… Jesus. She was so not my new sister just because some blowsy stranger had married my father, who, come on, could have maybe called and given me a little warning?