Again, Ronnie seemed to consider before answering. “Every kid deals with something,” she said. “Maybe their parents fight all the time. Maybe their fathers are never home. Maybe they’ve got a mom who drinks. There’re a lot of things that can go wrong. Kids figure out how to handle it, and most of them grow up just fine.” Ronnie gave her a close-lipped smile. “Although she may have some questions for you at some point. I’m sure you’ll have your answers ready.”
Annette bit her lip and wondered if there was anything she would be able to say; any way to explain how she’d felt and what she’d done that wouldn’t leave Ruby believing that it had all been her fault; that Annette’s defection had something to do with Ruby, and not with Annette. Annette sighed. Veronica nodded toward the table where Ruby was sitting, having an animated conversation with one of Eli’s cousins, with Dexter snuggled in her lap. “Ruby has a place in the world. A good place.”
Annette knew this to be true. Ruby lived in a beautiful home. She attended an excellent school. She had a father and a stepmother who loved her, two solid, stable adults to model solid, stable adult behavior. She had doting grandparents, a half-brother she adored, two tables full of giggling preteen friends from her school and her summer camp. And if she also had a crazy, selfish mother who’d cut and run, it could be worse. Like if she’d had an unhappy mother who’d stayed and made everyone miserable. Maybe Ronnie was telling the truth. Maybe Ruby, having endured this first, most primal wound, would be able to navigate disappointments, broken promises, and breakups and whatever other misery the world served her, with ease, because she’d already survived Annette. She would be, as the pop psychologists like to say, resilient.
For all the years of Ruby’s life, Annette had been there for her daughter as well as she could. There were phone calls and birthday gifts; there were visits during winter break and for a month each summer, no matter where Annette was or what she was doing, except for the handful of times when she couldn’t—the summer she’d been helping a friend in Aruba and a hurricane had stranded them there; the year she’d gotten a last-minute invitation to study Ashtanga yoga in India, and had called Ruby to say she’d wanted her to come, and had asked, but children weren’t allowed.
“It’s okay,” Ruby had said, her voice leaden, and later Eli had called her, hissing, “I hope it’s fucking worth it, Annette. Namaste.”
Don’t hate me, Annette begged her daughter in her head… but she hadn’t said it out loud. Ruby probably despised her already. It might not be until Ruby was much, much older that she would be able to see her mother as anything but the villain of her story, and her father as the hero; when she’d be able to set aside her black-and-white thinking and appreciate the nuances and shades of gray. It might never happen, Annette admitted. Ruby might hate her until the day she died… but at least Ruby hadn’t grown up with a mother who was miserable, a mother who’d taught her daughter, by example, that sacrifice and self-abnegation were what made a woman a good wife and mother. A little selfishness could be healthy. It could even save your life. That, she thought, was a message more girls and women could stand to hear, a thing that few were ever taught.
And she was glad, because now, finally, for the first time in Ruby’s life, Annette had managed to be exactly where Ruby needed her to be at precisely the right time. Maybe it was a sign, she thought. The universe telling her she’d made the right choice.
“Where to?” Annette asked as she flicked her high beams on to light up the darkness.
“I don’t know.” Ruby’s voice was faint.
“How about we just drive for a while?”
“Okay,” Ruby whispered.
Annette squeezed her daughter’s hand and pointed the car toward the highway.
Sam
After dinner, the boys had seen the distant glow of three separate bonfires from the living-room windows and had begged to go back to the beach. “Not tonight,” Sam said. He looked at his watch, then looked around for his brother-in-law for backup, but Eli had wandered out to the deck, where he stood, staring out at the sea like an emo teenager.
“I promise, before the end of the week we’ll have a bonfire, and I might even be convinced to buy you guys sparklers. We can roast hot dogs, and make s’mores, and stay up late. But not tonight.”
“Listen to Uncle Sam,” said Ronnie, and helped Sam herd the boys downstairs for face-washing and teeth-brushing. Sam got everyone into a bed. He read a chapter of Captain Underpants and turned off the light after delivering a final threat: “If I hear any more noise out of this room, no one is getting a malasada in the morning.” That did the trick.