Lost at Sea

Friends and family were arriving on Vinalhaven Island to celebrate Henry’s eightieth birthday. It was a perfect late-August day, the beach roses lining the shoreline set against cloudless blue skies. Henry and his wife Laura were seated on the railing next to the ferry terminal waiting for Lucy to arrive. Henry had not seen his sister since her husband died over a decade ago. She and Larry had done heroic work spreading literacy in remote African schools using donated technologies developed by ReadSmart. Henry’s son Georgie had arrived on an earlier boat and was swimming at Lawson’s Quarry with his wife Deepra and their son Lakshmi. Eliza and her husband were renting a house for the week on the nearby island of North Haven.

The yellow ferry chugged around the promontory, slowing in the harbor as lobster and pleasure boats steered clear of the churning wake. The ocean looked like a giant Tom Collins. Henry and Laura got up and pushed their way through the crowd of vacationers, who could no longer put off sad returns to mainland life. The Maine Department of Transportation staff, dressed in fluorescent yellow vests, had given up trying to explain the car lineup rules to exasperated New Yorkers. Notable among these was the retired head of the New York City Transit Authority, who owned a summer home and had offered up simpler solutions many times, only to be dismissed by the locals. The ferry thumped into the dockside frame, cradled within huge black bumpers bringing it to a full stop. Lines were secured, ramp lowered, and down came the commercial trucks followed by cars and tourists dragging suitcases. Henry spotted Lucy, her straw hat lifting in the breeze as she reached for it with her free hand. She walked behind the other passengers, scanning the crowd for her younger brother. Two of the three children of Ned and Eve Pendergast had grown old, and seeing his sister reminded Henry how quickly time passes and how much he missed their brother, Albert.

“Happy birthday, you old geezer,” Lucy hugged Henry. “I doubt anyone came as far as I did for your big birthday bash.”

Henry pulled away to gaze upon this elderly woman who had once been the bossy girl in the dainty dress. He shook his head in bemusement, thinking about the long journey they had shared, eventually freeing themselves from the wounds of their upbringing. Lucy looked remarkably well for a woman in her mid-eighties. Her face was wrinkled from years in the African sun, and her eyes revealed the weariness of someone who has soldiered bravely toward the end of life.

Lucy flashed a mischievous grin.

“What?” Henry was hunched over and raised himself to meet her glance head on.

“It’s just those bushy eyebrows. You look like Winston Churchill. And that ridiculous hat!”

“What about the hat? It’s my favorite …”

“ … Are those fishing flies sticking out the side?”

Henry removed his floppy felt hat, which was the signature statement of his island attire. He was now almost completely bald. “It’s a fishing hat, you moron.”

Lucy backed off in the realization she had just arrived and already they were regressing. “I’m teasing. My, how sensitive you are!”

Henry saw Jim Williams walking down the ramp. He had been thrilled when his former therapist had surprised him by saying he would come to the party. Henry had sent the invitation as a courtesy notification, not expecting him to come. Jim had stopped practicing years ago and now lived in Dallas. He had been eager for a reason to escape the Texas heat and Henry’s invitation seemed like just the ticket. Henry and the doctor had become frequent correspondents over the years, sharing reading suggestions and discussing current events.

Henry stepped aside to intercept him before he was carried away by the crowd. “Jim, over here!”

The doctor approached and looked surprised to see Lucy standing there. “Don’t tell me,” his head jerked backwards in happy surprise. “You must be Henry’s sister. I failed to make the connection on the boat.”

“I gather you two have met,” Henry was uncertain how he felt about his former therapist conversing with his sister.

Lucy’s eyes crinkled into a pretty smile beneath her hat. “I had no idea! It’s so nice to meet you, Jim. Henry claims you saved his life, which given how desperately he needed saving, I can believe.”      

Jim laughed. Henry looked on with a nervous smile. Jim had always been handsome, but now in retirement seemed relaxed in a way Henry had not noticed before. Freeing himself from his patients and their problems must have been a huge relief. His closely-cropped afro was a shade of pewter that matched his eyeglasses. He walked deliberately with a barely perceptible limp. “Your sister and I had quite the conversation on the ride over. What an extraordinary life of public service she’s led.” Henry sensed some chemistry at work.

Lucy blushed. “Oh, I don’t know about that. I think it’s far easier being the patient than the doctor.”

“How was your trip?” Henry patted Jim on the shoulder.

“Not so great. I’m getting too old to travel. Most of the flights out of Miami and Atlanta were cancelled in advance of Hurricane Bart. So I was rerouted through Chicago to Portland.”

Lucy twisted her suitcase handle so it stabilized on the rough surface. “I’m glad I came to the States a few days early to see Sasha. She’s planning to come to your party, Henry, but the latest forecast has increased the odds Bart heads up the Eastern Seaboard later in the week. I encouraged her to leave a day early if possible.”

“Who’s Sasha?” Jim asked.

“She’s our cousin many times removed,” Henry replied with sufficient haste that it was apparent there was more to the story. “She was a high-powered attorney in Manhattan for many decades, specializing in corporate law.”

“Sasha’s definitely not someone you want as an enemy,” Lucy added. “She reminds me of our mother, albeit a healthy version.”

Laura had been chatting with an island friend. She excused herself to join the welcoming party.

“Lucy! You look fabulous,” they hugged.

“You, too,” Lucy sensed how stressed Laura was given the commotion created by Henry’s week-long birthday celebration. Henry had insisted they eat out for his actual birthday so Laura could relax. A total of thirty family members and friends were arriving for the big event. Henry and Laura had purchased a small island home ten years ago. They had given up their Vinalhaven rental following Ned’s death so Henry could take a job in Portland. He had been unable to earn a living as a novelist and had accepted a marketing position for a refugee resettlement non-profit in Portland, which at the time was overrun by Syrian and Iraqi immigrants. The work was rewarding and better than his previous corporate jobs, as he finally felt he was making a difference in the world. He had regrets. His first novel ended up being his last. After Ned died, and the accompanying depression that sidelined him for months, Henry was unable to muster the energy to complete his novel about love. Henry had become completely blocked after learning his first love Chloé was in fact his half-sister, conceived through his father’s horrible rape of the servant, Louise. It was all simply too much to fathom. Henry and Laura needed to move closer to Laura’s ailing mother in Portland, who came up just short of the century mark, her final years spent in a nursing home. Following her death, Laura and Henry bought their current island home, living among lobstermen on the hill overlooking the harbor.

Georgie had become the star of the family, achieving notoriety as a musician on par with the success of his namesake, George. His latest recording had been released to critical acclaim, Urban Vibe hailing Georgie as a key figure in contemporary American composition. Georgie was a tenured professor at Tufts University and lived in Cambridge with his wife Deepra, an oncologist at Dana Farber, along with their only child Lakshmi. Lakshmi had recently celebrated his tenth birthday and was the source of unmatched joy for Henry and Laura, their youngest grandchild. Georgie’s career as a performer required him to travel frequently, leaving Deepra to balance her many life-and-death oncologist responsibilities with his schedule and the demands of raising Lakshmi. They had put off having a child as long as possible to focus on their careers. The birth of Lakshmi when Deepra was thirty-six had strengthened their love, although in recent years Henry and Laura had become concerned about the growing tension they sensed in the marriage. Henry’s daughter Eliza had married young (Laura would say too young) and had been a stay-at-home mother. Her husband was a New York City real estate developer and they lived in Greenwich, bringing the family full circle in a way not lost on Henry, their home less than a mile from his bomb shelter memories.

Laura wasn’t a fan of Eliza’s husband Dick, an ardent Republican who enjoyed tweaking his liberal mother-in-law whenever possible. If she had to listen to him complain one more time about his summer home taxes, or worse, the teacher’s union, she would explode. Eliza and Dick had two teenage sons and their youngest son Nate had been in and out of rehab for heroin addiction and lived with his parents in Greenwich. Nate was back in rehab for the summer so would not be coming to the birthday celebration, which was an unspoken relief for parents and grandparents alike.

Henry was looking forward...