Flashback

Fuck it! Came this far.

He stepped inside … and nothing.

But instantly the old cottagey seabreath filled his head like a dream. From a cursory glance, the Sherman fortune had not been squandered on makeover. The interior was just as he remembered it from twenty-five years ago—golden knotty-pine paneling, red plaid upholstery on matching sofa and chairs, rectangular coffee table with a glass top under which sat an arrangement of seashells, sand dollars, and starfish, fireplace with the dried wreath, logs in a wrought-iron pot. Familiar pine furniture in the bedrooms, and the same kitchen—an old four-jet gas stove, double white stainless steel sinks, but what looked like a new refrigerator. It was like stepping into an old movie set.

As he walked through the place his mind ticked off the kinds of things he’d do to restore it, were it his, wondering why the Shermans with all their money hadn’t upgraded the place. Maybe it had something to do with not separating old Boston Brahmins from their millions.

He also half-expected goblins to jump out at him. But nothing like that. The dark kinescope of his brain had blown a fuse. Not even a flicker of recollection. Nothing came back. He looked at the room, and the room looked at him, and that was it. So maybe it was a blessing in disguise, he thought. Maybe this was the point in the story where the beleaguered hero finally shakes the gargoyle off his back—in this case to be replaced by his new best friend, Zyprexa, ten milligrams daily. So say adios, take the next boat home, and get on with the rest of your gray- mush life.

“Who are you?”

Jack froze. A woman’s voice. From behind him. For an instant, he thought he was having another spell—that shortly he’d lapse into Armenian lullabies.

But behind him stood a real woman in real-woman flesh and a lavender sweater. “This is private property.”

Before he could respond, a volley of angry barks cut the air like gunshots. And from behind the woman emerged a large German shepherd with about fifty flashing incisors.

“Brandy, stop!” And the woman yanked the dog back on its leash. The dog instantly heeled and ceased barking. “What are you doing here?”

“I tried your house, but nobody was home.”

“That still does not excuse your breaking in.”

He held up the key. “I didn’t. I remembered where the key was kept. My family used to stay here during the summer. I don’t know if it rings a bell, but my name is Jack Koryan.” He pushed down the impulse to extend his hand because he did not expect the woman wanted to take it nor did he want to give Brandy a target.

“I don’t recognize the name,” the woman said. “And that doesn’t explain why you’re here.”

Wish I knew myself.

“You may recall someone nearly drowning out here last August. The Coast Guard found him and he ended up in a coma. It was in the papers.”

“Yes.”

“Well, that was me.”

“Oh. Well, I’m glad you survived.”

But he could see that she was still wondering what he was doing in her cottage. “I’m just trying to put some pieces together,” he began. “I don’t know if you remember the story, but thirty years ago the woman who was staying here disappeared one August night and was never found. That was my mother. She had stayed here a lot.”

And Jack explained: How he was found the next day by a groundskeeper who had shown up to assess the damage from the storm, only to discover Jack sitting in dirty diapers on the floor clutching his stuffed mouse. How he was rushed to a hospital in New Bedford, where he was treated for dehydration and shock and released two days later to his aunt and uncle. How he was unable to relate any of the events of the evening even in the most rudimentary baby talk, so it was assumed that he remembered nothing that had happened that night in the cottage—if anyone else had been there or the circumstances of his mother’s disappearance.

“That’s an unfortunate story, but I still don’t understand why you’re here.”

“It’s crazy, but I was hoping that something would come back. I’ve been having dreams of her.”

The woman looked at him in bewilderment for a moment. “My father sometimes took in odd sorts and occasionally let them stay here.”

“Odd sorts?”

“Oh, I didn’t mean it that way.” She had stepped into the room and was now standing with her foot on the stone lip of the fireplace. Brandy settled beside her, panting and looking bored. “Special people interested him. Artists, writers, naturalists … Did your mother paint?”

“No. She was a biochemist.”

The woman’s face suddenly opened up. “Oh, good heavens. The sea-creature lady.”

Sea-creature lady?

“From Harvard.”

“Yes.”

“Well, I’ll be. She had something to do with a joint lab at MIT.”

“Yes.”

The woman’s eyes expanded, and as if a valve had been turned open, turned effusive. “Yes, yes, yes. You see, Thaddeus was a trustee of the institute, which explains how he met your mother. She must have written a paper or given a talk or something which caught his attention. I think I was maybe ten or twelve at the time, but I remember her—a quick little lady with lots of energy. Yes. She used to come out and gather specimens, wade in the water with a face mask and net.”

Jack could barely breathe as he took in her recollection.

“I don’t know if you’re aware,” she continued, “but the waters out here are very special, because every twenty years or so the Gulf Stream brings in some odd creatures from the tropics—beluga whales and sunfish, Portuguese men-of-war, and smaller things. Sharks, too, even had a hammerhead caught just beyond the cove. But I remember her.”

“Rose.”

“Rose. Oh, yes: Rosie.” And she pronounced the name with warm recollection. “A lovely woman. Wore her hair in a bun. She had a whole collection of things in jars she put on the shelves over there. Even set up a little lab in here of sorts with a microscope and things. She used to show me her collection—little starfish and crabs … and jellyfish. Such a lively, lovely woman.”

“Jellyfish?”

“Yes. She must have been a marine ecologist—you know, someone who fought to save the whales or whatever, because Thaddeus was a great proponent of the save-the-sea movement, of course, and a charter member of the Cousteau Society, but that’s before your time … ,” and she went on.

Then she looked around the room and nodded at the corner. “She even had some mice, a cage with half a dozen or so. And a little maze she had built. She let me play with them.”

“Mice?”

“I don’t know what the connection was …”

Just then her cell phone chimed, and Brandy let out a reflexive bark. The woman produced a phone from her pocket and explained that she was down at the cottage talking to a visitor. She clicked off and stuck her hand out. “And, by the way, I’m Olivia Sherman Flanders.” She checked her watch. It was time to leave.

Jack handed her the key as they walked outside. She locked the door and dropped it in her pocket, probably thinking about calling a locksmith. They headed up the steps, Brandy ranging ahead on the leash. As they reached the top, Olivia said, “You said something about having dreams of her.”

“Yes, just dissociated images, nothing that makes sense.”

“But you must have been a very young child when she drowned.”

He nodded. “I can’t explain. But I apologize for letting myself in like that. I was just hoping that something would jar my memory.”

“Humpf,” she said with a shrug, and offered him a ride to the ferry.

But he refused. He could use the exercise to build up his leg muscles, in spite of the ache.