Stella sits at the table. Everything is strange. Her father never cooks. He makes coffee in the morning but Stella’s mother does all the cooking. Did all the cooking. There are four chairs at the round wooden table. The round blue wall clock ticks. It’s almost ten. She wonders if the clock has been ticking for all the years the house has been empty or if Frank or Sally Seabury put new batteries in. From what her father has told her of Frank, he is a high-flying international businessman who only comes home to Seabury in the summers and at Christmas. Stella doubts he’s personally done anything in the house. Rather, that he has instructed others to do these things for him.
“Dad, why didn’t you get along with your father?”
The whistling stops. The clock ticks. She’s always fatigued, no matter how much she sleeps. “Well? Dad?”
“It’s not a simple thing to explain, Stella.”
“I’m not going anywhere.”
Her father opens and shuts his mouth like a fish. Puts his head to the side and sticks out his bottom lip, drums his index finger on his chin, as he always does when he’s trying to come up with an answer. He can hardly tell a bedtime story let alone his own.
“Well, Stella, your grandfather was a nasty man. It’s that simple. My mother was very young when they married. She was a saint. Your grandfather worried about money. He sold insurance. He was always out at meetings. After my sister died, I was sent off to boarding school. I was done with him. He wanted me to be his clone.”
Her father puts the bacon on a plate, on top of a piece of paper towel, and pours the hot bacon fat into a tin can on the counter. “But that’s ancient history, Stella. We’ll let it drift out to sea. We won’t be just keeping it at bay anymore, get it? Get it?”
Stella groans.
“No one appreciates my humour now that your mother is gone.” He cracks four eggs, which sizzle in the cast iron pan, egg white dripping onto the stovetop and down the oven door.
Stella wonders if her parents would have stayed together if her mother had lived. Her mother got her driver’s licence six months before the accident. She wanted to be independent, she said, to be able to take Stella on trips, to drive her places in the bad weather. Her parents didn’t have screaming matches but it was constant bickering, separate lives.
Stella’s throat feels thick and stiff now. She tries to swallow as her father puts a plate of bacon and a rock-hard egg mass in front of her. She doesn’t want to cry. He’ll be upset. He hates tears. Stella wants to hide. She wants to read but she can’t because it hurts her head and it reminds her of her other self, the Stella who always read.
The counter is cluttered with bowls and pots. Her father is cooking for an entire family. She sees beer cans on the counter as well. Stella knows he’ll leave the kitchen a mess as he did in Ohio. He blames it on his years spent in university, living in residences and faculty accommodations, eating in cafeterias and in restaurants. Her father sits down at the table with his plate heaped with eggs and bacon.
The back doorbell rings out, an old-fashioned grinding sound, and then the kitchen door flies open. There stands a girl a bit older than Stella, but with teased black hair, a nose ring, and wearing black sandals, all of which contrasts with her red sundress, her pale blue eyes. She’s holding a basket with flowers sticking out one end and sets it on the table, oblivious to Stella’s and her father’s shocked faces. She opens the basket to reveal blueberry muffins.
“Success! Still warm,” she cries. “Welcome to Seabury. I’m Cynthia. Granny Scotia said we should make sure you feel welcome, so I got up early.” She puts her hands on her hips and looks at the bookcase, the few books and magazines still lying on the floor. She’s thirteen but she has the confidence of a seasoned adult tour guide arriving to orient them.
Stella watches her father’s sallow cheeks turn red. He wipes his hands on his pants and then grabs his napkin and wipes his face and looks down bashfully, pushing his glasses up, as though he’s a teenager again. He gives Cynthia a slow, awkward smile. “Well, hello. I’m William Sprague. And this —”
“Like, I know who you are, Mr. Sprague. And this is Stella, Stella Maris,” Cynthia says as she puts a muffin on his plate. “That’s a totally excellent name, by the way. I’ve been waiting and waiting for you to come. Seabury is so boring in the summer. My parents live in New York during the year. That’s where my father’s company is. We come here every year, or at least my mother and I do. Daddy never really takes a holiday, even though Mom says it would be good for him. He’s good at giving orders but not taking them.” Cynthia giggles like this is hilarious. “I’ve been at a boarding school in New Hampshire but this year I’m living with Granny Scotia. She’s getting older. Daddy says she has a heart problem. And he worries she has a memory problem. He has the memory problem.” Cynthia rolls her eyes.
Stella and her father stare at the girl.
“I love your white shirt, Mr. Sprague,” Cynthia says. “Is it Irish linen?”
Stella’s father nods, impressed.
“That’s so nice. My father always wears a big tie. And pin-striped shirts. He’s so formal. Or if he isn’t wearing a shirt and tie he
