Outside the subject of her family, Lolly was lighter and more open, so we tended not to bring them up, so when we finally met Adam, and later, June and Luke, we knew little about any of them. Mimi and I had pieced together that relations were difficult between June and Adam. He had various girlfriends whom Lolly didn’t respect; and once June began her relationship with Luke, Lolly at first refused to acknowledge him and for the most part avoided her mother. She talked to Pru about it the week before the wedding and, of course, Will, but I don’t really know what went on between Lolly and her mother. Clearly they had much to resolve, and according to Pru, among the many sad things about what happened is that they had, in those months leading up to the wedding, just begun.
When I spoke to Lydia in January, she told me June had been gone since early summer and that she had not seen or heard from her since the funeral. She said that what remained of the house had been demolished, and a chain now blocked the driveway from the road. She reported the news dispassionately, as if she had little to do with any of it, or with June, which surprised me, since the two of them, from what I could see in those few days before the wedding, seemed close. At the rehearsal, June fixed Lydia’s hair and both of them laughed secretively, like old friends. I can still picture them, side by side, talking in the church, on the lawn, at the sink, on the porch. I remember them more with each other than apart. They were a funny pair, very different in superficial ways — one sleek and blond, the other earthy, with long, dark hair falling down everywhere; one poised and stoic, the other needier, less sure. Still, they were much the same in how they approached their children: formal and timid, careful, as if they had only just met them. But with each other they appeared relaxed, natural. So to hear Lydia talk about June with such distance was a surprise, but then I remembered June at the funeral and the days before. She didn’t speak. Not to us, not to Lydia, not to anyone. I remember how she pivoted away from each of us when addressed, and if hugged, she held still, hands at her sides, until it was over. We reached out to her as best we could, but we were in shock, and instinctively we closed ranks among ourselves. We were out of our minds and away from home. Our boy was gone.
There had been rumors right away about Luke causing the explosion. The day we left Wells, the woman at the front desk at the Betsy told us she always knew something terrible was going to happen the moment she heard Lydia Hannafin’s boy moved into June Reid’s house. Bound to end badly, she said, shaking her head and sounding perversely satisfied. The four of us stayed quiet and left the small lobby as quickly as possible.
We chose to believe that what happened was a horrible accident, nothing more and nothing less. Anyone who had ever been in that kitchen knows it had to have been something to do with the stove. It looked like something from the Depression era. Rusty and white, tilting at an angle. I remember the afternoon before the rehearsal watching June fussing over one of the burners to boil water for tea, muttering when it wouldn’t light right away. If I blame anyone, it’s June. She should have taken care to replace that treacherous appliance. It was so clearly not safe. She had the means, and the rest of the property was well maintained, meticulous even. I try not to think about it, but at times I catch myself wondering how on earth could she have missed this one thing. How could she have been so careless? Knowing that June must agonize over these same questions dulls with pity, but does not eradicate, the anger I can still feel.
What was left of that old stove, the house, and any clues to what exactly caused the explosion were destroyed the day after the accident, bulldozed and dragged away by the state, though no one knew why. Our family is certain that Luke did not set out to hurt anyone. He was a decent man, and despite tensions in the house that night and even the days before, he was no killer. If it was due to some carelessness on his part, the boy paid a high price and God bless his tortured soul. His time in jail and his being black made him an easy scapegoat in that town, which you could hardly call racially diverse. Will, who planned on becoming a public defender in communities that didn’t have adequate representation, would have been livid to see how swiftly the finger was pointed. So with so much unknown, our family chose to follow Will’s lead and let go of any theories or blame. This doesn’t mean we haven’t suffered, we have. And it doesn’t mean we’ve found peace.
After we returned to Portland, there was a period when Mike wouldn’t speak to us because we hadn’t pressed for more of an investigation right after the accident. He insisted we hire a lawyer to sue the fire department, or the town, I can’t remember now exactly who he had in his crosshairs. Maybe we should have. But when I question our choice to walk away, I realize that whatever punishment we might have unleashed on the clumsy small-town officials responsible for destroying our chance for answers, or even if through some great show of force or determination or luck we actually found out what happened that night, there would be no changing the awful truth: Will is gone. We will never again see or hear or be with our magical son.
Mike has come around, but it’s still not easy. We see him less, but Mimi and I know it’s just for now. Pru has taken time away from graduate school and moved back home. Her friends from Moclips and college call and occasionally drop by, but she keeps to herself, reads novels she’s read before at the kitchen table until after midnight and sleeps in late. For now, we just give her space and let her be. And Mimi and I still teach — her third grade and me fifth — and we do what we’ve done for years: encourage and discipline, scribble what needs to be learned on chalkboards, and keep watch as the young people who come under our care for a short while hurry by on their way to the world.
We talk less now. There are car rides and Sunday mornings and entire meals when Mimi and I don’t speak a word to each other. Not out of anger or punishment, but we’ve learned that grief can sometimes get loud, and when it does, we try not to speak over it.
I’m ashamed to remember that we did not reach out to Lydia sooner than we did. Good reason or not, we kept our distance from her in those unreal days between what happened and the funerals. She lost her son the same way we had, and still we had no words for her. When we spoke in January, I told her I was sorry it had been so long since she’d heard from us, and that she had been and would continue to be in our prayers. I asked her to let us know if June turned up, and she said of course and I promised the same. We stayed on the line for a few breaths of uncomfortable silence, and then we said good-bye.
A month later, from the Moonstone, Mimi dialed Lydia’s number again, but it just rang and rang. We tried a few more times but each time it was the same. This was the day after we checked in, when we first saw June. It was early, and Mimi and I had been up and showered and getting ready to go for a walk down the beach and around the old neighborhood. Just before we left the room, we saw June cross like a ghost in front of our window. She was wearing the same clothes she wore the night of the rehearsal and the unreal days after. It was just a moment, but she looked the same, only thinner, less animated. We didn’t see her again until that evening, just after the sun had gone down. The four of us had walked to the water’s edge at sunset to spread Will’s ashes. The surf was rough and the cloud cover was thick, so there was no grand ceremonial sunset as we’d hoped. Just the chilly surf and a pewter sky and Pru, knee-deep in the ocean, shaking the small ceramic container where we’d kept Will’s ashes all year. Once the last bit of ash had finally disappeared, Pru came back to where we stood on the beach. We circled her and, with Mike, threw our arms around each other and we wept. We stood together for a long time. I’ve never been one to go to church, but I’ve always believed in a creative intelligence behind the ongoing riddle of the world. To that great force I prayed to guide Will’s soul wherever it was and to protect my family. The second prayer was a selfish one. Shoulder to shoulder on that beach I couldn’t bear the idea of losing any of them. Yet I knew we would, one by one, lose each other. Life never felt so gifted. Mike let go first and nudged us away from the encroaching water. Reluctantly, I let go, too, and we began to make our way back to our rooms.