This conversation transports Millicent back to a day at the beach in Rhode Island when she was about this girl’s age. The memory is a new one to her, so clear in its immediacy with details pulling her away from the Visitors Center and deep inside her mind. It had been a hot July day, her birth father and Frances there. A seagull had stolen her father’s lobster roll, and he had chased after it, watching as the gull dropped bits and pieces of lobster meat and bread into the ocean, other gulls flocking to the scene creating a storm of white and gray at the shoreline.
The beach is packed solid with sweaty flesh, dark men in speedos rubbing baby oil on even darker female flesh lying next to them on bright towels, some with reflective tinfoil beneath their chins to further their tanning. The sand is hot and burns the feet when walking to the ocean, dancing around bodies sprawled out like the dead at Gettysburg. Portable radios blare a mix of popular music into the air, commingling with the crashing of waves. The surf is big on this day, and the tanned lifeguards are on high alert.
Her father is angry and takes it out on Frances.
“I hate the beach, why do you insist on us coming?”
“We can get you another lobster roll. It’s not the end of the world. Relax.”
“The traffic home will be dreadful,” he peers out from beneath his floppy beach hat. His skin is pale unlike her mother’s.
Frances attempts in vain to cheer him up. “We can stop and get fried clams at Flo’s and wait for the traffic to clear out. We’re in no great rush.”
Millicent says: “Can we get Del’s lemonade, too?”
“Of course,” Frances answers.
“I’d rather not stop on the way home,” her father says.
“Oh, come on, Daddy. Can’t we at least get a lemonade?”
He doesn’t answer but turns his face away from them.
“Why are you always so sad, Daddy?”
He doesn’t respond.
“Will you take me down to the water?” she asks. “I’m too hot.”
He turns to look at her and she sees the damage in those eyes, damage done somewhere in his past, unknowable to her. But she sees it.
“Don’t ask so many questions.” His expression sinks into one combining disappointment with rising resentment. She is tired of always treading lightly when in his company. It’s as if he wishes he could be alone all the time, that he could be free of his family.
Her eyes well with tears.
Frances looks up from her book. “It’s bad enough you’re miserable all the time . . . please try not to foist all your unhappiness on us.”
Millicent withdraws, building a sandcastle off to the side of their blue-and-white striped beach umbrella. Her mother is reading a book. She sees the cover—a short story collection by John Updike called Problems. Her father is flipping through the pages of a magazine, The Economist. Millicent sees ocean salt visible on his brow. He is a serious man. A quiet man. A man who is unhappy with his life. Millicent feels this unhappiness in her parents’ marriage, the weight of it always present, a largely silent unease humming behind the scenes like the fan in her bedroom.
“I’m going for a swim,” Millicent stands up, doing her best to conceal her face so they don’t see the tears. “Who will come with me?”
“You go,” Frances turns to her husband.
“No, you take her. I took her last time.”
Frances is wearing a bright red beach hat and dark sunglasses. She is deeply involved in the Updike book and thinks carefully before saying: “You can go by yourself, Millicent. Just stay near the shore.”
Millicent traverses the obstacle course of bodies, stepping lightly and quickly to avoid burning her feet. She is sobbing as she reaches the edge of the ocean and cools her feet in the water. Young children are splashing in the shallow waters, large surf breaking offshore where a handful of adults are jumping over the waves, some riding them ashore. Millicent wades out into the ocean as children on boogie boards whiz past. There is a sudden indentation below, a step or two down, and she slides down and is now up to her chest in water. She turns to look back at the beach and sees their bright beach umbrella. She wades out deeper until she is awash in white foam, the agitated waters tugging her sideways in a building undertow.
She continues heading out, the waves now lifting her up and pushing her back toward shore. It takes all her effort to continue charging into deeper waters. She dives beneath a large wave and when she surfaces, hears a lifeguard whistle coming from the beach. A blonde girl in a neon orange swimsuit is standing on her tower waving for Millicent to come back ashore. Millicent continues away.
She wakes up on the shoreline, the blonde lifeguard’s face just inches away. She coughs up sea water. There is a commotion with several worried adults hovering above her. Millicent gazes up at the blue sky and sees a seagull gliding effortlessly in the breeze. She fixes her gaze on the adults above and realizes her parents are not among them.