Tomorrow There Will Be Sun Read online

  We throw open Clem’s door and there she stands, half naked.

  “Jesus,” she screams. “Don’t you knock?”

  I throw my arms around her. She has no shirt on, just a bra, and a tiny pair of cotton shorts that stand in for pajamas. Peter is holding her, too. She squirms her way out of our embrace and grabs a T-shirt off the bed, holding it up to her chest.

  “You’re okay,” I say. “You’re okay.”

  “Of course I’m okay. God.”

  “We tried calling. I texted you.”

  Clem gestures to her phone next to her bed. “I ran out of power.”

  Peter takes one more look at her and then races off, presumably to check on Malcolm. Clem slips on her shirt.

  “You told us our curfew was one o’clock.” She looks at her new watch. “It’s twelve-twenty. We got home early. What’s your problem?”

  “The club . . .” I start, but the relief is so overwhelming, it’s like I’m under water. I can’t fill my lungs. I sit down on the edge of her bed.

  “Yeah, the club was lit. It was super fun. Thanks for letting us go. But I got tired. So we grabbed a cab. We just got home, like, five minutes ago.”

  “Wait. I don’t understand.”

  “What don’t you understand, Mother? We went to the club. We danced a bunch. We didn’t have anything to drink or take any drugs just like we promised and then we left and we came home. Early, I might add.”

  “You just left the club?”

  “Yeah. Like twenty minutes ago.”

  “You took a cab?”

  “Yeah.”

  Peter and Solly appear in the doorway.

  “Thank God,” Solly says. “What a night.”

  “Sounds like you just missed it,” Peter says.

  “Missed what?” Clementine asks. “What is everyone talking about?”

  “Well, sweetie,” Peter says. “If Malcolm hadn’t gotten sick and you hadn’t left the club after only half an hour and come straight home you would have been there for a really terrible scene. You were so lucky. We’re all so lucky.”

  “Except for Malcolm,” Solly adds. “Just goes to show you there’s no correlation between a meal’s cost and its cleanliness. Poor kid. It must have been the ceviche.”

  I’m still under water. Still struggling to fill my lungs. To find the surface.

  “What happened?” Clementine asks.

  “There was a kidnapping. At the club. The whole downtown is chaos. There aren’t any cabs. We had to walk home. It was torture,” Peter says. “That was the longest walk of my life.”

  “Didn’t you hear the sirens?” Solly asks. “Maybe not. Ingrid and Ivan are sound asleep, so I guess you didn’t hear them here.”

  “No,” Clem says. “I guess we didn’t.”

  She won’t look at me.

  Solly lets out a huge sigh and stretches his arms above his head. “Well, I’m going to bed. I’m wrecked. What a fucking night. I love you all. Even you, Clementine. We don’t tell each other enough so I’m saying it loud and clear. I love every single one of you three idiots. And you know what else I love? Food poisoning. I have never loved food poisoning until tonight. All hail food poisoning. I love you, bad ceviche.”

  Solly steps across the threshold of Clem’s room and he kisses her cheek, then he bends down to where I sit silently on her bed and he kisses mine. He goes and he hugs Peter and they hold on to each other for a long time before pulling back and kissing each other’s cheeks.

  “Good night, Carlsons,” he says and heads off toward the master bedroom.

  “Come on.” Peter reaches a hand out to help me up from Clem’s bed. “Let’s go. I feel like I could sleep for days.”

  I keep my hands folded in my lap. “In a minute,” I say.

  He smiles at me. I understand, he is telling me. You just want to sit awhile with our beautiful, perfectly fine daughter.

  “Good night, Clementine.”

  She allows him to embrace her now that she’s clothed. “Good night, Daddy.”

  Peter closes the door and I continue to sit. I continue to wait for her to look at me. I continue to feel both the heavy weight of relief and the complete and utter confusion that arrived alongside the first scream of that first siren.

  Clem goes over to the dressing table in her room. She opens a drawer, takes out a package of disposable makeup wipes, sits down on the stool and starts removing her mascara and eyeliner. She has her back to me, but we can see each other in the magnifying mirror.

  She finally meets my gaze. “We did just get home about five minutes before you. I wasn’t lying about that.”

  I don’t say anything.

  “Malcolm doesn’t have food poisoning.”

  I still don’t say anything.

  “And we did go to the club. But only for a little bit like Malcolm said.”

  I wonder if she’s trying to say as many true things as she can that aren’t incendiary, that don’t have consequences. She’s listing a string of facts as a way to protect herself, building a fortress of truth into which she can retreat from whatever attack I have planned.

  But I do not have a plan of attack. I have no idea what’s happening. I’m confounded. I am lost like when I was in that crowd, but I am not afraid because my daughter is sitting in front of me, within arm’s reach, and now that her makeup is off, she is brushing her beautiful hair. Maybe I’m supposed to be summoning up some anger, but anger feels very far away. It lies on the pitch-black bottom of the ocean and I’m just coming up to the surface, just reaching the light.

  “Tell me,” I say. “Tell me what happened tonight.”

  She shifts her gaze so that she is looking hard at herself in the mirror. She frowns. “I don’t want to.”

  “You’ll forgive me for saying that I don’t really give a shit if you want to or not.” The calm in my voice surprises me. And I think it unnerves her. She can fight with me when her first line of defense is that I’m crazy or I’m irrational. But that line isn’t available to her as I sit here exuding reason and patience. It is the wee hours of the morning, and I have nothing but time.

  “Well, okay. But don’t freak out.”

  “Why does everyone keep telling me not to freak out?”

  “Because, Mom. You tend to freak out.”

  “Okay,” I say. “I won’t. I promise.”

  She turns around on her stool so that the magnifying mirror is no longer doing the work for us. We look directly at each other.

  “We went to the club. That part is true. And it was really fun. That part is also true. We danced. True. And we did not drink or take any drugs. All true.”

  I sit and wait. I am patience.

  “And then we left,” she says. “We left because we wanted to go somewhere and . . . be alone.”

  Calm. Project calm.

  “We figured you’d probably be home and even if you hadn’t gotten home yet, Ingrid and Ivan would be here, so we had to find someplace else, you know?”

  “Someplace else to . . . be alone.”

  “Yes. So we went to that beach. The one where you found us on the first day. The one that’s totally private. The one that looks like it’s in Lost. And that’s where we were. We were there up until about five minutes before you came back. I was wondering why you guys were out so late, but then I just figured: whatever. You were probably out drinking.”

  She is safe. She wasn’t at the nightclub. This is all that matters. This is all I should care about. I should stand up and give her a hug and tell her I’m relieved that nothing bad happened to her and I should tell her to go to bed and get a good night’s sleep.

  “Why did you and Malcolm need to be alone?”

  She stares at me. I watch as the signs of repentance start to vanish and her edges return. “Do you really need me to spell this out for
you?”

  “I guess I do.”

  “Malcolm and I wanted to be alone, Mother, because Malcolm and I wanted to have sex.” Now her bottom lip starts to tremble a little. She’s trying so hard for defiance, but she doesn’t have it in her.

  Something is wrong.

  A single tear works its way down her cheek. I fight the urge to reach out and wipe it away with my fingertip. I am afraid to do or say anything. Afraid to scare her off. I wait for her to say more, but she doesn’t.

  “Are you okay?” I ask.

  “Yes.”

  “Do you want to come sit next to me?” I pat a spot on the bed.

  “No.”

  “Do you want to tell me what happened at the beach?”

  She swallows. She looks down at her hands. She still doesn’t say anything. I can’t help myself: I search her. I search every inch of her. She is sitting before me in a tiny T-shirt and even tinier shorts. Even after days of sun, her skin is so pale, so delicate. I am looking for a sign that she’s been hurt. I look for scratches. Bruising. Deep purple or maybe beige since the bruise would be so recent. There is nothing. She is flawless. She is perfect.

  “It didn’t really go how I’d imagined it would,” she says finally.

  Another tear. She turns back around to face the mirror, grabs the balled-up makeup wipe and rubs her eyes with it. She leans in close and inspects herself, looking for traces of eyeliner or mascara, but there’s nothing left.

  “What happened, Clementine?”

  Now she starts to cry in earnest. She keeps her back to me and she shields her face from the mirror but her shoulders are shaking. She looks so small and vulnerable. I let her cry for a little.

  “What did he do to you?” I ask finally. My voice is barely more than a whisper.

  She straightens up. She turns around. Her face is a red, blotchy mess.

  “What?”

  “Did he hurt you?”

  “No. Mom. God.”

  “Did he force you to do something you didn’t want to?”

  “Mom. We didn’t have sex.”

  Relief floods me. I exhale and collapse a little. I’d been sitting up straight. Rigid. I didn’t realize how tautly I’d been holding every muscle in my body.

  “Why are you smiling?” Clem asks.

  Was I smiling?

  “I guess I’m just relieved.” I lean forward and I reach for her hand, but she pulls hers back.

  “Mother. We didn’t have sex because he didn’t want to. He rejected me.”

  “No, that can’t be right.”

  “God. Why are you so clueless? Of course it’s right. I wanted to have sex and he didn’t. That’s rejection. He rejected me. He rejected me because I’m not good enough for him.”

  The calm and quiet is leaving the room. The reason, the understanding, the connection we’d forged, is packing its bags. I am no longer patience.

  “Clementine. Why would you want to have sex with Malcolm? Why would you want your first time to be with him? With someone you don’t really know all that well? Why wouldn’t you want your first time to be with somebody like Sean?”

  “Lol,” she says, though she is not laughing out loud. She is not amused in the slightest. She is saying lol but she means the opposite of lol.

  “What’s that supposed to mean?”

  “I mean it’s funny that you think that this would have been my first time.”

  “I don’t understand. . . . I thought you and Sean weren’t having sex.”

  “And why did you think that?”

  “Because you said you’d tell me if you were. You promised you’d come to me before you made that decision.”

  “And you really thought I’d tell my mommy before I had sex with my boyfriend? Do people even do that?”

  “Yes, Clementine. They do.”

  “Ha. I don’t think so, Mother.”

  We sit silently, wrapped in our own grievances. I reach for the calm, the patience. When I speak again I bring the volume down several notches. Back to where we began.

  “I thought you and Sean weren’t ready. I thought you were just enjoying the love part of your relationship without the sex.”

  “I think you thought that because you read my texts.” Now I’m the one avoiding her stare. “And since we both know you read my texts we’re careful about what we say to each other.”

  I sigh. “Oh, Clem.”

  She sniffles and clears her throat. She is done crying. She is pulling herself together. “I thought Malcolm was into me. He sure seemed like he was. But then when it came down to it, to you know, doing it, he stopped. He said he didn’t think it was a good idea. He said I have a boyfriend, and that his life is complicated, and that we probably won’t see each other again for another four years, and . . . I’m just really embarrassed.”

  “Oh, Clem,” I say again. “It sounds like he was being thoughtful. And kind. And mature about it.”

  “No, Mother. He was rejecting me. Obviously I’m not attractive enough or whatever. I’m gross. If I was hot enough, he wouldn’t have been able to stop himself.”

  I pat the spot on the bed next to me. “Please?”

  She rolls her eyes, but then she lifts herself off the stool and she collapses into me. Her head is on my shoulder. I put my arm around her and I kiss her beautiful hair.

  “Honey,” I say. “You shouldn’t be embarrassed. Malcolm was just trying to do the right thing. He’s a good kid. I’m sure he wanted to. I see the way he is with you, the way he looks at you. But sometimes the right thing to do is to hold back, to stop ourselves from doing what we want, from acting on every impulse we have. Sometimes we have to look ahead. To try and predict the ways in which our choices may affect us later.”

  I want to add that Malcolm certainly did not learn this from watching his father, but of course I don’t.

  Clem’s breathing is slow and steady. She is seconds from sleep. Like Ivan when his thumb is in his mouth.

  “I’m so tired,” she says.

  She scrambles away from me, up and underneath the covers of her bed. I rise and walk over to her and pull the blanket to her chin. I stroke the hair off her face. I reach to turn off the light, but before I do, I look at her closed eyelids.

  I take a moment to see what my daughter looks like sleeping.

  * * *

  • • •

  I WAKE UP AT NOON. This has never happened. Not even in college when everyone slept half the day away. Peter is still snoring next to me. Sleeping late has never been a problem for him.

  I go downstairs. I’ve missed breakfast. I wonder if they’re already preparing lunch. If it’s too late to ask for a poached egg.

  There’s nobody in the dining room so I head for the kitchen. There’s nobody in the kitchen either. The coffeepot is half full. Someone has pushed the button and brewed the pot Roberto prepares before he leaves for the night. And someone has left dishes on the counter. A half-eaten bowl of cereal. Two plates with crusts of bread and the rough husk of a pineapple wedge.

  There are never dirty dishes on the counter. Luisa won’t stand for it.

  I go back to the dining room and walk out to the edge of the balcony. I look down one level to the pool. Ivan lies on an alligator raft, surrounded by a rainbow of foam noodles. Solly and Ingrid sit side by side in loungers, holding hands.

  “Morning,” I call down.

  “Is it?” Solly calls back. He looks up at the sun. “Because it feels like afternoon to me.”

  “Where is everybody?”

  “Malcolm is sleeping off his food poisoning,” Solly says. “And I assume your people are still upstairs filling their eyes with golden slumbers.”

  “What about Roberto, Enrique and Luisa?”

  “They didn’t show this morning,” Ingrid calls. “So I made us some breakfast.
There’s plenty of stuff in the fridge. Solly filled me in on what happened last night. Oh, my goodness. So scary.”

  “Do you think the roads are closed?” Solly asks. “That maybe that’s why they aren’t here?”

  “I don’t know,” I say. “I’ll go see what I can find out online.”

  “Don’t bother,” he says. “The wi-fi is down. Better just grab yourself a cup of coffee and something to eat and join us by the pool. Out here”—he holds his arms out wide—“it’s still paradise.”

  I do as I’m told. I pour some coffee. I make some toast. I cut up what’s left of the pineapple. It has been five days since I have prepared anything for myself or anyone else and it feels laborious. I marvel at how quickly one can adjust to doing nothing.

  I join the Solomons poolside. They seem calm and relaxed. Blissed out. They continue to hold hands.

  “Look at me,” Ivan shouts. “Mommy, Mommy, look at me!”

  “That’s amazing, baby.” She pulls her hand out of Solly’s so she can clap at Ivan’s unimpressive underwater trick. “You are amazing.” She slips her hand back into Solly’s.

  I stare at Solly’s hands. I think of how last night they lifted me up, pulled me from the crowd. How they guided me toward Peter and the kind officer. I think of Solly’s steady voice in my ear. It’s okay. The kids are okay. We found somebody who knows. This way.

  I loved Solly last night. I do love Solly. But I hate him, too. And I hate to see how he holds Ingrid’s hand as if to say I am yours. We belong to each other.

  I lie back and I close my eyes to the sun. Ivan splashes in the pool. Solly hasn’t put on any music in deference to the sleepers. The air is still, but not silent. I hear sirens. At least I think I do. They are in the distance, so far away that they could be the sirens from last night. My brain could still be processing the noises and reverberations, the chaos.

  “Do you hear that?” I ask.

  Solly and Ingrid both sit up straighter. Ingrid cocks her head. “I think so,” she says. “Are those sirens?”

  “Sounds like it.” Solly lies back down and sighs. “You know what I could use right now? I could use a cold drink.”