Five Sisters (22 page)

"But I can't forget it! And you can't either, Charlie . . . I know you can't."

"I . . . I can," he lied, "And I know that right now it might seem like you'll never be able to, but you will. You'll find some charming young man that will sweep you off your feet and you'll forget all about me. You may not think so now, but you will," Charlie said. He glanced up with a rather guilty expression, "I'm old enough to be your father, Sara. I'm more than twenty years your senior, have you realized that?"

"Of course I have," said Sara, stepping towards him, "But it doesn't matter."

Charlie backed away from her, "But it does matter! Have you ever imagined that you'd want to be with a man like me?
A man with . . . with . . . with graying hair and bags beneath his eyes and more wrinkles than he'd care to admit?
A man with shabby old clothes, no house, and no money?"

Sara blinked away tears, but forced herself to shake her head.

"You need someone that can take care of you, Sara, someone who can support you. I can barely support myself."

"I don't care about being wealthy. Money makes no difference to me."

"That's only because you have it! You've never known what life can be like without it," Charlie told her firmly. He finally glanced up to look her in the eye and said in a low voice, "I really don't want to discuss this matter any further. It'd be best if you leave now, Sara."

"But Charlie I . . ."

"Good night," he interrupted.

Sara fought back more tears by biting her lip and took a step towards the door. As she put the photographs back down on Charlie's desk, he sat down on the sofa in the back of the room. It was so old that the springs were falling out and it was covered in rips and patches. Charlie rested his elbows on his knees and laid his head in his hands as though he were ashamed of himself.

Sara tried to say goodbye, but couldn't find her voice. She left without another word, leaving Charlie broken and alone in his office.

Laden with a tray containing two dinner plates and two tall glasses, Gail feebly made her way down the stairs. She tried to keep as much tea in the glasses as possible, but it was rather difficult on such a narrow staircase and the warm liquid kept spilling onto the tray. When she finally reached the bottom, she sighed in relief and backed into Nathaniel's room.

He looked up and smiled, "What's on the menu tonight?"

"Pasta," Gail replied as she handed him his plate, "And warm bread too."

Nathaniel stuck out his tongue in disgust and Gail, with a raised eyebrow, smirked, "Ungrateful as always."

"Just tell your sisters to stop adding in so
much tomatoes
for once," he replied, picking at the red chunks with his fork.

"That sauce is delicious and I honestly don't see what you have to complain about. The tomatoes are wonderful."

"Disgusting."

"Juicy."

"It's not even sauce, for God's sake," Nathaniel claimed, "
It's
huge hunks of tomatoes surrounded by a small amount of liquid."

"Oh, come on! It's not that bad!"

With a small grin hidden behind her frown, Gail sat down in the chair beside him and began her own meal.

"Any news from the deck, Miss St. James?"
Nathaniel asked, for Gail had now assumed the responsibility of informing him of any updates of his fellow passengers, all of which were a mystery to him. He'd met Emy, Sara, and Nora before, but he'd only gotten a glimpse of Mary. And as far as the sailors, he'd only had the chance to meet Sawyer, Zooey, Rory, and Jacob. But he still liked to hear about what everyone was up to. It provided a little bit of intrigue in his rather boring days.

Gail shrugged, "Not much."

"Is Sara still acting strangely?"

"Yes, but I haven't found out why. She's been really quiet all of the sudden and she'll only read in our room, never in Charlie's office like she used to."

"Perhaps she's not feeling well. Or maybe she misses Laraford. Or that man, the artist, what's his name?"

"Brook?"

"Oh yes, Brook. Perhaps she's missing him."

"Perhaps," Gail agreed.

"And no change in Emy?"

Gail shook her head, "Not Nora either. I'm still convinced Emy's in love with one of the sailors, but I haven't found out which, and Nora's still hopelessly infatuated with Ben."

"How's Mary been lately?"

Taking a bite of her bread, Gail replied, "You know, it's strange- she was so depressed for a while, barely sleeping or eating, and now she's suddenly fine. I don't know if she's alright with the marriage now, because none of us have the courage to mention Ethan to her, but I'm hoping that's why she's been in such a good mood."

Nathaniel nodded, "That's probably it."

Gail gave a small smile and responded, as she always did, "And any news from the dungeon, Mr. West?"

"Well," Nathaniel stated in a deep, professional voice, "Besides visits from a rust-haired girl and a gray-haired man, things have been rather wearisome in the room occupied by Mr. Nathaniel John West. There's still a terrible amount of water visible outside his window and just a small sliver of the sky. The books haven't moved tremendously since you last stopped in and the medicine in these sparkling little bottles has slowly been draining away. Our occupant, Mr. West, maintains that he can still find a slight amount of enjoyment in reading old newspapers and can't wait for the day this old ship arrives in Wickensville and he can update his growing collection. But until then he is finding that although she may be a naïve, petulant little girl, Miss Abigail Ellen St. James provides a scant amount of amusement he is most thankful for."

Gail grinned, "Thank you for the update."

"You're very welcome," Nathaniel replied, pushing the chunks of tomato out of his sauce, "Do you know what I was thinking about today?"

"What's that?"

"I wonder what'll happen when I die."

Gail dropped her fork and looked up with wide eyes. That wasn't the sort of statement one likes to hear from a sick man, "What do you mean?"

Nathaniel continued casually, "Well, I wonder if I'll be put in a graveyard. I wonder what they'll write on my tomb. Who'll show up at the funeral? Will my parents? Will anyone even cry or will they all be silently thanking God for answering their prayers? I mean . . ."

"Nathaniel!" Gail exclaimed, "What in the world are you talking about? Who would ever thank God when they find out you're dead?"

"Plenty of people, I'm sure.
My parents, my nurses.
I'm sure they all just think of me as a nuisance they're forced to take care of. So they'll probably be throwing parties upon my grave."

"Don't say such a terrible thing!"

"But it's true." Gail raised an eyebrow at him, to which Nathaniel continued, "Well, perhaps they won't do all that. Actually, now that I think about it, they probably won't even come to the funeral. They won't want to take the time to do so. And they'll probably all be happy that they don't have to bother with me anymore."

"But you're their son!"

"That's never mattered much to them before."

Gail sighed, "Oh it's really useless to try and argue with you."

Nathaniel chomped into his bread before adding, "But if you and I are still acquaintances at the time of my death, will you promise me something?"

"What's that?"

"Don't let them drag me away to a cemetery, throw my body into some hole, and stick a slab of marble on top that says something silly and untrue. Tell them to just burn me up and throw me into a river," he scratched his head, as though thinking rather deeply, "Or rather, just tell them to do whatever will take the least amount of effort. I don't want everyone going all out of their way to buy me a gravestone and a coffin and a spot at St. Joseph's. I'll be dead, so I really don't think I'll care if I'm rotting away in a padded oak box or burnt to a crisp."

"But don't you want people to remember you?
To come to your grave and weep and say 'Boy, I'm going to miss that guy.'
Or bring you flowers on your birthday?"

"No, no. I don't want any of that," Nathaniel grinned, "In
fact,
you bring up another excellent point, my dear. I don't want anyone to bring me anything. Don't spend your well-earned money buying a bunch of silly flowers for a man who's
dead
. I've never understood why people do that. If someone's
dead
, they're really not going to care if you stick a bouquet over their rotting corpse."

"But don't you want to look down from heaven and see that people actually miss and care about you?"

Nathaniel chuckled, "Do you actually think that
I
am going to fly up to heaven and meet the big man himself? And he'll place some wings on my back and a halo over my head and send me off to play amongst the clouds?" he laughed harder, "At the rate I'm going, God won't even look at me before sending me straight down to Mr. Hades. And I don't think you can look up at people from hell; it doesn't work that way. But if you can, I wouldn't want to see people placing flowers on my stomach anyway. I'd think they were all a bunch of fools for wasting their money and taking the time to weep over someone who really doesn't care. It's silly."

Gail sighed, "Whatever you say."

"So you'll take care of all that for me,
Gaily
?"

"I suppose so."

"Good. So now that that's taken care of, do you want to play Rummy?"

The following morning, Emy and Gail had just woken up, but
neither felt ready to dress or head upstairs just yet and
they were simply relaxing beneath the blankets of their beds. Mary and Nora were already preparing the sailors' breakfast and Sara was taking a walk around the deck.

Emy rolled over to face Gail, "Shall we head upstairs now? I'm sure everyone's wondering what's keeping us."

Gail pulled her covers up over her face and shook her head quickly, "No, not yet.
Just a bit longer.
It's so nice and warm under here."

Emy nodded, "And so cold and windy on deck."

"Any idea what's wrong with Sara?"

"No.
Or Mary?"

"No," Gail paused, "And have you noticed that Charlie's been acting strangely too? He's a bit quiet than usual and he just sits in his office all day, letting Sawyer take over with the steering wheel. That's not like him at all."

"I hadn't noticed," Emy replied, "But I'll keep an eye out today."

"It seems like everyone's been acting strangely lately, doesn't it?"

Emy nodded, "And I haven't any idea why."

"Me neither."

"How much longer till we arrive in Brighton?"

"Quite a bit.
I think we're only halfway there," Gail informed her sister, "Charlie says that storm delayed us a bit."