drove us to the ferry station, where people could grab a boat to Nantucket, Martha’s Vineyard, Provincetown or, in my case, Scupper Island, my hometown, a small island three miles off the rough and ragged coast of southern Maine. The ferry came to Boston almost every day; it was also the mail boat and could carry all of three cars.
Bobby unloaded my suitcases and bought my ticket. Our breakup had made him once again solicitous; he’d been a prince these past few days, fetching me my painkillers, reading to me as I fell asleep, even cooking for me.
I didn’t care. He’d been fondling someone’s hair in my hospital room, and that was not something I’d forget.
The ferry pulled in, a battered little thing, same as it had always been. Jake Ferriman, the eponymous captain of the Scupper Island ferry, was a fixture. He didn’t acknowledge me, just tied up the boat and jumped off, a small sack of mail in one hand.
I’d hoped my mom would come on the ferry to get me; I’d called her when I was discharged from the hospital and told her I’d be coming home, that I’d been hurt but was okay—I think I used the words expected to recover, always looking for attention where my mother was concerned. Her only response had been a sigh, followed by “I’ll pick you up at the dock when you get here,” and I bit down on all the things I wanted to say. It could wait. I was starting over, after all.
Jake returned from wherever he dropped the mail, carrying the return post in a bag in one hand. He checked his clipboard. “You travelin’ alone?” he asked, eyeing Boomer.
“With the dog here.”
He frowned, glanced at me again, then made a check mark on his clipboard.
“I guess this is it, then,” Bobby said. “Call me when you get settled, okay?”
He hugged me carefully, then buttoned my coat over my sling. There was the lump in my throat again. “Take care,” I whispered.
We’d been friends for a long time and a couple for more than a year. All that was over and done with now.
Bobby’s eyes were wet, too.
Jake hefted my suitcases onto the boat, then took Boomer’s leash. My dog jumped happily onto the boat and snuffled the wind. I followed more carefully.
I went inside the ferry’s cabin and sat down, laid my crutch next to me. Looked at Bobby through the window and waved. Tried to smile.
“Ever been to Scupper before?” Jake asked.
I blinked, surprised he didn’t know who I was. Then again, I was an adult now. I wasn’t the overweight girl with bad skin and worse posture. “I grew up there. I’m Nora Stuart, Mr. Ferriman.”
“Sharon’s girl?”
“Yes.”
“The one with the kid?”
“No. The other one.” The doctor, I almost added, but that would’ve been prideful, and Mainers didn’t like that.
Jake grunted, and I sensed our conversation was over.
Then he started the engine, pulled the lines, and we were off, Boston’s pretty skyline growing smaller as we headed out on the dark gray water, toward the clouds hanging on the horizon.
My hands tingled with nerves, and I petted Boomer’s head. He looked up at me with his sweet doggy smile. “Sorry about this, pal,” I whispered. “No one is going to be too happy to see us.”
Scupper Island, Maine, was named for Captain Jedediah Scupper, a whaling captain who left Nantucket after he lost an election on the church council. He came to settle his own island and give Nantucket a big middle finger. Nantucket didn’t seem to mind. Captain Scupper brought a wife and five kids, and those five kids found spouses, and before you knew it, there was a legitimate community here.
Over the years, its residents lived the same way as those on most Maine islands did—they suffered after the whaling industry died, then turned to fishing and lobstering.
Islanders prided themselves on survival and toughness, bonded together by hurricanes and nor’easters, drownings and hardship. When the Gilded Age hit, it gave Scupper a new industry—service. Cleaning, gardening, catering, carpentry, plumbing, nannying, taking care of the rich folks and their property.
That never changed.
I grew up with the belief that while the rich people came in June—the summer nuisance, we called them—Scupper Island was for us, the tough Yankees. We’d deal with the summer people, those who owned big houses on the rocky cliffs and moored their wooden sailboats in our picturesque coves. The kids were attractive and polite, but never our real friends, not when they wore Vineyard Vines and Ralph Lauren and had European nannies. Not when they ate at the local restaurants where our parents worked.
But they were our bread and butter, and lots of them were genuinely nice people. They donated to our schools, paid the taxes that kept our roads patched and plowed, fed the local economy. Still, we were glad when they left every Labor Day. Being cheerful representatives of their summer getaway was a little wearing.
Scupper belonged to us. To my sister and me, to our dad and absolutely to our mom.
My mother, Sharon Potter Stuart (and believe me, her maiden name was the source of great joy to this Muggle), was a fourth-generation islander, born and raised here. She was a typical tough Maine woman—able to shoot a deer, dress it and make venison chili in the same day. She cut and stacked her own wood, made her own food, viewed going to restaurants as wasteful. She knew how to do everything—fish, sail, fix a car, make biscuits from scratch, sew our dresses. Once, she even stitched up a cut when the one doctor on Scupper was attending a difficult birth.
Scupper was not just the name of our founder. It’s also part of a ship—a drain, essentially, that allows excess water to flow out into the ocean, rather than puddle in the bottom. It was almost fitting, then, that so many of Scupper Island’s residents left, slipping away to bigger waters. If you didn’t make your life off the sea or tourism, Scupper Island was a tough place to stay.
Mom never went to college, never took a vacation. Once, I made the mistake of asking if we could go to Disney World, like just about every other American family. “Why on earth would we go there? You think it’s prettier than this here?” she said once, her thick Maine accent turning earth to uhth, here to heeah.
My earliest memories of my mother were all good. She was safe and reliable, as mothers should be. Our meals were nutritious if unimaginative. She braided my somewhat-wild hair every day, patiently taming the snarls without ever pulling. She made sure we were clean. She drank black coffee all day long, the kind that she brewed in a pot on the stove, and watched us play while she did housework and chores, a hint of a smile on her face.
Our house, though plainly furnished, was clean and tidy. Homework was done at the kitchen table, under her gaze. She went to all the parent events at school. When we walked through a parking lot or across the Main Street and Elm intersection, she held my hand, but otherwise, there wasn’t a lot of physical affection. When I was very little and she gave me my bath, sometimes she put the washcloth on my head and told me I had a fancy
