Chapter 7: The Boathouse

The boathouse stood at the end of the pier I had not looked at in about three days.

I looked at it now.

The planks were grey and soft, the water below them black and slow, and the cold came up through my shoes.

My mother had walked here, and my mother had fallen here.

I made myself keep walking.

The boathouse door had a brass padlock, and the old key turned in it with a groan.

I went in and locked the door behind me, as Winifred had said.

Inside it smelled of dust and cedar and old lavender.

A small bed stood against the far wall, with a patchwork quilt pulled flat.

Beside it was a desk, a lamp and a chair with a cardigan over the back.

Someone had dusted everything.

I stood in the middle of the room and could not move.

I had spent my life building a wall of facts about a woman I had no face for.

Now she had a cardigan.

I touched the sleeve, and the wool was soft and gray, with a hole in one elbow.

I put it to my face and breathed in.

It smelled faintly of her, or of lavender, or of nothing at all.

I didn't care which.

I stood there with my eyes shut until I could breathe properly again.

The desk drawers held pencils, a hairbrush with dark red hairs in it, and a stack of unpaid hospital bills.

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