“That she’s an idiot? Think about it, Harmon. If you’re young and you’ve got heart damage, then you’re not supposed to be partying. And you’re certainly not supposed to go on starving yourself.”
“She’s not starving herself. I saw her in the marina with the fellow. They were sitting in a booth, ordering breakfast.”
“And how much of the breakfast did she eat?”
“I don’t know,” he admitted, remembering her small back as she’d leaned over the table. “But she doesn’t look sick. She’s a pretty girl.”
“That’s what Kathleen says. Tim met her when he was driving around the country following some band. I guess people just follow this band around, Fish or Pish. Something. Remember Kevin talking about Dead Heads, people who followed around that mess—what were they called? The Grateful Dead? I always found that offensive.”
“He died,” said Harmon. “That fat fellow Jerry of that band.”
“Well, I hope he died gratefully,” Bonnie said.
The leaves were half-gone now. The Norway maples still hung on to their yellow, but most of the orangey-red of the sugar maples had found their way to the ground, leaving behind the stark branches that seemed to hang like stuck-out arms and tiny fingers, skeletal and bleak. Harmon sat on the couch next to Daisy. He had just mentioned to her that he never saw the young couple anymore, and she told him that Les Washburn had kicked them out after the party that had led to the arrests, but she didn’t know where they were living, only that Tim still worked at the sawmill.
“Bonnie said the girl had that disease where you starve yourself,” Harmon said. “But I don’t know if that’s true.”
Daisy shook her head. “Pretty young girls starving themselves. I’ve read articles about it. They do it so they can feel in control, and then it goes out of control and they can’t stop. It’s just the saddest thing.”
Harmon himself had been losing weight. It wasn’t that hard to do; he just stopped taking the extra portion at night, had a smaller slice of cake. He felt better. He told this to Daisy, and she nodded.
“Same with my smoking. I’ve been putting off the first cigarette of the day, and I’ve got it pushed back now—three in the afternoon.”
“That’s great, Daisy.” He had seen that she’d not been smoking on Sunday mornings, but wasn’t going to mention it. The appetites of the body were private battles.
“Tell me, Harmon,” Daisy said, brushing something from her pant leg, glancing over with a mischievous smile. “Who was your first girlfriend?”
In fourth grade he’d had a crush on Candy Connelly. He’d stand behind her to watch her take the steps up the big metal slide on the playground, and one time she had fallen. When she’d cried, he had felt helpless with love. All that at nine years old. Daisy said when she was nine, her mother sewed her a yellow dress to wear to the spring concert the school had every year. “She pinned a white lilac to it just as we left that evening,” Daisy said, with her soft laugh. “Walking to the school—oh, I felt so pretty.”
Harmon’s mother didn’t sew, but she used to make popcorn balls at Christmas. Speaking of this, he felt something had been returned to him, as though the inestimable losses of life had been lifted like a boulder, and beneath he saw—under the attentive gaze of Daisy’s blue eyes—the comforts and sweetness of what had once been.
When he got home, Bonnie said, “What took you so long? I need you to climb up and fix those gutters like you’ve been promising to do.”
He handed her the bag with her doughnut.
“And the pipe under the sink has been dripping into that bucket for weeks. Ironic you should own a hardware store.”
Unexpectedly, a ripple of terror went through him. He sat down in his La-Z-Boy. In a moment he said, “Hey, Bonnie, would you ever want to move?”
“Move?”
“Say to Florida or somewhere.”
“Are you crazy? Or are you kidding.”
“Where there’s sun all year long. Where the house isn’t so big and empty.”
“I’m not even going to answer such a ludicrous thing.” She peered into the bag with the doughnut. “Cinnamon? You know I hate cinnamon.”
“It’s all they had.” He picked up a magazine, so as not to look at her. But in a moment, he said, “Has it ever bothered you, Bonnie, that none of the boys want to take over the store?”
Bonnie frowned. “We’ve talked about that, Harmon. Why in the world should it bother us? They’re free to do what they like.”
“Of course they are. But it would’ve been nice. Have at least one of them around.”
“This negativity of yours. It’s driving me nuts.”
“Negativity?”
“I just wish you’d perk up.” She crumpled the doughnut bag closed. “And clean out those gutters. It isn’t pleasant, Harmon, having to feel like a nag.”
By November, the leaves were gone, the trees along Main Street were bare, and the sky was often overcast. The shortening days made Harmon recall a soberness of heart that he had felt off and on for a long time; no wonder Bonnie had told him to perk up. In a small, private way, he was perking up. Because now, as he went around closing up the store, selling nails to a last-minute customer, he found himself looking forward to his Sunday mornings with Daisy with a sense of gladness, not the furtive urgency of those few months they’d been…“buddies.” It was as though a lightbulb glowed in a town where nighttime came swiftly, and sometimes driving home he would go the long way to pass by her house. Once he saw a dented Volvo parked in her driveway; it was covered with bumper stickers, and he wondered if some of Copper’s family had come from Boston to visit.
The next Sunday, Daisy said, in a hushed tone at the door, “Come in, Harmon. Have I got a story to tell you.” She put a finger to her lips, then said, “Nina’s asleep upstairs in the little room.” They sat at the dining room table as Daisy told him in a whisper that the girl, a few days earlier, had had a fight with Tim—they’d been staying at some motel on Route 1 since getting kicked out of the Washburn place—and he’d gone off with their cell phone. Nina knocked on Daisy’s door, so distraught Daisy thought she might have to get her to a doctor. Nina got hold of the boy, though, and he’d come by to get her. Daisy thought they’d made up. But last night the girl knocked again, another fight, and she didn’t have a place to stay. So now she was upstairs. Daisy clasped her hands together on the table. “Boy, do I want a cigarette.”
Harmon sat back. “Well, hold off if you can. We’ll get this figured out.”
Above them the floor creaked, there was a motion on the stairs, and here was the girl, wearing flannel pants and a T-shirt. “Hello,” said Harmon, so as not to frighten her, being startled himself. He had not seen her for weeks, since she’d been in the store; she was hardly recognizable. The girl’s head seemed much too large for her body; veins were visible on the sides of her forehead, and her bare arms were as skinny as the slats of the chair back she took hold of. He almost couldn’t look.
“Sit, dear,” said Daisy. The girl sat, her long, long arms placed on the table. Truly, it was as though a skeleton had sat down with them.
“Did he call?” the girl asked Daisy. Her skin was not cinnamon-looking now, but pallid, and her hair, uncombed, looked like the hair of a stuffed animal, not real.
“No, dear. He didn’t.” Daisy handed her a tissue, and Harmon saw the girl was weeping.
“What’m I going to do?” she asked. She looked past Harmon, out the window at the road. “I mean, Victoria, of all people. Jesus, she was my friend.”
“You can stay another day while you get it figured out,” said Daisy. The girl turned her big light-brown eyes toward Daisy, as though studying her from somewhere far off.
“You should eat something, dear,” Daisy said. “I know you don’t want to, but you should.”
“She’s right,” Harmon said. It worried him to think of this girl falling faint or dead in Daisy’s little cottage. He thought of Bonnie saying how she
had already damaged her heart. “Look.” He pushed forward the two bags from the marina. “Doughnuts.”
The girl eyed the bags. “Doughnuts?”
“How about just half a glass of milk, and a bit of doughnut?” Daisy asked. The girl began to weep again. While Daisy went to get the milk, Harmon reached into his pocket and handed her his white folded handkerchief. The girl stopped crying, started to laugh.
“Hey, cool,” she said. “I didn’t know anyone used these anymore.”
“Go ahead and use it,” Harmon said. “But for the love of God, drink that milk.”
Daisy brought in the milk, took the doughnut from its bag, broke it in two.
“Fucking Luke,” the girl said, with sudden energy. “He put me on fucking probation for being a muffin cutter.”
“A what?” asked Daisy, sitting down.
“In the hospital. One time I cut my muffin in half. The rules are, you’re not supposed to engage—that’s the word they use, engage—with the food except to eat it. So I have this plastic knife in my pocket and I cut the muffin in half, and I get reported to Luke. ‘We heard you’ve been cutting your muffins, Nina,’ he said, with his arms folded across his chest.” The girl rolled her eyes extravagantly when she finished telling this. “Muffin Luke. The fucker.”
Daisy and Harmon looked at each other.
“How did you get out of the hospital?” asked Harmon.
“I ran away. But next time, my parents said they’d commit me, and then I’m fucked.”
“Better eat the doughnut,” Harmon said.
The girl giggled. “You’re kind of goofy.”
“He’s not goofy. He’s concerned about you. Now eat the doughnut,” Daisy said, in a melodious voice.
“So, like, what’s the story with you two?” The girl looked from one to the other.
“We’re friends,” said Daisy, but Harmon saw that her cheeks colored.
“Okay.” Nina looked again from one to the other. Tears swelled in her eyes and spilled over. “I don’t know what to do without Tim,” she said. “And I don’t want to go back to the hospital.” She had begun to shiver. Harmon took off his big woolen cardigan and put it over her shoulders.
“Of course you don’t,” said Daisy. “But you need to eat. You’re going to have other boyfriends, you know.”
Harmon realized by a shift in the girl’s expression that this was what she feared—being without love. Who didn’t fear that? But he knew her problems had roots that were long and tangled, and the safety of Daisy’s cottage could not provide any lasting relief. She was very sick. “How old are you?” he asked.
“Twenty-three. So you can’t make me go to the hospital. I know this shit,” she added. “So don’t try anything.”
He held both palms toward her. “I am trying nothing.” He put his hands down. “Didn’t you get arrested?”
Nina nodded. “I had to show up in court. We both got ACD’s, but I got an extra lecture because I’d been, you know, an asshole to that fucker police.”
“What’s an ACD?”
But Nina was exhausted; she folded her arms, putting her head down, like he had seen her do in the marina that day. He and Daisy glanced at each other. “Nina,” he said softly, and she rolled her eyes toward him. He picked up the doughnut. He said, “To my memory, I have never begged for anything.” Just slightly the girl smiled at him. “And I am begging you to eat.”
The girl sat up slowly. “Only because you’ve been nice,” she said. She ate the doughnut so ravenously, Daisy had to tell her to slow down.
“He stole from you,” Nina said to Harmon, with her mouth full. “He stole some tubing that day to make a bong.” She lifted the glass of milk.
“You’re better off without him,” Daisy said.
A loud knocking on the kitchen door caused them all to turn; the door opened, banged shut. “Hello!”
The girl gave a whimper, spit the doughnut into Harmon’s handkerchief, started to rise from her chair. Harmon’s sweater fell from her shoulders to the floor.
“No, dear.” Daisy put her hand on the girl’s arm. “It’s only a woman come to collect money for the Red Cross.”
Olive Kitteridge stood in the doorway to the dining room, almost filling the space up. “Well, look at the tea party. Hello, Harmon.” To the girl: “Who are you?”
The girl looked at Daisy, then at the table, her hand clenching the handkerchief. Looking back at Olive, she said sarcastically, “Who are you?”
“I’m Olive,” said Olive. “And if you don’t mind, I’d like to sit down. Begging for money seems to knock me out. I think this is the last year I’ll canvass.”
“Can I get you some coffee, Olive?”
“Nope. Thank you.” Olive had gone round to the other side of the table, seated herself in a chair. “But that doughnut looks good. You have any more?”
“In fact, we do.” Daisy opened the other bag, glancing at Harmon—it was the doughnut meant for Bonnie—and pushed the paper bag toward Olive, the doughnut on it. “I could get you a plate.”
“Oh, hell no.” Olive ate the doughnut, leaning forward over the table. A silence fell.
“Let me get you the check.” Daisy stood and went into the next room.
“Henry okay?” Harmon asked. “Christopher?”
Olive nodded, her mouth moving with the doughnut. Harmon knew—as most people in town did—that she didn’t like her son’s new wife, but, then, Harmon didn’t think Olive would like any wife of her son. The new wife was a doctor, smart, and from some city, he didn’t remember where. Maybe she made baggies of granola, did yoga—he had no idea. Olive was watching Nina, and Harmon followed her gaze. Nina sat motionless, slumped forward, the back of each rib bone defined against her thin T-shirt; she clutched his handkerchief with a hand that looked like the claw of a seagull. Her head looked too big to be supported by the ridged stick of her backbone. The vein running from her hairline across to her brow was a greenish-blue color.
Olive finished the doughnut, wiped the sugar from her fingers, sat back, and said, “You’re starving.”
The girl didn’t move, only said, “Uh—duh.”
“I’m starving, too,” Olive said. The girl looked over at her. “I am,” Olive said. “Why do you think I eat every doughnut in sight?”
“You’re not starving,” Nina said with disgust.
“Sure I am. We all are.”
“Wow,” Nina said, quietly. “Heavy.”
Olive looked through her big black handbag, took a tissue, wiped at her mouth, her forehead. It took a moment for Harmon to realize she was agitated. When Daisy returned and said, “Here you go, Olive,” slipping her an envelope, Olive only nodded, put it into her bag.
“Jesus,” said Nina. “Okay, I’m sorry.” Olive Kitteridge was crying. If there was anyone in town Harmon believed he would never see cry, Olive was that person. But there she sat, large and big-wristed, her mouth quivering, tears coming from her eyes. She shook her head slightly, as though to indicate the girl needn’t apologize.
“Excuse me,” she finally said, but she stayed where she was.
“Olive, is there anything—” Daisy leaned forward.
Olive shook her head again, blew her nose. She looked at Nina, and said quietly, “I don’t know who you are, but young lady, you’re breaking my heart.”
“I’m not trying to,” Nina said, defensively. “It’s not like I can help it.”
“Oh, I know that. I know.” Olive nodded. “I taught school for thirty-two years. I never saw a girl sick like you, it wasn’t around then—not up here, anyway. But I know from all those years with kids, and—and just living—” Olive stood up, wiped crumbs from her front. “Anyway, I’m sorry.” She started to move away, stopped when she was near the girl. Hesitantly, she raised her hand, started to put it down, then raised it again, and touched the girl’s head. She must have felt, beneath her large hand, something Harmon didn’t see, because she slid her hand down to the girl’s bone of a sho
ulder, and the girl—tears creeping from her closed eyes—leaned her cheek on Olive’s hand.
“I don’t want to be like this,” the girl whispered.
“Of course you don’t,” said Olive. “And we’re going to get you help.”
The girl shook her head. “They’ve tried. I just keep getting sick again. It’s hopeless.”
Olive reached and pulled over a chair, so that she could sit with the girl’s head on her big lap. She stroked the girl’s hair, and held a few pieces in her fingers, giving Daisy and Harmon a meaningful nod before flicking the hair to the floor. You lost your hair when you starved. Olive had stopped her own weeping, and said, “Are you too young to know who Winston Churchill was?”
“I know who he was,” the girl said, tiredly.
“Well, he said, never, never, never, never give up.”
“He was fat,” said Nina, “so what did he know?” She added, “It’s not that I want to give up.”
“Of course not,” said Olive. “But your body’s going to give up without some fuel. I know you’ve heard this all before, so you just lie there and don’t answer. Well, answer this: Do you hate your mother?”
“No,” Nina said. “I mean, she’s kind of pathetic, but I don’t hate her.”
“All right, then,” Olive said, her big body giving a shudder. “All right, then. That’s a start.”
For Harmon, the scene would always remind him of the day the ball of lightning came through the window and buzzed around. For there was a kind of warm electricity, something astonishing and unworldly in the feeling of the room, as the girl began to cry, and Daisy eventually got the mother on the telephone, arrangements made for her to be picked up that afternoon, promises that she would not go to the hospital. Harmon left with Olive, the girl wrapped in a blanket on the couch. He helped Olive Kitteridge get into her car, then he walked back to the marina and went home, knowing that something in his life had changed. He did not speak of it to Bonnie.
“Did you bring me my doughnut?” she asked.
“There was only cinnamon,” he said. “The boys call?”
Bonnie shook her head.