Page 11 of The Quiet Rebuild

This time, when the commercial interrupted the broadcast, Taylor was in tears. After years of fame and wealth, it had never occurred to Taylor to do something powerful with her cash. “Turning inward,” the way Stella and Greta had had to, was not a comfortable thing, not for Taylor, not for anyone. Did Taylor have it in her to go to a place like the Harbor House and sit in the silence of herself? Did she have it in her to start again?

6

Aweek before Christmas, the Harbor House was filled with decorations: six different Christmas trees collected from the local Nantucket Christmas tree farm, wreaths on every window, garlands and tinsel and white-tipped pine cones and stockings over the fireplace. Christmas music twinkled in from speakers high above, speakers that Gwen had had installed over the course of the previous months of reconstruction. Lindsey stood in the foyer, her eyes closed, allowing herself to feel the Christmas spirit. More than that, she begged to get the feeling back in her toes. She’d gone for a long beach run, and now, the tips of them were frozen and dead.

“There you are!” Candice appeared, wiping her hands on an apron that was covered with flour. “How was your run? You must be freezing! What is it? Twelve degrees?”

Lindsey grimaced and followed her sister into the kitchen. She missed her Costa Rica runs, her long hours of stretching her legs past turquoise waters and fruit-filled trees. “I think it’s good character-building,” she suggested, trying to laugh.

Candice poured Lindsey a mug of tea and ordered her to sit and drink it. She also set a cut-out Christmas cookie on a napkin and said, “You need to carb load after that, right? That’s a term in the running world?”

Lindsey laughed and took a bite. “Wow. When did you get so good at baking?”

“It comes with being a mother.” Candice laughed. “One day, I woke up and knew how to make anything.”

Lindsey winced but didn’t let it affect her smile. “Where is everyone else?”

“Guys?” Candice called, and soon enough, Candice’s kids, Peter and Sarah, appeared—Sarah back from her first semester of college.. Behind them appeared their Uncle Henry, who’d just returned to Nantucket after another business trip. “I thought you were going to help me decorate cookies!”

“We got distracted.” Sarah grinned at her Uncle Henry. Sarah had taken a philosophy course last semester and now wanted to talk all things Jungian theory. As it happened, Uncle Henry was fascinated by it and had done a great deal of reading during his business trip, so they were having endless discussions that, Peter said, did his head in.

“How are the geniuses doing?” Lindsey asked, eating the rest of her cookie and reaching for another.

“She’s the genius,” Uncle Henry said of Sarah. “You should hear the way she runs circles around me.”

Eventually, Lindsey went to her room to shower and change into something cozy. Always, after a cold run like that, it was the most delicious feeling to bundle herself up and feel extra warm and extra tired. She logged her mileage in the app on her phone, impressed by how far she’d come over the previous few months. She wondered if she was running away from something, emotionally. And then, she remembered the box, still stuffed away in her closet, untouched. She ducked out of the room and headed back downstairs to join the others. Candice wanted to watch a Christmas movie. She wanted to order pizza.

The following morning, Gwen arranged for a meeting to discuss the potential candidates for the first round of Harbor House attendees. Lindsey and Candice sat on the other side of their mother’s desk and flipped through the numerous printouts, all of which featured photographs, write-ups, and application prompts from women around the world. It was mind-boggling to read their names and see their faces. More than that, they’d written what had happened to them, what had pushed them to apply. Often, the stories broke Lindsey’s heart in two.

“Oh, this is terrible,” Candice said, raising a paper. “This woman lost all of her children in a house fire last year. She and her husband are getting divorced.”

“I saw that one,” Gwen said. “I think she should come, if she wants to come. Don’t you?”

“Definitely,” Candice agreed, putting the woman in the “yes” pile.

They talked about a few of the potential candidates, weighing up who they thought needed a fresh space more. It was difficult to gauge. Lindsey guessed they all needed the Harbor House, in a way. How could they turn anyone away?

And then, she saw it: a familiar face, peeking out from the pile of applications. It was Taylor Charron, the actress. The photograph was one of her headshots, maybe taken five to ten years ago, and there was a light in her eyes that, Lindsey knew, had died out after her husband’s affair and the loss of her career. In her application, Taylor had written:

This year, I learned something about myself. Everything I’ve planned for, everything I thought would be my future, everything that mattered to me, was not really mine. It all evaporated in front of me. It’s forced me to question: what was I building my life for? What happens now that nothing I once cared about fills my days? Why should I go on, when I have nothing left? Worse than that: I can’t go in public without being recognized. If I wanted to rebuild at a spa or meditation retreat, someone would almost assuredly take my photograph and report back. But something about the Harbor House, and about Greta’s and Stella Vanberg’s stories, captivates me. I sense it’s the only place in the world where I can figure out the next phase of my life. Is that naive? Maybe. But the fact that I can still feel naivety after everything is beautiful.

“What do you have there?” Candice asked Lindsey, breaking her reverie.

Lindsey handed the application over, lacing her fingers together as she watched her sister read.

“Oh! That actress?” Candice tilted her head and glanced at Gwen.

“I think she needs us,” Lindsey said.

Candice finished reading and nodded half-heartedly. “What do you think, Gwen?”

Gwen set the paper in the “maybe” pile. “Honestly? I think other women need us more.”

“The thing about Taylor is, she could help advertise for us,” Lindsey offered now, surprising herself. “She’s a big name. She could shed a lot of light on the Harbor House.”

“We have so many applications,” Gwen pointed out. “So much interest. I don’t think we need that.”

“Okay.” Lindsey sniffed and turned to look out the window, where she saw Peter and Sarah walking along the frigid beach.