Present Day
Will had left his toothbrush behind. Even three months after he packed his three bags and headed back to Manhattan, Ella still kept the bright blue toothbrush in the little cup by the sink. Now, on an impossibly dark and doom-filled night in August, Ella sweated at that very sink and dabbed at her armpits with squares of toilet paper. It was Friday, but it felt just like any other day, especially because Ella had shifts at both of her jobs over the weekend. It was almost impossible to make ends meet in Brooklyn. Perhaps it always had been— but things had gotten much more difficult lately.
Especially now that Will was gone.
Back in the living room, Ella’s eighteen-year-old daughter, Laura, sat cross-legged on the couch with the remote control on her thigh. Laura waved a magazine toward her face to create a temporary wind. On the screen, Debbie Harry gave an interview about the craziest moments she lived through in the eighties. Back in the early two-thousands, even before Laura had been born, Ella and Will had spent a wild night of their own with Debbie Harry. Their indie rock band, Pottersville, had just toured across Japan and South Korea, and Debbie had just performed a show in Tokyo. One way or another, she’d heard of them, and they’d been invited to her hotel suite for champagne and whatever else came after that. The night was certainly on Ella’s list of the craziest of her life, which was saying something. She supposed she would wait a few more years until she told Laura the extent of that story.
Just now, Ella was grateful to have her girl home for a little while longer. Very soon, Laura would move into the dorms at Columbia University and start her journey toward whatever came next. As Ella had just barely graduated high school and never bothered with college, she burst with pride over Laura’s academic dreams. The girl had never been a musician, and both Will and Ella had been A-okay with that. (In fact, it had pleased them, as the money in the music world seemed to diminish by the day.)
“I’m glad I get you all to myself tonight,” Ella said as she sat across the couch from her daughter.
Laura offered her a sweet smile. “Where’s Danny tonight again?”
“Oh, he’s over at Jason’s,” Ella explained. “He said something about a brand-new video game that he just had to play tonight. What am I going to do without you here in a few weeks? It’ll just be me and a teenage boy.”
Laura giggled. “I don’t envy you.”
“Gee. Thanks.”
Ella hustled up to the kitchen and placed a bag of popcorn in the microwave. As the plate circled beneath the orange glow of the machine, Ella peeked out the window at the chaotic streets of Brooklyn on a Friday night. Now forty-two, Ella could hardly believe that the first time she’d come to New York City, she’d been Laura’s age. She could still feel the big-hearted wonder she’d had for a city that seemed impossible to grasp. Now, the city seemed just as impossible, but she was often too tired to care.
Ella returned to the couch with a big blue bowl of popcorn and chatted to Laura for a while about the items they still needed to purchase for Laura’s big move to college and the events planned with Laura’s friends. Ever since Laura’s girlhood, she’d been such a bright light of optimism, without any of the moodiness that had plagued Ella’s youth. Ella had feared that with Will and Ella’s separation, Laura would reveal the first “angst” of her teenage years. That hadn’t happened, at least not yet.
In fact, Ella had always had a remarkably powerful relationship with her children. This had surprised Ella, as her relationship with her own family had been negligible since 1997.
Over the years, she and Will had toured the world to promote their albums. This had begged the question,“What do we do with the children?”With both of Will’s parents gone, Ella had dropped her children off at The Copperfield House, of all places. Each time Ella had returned to The Copperfield House to drop off or fetch her children, fear had permeated through her body. It was really as though those horrific years in the nineties would always haunt her. Still, Greta had gotten a bit better since those first few years. Had she still been stuck in her bed for weeks at a time, Ella wouldn’t have left her children with their grandmother. That was obvious.
It was nearly midnight. Ella’s eyelids drooped ominously, proof that she needed to take her forty-two-year-old body to bed. She checked her phone and found another message from her sister, Julia, who now lived at The Copperfield House full-time.
JULIA: Dad’s book comes out so soon. I’m literally freaking out.
Ella grimaced. Since both Alana and Julia had returned to The Copperfield House to rebuild their lives, they’d gotten incredibly chummy with one another. They’d told one another their deepest secrets and worked on healing after the extensive trauma of their past relationships. When Ella was around, Alana and Julia tried as hard as they could to include Ella in their sister squad. Ella, however, was resistant. How could she actually forgive her sisters for leaving her behind with Greta like that? Yes, it had been a long time ago. But Ella didn’t forget so easily.
Besides, with Will gone and a bazillion bills to pay, it wasn’t exactly a wonderful time for Ella to ask herself any deep questions about the Copperfield Family or spend time on Nantucket. Since that fateful night in Greenwich Village, Ella hadn’t bothered to tell anyone her secrets, save for Will. This meant that each time she saw Alana or Julia at The Copperfield House, she kept her lips sealed to the horrific events of her own life.
Beyond that, she truly didn’t want either of them to say what she thought they might: that Ella was so lucky that she and Will had never actually gotten married.“Oh, it’s so much easier for you,”Ella could imagine Alana saying.“Much less paperwork. You both can just move on from each other’s lives.”
In some ways, this was true. Ella had to admit that. In others, her relationship with Will had been the only pillar upon which her entire life had rested. He had been her love, her best friend, her bandmate, her sounding board, her massage therapist, her nurse, her running partner, and her personal chef. Now, he was gone— and with his departure, the band had disintegrated, too.
Ella hadn’t written a song in over three years. She hadn’t performed in over five. Music had been her lifeblood. Was that time of her life really over?
Ella’s phone buzzed with an actual phone call, which was increasingly rare, with two teenagers and very few friends.
It was Will. Her heart pounded with fear as she lifted the phone. Maybe he called to have the talk they’d been neglecting all this time? Maybe he had decided that all this separation was silly and that they needed to get back to where they’d come from and write a gosh dang song?
“Hey.” Ella’s voice wavered.
“Ella, it’s Will.” His, on the other hand, was sharp and brash. “I’m at the hospital.”
This was the breaking point. Ella blinked through the shadows of the kitchen and imagined the worst kinds of horrors.
“Danny’s here,” Will continued. “They’re pumping his stomach.”
Ella’s jaw dropped. “Excuse me?” She didn’t recognize her own voice.
“Just get down here,” Will shot. “Brooklyn Hospital Center. I’ll meet you in the waiting room.”
The next three minutes passed in a flurry of near violence. Ella pushed her arms through the sleeves of a flannel shirt as Laura began to wail. Outside, Ella waved an arm in the air to hail a taxi, and within that taxi, she held onto Laura as Laura shook with sorrow. Throughout, Ella didn’t allow herself to cry.