At Wave's End: A Novel Read online

  After setting the menu down, she headed back to the kitchen. Her fatal mistake had been thinking of the apartment as hers, when it had been on loan from Ellie all along (despite the day-to-day details of phoning a plumber or camping out for the cable company usually falling to Faith).

  Everything about their place was perfect: its proximity to the 2 train and the ironic Bread & Beyond, purveyor of both tombstones and fresh baguettes, on their corner. And the game-changer: the stacked washer/dryer that ate up precious closet space but saved hours of schlepping.

  Sighing, Faith smoothed the front of her double-breasted chef coat and ignited her grill station. The intense dinner crush that followed barely offered a moment to breathe. However, the gods did smile down on her by keeping the persistent NPR customer away for the night. When she finally stepped out back for a break, she saw her mother had called four times, so Faith phoned her back immediately.

  “What’s wrong? Are you okay?”

  “I’m better than okay, Faith. I’m fantastic! I won. I won the mermaid’s purse!”

  Faith frowned. Had her mother attended some sort of under-the-sea-themed bazaar? “Cool. But four calls over a pocketbook? I was worried sick you’d been in an accident.”

  “Pocketbook?” her mother laughed. “The Mermaid’s Purse isn’t a handbag, Faith. It’s a bed-and-breakfast. An actual B and B at the Jersey shore. I’m going to be an innkeeper!”

  5

  “Wait . . . what?” Faith sank onto the picnic bench behind Piquant to digest her mother’s announcement. “How in the world did you win a bed-and-breakfast?”

  “I entered that contest. In the magazine. I told you.”

  Magazine. Faith vaguely recalled the reference from their last conversation. “Right. Remind me of the details again?”

  “I still can’t believe Maeve chose me,” her mother gloated.

  “Who’s Maeve?”

  “Maeve Calhoun. The owner of The Mermaid’s Purse. She chose my essay out of thousands of entries.”

  “What was your essay about?”

  “Why I would be the perfect candidate to take over her inn. Obviously, I persuaded her. And now I’m going to run a bed-and-breakfast. At the beach!”

  Faith kneaded her forehead. “But you don’t have any experience. You’ve never even waitressed.”

  “I’ve made beds. And breakfast. And I worked as a hotel maid for a while.”

  “Motel,” Faith corrected. “Which is nothing like an inn. A bed-and-breakfast is much more personal.” No doubt her mother’s Disneyized vision of innkeeping had everything to do with afternoon tea, chilled pitchers of lemonade, and crumpets consumed on porch rockers, with zero regard to the round-the-clock housekeeping, gardening and dozens more daunting responsibilities and costs that came with the innkeeper title. “So when is all this supposed to happen? Next summer?”

  “Why, no. I have to take ownership sooner than that.”

  “But you can’t, Mom. Your job, remember? You’re this close to getting that pension. That security.” In the darkness behind the restaurant, Faith pinched her thumb and forefinger together.

  “Well, of course I’m taking my employment into consideration.”

  Faith sagged against the picnic table in relief. “That’s good to hear.”

  “Just remember, Faith: there are other paths to financial peace of mind.”

  No. You will not throw away this one sure thing. Glancing at her watch, Faith felt the back of her neck flush with heat, her body’s reflexive response to Connie’s irresponsible impulses. “I’ve got to get back to work now. But we need to talk more about this. A lot more.”

  “I agree. That’s why I’ve already booked my flight. I’ll see you soon!”

  6

  Upon returning home from work that night, Faith opened her laptop, found the Mermaid’s Purse giveaway online and pored over the details:

  After more than two decades of running an idyllic bed-and-breakfast on the Jersey shore, Maeve Calhoun wants to hand over the straps of The Mermaid’s Purse to one lucky essay-contest winner.

  Lucky, huh? Faith scrutinized Calhoun, a tall, sturdy, pleasant-looking woman with soft white hair, who smiled broadly in front of a charming two-story shingled Victorian. Calhoun held open a wrought-iron gate and carried a gingham-lined basket brimming with muffins, a touch Faith found to be a bit of overkill.

  Reading on, Faith learned a number of things about Maeve: that she herself had won the inn in an essay contest twenty-five years earlier; that Calhoun would miss her returning guests, who had become like family; and that selecting exactly the right successor to run The Mermaid’s Purse would ease the innkeeper’s sadness.

  How wonderfully warm and inviting the whole possibility sounded. Too inviting. Faith eyed the alluring accompanying images: turquoise surf crashing onto almond sand; candy-colored umbrellas stuck into soft dunes like lollipops; a rainbow of towels spread beneath them. All in all, Maeve had expertly packaged this tempting prospect of beginning a brand-new life at the beach, right down to the golden muffins resting on their gingham bed.

  No wonder Connie had entered. The proposal had been designed to seduce someone like her. And as usual, it would be up to Faith to dash that dream.

  Scrolling down to the contest rules, Faith learned Connie had paid a one-hundred-twenty-five-dollar entry fee for the privilege of submitting her essay—no small sum to her coupon-clipping mother, Faith thought, massaging her lower lip. Reading further, Faith sucked in her breath: according to the mathematics of the novel contest, her mother’s essay had outshone the fifty-six hundred or so other entries Maeve needed to recoup the inn’s market value of seven hundred thousand dollars. That must have been some essay, Mom, she thought.

  The rules also defined the winner’s obligations: assume ownership within three months of the contest closing date (her mother had been correct on that count); run the property as an inn for at least one year; and allow Calhoun to stay on at The Mermaid’s Purse for an unspecified transition period.

  For more context, Faith scanned some of the inn’s guest reviews, which were mostly positive (although only a handful had been posted recently). The target of some scathing feedback from diners herself, Faith discounted the inn’s single vicious review, no doubt planted by a jealous rival.

  At that point, Faith closed the laptop in frustration, the clock ticking on her opportunity to influence her mother’s decision. She called Connie in the morning, and several times more in the weeks leading up to her arrival, but nothing Faith said dissuaded her from her East Coast trip.

  Her mother was coming to Wave’s End—with or without Faith’s blessing.

  7

  Why had table eleven chosen today of all days—the day her mother arrived to size up her lottery winnings—to dawdle over dessert? Faith fretted as she drove toward Newark Airport. A brisk autumn breeze swirled through the Zipcar’s open windows, its freshness occasionally fouled by factory fumes. Ahead of her, Faith eyed a rare sight: a perfectly spaced queue of departing jetliners dotting the skyline like prayer beads. Where were they headed? she wondered. Having recently paid off the last of her student loans at the ripe old age of twenty-seven, she had yet to treat herself to an extravagant adult vacation—not that this would happen anytime soon.

  Driving in the fast lane to make up for lost time, Faith tried hard to imagine that experience. Her only comparisons were discomfiting weekends with her mother at various hotel chains during her teens, enduring punishing time-share pitches in return for their stay. (One time Connie had literally kissed her hard-earned room voucher on their way to the pool.) At checkout, her mother’s promotional tote bulged with breakfast buffet booty: cereal boxes, packaged breadsticks, tiny jam jars in foreign flavors like boysenberry. The entire ordeal made Faith cringe with embarrassment.

  Even today, the memory made her recoil. For distraction, she turned on the car radio.

  “At the moment, US forecasters predict that tropical storm Nadine will make landf
all on the East Coast . . .”

  Nadine: the name certainly sounded harmless enough, Faith thought, switching the station. She’d had her fill of weather prognostications for the moment. For days, the mere mention of Nadine churned up waves of panic from Cuba to Canada in terms of the impact she might have, even though the storm barely rustled Caribbean palm trees currently. Already that morning, Xander had asked Faith to estimate Piquant’s frozen reserves as a precaution.

  After leaving the rental car in short-term parking, Faith headed toward the arrivals area. For now, her priority was taming the tornado that was her mother. She soon spotted Connie sprinting down the narrow hall, her gray hair flying and her oversized chunky cardigan flapping over her calf-skimming paisley dress, and raised a hand to wave. Seconds later, Faith found herself wrapped in her mother’s familiar patchouli-and-warm-wool scent.

  “I’ve missed you so much.” Stepping back, Connie smoothed Faith’s ponytail, laying it to rest on her daughter’s shoulder. “So, how’s my little cook doing?”

  It’s chef, not cook. “Tired. I raced across the river to get here on time.”

  “Well, we’re together now, and that’s what counts. And isn’t this going to be an adventure. I can’t wait to show you The Mermaid’s Purse.” Oblivious to the masses moving around her, she yanked a magazine from her worn leather tote and opened it, the twin turquoise Buddhas dangling from her ears quivering. A glance at the page told Faith it mirrored what she had seen on Maeve’s website.

  “Not here, Mom. We’ll get trampled.” Faith took her mother’s elbow and steered her toward baggage claim.

  “All right.” Connie rolled up the magazine. “But you have to admit, it’s serendipitous this prize brought me to the East Coast. To you.” Tapping Faith’s arm with the coiled periodical, she stepped onto the down escalator, then turned and smiled up at her daughter. “Now I’ll just be two hours away.”

  “Fantastic. But don’t get carried away. We haven’t even seen the place.”

  “I don’t care. I can already see myself there,” Connie said as they stepped off the escalator. “And it would be nice if you weren’t always such a party pooper.”

  “I’ll be the first one to throw a party, once you’re officially retired.” Faith stopped to consult the arrivals board, then led her mother toward her flight’s luggage carousel. Party pooper. Her mother acted as if Faith had relished being the buzz kill her entire life, the raiser of red flags, as though she were the parent and not the other way around. Faith had long ago accepted her fate. Connie had barely been out of her teens when she gave birth, and Faith’s father hadn’t remained in the picture for very long. Her mother had said little about him, other than he had loved Faith very much but couldn’t take care of himself, much less a family. End of story.

  Nor had Connie’s mother been much help. Always restless, Edna Winnick abandoned her daughter and son when her children were teens, lured by Las Vegas’s glitter and promise—a broken promise, as it turned out, as the best the Strip offered her was a job at an all-night buffet. Ultimately, Faith’s grandmother died a penniless waitress.

  Faith had never even met her—the only relic of the woman was a gold locket gathering dust in her own mother’s jewelry box.

  Yes, Connie had been dealt a crappy hand, Faith thought as the conveyor belt lurched to life, uncomfortable with the resentment she still harbored. And, unfortunately, her mother had become something of a gambler herself, taking risks like the one that brought her to the East Coast today.

  This time, she feared her mother had gone too far. She needed to stop her before this Mermaid’s Purse situation grew too messy for Faith to clean up.

  Still, Connie literally thrummed with excitement over winning, and had come all this way to claim her prize. Trying to summon a little enthusiasm, Faith joined her mother at the luggage carousel and took her arm. “I am curious to see the inn up close.”

  At that moment, Connie spotted her bag and stepped away to grab an oversized tapestried suitcase reinforced with a thick belt of duct tape.

  “That’s a pretty big bag for a couple of days,” Faith said.

  A carton similarly swathed in duct tape lurched down the ramp onto the conveyor, and her mother grabbed that as well. “Keep an eye out, Faith. There’s three more like that.”

  “You’re kidding, right? Is there anything left in your apartment?” Faith wondered if the compact Zipcar would hold all of her mother’s baggage.

  “No.” Her mother kicked the base of her suitcase. “This is it, Faith. I have a really good feeling about this, and I want to be prepared, just in case!”

  8

  To Faith’s immense relief, Connie confirmed that she hadn’t quit her job, but had only redeemed her remaining vacation days for her extended stay. There was still a window of time for Connie to reconsider, to go back to Albuquerque with her pension intact. Not wanting to waste a day, Connie insisted they head straight to Wave’s End from the airport.

  Despite the fact that her mother hadn’t thrown away her chance at stability, as they crested the Driscoll Bridge around four thirty, the mouth of Raritan Bay glistening below them, Faith had the unsettling feeling she was driving straight into the eye of a storm. “Remember, Mom: no matter how great The Mermaid’s Purse seems, you promised you wouldn’t sign anything until a lawyer looks everything over.”

  “Yes, Faith. I recall that conversation.”

  Faith glanced at the back of the Zipcar, loaded with her mother’s belongings.

  “We’re going to need a plan B. In case this doesn’t work out.”

  Connie stretched. “I refuse to think about that possibility.”

  Once over the bridge, Faith ignored her GPS, leaving the Garden State Parkway and heading east to connect with the coastal road. She had been down this way with Xander a few times last year to scout a new restaurant location, scouring shore towns from the Atlantic Highlands to Cape May. They had not stopped in Wave’s End, home to The Mermaid’s Purse, however. In the end, Xander dismissed the entire region as foodie Siberia and wound up opening a pop-up patio bar in the Hamptons instead. Maybe that was where her boss had gotten himself into trouble, spreading himself too thin.

  The navigation system rerouted, and mother and daughter meandered south, the marzipan Victorians, reproduction streetlamps and quaint tent communities giving way to pizza stands, bars and souvenir shops. They passed clusters of surfers peeling out of wetsuits, leaning dripping boards against their cars.

  A block of weather-beaten bungalows and an ornate brick arch marked the town line; on the other side of the arch, the ocean road suddenly widened, as if in deference to the stately mansions studding its curb, their expansive columned verandas and inviting porch rockers facing the sea.

  “Hey, look!” Connie exclaimed. “That sign says, ‘Welcome to Wave’s End.’” As Faith drove, Connie alternated between peering out the car window and consulting Maeve’s magazine spread on her lap. “I don’t get it. We’re at the beach. But I don’t see anything that looks like The Mermaid’s Purse. Why is it telling us to keep going? I don’t trust that gizmo, Faith.”

  A single lane now, the beachfront road elbowed at a fishing pier, whose clapboard snack stand had been nailed shut for the season. Faith slowed to a crawl, peering at each structure.

  “Well, I do. Let’s see where it takes us.” After a scant two miles, another sign indicated they were leaving Wave’s End, and, per the preprogrammed directions, Faith navigated away from the coastline. Out of the corner of her eye, she could see her mother’s smile fade as the beach receded behind them.

  “Cheer up. I’m sure we’re almost there.” At the next traffic light, Faith turned left as the system instructed.

  “Okay, we should be close now.” Connie leaned forward. “Look. Up ahead. There’s someone on the sidewalk waving. That must be Maeve.” Faith slowed the car at the snowy-haired woman flagging them down. Behind her, a wall of arborvitaes all but hid a dilapidated Victorian sandwiched be
tween an auto body shop and a real estate office, the latter roped and anchored to resemble a seaside shack.

  As Faith pulled to the side of the road, Connie leaned over her for a better look. “That can’t be the inn. It looks nothing like . . .” Connie glanced at her lap again in confusion.

  “It has to be. Look at that sign on the porch.” Faith pointed to the placard hand-lettered with the inn’s name. “I think we found your prize, Mom. Welcome to The Mermaid’s Purse.”

  9

  Pulling into the inn’s driveway, Faith drummed the steering wheel, her worst fears realized. She needed to devise an exit strategy.

  “Well, what are we waiting for?” Connie resolutely tucked her hair behind her ears.

  “You really want to go in?”

  “Of course I do. I won the place, didn’t I?”

  “So they said. But look at it, Mom. And then look at this.” Faith tapped the magazine in her mother’s lap. “Those pictures had to have been taken twenty years ago. This inn looks nothing like you expected. She scammed you.”

  “A lovely-looking woman like that would not scam me.”

  “Of course she would. This is no different from those jacked-up rental ads on Craigslist, with their misleading descriptions and pictures.” Faith sat back. “Tell you what: I’ll take you back to the city. You can spend a few nights with me, have a meal or two at Piquant. After that, we’ll figure out how to get you back home.”

  “I can’t go back to Albuquerque.”

  “Of course you can. You’ve got your job there.”

  “And what do I tell everybody?”

  “That you changed your mind. Decided you weren’t cut out to be an innkeeper. It’ll make a great story.”