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CHAPTER THIRTY-TWO

ELLIOT

T hey found each other .

I open my mouth and then close it again, trying to absorb the enormity of Jane’s words. My thoughts are racing, every emotion coursing through me. I’m unable to pinpoint a single one of them as that one thought keeps pinging around in my brain, over and over again.

And I don’t know why, but something about it warms me straight through, makes every part of me feel light and buoyant, even as I try to comprehend the ramifications of this discovery.

I realize suddenly that I’ve been sitting here for who knows how long, saying absolutely nothing.

But then Amelia takes my free hand in hers, lacing our fingers together and squeezing, looking at Jane and Bonnie. “Tell us everything.”

Bonnie leans forward, resting her elbows on her knees. “Sorry to just spring this on you. This is why we thought it was better if we talked in person. It was clear on the phone that you didn’t know about any of this. And, well, their story is kind of epic. It deserves an in-person telling.”

“I’ll say,” I mutter, and everyone laughs.

It breaks the tension, and for a second it feels like the entire room takes a deep breath and a long exhale.

Jane goes to the kitchen, coming back with a tray of breakfast pastries and a pot of coffee, and we all dig in.

I hand Amelia a cinnamon roll and wink at her, loving the way she grins back at me and the flush that blooms on her cheeks.

“Want me to go get a Diet Pepsi from the car?” I murmur, tucking her hair behind her ear.

She shakes her head, gesturing to the glass of orange juice in front of her then leaning over to kiss my cheek. “I’m all good.”

“You two are beautiful together,” Jane says, looking back and forth between Amelia and me.

“You remind me a lot of how Clara and my father used to be, actually. They were always drawn together when they were in the same room. Always turned toward each other, touching in some way. It was so clear that they were made for each other. That they belonged together. I hope you don’t mind me saying that I see that in you too. ”

I’m reeling a little from the reminder that she knew Clara and Henry together.

That she saw them. Witnessed their great love.

But then Amelia glances at me at the same time I turn my head to look at her and I settle because, when our eyes connect, I understand exactly what Jane is talking about.

The connection between us that is both undeniable and entirely unbreakable.

We were made for each other. I’ve never been more sure of anything.

I wrap an arm around Amelia, and she tucks herself into me as I look back at Jane.

“Can you tell us their story? All we know is what we could piece together from Henry’s postcards.

We assumed they fell in love in London, and then she moved to Boston and left him behind.

My grandmother Cece—Clara’s daughter—had never even heard Henry’s name before. ”

“Of course I can. It’s your story too. Clara and Henry met in London.

He was a soldier. The way they told it to us, Clara and her sister snuck out of the house late one night and went to a dance in London’s West End.

Henry was there with a group of soldiers, and he asked Clara to dance.

He told me he knew the second he laid eyes on her that she was the one.

That they danced for hours and then walked around London hand in hand until the sun rose.

For weeks afterward, they were inseparable.

They fell in love over a summer in London, spending every free moment they had together, all while hiding their relationship from Clara’s parents.

Clara said they never would have approved, and she was right.

When they eventually found out, they were furious.

According to Henry, they hated that their daughter was dating a soldier—they wanted her to marry someone of a higher class.

Their anger and disapproval of the relationship was strong enough that they sent Clara to America all alone, to live with relatives.

All Henry had left of her was the Boston address she gave him before she left, so he did the only thing he could do.

He wrote to her, as often as he could, for as long as he could. ”

“Did she ever write back?” Amelia’s voice is laced with emotion, and I tighten my arm around her shoulders, as much to comfort as to remind myself that she’s here and I’m here. We’re together. We found each other again, and nothing will ever break us apart. I won’t allow it.

“Once.” Bonnie reaches into a drawer in the end table beside the couch, pulling out a single postcard and handing it to me. I hold it so Amelia can read it with me.

Dear Henry,

Your words remind me both how loved I am and also how that love is no longer mine to hold.

I need you to do something for me. You won’t like it, but I’m begging you, from across an ocean.

Please stop writing to me. It’s too hard, this reminder of what could have been, if things had been different.

Things aren’t different. I’m here, and you’re there, and that is never going to be anything other than what it is.

I’m not your girl, Henry, as much as I long to be.

We’ve had all that was meant for us. One summer.

And enough love and memories to last a lifetime.

Yours,

Clara

“Fuck,” I mutter, swiping a hand down my face, my eyes still on the postcard.

“Indeed,” Bonnie says, a wry smile on her face.

“The way he tells it, my father tried to forget her, but he never fully could. After he left London and came to America, he got married to someone local, and Jane and I were born a few years later. I think he loved my mother as much as he was capable of loving her when his heart so obviously belonged to someone else.”

“How did he end up here in Maine?” The question seems almost irrelevant in light of everything, but for some reason, it’s the only thought I can grab hold of right now.

“He said London was over for him once Clara left,” Jane says, taking a sip of her coffee.

“His family was there, but without her, it wasn’t his place anymore.

His military service ended a year or so after Clara left, but with a broken heart and an ocean between him and Clara, he decided not to reenlist. One day, on a whim, he packed everything up and boarded a ship to America.

He didn’t know what he was going to do or where he was going to go, but he said he needed to be where she was, even if he never saw her again.

According to him, anything without an ocean between them felt closer.

While he was on the boat, he met a man who owned a ship-building company, and by the time the boat arrived at Ellis Island, he had a job.

Once he was granted entry to the U.S. he moved here, to Rockport, where the company was located.

He said it being so close to Boston was like a sign. ”

“Please tell me he looked for her then,” Amelia says, leaning forward, eyes wide.

“He did.” Bonnie smiles, a little sadly.

“But you have to remember that this was the early 1900s. It took him a long time to finally make his way to Boston. When he did, he went to the address she left him and sat in the park across the street, hoping to catch a glimpse of her. When he finally did, she was walking with a man and pushing a stroller, and it was obvious that she had married. Started a family. He loved her enough not to involve himself and destroy the life she built in his absence.”

“So he just left?” Amelia whispers, voice thick with tears. “I hate that so hard.”

Bonnie laughs a little. “He did. I guess because I know how the story ends, and because I know my dad, I’ve always thought it was just a little romantic. Sacrificing his own happiness for hers.”

“But she wasn’t happy.” All three women turn to me. “Cece wasn’t able to tell me much, but she did tell me that. She said she doesn’t think her parents were ever in love. That her father wasn’t a good man, and she never remembers her mother being happy.”

“She’s right, but my father didn’t know that.

What he saw was a family, and he would never have broken that up,” Bonnie says.

“So, he came back here to Rockport. He met my mother and had us, and I think he was content, if not abundantly happy. They made a good life here, but he never forgot about his Clara.”

“Hot damn,” Amelia says, emotion gone from her voice and her tears forgotten. “Now we’re getting to the good stuff. That was a rough third act breakup. I’m so ready for the reunion.”

I laugh and drop a kiss on her head, absolutely adoring her, as Bonnie grins. “Romance reader?”

“Yep,” Amelia says. “And I have to be honest, this story is better than any book I’ve ever read. I think Hannah needs to write this one. My friend and Elliot’s brother’s probably soon-to-be sister-in-law, Hannah, is a romance author, and this story is screaming to be a book.”

“Wait until you hear the rest,” Jane says, pouring more coffee into her mug.

“Say less.” Amelia’s rapt attention makes everyone laugh.

“My mother died young.” Jane takes a sip of her coffee.

“Pneumonia. I was about sixteen and Bonnie was fourteen. One morning, about two years after my mom died, my dad was reading the paper like he always did, when suddenly he stopped. His face turned white, and his eyes went wide, and he dropped his coffee mug on the kitchen floor.” Jane stops for a second, as if lost in thought.

“It’s funny the things you remember. Anyway, what I didn’t find out until much later was that he had seen an obituary for your great-grandfather.

Clara’s husband. He wouldn’t have known it was him, except it seems that your family was fairly prominent in Boston at that point. ”