and I’m leaving for college in a year anyway. After I’m gone, they can do whatever they want. That’s why I want to go away, even though Mom wants me to stay in Princeton. I want to get out. But she’d be really upset if I told her why.” Olivia suspected that was true. “And … oh I don’t know … I’m just ready to leave and move on.” She sensed that he was going to tell her something else, but he changed his mind and didn’t.
“Anything else?”
“No, that’s it. And I don’t want you to tell them what I said.”
“I won’t. But maybe you should sometime, just so they know how you feel.”
“They only care about each other,” Alex said, sounding sad. “I wish I had a brother or sister.” It struck Olivia then as she thought about it that life was so ironic. She had been an absentee parent much of the time, so John made a point of being at home with his son all the time, but he was so crazy about his wife that they wound up shutting out their son, who was just as lonely as he might have been if they weren’t around. She realized that we’re all blind to the errors we commit, no matter how glaring they are to others, or the people we hurt when we commit them. In the end, Alex’s childhood was even lonelier than his father’s had been—at least her children had had their father and grandmother paying attention to them. Alex had no one, except two parents who were crazy about each other, to the exclusion of all else.
Alex and his grandmother talked on deck for a long time that night, as the boat motored toward Sardinia in the moonlight. The night sails seemed peaceful and beautiful to Olivia, and when Alex went to bed, Olivia went to her cabin, got into bed, and picked up Liz’s manuscript. She could hardly wait to read it.
Chapter 8
The next morning they reached the Strait of Bonifacio just after dawn. It was the stretch of open water between Corsica and Sardinia, and the captain had warned her that it might be rough, but only for a short time, and after that the sea would be smooth again. And as they hit the swells, a series of hard bumps that made the big boat shudder woke Olivia up. She didn’t feel sick, but it was unnerving. She lay in bed, feeling it for a while, and then finally decided to go up on deck and look around. She couldn’t sleep anyway, and it was worse lying in bed, feeling the boat come down hard after every swell. She wondered if it had woken up the others too.
When she went out on deck in her nightgown and bathrobe, she saw Liz huddled in a protected corner of the deck, and Olivia thought she looked a little green. She hadn’t gotten seasick so far, but the Strait of Bonifacio made for a rough hour or two.
“Are you feeling sick?” Olivia asked her daughter with a worried look. She was still wearing the wristbands the crew had given her, and she was convinced they had worked until then. Olivia wasn’t sure if it was psychological or real, but if Liz thought they worked, that was fine.
“A little,” Liz admitted with a weak smile. “It sure got bumpy all of a sudden.”
“It’ll be over soon. It’s just getting between Corsica and Sardinia. The captain said it won’t be more than an hour.” And the boat had stabilizers, fortunately, it would have been worse otherwise, and the Lady Luck was a heavy boat, with a steel hull, that helped keep them steady too.
Then Olivia shared some good news with her, hoping it might distract her from the swells. “I read your book last night. Twice. I wanted to be sure of my reaction when I talked to you. You kept me up half the night.” She grinned. “I love it, Liz. It’s absolutely fabulous. I have no doubt someone will want to publish it. I think it’s going to be a runaway best seller, one of those cult books that everyone falls in love with.”
“You’re just saying that,” Liz said mournfully. “You don’t have to lie to me.”
“I never do,” Olivia said seriously, settling a cashmere throw over her daughter’s shoulders. She was shivering in the early morning breeze. “Sarah has no idea what she was looking at. And if you don’t call your agent