Jodie Picoult - Songs of the Humpback Whale - A Novel in Five Voices

Sam stands up, his hands in his pockets. “You’re giving me an ultimatum.”

“No I’m not.”

“You are,” Sam insists. “If I want you, I’ve got to do something about Hadley. And even so, it would be a temporary victory.”

“What do you mean by that?”

Sam grabs my shoulders. “Tell me you’ll leave him. You and Rebecca can stay with me in Stow. We’ll get married and we’ll have a zillion kids.”

I smile sadly. “I’ve already got a kid. I’m too old to have babies.”

“That’s bullshit,” Sam says. “You know that. We’ll live in the Big House and it’ll be perfect.”

“It’ll be perfect,” I say, repeating his words. “It’s nice to think that.”

Sam wraps his arms around me. “I’ll talk to Hadley. I’ll work something out.” He leans his head on my shoulder. “Perfect,” he says.

Only Joley is in the Big House when we return. It is late afternoon, and he’s come in for a cold drink. As we walk into the house, Sam is grabbing at the waistband of my shorts. “Stop!” I laugh, swatting his hand away. That’s when I see my brother. “Oh,” I straighten up- we’ve been caught with our hands in the cookie jar.

“Where have you two been?” Joley says, amused. At least he’s not shocked, like Rebecca. Where is she?

“At the nature sanctuary,” Sam says. “Where is everyone?”

“Finishing up. Rebecca’s down there too.”

“Can I talk to you, Sam?” Joley asks, and Sam looks at me: We knew it was coming. He leads Sam into the kitchen and starts the faucet running, no doubt to keep me from listening.

I walk into the den, where the television is on. The five o’clock local news. I swing myself sideways in the armchair so that my feet dangle over the edge. The anchorwoman is reporting on a fire that killed three people in Dorchester. Then a familiar logo appears on the screen behind her. Why do I know it? “And now,” the anchorwoman says, “we take you to Joan Gallagher, reporting from Gloucester, where rescue efforts have been underway for the past three days to save a humpback whale tangled in a fishing boat’s gill net. Joan?”

“I don’t believe this,” I say out loud. “This stuff follows me.”

“Thanks, Anne,” the reporter says dutifully. “Behind me is Stellwagen Bank, a major East Coast feeding ground for several groups of humpback whales. Many people have been following the plight of Marble, a humpback who became tangled three days ago in a gill net left behind by a fishing vessel. Sighted once by the Coast Guard, it took forty-eight hours to find the exact location of Marble again. Today, Dr. Windy McGill, director of the Provincetown Center for Coastal Studies, undertook the rescue of the desperate humpback.”

The reporter cuts to footage of an inflatable boat being tossed about on the ocean. There are two people on board. “Dr. McGill was joined by a colleague, Dr. Oliver Jones, a prominent marine biologist whose research on humpbacks is world-renowned.” They zoom in on Oliver’s face, bent low as he untangles a nylon rope. I sit absolutely still. “Dr. Jones, who studies whales off the coast of California, just happened to be in the Boston area and offered his help when he heard of Marble’s dilemma. These two scientists bravely made the twenty-three mile trip in a Zodiac raft to the location of the whale.”

They show the boat being pitched up, regaining its balance, slapping back against the ocean. “Oliver,” I say, covering my mouth with my hand.

By now Sam and Joley have come out of the kitchen. They stand on either side of me, watching the footage. “Isn’t that . . . ?” Joley says, but I hush him.

The camera refocuses on the reporter. “After three and a half hours of dedicated and dangerous work, Marble swam free. She was joined immediately by several other whales. And perhaps the most touching twist to this story was that the foremost rescuer, Dr. Oliver Jones, is in need of some help himself.”

“Jones?” Sam says.

The camera closes in on Oliver’s face, on his pale eyes, his Kahlua skin. “Jane.” His voice is shaking, hoarse. “I need you. I hope you can see this, and I hope you and Rebecca are all right. I want you to know something. I can’t stand being without you.”

“Don’t tell me,” Sam says.

Oliver takes a picture out of his wallet, one of Rebecca and me. It’s not even a good one. “If anyone out there has seen my wife or this little girl, please call in,” Oliver says.

I have grabbed Sam’s hand; I didn’t even notice myself doing it. “That’s Oliver. That’s my husband.”

Oliver stares at me, painfully honest. I wonder how much he can see. I wonder if he knows what I have done. “I love you,” Oliver says to me, just me. “I don’t care if the whole world knows.”

After the news broadcast, Sam takes off. He says he has something to do; he doesn’t mention what it is. He doesn’t say anything to my sister.

“Come on,” I say, taking her hand. “Help me make dinner.” She follows me into the kitchen, weak, easily led. She sits down on a ladderback chair.

“Oh, Joley,” she sighs. “What have I done ?”

I take carrots and lettuce from the refrigerator. I’m not gourmet, but salads are easy. “You tell me .”

She looks up, her eyes wild. “Maybe we can run away. If we leave now we’ll be gone by the time Oliver gets here.”

“You can’t drag Rebecca away again. It’s not healthy. She’s just a kid.”

“I’m not talking about Rebecca,” Jane mutters. “I’m talking about Sam .”

I drop several carrots I have been peeling in the sink. “You knew Oliver would come to find you. You told me that yourself. And you didn’t want to talk about what would happen when he got here.”

“I don’t want to talk about it.”

“You’re right. Maybe if we don’t think about him, he’ll disappear.” I throw the vegetable peeler into the sink. “All right, then, let’s talk about something else. Let’s talk about Sam.”

“I don’t want to talk about Sam,” Jane says.

“Look at me.” She will not.

“What’s going on?” When I spoke to Sam earlier, he gave me the runaround. I first heard from Rebecca, who came running to me in the morning, crying. Uncle Joley , she sobbed, I hate her. I hate her.

“Nothing,” Jane says. Then she sighs. “I’m not going to lie to you. You know what’s going on. Everyone knows what’s going on.”

“You tell me,” I say. I want to hear it from her.

I am expecting her to tell me she slept with Sam. But instead she tilts her head, and says, “Sam’s the person I was supposed to fall in love with.”

“Then what is Oliver?”

Jane looks at me and blinks quickly. “Extra baggage.”

“You’ve been with Sam for five days. How can you come to a conclusion in five lousy days?” He doesn’t know you, I think. I’ve been by your side for thirty years. I’m the one to whom you are tied.

“Remember what I said to you when we first got here?”

“That Sam was a stubborn pig.”

“Besides that,” Jane says, smiling. “I did say that, didn’t I? Well, I also said that I’d know what I was looking for when it hit me. I said that all I needed in my life was an instant of time when I could honestly say I was on top of the world, and not be lying. This is it.”

“You also said that if you got those five terrific minutes you’d go back to Oliver. You’d live the life you started with and you’d never complain.”

“But that was before. How do you know my five minutes are up? I said I’d go back when it was over. But it’s not over yet. Not by a long shot, Joley.”

I start to tell her about Rebecca, and what happened this morning. I tell her because it gets me off the hook; it keeps me from thinking about Jane and Sam, together. Rebecca came up to me, and told me what she had seen. She said, Does this mean my parents are getting a divorce? Does this mean I’m never going to go home?