Page 51 of The Castaway

“Yes?”

“I think you’re really brave. Not just because I’m the one writing this book and I think it’s going to be ground-breaking, but because it takes guts to share yourself. And this event is going to be unprecedented. You don’t have to share any of this with the world—not your story, not your marriage, and not Jack’s death—but you are, and I think that’s extremely generous.”

Ruby smiles at Dexter, thinking of the Jackie Kennedy biography that she and the book club read, discussed, and parsed for meaning as she sought counsel on how to proceed with telling her own story.

“I’m going to lean on the words of the immortal Jackie O. here when I say, ‘You cannot separate the good from the bad. And perhaps there is no need to do so.’” Ruby pauses. “It’s simply my story, Dexter. The good, the bad, and the ugly. And I think every person can relate, because no matter who we are, we’ve got our own good, bad, and ugly.”

Ruby

Event weekend. It’s hot, muggy, and the sky is threatening a storm the likes of which Ruby actually welcomes. She races around the island in her cart with Banks behind the wheel, checking items off her to-do list and mentally preparing herself for the shift in her life that’s about to occur.

In the end, Athena’s website logged over three point five million dollars in bids on the ten packages to attend Ruby’s big event. It’s a staggering figure, and Ruby already knows that the news organizations who won spots (all of the biggies: NBC, CBS, ABC, CNN, Fox, Harpo Studios—Oprah’s people are already trying to finagle a private sit-down with Ruby during the course of the weekend—and a handful of others) will most likely make eye-popping donations afterwards in an effort to elbow one another out of the way and prove to the world that they care the most about the cause at hand.

But the real highlight of the event will be the chance for Ruby to put a period at the end of a chapter of her life. Obviously there’s more to her marriage that will carry on and be with her until the end, and she’s well aware that simply meeting Etienne and Julien doesn’t mean that she can put them on a back shelf and pretend that they don’t exist, but for now, this chance to speak and share will officially end her time as Jack Hudson’s smiling, loyal wife. His silent, dignified widow. The sole keeper of his memories. From this point forward, she will be a footnote in American history, but she will be the main story of her own life: a woman who was tattooed at a rock festival, someone who loves wine and music and laughter, a human who still wants to find love, be loved, and reallylivethis second chapter of her life on her own terms, with no professional stylist, no stage makeup, no speech writers.

The bookstore is sparkling. The women have been true to their word, showing up in their free time to stand on ladders and clean each crystal, bead, and light bulb in every chandelier. They’ve waxed every wood surface and reorganized the bookshelves. The entire center of the store has been cleared out and set with rows of chairs for Ruby’s expected guests, and Dexter has arrived and is documenting everything quietly, following Ruby around as she talks, asks questions, and makes requests of her daughters and friends.

At five minutes to six on the evening of what would have been Jack’s sixty-second birthday, everything is in place. The journalists are there, looking serious and overheated from walking around on Seadog Lane in the thick evening air, and Ruby is in the tiny back office of the bookstore, getting a pep talk from Athena and Harlow as Dexter sits in the corner and listens in—a fly on the wall in the very best sense.

“Mom,” Athena says, holding both her mom’s and sister’s hands as the three women stand together in a tight circle. This is all they have now: a circle of three forever, and no matter what happens or where they all end up living in the future, they need to stay as tightly knit as they’ve become this summer. “You’re making us really proud, and I fully believe that Dad would be proud too. This might not be what he planned when he wrote the letter, but you’re doing something that’s honestly going to help a lot of people.”

“You think?” Ruby asks, looking at her daughter nervously. “Because I just forged ahead on this without really and truly asking for permission from the two of you. I’m opening up your closets just as much as my own, and I’m letting all the skeletons fall out for the world to see.”

Harlow shakes both of their hands abruptly, like they haven’t got time to waste. “Mom, it’s for the best,” she says, sounding absolutely certain, and also as grown up as Ruby has ever heard her sound. “Just wait until this hits the news this evening—you’ll see. Now get out there and kick some ass, okay?”

Ruby laughs, still feeling the tiniest bit shaky. “Yeah,” she says, nodding her head to encourage herself. “Yeah, this is what I’m doing, and it’s going to be great.”

“Go get ‘em,” Athena says, kissing her mom on the cheek. Harlow leans in and does the same.

“Love you, girls,” Ruby says, smoothing the front of a carefully chosen pale pink linen dress that highlights the healthy tan she’s gotten while living on Shipwreck Key. She’d slipped it on in the back room of the book shop and then hasn’t sat down since, hoping to keep it freshly ironed and wrinkle-free until the cameras are on her. Sunday came by the house that afternoon to help her with her hair and makeup, and then Ruby had added her wedding rings, a pair of gold hoop earrings, and a gold bangle bracelet from her mother, who is sitting in the front row of the gathered press corps out in the bookstore.

Ruby walks out of the back room and into the hotly lit shop. Cameras and lights are set up all around and aimed at the podium that’s stationed at the back of the store, with the chairs positioned in rows to face it.

Ruby steps up to the podium with the letter held carefully in her hands. She sets it in front of her and smoothes out the folds so that she can read.

“Thank you for coming,” Ruby says into the microphone. Though she wouldn’t need one if it were just the twenty-five people gathered there in the bookshop, she wants to be heard and recorded clearly so that her message can be relayed to every news outlet in the world.

The folding seats in the shop are filled with every notable face from every huge news show in the country. Had Ruby not already encountered them all a number of times in her life, both in formal and in social settings, she would have needed to take a moment to really soak in the level of power in the room. But at that moment, she knows that she alone holds all the power in the bookstore.

Ruby clears her throat before continuing and slips her reading glasses on. “I understand that this is an unusual situation, with a highly unusual structure, and I hope that my motives become clearer as I share with you all.” There are clicks from the cameras around the room photographing everything for posterity, and along one wall, Molly, Marigold, Heather, Tilly, and Vanessa stand, watching with silent support all over their awed faces.

“First of all, I want to acknowledge that you’ve all taken a bit of a journey to get here, which I appreciate. I’ve taken a bit of a journey myself. Just over a year ago, I was the First Lady, preparing to support my husband in a bid for a second term in the White House, when I learned that he’d been killed in a small plane crash.” The room is silent except for the occasional camera click. “Shortly after, I learned that he’d died in France while visiting his mistress and their twelve-year-old son, something that has come to light and been a point of interest for many people—and understandably so. We trust our leaders to be fair and honest, and finding out that the President of the United States has been anything but honest in his personal life is unsettling. What I’m about to share with you today is not an apology, and not an excuse for anything that my late husband did or didn’t do, but it is a piece of the puzzle that we’ve all been missing as we’ve tried to understand exactly what happened.”

In the front row, the lead anchor of the NBC Nightly News shifts in his chair, eyes glued on Ruby like he’s never heard a more interesting news story than this one.

“Not long ago, the woman my husband was visiting in France came to me with a letter from Jack. He’d left her one as well, and asked that she wait until a full year after his death to give me mine. Why, I don’t know, but that was his wish, and she honored it. My daughters and I have read the letter, of course, and now I want to share it with you.” Ruby looks directly into each of the cameras and gives a long, meaningful look at the people who will be watching and listening. “I think this letter actually belongs to all of us.”

The room is absolutely silent as Ruby spreads the paper flat again on the podium. Then she begins to read.

My Ruby…if you’re reading this, it’s because a year has gone by and I’m not with you. By now, you will undoubtedly know everything—every one of my transgressions, misdeeds, and choices. You will not necessarily know why, because even I don’t know why I’ve made all the choices that I have. But there will be no more secrets.

You know by now that I fell in love with the sister of one of my best friends. This was not to hurt you, Ruby, and it was not to in any way take away from the life we made with our girls. You were and are the best wife and First Lady that a man could ever hope for, but at some point, my heart went left and we went right, and life changed in an instant. I would apologize for what I’ve done and for hurting you, but to do so would be to say that I wished my son had never been born, and I don’t wish that. So I want to take responsibility, to own my actions, and for everyone to know that I understand that there was wrong in my actions, but in a lot of ways, there was also right. There was love, there was happiness, and there was pride—in all three of my children. I hope you can forgive me for not wishing to undo anything. You know who I am, Ruby, and you know that I’m a man who forges ahead and never backs down. I have been that man till the very end.

But right now, I’d like to clear up one last thing: the final secret that I’ve been keeping from everyone. Three months ago, I was diagnosed with Creutzfeldt-Jakob disease (CJD), a rare and fatal brain disorder. About 70% of people with CJD die within a year, and the symptoms worsen rapidly—much more quickly than in Alzheimer’s or other neurological diseases. Not to sound glib, but “I ain’t goin’ out like that.”

Ruby looks around at the people in the room. Their soft laughter at this, their shocked tears, and the way they’re listening so intently have reminded her that she’s not alone in the bookstore as she reads her late husband’s words yet again. There are people in front of her who feel just as stunned by this news as she was the first time she read it.

So, how am I going out?Ruby reads on, blinking a few times against her own tears.You know how much I love to fly. You know the freedom it gives me, and the way I can forget who I am and where I am when I’m looking out at the horizon.

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