by Grace Palmer
This wasn’t good. He wanted to confront her. The morning had been hectic, but now that Winter was happily eating her waffles and Summer would be strapped into her high chair with blueberry puff cereal and a banana, he had his opportunity.
The bottle was already half gone, she’d lie. Holly and I opened it a while ago. And then I fell asleep. You know how I haven’t been sleeping recently. Exhaustion caught up to me and I fell asleep.
There. That was it. Perfectly plausible, perfectly reasonable.
Eliza could have walked out of the room at any point, but she stayed rooted to the spot as though Oliver had cast a spell on her. As though his words held some kind of power.
As much as she dreaded hearing whatever he was going to accuse her of, all she could do was stand there and wait for it to happen.
A minute later, Oliver reappeared in the doorway.
He hesitated on the other side of the threshold, watching Eliza like she was a stray animal he hoped to capture. Finally, he stepped through the door and didn’t stop until they were less than a foot apart. Until he could lay a warm hand on her shoulder and squeeze.
“What’s going on, Eliza?”
This wasn’t an accusation. Where was the accusation? Eliza had prepped herself for defense, not offense. Oliver was changing the rules. Unfair. Uncalled for.
“Breakfast, I believe?”
He pursed his lips in disappointment. “You know what I mean.”
Did she? Because Eliza wasn’t so sure.
Did he mean what was going on this morning? As in, why she’d woken up with a hangover on the front porch? Or maybe he wanted to know what was going on the day before when she’d apparently traipsed all over town looking for super special tampons that didn’t exist. Or was his question more in general? If so, she was even less sure how to answer.
Oliver must have seen the lack of a satisfactory answer on her face because he sighed, his shoulders sagging under the weight of whatever unspoken words he was carrying around. “Liz…”
“Sorry,” Eliza shrugged. “I don’t know what you mean.”
“With you.” The words came out like a slap. Shocking. Sharp. Oliver ran a hand through his hair, tugging on the strands out of sheer frustration. “Something is going on that you aren’t telling me. I know it.”
The rapidly decreasing number in their checking account.
Eliza’s therapist appointment.
The pills.
“Nothing is going on. I’ve just been—”
“Are you having an affair?”
If his last words were a slap, this question was a gut punch. They knocked the wind out of her. She had to inhale sharply to catch her breath.
“What?”
“It’s all I can think of,” he said. His eyes tilted down at the edges, and for the first time, Eliza could see the dark circles under his eyes. The wrinkles at the corners looked new. “Something is going on and it has been for a while. I just don’t know what.”
She was doing this to him. Everything she’d tried to do—get a handle on the budget, keep Summer healthy, put on a smile—none of it mattered. Oliver was miserable. Suspicious and upset and justified in feeling all of those things.
She had to tell him the truth.
Eliza opened her mouth, ready to tell him everything. Anything just to wipe that look off of his face. But the real words wouldn’t come.
“I’m not cheating on you,” she said instead. She could tell him that at the very least and it would be true. In this moment, that fixed something. A small something broken between them, mended.
But the rest of it? If Eliza told him about the therapist and the pills and Dr. Geiger and the way Summer sometimes felt like a ghost in her arms, as if she didn’t exist at all… he’d only worry more. Nothing Eliza could say would ease his burdens. So, she wouldn’t say anything at all. That was the best option.
His mouth opened and closed several times before, finally, he nodded. “Okay. Then what’s going on?”
Eliza was spared thinking of a response by a loud bang from the kitchen. A second later, Winter screamed, “Summer dropped her breakfast!”
“It’s time for daycare drop-off, anyway,” Eliza said, laying a hand on Oliver’s shoulder now. Squeezing. “I’ll do it.”
She could feel Oliver watching her as she hurried into the kitchen and scooped up the mashed remnants of Summer’s banana from the floor, then wiped Winter’s face clean of syrup and butter.
As she herded their eldest towards the door, her pink sparkly shoes lighting up with each step, Oliver followed behind them. But he didn’t say anything.
Eventually, something would have to give. Eliza would have to explain things. But she’d explain them from the other side.
Once she figured out how to keep money in their account and once Summer’s lungs could handle a cold without a trip to the ER—then everything would calm down. Then she’d tell him how stressed she’d been. And she’d laugh, and when she laughed then he would laugh, and if both of them could laugh, then everything would be perfectly okay again.
Time and distance made all problems seem small. One day, the problems that sat on Eliza’s chest and stole the breath from her, they would feel small.
One day, that damn elephant would find someone else to crush. And Eliza would be free.
Just not today.
17
Sara
The Offices Of Boston Investment Group
Parker was leading Sara back towards the elevator when he suddenly stopped in his tracks. “Oh, before you go, I’d love for you to meet one of the other partners. He’s usually in New York, but he’s in office today. Do you have the time?”
Would Sara one day have an office in this building? Maybe she would split her time between Nantucket and Boston. It was a stretch, but a week ago, she would have said someone offering to buy her business from her was a stretch. Yet here she was.
“I have the time,” she said, as though there was anything other than stuffing her face with a sandwich and some coffee on her agenda.
Parker seemed pleased and changed course, leading her back the way they’d just come.
Offices lined the right wall, but the left was endless windows. They looked out on a green space just across the street. Silvery leaves shimmered in the breeze, shading crisscrossing sidewalks filled with people in business attire eating lunch on benches or walking with phones pressed to their ears.
Sara was still looking out the window, transfixed on a woman in a pantsuit and sneakers who appeared to be jogging in place with a Bluetooth headpiece in her ear, when Parker knocked on his partner’s door.
“Come in!” A man’s voice, deep and pleasantly raspy.
Parker pushed the door open and Sara smoothed down her skirt before following him inside. The deal was done and dusted, but she still wanted to make a good first impression.
“You have a minute, man?” Parker asked, his tone casual. “I wanted you to meet Sara Benson before she left.”
“Of course. I have plenty of minutes for our latest acquisition,” the man said.
Acquisition. The word made Sara feel like a piece of art to be set up and viewed in a gallery. But she brushed it off. Business speak. She’d get used to it.
Parker was still standing in front of her, but replaying the words in her head, something about the man’s voice—deep and sure—struck Sara as familiar. A chill moved down her spine.
Once, when Sara had the flu as a teenager, her mom had baked peanut butter cookies. They used to be Sara’s favorite, but the smell of the baking peanut butter had sent her running across the hall to the bathroom. Ever since, she hadn’t been able to eat them.
This was like that.
Something inside of Sara shivered as the man spoke. And when Parker stepped aside, giving Sara her first full view of his “partner,” she understood why.
Gavin Crawford sat behind the desk.
His hands were folded in front of him in a posture Sara had seen countle
ss times before. It was the view she’d been met with anytime she’d walked into his office… back when he’d been her boss in New York City.
The smile stretched across his face was familiar, too. Gleaming, charming, but now Sara could see it was tinged with something sinister.
Once upon a time, Gavin’s allure was irresistibly powerful. Catnip to Sara. He’d been devilishly charming.
Now, he just looked devilish.
“It’s a real pleasure, Sara.” He stood up and extended his arm across the desk.
Shocked mute, Sara was operating on her most basic impulses. That was the only reason she reached out her arm and took Gavin’s hand.
“Gavin is actually in the restaurant industry as well,” Parker said cheerfully, oblivious to the thickening of the air around him. To the tension that throbbed and pulsed like a heartbeat in Sara’s ears. “He will be your primary point of contact.”
“I’ll be a supervisor of sorts,” Gavin said, one of his thick eyebrows quirking up slightly. A challenge, perhaps. “For a year, at least. Per the agreement. Assuming you signed it?”
Parker nodded excitedly. “She did. We just took care of the paperwork and the finer details. I’m excited.”
Sara was nauseous. Could she run down the hallway and shred the contract before Parker called security?
“Caroline is faxing it over to your business manager right now,” Parker said. “Patrick, I believe?”
Patrick. Jose. Annica. The faces of her employees, her Little Bull family, flashed in Sara’s mind. She’d sunk her own ship and taken them down with her.
Gavin’s goal since the moment Little Bull had opened had been to ruin it. And now, he would be in charge. Once again, he’d be Sara’s boss.
“Great,” Gavin said, planting his hands on his hips, chest puffed out. “I can’t wait to get started. I have so many ideas.”
Parker beamed, looking from Gavin to Sara, certain everything was sailing along just as it was meant to. And all Sara could do was smile as the dreams she’d carried into the meeting took on water. As they slipped through her fingers no matter how hard she tried to cling to them.
She didn’t need a time machine to know how this would end.
There would be no survivors.
18
Eliza
Eliza and Oliver had strict screen time rules in their household. But Eliza handed Winter her cell phone the instant she was strapped into her seat.
She couldn’t handle the chatter today. Didn’t have the bandwidth to explain why the back of cement trucks rotated constantly or why some people blew smoke out of their driver’s side windows or why the people two lanes over didn’t respond when Winter shouted “Hello!” at them through the closed window.
So instead, Winter played a game with exploding candy while Eliza drove. Hands at ten and two, Eliza gripped the steering while, knuckles white, trying to ignore how badly her head hurt and her stomach churned.
At daycare, Eliza pulled into the drop-off lane and hopped out of the car. She tossed a wave to Miss Amber, one of the college students who escorted the kids inside and into their different classrooms.
“Why do I have to go to daycare?” Winter pouted when Eliza opened the back door. Her little fingers clutched the phone as though her life depended on it. The screen under her thumbs filled with candy and exploded in rainbow of colors and shrapnel. Game Over flashed repeatedly.
“Because it’s fun,” Eliza said. “And because Mommy and Daddy have to work.”
Eliza plucked the phone out of her hands and shoved it in her back pocket. Winter strained against the straps of her car seat reaching for it.
This was why they limited screen time. Because it turned their daughter into a demon.
“Daddy can play with me,” Winter said, certain this was true. Why wouldn’t it be? Oliver could always play with her. Even when he was supposed to be rehearsing. Eliza was the only one who insisted on keeping work and parenting hours separate.
Eliza shook her head and lifted Winter out of the car. “No, he can’t. He’s busy today. We both are.”
She stomped one foot, a faint pink light flickering across the shaded cement. “You’re not nice!”
“I’m sorry. But once you get inside, you’ll have fun. You always do.”
She stomped her other foot and crossed her arms. The line of cars behind Eliza was growing, and even though every parent there knew what it was to deal with a temper tantrum, it didn’t make it any less embarrassing.
“Come on,” Eliza urged, pushing on Winter’s back. “Inside.”
Winter dug in her heels, setting off the flashing pink lights again. They were turning this display into a full-blown performance, complete with a light show. “No!”
Eliza growled low in her throat and, reaching her limit, scooped Winter up with one arm and carried her down the sidewalk like a rolled-up carpet.
Winter kicked and screamed. “I don’t like you!”
“I don’t like me very much, either,” Eliza mumbled. Though she doubted Winter could hear her over her crying.
Miss Amber frowned as they approached. “Oh no! Someone is upset today!”
The sympathetic tone to her voice caught Winter’s attention, and when Eliza set her daughter back on the cement, she ran towards the young college student, clinging to her leg.
“Sorry,” Eliza said with a smile. “Rough morning.”
“I can relate,” Amber said with an eyeroll and a self-deprecating laugh.
Somehow, Eliza highly doubted that. She waved to Winter, but her daughter didn’t wave back. She was still pouting, her lower lip pushed out in an exaggerated frown. Once Miss Amber was leading Winter into daycare by the hand, Eliza sighed and turned back to her car.
Four cars were behind her now, parents prying their kids out of car seats. They all seemed too busy convincing the kids to leave stuffed animals in the car or replacing the shoes they’d kicked off on the drive over to have paid any attention to Eliza and Winter’s display. But Eliza still felt the need to smile as she walked. To convince them all she was fine. That she was unbothered.
Oh, that? That wasn’t a meltdown! That was nothing. She loves me. I love her. Life is peachy.
A woman was bent over in the backseat of the white SUV just behind Eliza’s, and as Eliza passed, she stood up and turned.
Eliza recognized her instantly. The sunshine woman from the pharmacy. The one who had picked up her dropped prescription. Who was responsible for the pills making it into Eliza’s house.
Immediately, Eliza turned her head, eyes on the ground. But just like the day before, the woman was persistent. “Oh, hello again!”
Ignoring her was tempting, but unless Eliza was deaf, she had no excuse for not hearing the woman. And while she wasn’t in the mood to be friendly, she didn’t want to be rude. So she looked up. “Oh, hi there.” She smiled. “Small world.”
“Very,” the woman agreed. “We just moved here. I didn’t expect to be seeing familiar faces so soon. I’m Andrea.”
“Eliza.”
“Nice to meet you.” Andrea leaned against her car, hitching a thumb over her shoulder into her backseat. “This is his first week here, but he won’t get out of the car until he ties his own shoes. It can take a while.”
“Independent. That will be a good thing later on.”
“But a real pain until then,” she laughed.
Andre didn’t seem like the type of person who needed to fill an antidepressant prescription the moment she moved to a new town. She seemed fine. Happy. Eliza, on the other hand, had just carted her daughter under her arm through the front doors of daycare.
“Well, anyway—”
Eliza started moving towards her car, but Andrea stepped forward. “Oh, actually. I know this is weird, but since I did just move here… I’m trying to make friends. Maybe we could—”
“There are a lot of nice parents here at the daycare,” Eliza interrupted.
She knew where this was going. But
Andrea didn’t want to be friends with her. She just didn’t know it yet. Plus, she knew too much. She’d seen Eliza at the pharmacy. If she told Oliver…
“There’s a monthly parent’s night,” Eliza continued awkwardly. She’d never been, but she’d read about the event in the newsletter. “Everyone gets together for punch and cookies. A meet-and-greet of sorts. Might be a good way to get connected.”
Andrea nodded, but her smile dimmed. “Oh, okay. Yeah. That sounds nice.”
“It is,” Eliza said, having no way to know if it was nice or not. It might be horrible.
But not as horrible as going out for coffee or drinks with Andrea. Not as horrible as having to muster up the energy for small talk with a stranger.
And not as horrible as finding out your one and only friend in your new hometown was a liar who slept on their front porch because they were too drunk and broken to find the bed.
No, this was better for both of them. Eliza was doing her a favor.
19
Holly
Downtown Nantucket
“We should’ve done shopping before brunch,” Diana said, poking at her stomach as they walked down the brick sidewalks of Main Street. “I’m bloated.”
“From your egg whites and avocado toast?” Lindsay asked, punctuating the question with an eye roll.
Diana narrowed her eyes, lips pursed. Holly knew it was only a matter of time before one of them snapped and started an epic fight. Just like the good old days.
“I’m perpetually bloated, so I like to buy clothes that way,” Holly said, hoping to diffuse the tension. “That way I can be sure they’ll fit.”
“You should speak with a gastroenterologist. I’d recommend mine, but he’s in Miami. Obviously.” Diana played chicken with a tourist, walking straight towards a woman in a sheer swimsuit cover-up and flip flops, head held high. Until she realized the woman wasn’t paying any attention and wouldn’t move. Only then did Diana duck behind Holly to avoid a collision. “Ugh, I do not miss the tourists. This place has way too many fanny packs.”