That Summer

by Jennifer Weiner

  She snorted. Diana looked at her quizzically.

  “I was just thinking, I read once, in India there’s a tradition where if you want to end your marriage, you just say ‘I divorce thee’ three times.” She shrugged. “And then I was thinking about Michael Scott on The Office, and how he tried to declare bankruptcy by just yelling…”

  “ ‘I declare bankruptcy!’ ” Diana said.

  “Yeah, that’s it,” said Daisy. She rubbed her face. She’d been awake all night, first driving, then lying, sleepless, in the bed she’d once shared with Hal, playing and replaying the history of their marriage, running her mind along its seams the way she’d run her fingers over a pie crust, looking for rips, for holes, for anything that might have indicated trouble. “I should have known,” she said again.

  Diana’s voice was gentle. “You can’t blame yourself.”

  “Who should I blame, then?”

  Diana shrugged. “I don’t think it’s about blame. It’s about what happens next.” She bent down to pick up an oyster shell. “It’s about Beatrice. And all the girls who come after us.”

  “I know, I know. You’re right. I’m just so sorry.”

  Diana nodded. They were silent for a moment, and then Diana spoke again. “Whatever happens, I’m glad that I met you. And Beatrice. I’m glad you were my friend.”

  Daisy made a noise, a kind of sobbing, hiccupy laugh. Diana took Daisy’s hand and squeezed it. And after that, it seemed like there was nothing else to say. They sat, in silence, until Pedro started barking at the sound of a car coming up the driveway. Both women got to their feet, watching, as Hal parked the car and got out.

  “Daisy,” he said, and had the nerve to smile. He’d worn khakis and a crisp button-down shirt, and looked like he was ready to host a barbecue, or attend a cocktail party. “There you are!” Daisy thought that he sounded indulgent and amused; a parent whose toddler had put her favorite teddy bear in a shopping bag and run away from home, only to be spotted and scooped up at the end of the driveway.

  Daisy heard the rain begin, pattering on the water. A moment later, she felt the first raindrops splashing on her cheeks and in her hair.

  Hal stopped a few feet away from the benches. “Excuse us, please,” he said to Diana. “I need a moment with my wife.”

  “No. Stay,” said Daisy.

  “It’s fine,” Diana murmured. “You could go for a walk on the beach.” She leaned forward as she got to her feet and, in a voice meant for Daisy’s ears alone, she said, “Just be careful. The deck gets slippery. And you want to watch out for that wobbly post.” Then, head down, she hurried across the deck. Pedro gave Hal a baleful look and followed his mistress inside.

  Daisy stood up, resting her hands on the railing, looking out over the water. The wind had whipped the ripples into white-capped waves. She heard thunder again, and she could feel the presence of her husband behind her.

  Hal’s voice was still jolly and indulgent. “You always did love a storm.”

  Daisy didn’t turn. “Do you know who she is?” Before he could answer, she told him. “You raped her,” she said.

  Hal sighed. “It was a party. Everyone was drunk. And it was a long, long time ago.”

  She turned, looking Hal full in the face. “Did you ever think about it? About her?”

  Hal reached for her. Daisy jerked away.

  “Daisy, listen to me.”

  “No,” she said. “No. I don’t have to listen to you anymore.”

  “I want to tell you that I’m sorry. I owe you an apology.”

  “I’m not the one who is owed an apology,” she said.

  Hal kept talking in that low, soothing voice. “But you’re absolutely right. I should have told you.” He put his hands in his pockets and gave a shrug, and suddenly she was furious, angrier at him than she’d ever been angry at anyone in her life.

  “But you didn’t,” she said. “Because when did I ever deserve your honesty? Or your respect? When did you ever see me as a partner? Or even an actual adult?” She stalked toward him, sticking her finger in his chest. “You decided where we’d live. You decided who we would see. You decided where we’d go on vacation, and what kind of car I would drive, and where Beatrice would go to school. You controlled me.”

  “Daisy, I never—”

  “Stop lying!” she yelled. “For once in this pathetic excuse for a marriage, be honest with me! Tell me the truth!”

  “All I did was love you!” Hal roared.

  Daisy stared at him, mouth hanging open.

  “Everything I did, everything I kept to myself, every decision I made for us, it was all because I wanted to keep us safe.”

  “Oh, please.” She could see his chest heaving underneath his blue button-down shirt. She knew that shirt. She’d bought it for him at Bloomingdale’s; she’d pulled it from the hamper (or sometimes picked it up from the bedroom floor) a hundred times. She’d taken it to the dry cleaner and back again and hung it in his closet. His little bird.

  “I know how men are,” Hal was saying. “I know how the world is. And yes, I knew how I was. I wanted a home, I needed a wife, I needed a family. And you,” he said, jabbing his finger at his chest, “needed me.”

  “No,” Daisy said. “Maybe you thought so. Maybe you made me think it, too. But it’s not true.”

  “I took care of you! I loved you!”

  “You controlled me,” Daisy said. “Being your wife meant that I couldn’t have a real business, and I barely had friends. You didn’t ever let me go anywhere, or see anyone, or do anything.”

  “What would you have done?” he demanded, with a sneer supplanting his easygoing smile. His voice was low and mean. “What do you think you would have become?” He shook his head. “You think I kept you off the cover of Bon Appétit? That you were going to be Martha Stewart?”

  Daisy turned so that her back was toward the water. She braced her feet and raised her chin as the wind whipped at her hair. “You’re a criminal,” she said. “You knew if you told me the truth, and if I told anyone else, you could lose your law license.”

  “And then where would you be?” he taunted. “No big house in the suburbs. No private school for Beatrice. No Lexus to drive around.”

  “You think I care about that?” she screamed. “You lied to me!” With that, the rain arrived in earnest. Icy raindrops sheeted down, plastering her hair to her head and her clothes to her body. “I want a divorce,” she shouted, feeling hot, salty tears join the rain on her face. “I want you gone when I get home. I want you to stay away from Beatrice. I never want to see you again.”

  Through the rain, she saw something flare in his eyes. Alarm at her threat to leave him, fear that he’d lose the house, or his daughter, or maybe, worst of all, his reputation. “I gave you everything,” Hal shouted.

  “No, you took everything!” she yelled back. “You took my name away!”

  Hal looked as bewildered as if she’d slapped him. Then his jolly, reasonable look was back, the mask once again in place.

  “Daisy,” he said, his voice calm.

  “That’s not my name!” she shrieked.

  He reached out to put his hands on her shoulders, as he’d done so many times before, to hold her still, to instruct her, and in her head she ducked and saw Hal stumbling forward, grabbing for the wobbly post, the one that had never been repaired. She saw his feet skid on the slick surface of the deck, saw his arms pinwheeling, hands groping, reaching for her, for help that wouldn’t come. She saw him fall, thudding down one, two, three, four, five, six flights of stairs, to lie, broken and motionless, on the sand, limbs twisted, eyes open to the rain. She saw herself look down at him, seeing nothing but a male body around a man-shaped void. Not a man at all, but a creature with cold, flat eyes, a monster with instincts for self-preservation and a species of low cunning, but not a man, not a person who had loved her, or anyone.

  Hal had looked like what she was supposed to want—the body, the name, the degrees and the j
ob and the money that he earned. She had taken those facts and built a man around them; had taken a collection of gestures and phrases and called them love. She’d willed a husband into existence, because Hal had said he’d give her the life she’d wanted, because he’d caught her at a moment of weakness and unfurled his promises like a banner. You’ll never be lonely. You’ll never be afraid. You’ll never worry about money or worry that no one wants you. She remembered her mother’s face when she’d come home with the news, how Judy had grabbed her hand and kissed the diamond of her ring. She remembered Hal lifting their newborn daughter into his arms, with pride and adoration on his face. But had that been real, or again, just a projection, a mirage, her mind showing her what she wanted to see? He’d taught Beatrice how to ice-skate and swim and ride a bike; he’d coached her T-ball team, he’d taken her to every father-daughter dance. Daisy had thought that, too, was love, but now she thought it was closer to camouflage; the protective actions of a man who knew how he had to behave if he wanted the world to count him as one of the good guys. Hal, she thought, had only gone through the motions, doing what was required to get the life he wanted, the life that he thought he deserved.

  All of those thoughts flashed through her head in an instant as the wind howled and the rain poured down. I could end it all, right now, she thought. I wouldn’t even have to do anything. Just duck. But, as much as the idea pleased her, she wouldn’t let him fall. Death would be too easy. Death would let him off the hook. Life, though, life with the knowledge that Daisy knew what he’d done and who he was… that would be close to intolerable for a man as proud as Hal Shoemaker. Let him live, like a parachutist with his straps cut, tumbling down and down, forever. Let him live, with his every moment a torment, every hour burning.

  Through the rain, Daisy could see another life, a life where she lived out here full-time, with Beatrice, and Diana nearby. Where she could walk her dog on the beach every morning, with her friend, and spend her days cooking in a restaurant. Where Diana could spend time with Beatrice, where Beatrice could go to public school and figure out for herself who she wanted to be, if she wanted to go to college or not. Maybe Daisy could even help at the restaurant and give Diana and her husband time to travel, to see the world. Maybe she had gifts she could give them, ways to repair the damage, and stitch up what had been torn. The only thing she knew for sure was that there was no way forward with Hal, not knowing what she knew about what he’d done. Her life as his wife, as Daisy Shoemaker, was over. I divorce thee.

  And so, instead of ducking, Daisy stood still. When she felt Hal’s hands on her shoulders, she said, “We’re done, you and I,” and waited until she saw that knowledge land in his eyes, before she turned and walked away with the rain scouring her skin, wishing only for a door to close, quietly but firmly, behind her.

  Coda

  On a hot August afternoon, a girl in a yellow bikini stood on a paddleboard and made her way across the glassy, blue-green waters of Cape Cod Bay. A breeze lifted the spill of shiny silvery hair that fell halfway down her back; the sun warmed her face and shoulders. She still didn’t know everything that her parents had discussed, in long conversations with their bedroom door locked, or how, precisely, her uncle Danny and her mother’s friend Diana fit into the story. Her mind shied away from the worst of the possibilities, like a little kid’s fingers from a hot stove. All she knew was that things had been tense with Uncle Danny and Diana, but, over the past weeks, there’d been a thawing.

  As for her parents, Beatrice still wasn’t sure. Her father had ceded his father’s house to her and her mom for the entire summer and beyond. Her mom had told her they’d stay through the school year, that Beatrice would go to the public high school in Orleans—at least for the next year.

  Her father had been coming up every other weekend, renting a cottage in North Truro instead of staying with them. He brought presents for her mother—bouquets of hydrangeas, fancy chocolates, expensive sea salts, once, a whole bag full of spices and rubs from the Atlantic Spice Company—and he didn’t bring his laptop, giving Beatrice his entire attention and hours of his time. One weekend, they’d ridden their bikes all the way from Wellfleet to Orleans and back again; once, they’d spent an entire afternoon on the beach. When Beatrice asked her father, “Are you and Mom getting divorced?” he’d said, “It’s not what I want. But it’s not up to me.” When Beatrice asked her mom, her mom said, “Can we talk about this later? I have to get to work.” Her mother had a job now, cooking at the restaurant that Diana owned, and Diana herself was spending a lot of time at their house. She’d shown Beatrice how to turn an old book into a birdhouse using balsa wood and glue; Beatrice had shown her how to preserve insects in resin. Beatrice had met Diana’s husband, who was, it turned out, the caretaker for the house, and he was teaching Beatrice how to surf cast. It would have been the perfect summer, minus the uncertainty, and the unhappy looks she saw her dad sending in her mom’s direction, and the way her mom’s shoulders would stiffen every time Beatrice’s father touched her, or said her name.

  “Hey!”

  Beatrice turned at the sound of a voice calling across the water, and saw a guy, maybe a few years older than she was, paddling toward her. Beatrice angled her board until they were floating, side by side, facing the beach, where a volleyball game was in progress. Beatrice could hear the smack of palms against leather, the good-natured trash talk as a girl leapt up high and spiked the ball down on the sand.

  “Great day for it,” said the guy. He wore dark-blue board shorts and a red Red Sox cap.

  Beatrice nodded. “It’s perfect,” she said.

  “You here on vacation?” the guy asked.

  “I actually live here,” Beatrice said.

  “Lucky you,” said the guy, his eyes widened in approval.

  “That’s right,” she said. Her tone was friendly, but her expression was thoughtful and even a little sad. “Lucky me.” A motorboat zoomed past them. Beatrice gripped the base of her board with her feet, letting her body sway with the motion, instead of resisting. “We used to just come for the summers. But this year we’re going to be washashores.”

  The guy considered. “I’ll bet it gets lonely out here in the winter.”

  Beatrice gave a little shrug. “I don’t mind being by myself. And we’ve got lots of company. My uncle Danny and his husband were here for a few weeks. And my mom’s best friend lives right up there.” With her paddle, she pointed at a little cottage, shingled in silvery cedar, perched high on the dune. “She’s got two nieces about my age, and they come up on the weekends, so I’ve got some friends.”

  “Sweet,” said the guy.

  “Sweet,” Beatrice agreed. “My mom’s friend owns a restaurant in P-town. My mom cooks. I bus tables on the weekends.”

  “What’s it called?”

  “The Abbey. Ever been?”

  “I know I’ve walked past it.”

  “You should go,” Beatrice told him. “Get the crabmeat-stuffed cod. It’s the best thing my mom makes.”

  “Sounds great. I love seafood.” The guy turned his paddle in his hands, gathering himself. “You, uh, want to come to the beach for a while and hang out?”

  Beatrice thought it over, balanced lightly on her board, swaying with the waves that advanced and retreated beneath her.

  “Maybe later,” she said. “But right now, I’m just getting started.” She gave him a little wave before she turned her board, bracing her feet, digging her paddle deeply into the water, propelling herself out toward the fullness of the sun.

  Acknowledgments

  Writing a novel is an adventure. Even after all these books, and all these years, every time still feels like the first time when I head into undiscovered country with only my imagination to guide me. Writing a book during a pandemic presents a special set of challenges. I am very grateful to everyone on my publishing team for all their help and support through these difficult days.

  Libby McGuire kept a steady hand on the wheel a
s she guided this book to publication. I’m grateful to her and to Simon & Schuster CEO Jon Karp.

  This is the second book I’ve written with Lindsay Sagnette, whose smart, thoughtful suggestions improved the plot and the characters immensely.

  Ariele Fredman is a genius publicist. She works hard, she’s funny, she’s good company, and she is mother to one of the most charming little girls you’ll ever meet.

  Dana Trocker is a marketing wizard, and every writer should be lucky enough to work with someone with her energy and smarts.

  I’m grateful to everyone on the Atria team: Maudee Genao and Karlyn Hixson in the marketing department and Suzanne Donahue and Nicole Bond, who handle my backlist and worldwide sales. In the art department, my thanks to James Iacobelli, who always makes my books look good, and to designer and illustrator Olga Grlic.

  Thanks to Chris Lynch, Sarah Lieberman, and Elisa Shokoff in the audio department.

  Big, big thanks to the assistants, who are unfailingly helpful and smart and will be in charge of everything someday: Libby’s assistant, Kitt Reckord-Mabicki; Lindsay’s assistant, Fiora Elbers-Tibbitts; and Joanna’s assistant, Opal Theodossi.

  Dhionelle Clayton did her usual perceptive job of editing this book, and her suggestions made it stronger.

  I’m grateful to my agent, Joanna Pulcini, for all her hard work, on this book and on all my books.

  Thanks, as always, to my assistant, Meghan Burnett, whose indefatigable good nature and good cheer made the isolation feel less lonely, and who, in addition to her stellar work handling all aspects of my working world, has become one of my trusted first readers.