“I’m sorry, babe,” Brian said. “Let’s go. We’ll get something to eat, just you and me.”
“Yeah, okay.” She swiped at her face, actual tears. Susannah didn’t make gestures just for effect.
“Got everything you need?”
“Uh-huh.”
They started toward the back door. Brian had his arm around my sister, steering her away. Two of Grandma’s silver forks were sticking out of the back pocket of his jeans.
“Wait!” I’m sure they both thought I was only about to make a last-ditch effort to get Susannah to stay. But I knew that was a lost cause. “Over my dead body you’re leaving with those.”
Susannah turned around. “What are you talking about?”
“He has the silver he was ‘polishing’ in his back pocket.”
Brian reached around before Susannah could check and pulled the forks out of his pocket. He yanked open a drawer by the stove and dropped them inside. They clanged against whatever else was thrown in there. We didn’t have a designated utensil drawer with one of those organizers to separate everything into neat little sections. Nope—the utensils were subject to the same chaos as everything else in our house.
“Don’t think I didn’t know what you wanted to do with those,” I said.
“You think you know everything about everybody, don’t you?” he asked me.
But he didn’t stick around to hear my answer. The screen door slammed shut behind them.
That was my life these days: a series of doors slammed shut.
With Susannah and Brian gone, I went around the kitchen opening various drawers, on the hunt for whatever other pieces I could find of Grandma’s silver. I think there’d originally been twelve each of the forks, knives, and spoons, plus serving pieces. I found maybe half, buried under a hundred other things—a screwdriver, a paperback book with the cover torn off, a broken pair of scissors, a stretched-out Slinky, an old photograph of my parents looking young and happy. I paused for a second, staring at them. Susannah had inherited the recessive blond gene, but my hair was chestnut brown, like both of my parents’. My face was mostly my mother’s—same eyes and arched brows, same small space between our upper lips and our noses.
I dropped the photo back in and slammed the drawer shut. Somewhere in the house was the velvet-lined wooden box that the silver was meant to be stored in, to prevent the blackened tarnish Brian had so diligently been cleaning off. God, he never did anything without an ulterior motive. But Susannah was an ostrich with her head in the sand about all things Brian Beecher. About a lot of things, actually.
Where the box was hiding was anyone’s guess, and I didn’t have the time or the inclination for that game of hide-and-seek. I collected all the silver I could find, put my loot in a paper bag, and ran it up to my bedroom closet. Only then did I finally leave the house for my morning run.
I RAN ALONG THE BEACH WITHOUT A SPECIFIC destination in mind. But somehow, instinctively, as my heart pounded and my legs ached, missing a thousand pounds of horse between them, I ended up at Oceanfront, the only place in Idlewild I ever really felt comfortable. I went into the barn, greeting the horses in their stalls as I made my way back to the one that had last been Orion’s. The stall was empty, but there was a fresh bedding of cedar chips on the floor, which meant someone was boarded here in Orion’s absence, probably a horse out on its own morning ride. Around the corner came a voice: “Not to worry, Ma. I’ll get you a check tonight.”
When I peeked around, I spotted Jeremy Gummer, a cell phone pressed against his ear, at the far end of the corridor. Gumby Gummer. That had been his childhood nickname, he’d once told me, and it fit. He was tall and lanky but with a softness to him. Not sharp like Brian, and not solid and square like Charlie.
Everyone knew Jeremy’s story: He used to be a weekender in Idlewild, who boarded a horse at Oceanfront. But a couple years back his father was convicted of insider trading. The family managed to hold on to their Idlewild home, which had been on his mother’s side for years. But otherwise they were wiped out. Everything had to be sold, including Jeremy’s horse, to pay legal fees and penalties. Now Mrs. Gummer ran a bed-and-breakfast out of their main house, and she and Jeremy lived in the caretaker’s cottage. Jeremy himself had to put college on hold and get a job, and Oceanfront’s owner, Naomi Ward, had hired him as a part-groom, part-trainer. Multiple times I’d seen him ease his way into the stall of a snorting, stomping animal, get up close, and speak in low tones to calm all the wildness right out of it.
Jeremy had left a bucket of grain just outside the stall of a horse named Kismet, who whinnied from within, hungry for lunch. It’s tough to be a horse and always be at the mercy of humans when you want your food. “Hey there. I got you, I got you,” I told him. I unlatched the stall door and carried the grain in, unhooked the old feed bucket, and replaced it with the fresh one. Kismet hardly waited for me to move my hand before he nosedived in. I dropped the old bucket, and it clanged onto the floor. Jeremy ran over to investigate and was clearly startled to see me.
“Sorry,” I mouthed sheepishly. I had the bucket back in hand, and I slipped out of Kismet’s stall and redid the latch.
“Listen, I have to go,” Jeremy said into the phone. “Yeah, you, too. See you later.”
“Hey,” I said, once he’d clicked off. “I was just trying to help. I didn’t mean to interrupt your call.”
“No worries.” He reached toward me with a hug hello. “Oh, no, I’m too sweaty,” I told him. “I ran all the way here.”
“Sorry.” He backed up awkwardly and propped an elbow up against the window of the stall across from Kismet’s. “I heard you’d be away all summer.”
“I had some family stuff to get back for,” I said.
“I hope everything’s all right.”
I hesitated for the smallest moment. I was certain Jeremy didn’t notice. “Oh, yeah,” I said. “Of course. Everything’s great. My aunt just wanted some quality time.”
“I get it,” Jeremy said. He tugged at the goatee on his chin. Facial hair was not really my thing, but there was something about Jeremy’s that I found fascinating, because it always looked like he’d just started to grow it. Did he trim it that way, or was that the most he could get? We did not have a close enough relationship for me to probe these things. “Where’s Orion?”
“On his way. His return is just a bit delayed because my friend Beth-Ann had a competition and she needed a good jumper.”
As if Beth-Ann and I were friends. As if I’d make the mistake of lending her Orion again.
Behind us another horse whinnied a lunch demand.
“Orion will be back soon,” I said. I needed to say it out loud to make myself believe it. “So I need to talk to someone about his board. Is Naomi around?”
“Later today,” he said. “But I can ask for you and call you back.”
“Thanks,” I said. Except I didn’t have a working phone. “Or I’ll call you.”
“Either way.”
“Thanks,” I said again. “And, uh, maybe you can ask Naomi if she needs more help around here. You know, as long as I’m back.” And as long as I was destitute. Working at Oceanfront, I’d have money on hand to bring Orion home, without having to rely on Gigi and the missing trust fund, and be able to board him at a discount. But I certainly wasn’t going to tell Jeremy all that and blow my cover. “I can’t spend every single waking hour with my family, and I’d like to feel useful.”
“She mentioned we needed someone,” he said. “I’ll let her know you’re looking. And I’ll tell her how you helped out today with Kismet.”
“Oh, that was nothing,” I said. I twisted my hands together. They were even sweatier than the rest of me.
“So, uh, I heard the Copelands are hosting some blowout party tonight.”
My heart skipped a beat at the mention of the Copeland name. “Yeah, I heard that.” I hoped my voice sounded cool, as if a Copeland party was completely unremarkable to me.
“People around he
re have been trying to get invites, but it’s some political thing. Really exclusive. Apparently Gucci is doing the fireworks.”
He meant Grucci. It was a fireworks company that did the pyrotechnics for the Olympics and presidential inaugurations. Hannah Mayberry, who went to Hillyer with Lennox and me, had invited us to the New Year’s display over the Statue of Liberty a couple years before. Her dad’s law firm did the deal, so we had VIP passes and shook hands with the Grucci brothers themselves. And now they’d be in the Copelands’ backyard.
“You’ll be able to see them from the beach,” he went on.
Lennox had been the first of the two of us to notice that Jeremy had a crush on me. I sloughed it off, telling her I was sure he was nice to me simply because I was nice back—which was more than you could say for a lot of the girls who boarded their horses at Oceanfront. But even after I came around to agreeing with her, she didn’t push me to pursue it. There was an element of “us and them” when it came to Jeremy Gummer and the Oceanfront regulars; not just because he was the only guy at the barn—most riders were girls—but also because he wasn’t wealthy like the rest. From my end, I liked Jeremy a lot, but not that way; besides, I didn’t want to get too close to him. Getting close to him would be something everyone around us would notice. It’d be yet another thing they’d talk about.
From down the corridor the horse whinnied again and stomped a foot. “I think you’re being paged,” I told Jeremy. “And I’ve got to get going. But tell Naomi I can start Monday.”
“Monday,” he repeated. “See you then.”
8
GRAVESIDE CHAT
ON MY WAY BACK HOME I RAN ALONG THE ROAD instead of the beach, figuring pavement versus sand would make the running easier. The houses I passed looked like paintings in their perfection, but I only got as far as the Point before I had to stop and drop to my knees, my breaths coming in short, ragged bursts. My legs felt like they were made of Jell-O. It was a few minutes before I stood back up and walked over to the guardrail. The ocean was roaring below, and there on the lip of the cliff was a bouquet of flowers—roses, at least a couple dozen of them, tied together with a satin ribbon, the petals browning from being left out in the sun. I knew it wasn’t the smartest idea to walk out to the edge of a cliff to get them, but we’d seen that guy out here in the same spot the night Lennox had picked me up from the airport. God, that seemed like ages ago.
If he could do it, then I could.
Just as I stepped forward, a gust of wind came up and swept the bouquet off the rocks. The water below was too rough to hear a splash. I stepped back again. Why did I want withered flowers anyway? We had more than enough things that were dead and dying back at Edgewater already.
Behind me, a car was coming down Break Run, and I heard the sound of gravel crunching as it slowed, and then a honk. “Lorrie!” Lennox called.
“Hey.”
“You looked like you were thinking of going over.”
“There was a bouquet of flowers,” I told her.
“Huh. Maybe the freak put them there.”
The breeze blew again. It was pushing ninety degrees, but a chill suddenly went up my spine. “Oh my God,” I said. “You don’t think someone left them here for him, do you? Like, because he fell or something?”
“Oh, no,” Lennox said quickly. “If that had happened, we would’ve heard all about it.”
“Yeah, maybe.” I paused. “So where are you headed?”
“Just coming back from the nail salon.”
I looked at her hand on the steering wheel, nails free of polish. “Going for the natural look?”
“Diana double-booked, if you can believe it. And the only reason the other customer got there first was because I held the door open for her. Which just goes to show that no good deed goes unpunished. Diana doesn’t have another opening today, but she said maybe, maybe she could squeeze me in later this afternoon—like she’d be doing me a favor. I’d have to go all the way back there, and she wouldn’t even be able to do my toes, too.”
I had a flash of a mean thought in my head: Oh, the hardship of Lennox Sackler-Kandell, having to paint her own toenails.
But then I felt bad for being begrudging. Hardship is all relative. “That’s annoying,” I said.
“Yeah. My next manicure better be on the house,” she said. “But the good news is, I ran into you. I just tried calling to see if you wanted to have brunch. I’ve been calling you for days, as a matter of fact.”
“Sorry about that. Cell-phone issues.”
“So, brunch?”
I shook my head. “I don’t have any money on me.”
“No prob,” she said. “I do. I can add it to your tab.”
I didn’t want to owe Lennox any more than I already did. Besides, I was too sweaty for the club and too mortified to appear at any of a half dozen places in town where Susannah and Brian previously might have left their waiter in the lurch when the check came. “I’m not that hungry, actually,” I said as my stomach turned over in hunger. I wondered what treats Lennox had in her purse right then. A candy bar? A power bar? “But I will take a lift.”
“Hop in.”
I walked around to the other side and pulled open the passenger door.
“Where to?” Lennox asked.
“Let’s just drive around for a bit, if you don’t mind. I’m not ready to go home yet.”
“Your wish is my command.”
“Did you tell the moms about my plane ticket?” I asked as Lennox pulled out onto Break Run.
“Yeah,” she said. “They’ll get the credit card statement, and I didn’t want them to open the envelope and just find out like that. But don’t worry—they were completely cool about it. They know there’s a cash-flow issue out of your control and you’re in a tough spot sometimes, and obviously they wouldn’t want you stranded in North Carolina until the funds cleared up. You’re practically another daughter to them.”
“Thanks, sis,” I said.
“Besides, they know you’re good for the money.”
Ah, there was the rub—the difference between practically being another daughter and actually being one. An actual Sackler-Kandell daughter would get to take a lot for granted, like having the money to get home from wherever it was she’d gone, and like not opening mail to find out her tuition hadn’t been paid. Like knowing she was, in fact, good for the money.
“You’re not mad, are you?” Lennox asked.
“No, no, of course not. I knew you had to tell them. I just wondered if you had yet, that’s all.”
“But there’s something you’re not saying,” she said. “I don’t mean to go all therapist on you, but we never did have that ice cream chat.”
I turned away again, took a deep breath, and exhaled out the window into the wind.
“I don’t think it’s healthy to keep too much inside for too long,” she said. She looked away from the road for an instant and put her free hand on my knee. “I’m serious about this. You can tell me anything.”
“I know I can,” I said. “I’m just still processing everything.”
“Process with me,” Lennox said. “I’m a journalist, you know.”
“What does that have to do with it?”
“I’m good at information intake, that’s all.”
“Soon,” I told her. “I promise.”
“All right,” Lennox said. “I’ll take a hint, even though I don’t want to. I have something really exciting to tell you anyway.”
“Oh, yeah?”
“The Copelands are back, and there’s a party at the Compound tonight. I got a Google Alert about it.”
“You have a Google Alert for a Copeland party?”
“For anything Copeland,” she told me. “So I can be the first to know.”
“Well, you’re actually the third person to tell me about the party,” I said. “I was at Oceanfront just before this, and Jeremy said he’d heard there’d be fireworks.”
Lennox gave me a sl
y smile. “Let me guess what kind of fireworks Jeremy had in mind.”
“You’re incorrigible,” I told her.
“Nice use of an SAT word.”
“I try.”
“Anyway,” Lennox went on, “Claire said the usual crowd will be at the club tonight.”
I stiffened in my seat. It was hard enough to hang out with Claire Glidewell and the usual crowd and pretend to be like everyone else on a good day. If I told Lennox I didn’t want to join them, she’d have to choose between them and me. I knew she’d choose me. But Lennox liked those kids. I think it was fun for her to have some Idlewild friends who were normal. Making her choose wouldn’t really be fair to her.
“Wait a second,” she said. “You said I was the third person to tell you. So, Jeremy and I are two. Who’s three?”
“There’s my journalist.”
“Am I supposed to investigate this further or just take some wild guesses?”
“You’ll never guess.”
“Brian?”
“Ew! Why’d you pick him?”
“I was going for Person Least Likely to Have Any Intel on the Copelands.”
“Actually, Brian’s so weaselly, I wouldn’t put it past him to know everything,” I said. “But you’re wrong on this, and you should just give up so I can tell you and watch you freak out.” She nodded for me to go ahead. “Charlie.”
“Charlie? Who’s Charlie?”
“Franklin Charles Copeland the Third,” I said. “Otherwise known as Charlie.”
“Wait! What?”
The car swerved and I gasped. “Eyes on the road, Len!”
“I can’t,” she said. “I should pull over for this.” We happened to be on Lamb Avenue just then, the road that ran alongside the Idlewild Cemetery. When I’d said Charlie’s name, Lennox had nearly driven into the white picket fence that bordered the property. Now she slowed to a stop, and I glanced out the window at a row of headstones.
The cemetery had never been my favorite place. When Susannah and I were young, we held our breath whenever we drove past it, so we didn’t inhale any of the dead’s souls. That was the old wives’ tale that Gigi had told us, and of course it was bullshit, like most other things to ever come out of her mouth. The dead were harmless, and better for us to pull over here than in front of someone’s house. These residents wouldn’t look out and wonder what Lennox and I were doing on their front lawn.
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