113 Katama Rd
Sisters of Edgartown
By
Katie Winters
ALL RIGHTS RESERVED. No part of this publication may be reproduced, distributed, or transmitted in any form or by any means, including photocopying, recording, or other electronic or mechanical methods, without the prior written permission of the publisher.
Copyright © 2021 by Katie Winters
This is a work of fiction. Any resemblance of characters to actual persons, living or dead is purely coincidental. Katie Winters holds exclusive rights to this work. Unauthorized duplication is prohibited.
Table of Contents
Copyright Page
Chapter One
Chapter Two
Chapter Three
Chapter Four
Chapter Five
Chapter Six
Chapter Seven
Chapter Eight
Chapter Nine
Chapter Ten
Chapter Eleven
Chapter Twelve
Chapter Thirteen
Chapter Fourteen
Chapter Fifteen
Chapter Sixteen
Chapter Seventeen
Chapter Eighteen
Chapter Nineteen
Chapter Twenty
Chapter Twenty-One
Chapter Twenty-Two
Chapter Twenty-Three
Chapter Twenty-Four
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Chapter One
It was early May. How was it possible? Camilla resented this fact — that time had rushed through her fingers so frantically, sped from her husband’s leaving in December to all the way to now, this fateful day when she had to face the truth. It wasn’t fair, really, that time had taken its toll so readily. She could remember long-ago days when she’d actually willed time to speed up: when Andrea had been a gut-screaming toddler; when she’d been smack-dab in the middle of a long night shift at the hospital; when she’d ached for a vacation. Now, it seemed, all those wishes had caught up to her and the worst year of her life had given her very little time to heal or make things better.
“I just needed a little bit more time,” she now muttered to the steering wheel of the big truck she’d borrowed from her soon-to-be-ex-husband, Jonathon. “Why couldn’t I have just a little more time?”
She sat up toward the edge of the seat so that her feet just barely pressed against the gas and brake. She was parked on Green Hollow Road, out in front of one of her best friends, Jennifer Conrad’s house. The entire truck quaked around her as though her inner anxiety sped out into the exterior world.
Jennifer stepped out of her front door as a Martha’s Vineyard breeze swept up beneath her trench coat and whipped it, along with her glorious red hair, back behind her. Jennifer Conrad seemed ever-ready for the pages of a magazine. Camilla, who hadn’t slept a wink the night before, due to worry, looked a bit more like a soggy newspaper at the bottom of the trash.
“Hey, hon.” Jennifer slid into the passenger side of the truck and furrowed her brows. “Did you manage to get any sleep last night?”
“Not much,” Camilla admitted. In the previous months, her best friends — Jennifer, Olivia, Amelia, and Mila, had all looked at her with similar expressions. It was as though they all expected her to totally self-destruct.
“But you’re okay to drive, aren’t you?” Jennifer asked.
“Of course,” Camilla returned. “I told you. You’re just here as emotional support. I don’t need anything else.”
Camilla snaked the big truck westward, where the ferry boats docked up in Oak Bluffs before departing toward Woods Hole, a little area of Falmouth, Massachusetts, on the mainland. Camilla couldn’t remember the last time she’d been off the island — probably the previous summer when she and Jonathon had helped Andrea move to the city for her first year in fashion school. Ah yes. They’d probably taken this very truck, one of the ones that belonged to Jonathon’s construction company.
The truck hovered in a line behind a number of other vehicles, all on a trek toward the big ramp, which guided them into the belly of the huge ferry. Camilla’s fingers tightened over the wheel as Jennifer flicked through radio stations. Although Camilla had known Jennifer since about age four, she felt vague embarrassment at her lack of interesting things to say. On today of all days, her tongue was a floppy, useless thing.
Suddenly, there was a massive horn. It blasted from behind the truck, and Camilla leaped from her seat and dropped her foot from the brake.
“What the heck —”
“I think, um, yeah. They just got impatient because you weren’t going, I guess, is all,” Jennifer said softly as she gestured toward the empty space between them and the ramp.
“Oh.” Camilla hated that she hadn’t even noticed.
She shuddered, then placed her foot on the gas once more. But because she wasn’t accustomed to the monstrous machine, it bucked forward and very nearly crunched into the back of the car in front of her. Camilla freaked. She gripped the steering wheel even harder and grumbled, “Shoot. Shoot, shoot.” Her knees pushed together as her legs jiggled with panic.
It took everything she had to maneuver the truck to a parking spot on the ferry. All the while, Jennifer whispered her support, with her own hands clutching her knees. “That’s right. Almost there, now. Don’t worry.”
Once outside the truck, Camilla fell forward slightly and pressed her hands against the windows of the big beast for support. Jennifer hustled up behind her and placed her hand on Camilla’s upper back.
“You okay?” she asked, for maybe the zillionth time that year.
“I don’t know,” Camilla murmured. “I thought I was. But as you can see, I didn’t exactly win any awards getting us onto the ferry.”
“Focus on your breathing,” Jennifer murmured. “Let’s go to the cafe. Grab a snack. And — pass me the keys.”
Camilla arched her brow. “I told you. You don’t have to drive.”
“You know I like being in control.” Jennifer’s voice lifted as she gave Camilla a sure smile. “Consider it a gift to me. All I’ve done all week is walk from the bakery to the office and back again. This is a girls’ road trip, and dammit, if I’m not the Louise to your Thelma.”
“Does that mean I’m the stupid, ditzy one?” Camilla said with a wry smile as she gently placed the keys in Jennifer’s outstretched palm.
“No. It means you’re the hot one who gets to hook up with Brad Pitt,” Jennifer returned with a laugh.
They headed up to the cafe, where Jennifer ordered them black coffee and muffins. They sat on either side of a small table, which was attached to the wall of the boat, just beneath a window. As the ferry motored away from the island, they watched in silence. There was something about watching their beautiful rock, there beneath the sun, ease into the horizon and then disappear. It always made Camilla understand how small her life was.
“I’m nervous.” Camilla lifted her coffee and stared into the black liquid, which caught the reflection of the window above.
“You know, Andrea will understand,” Jennifer coaxed. “She’s a good kid. She always has been.”
“But she shouldn’t have to be this good,” Camilla said. “She’s twenty-one years old. She’s on the precipice of her life. And all me and Jonathon ever wanted was the best for her.”
Camilla made a fist and placed it over her mouth as another cry curled up from her stomach.
Jennifer placed a hand over hers, there to the side of the coffee. When Camilla opened her eyes again, she found Jennifer’s soothing face before her.
“Remember what you’ve done, every step of the way, since December?” Jennifer tried.
“One step ahead of the
other.” Camilla exhaled slowly. “One day at a time.”
“No doubt, this is one of the harder days,” Jennifer said. “But you’ll get through it. And better than that, now, Andrea will be back on the Vineyard.”
“Hating Jonathon and me with every fiber of her being, no doubt.”
“Not you, Cam,” Jennifer affirmed. “You’re not the one who lost all of her college funds.”
The weight of this punched Camilla in the stomach once again. How could Jonathon have done this? How could he have ruined everything in every single imaginable way? Camilla could understand Jon wronging her, sure but his daughter? Andrea had been his entire world.
WHEN THEY JUMPED BACK in the truck, later on, Jennifer cranked the engine and eased them off the ferry and back out onto the wild highways of Massachusetts. It was foreign out there, just miles and miles of paved roads, and Camilla felt that burning feeling in the back of her mind, the one that told her she was continually moving further from the comforts of home.
“I can’t believe Andrea spent almost an entire year off the island,” she said under her breath.
“But we’re lucky, you and me,” Jennifer said. “Our babies want to stay on the island for good. Build lives there. Olivia isn’t so lucky. I could see Chelsea and Xavier running off for good.”
“Yes, but Olivia is a little preoccupied at the moment with Anthony,” Camilla offered. “And the inn should open sometime this summer, right?”
“I hope so. Olivia and Anthony haven’t taken a day off from that place in months,” Jennifer said. “Did you see Olivia’s biceps the other day? She’s thin as a rail and stronger than an ox. She said Anthony has her doing some of the harder construction stuff, and she’s welcomed it.”
“To think, our little bookworm had even more to learn.”
Jennifer sniffed and adjusted her sunglasses. A silence fell between them. Camilla found it very difficult to focus on anything that wasn’t the devastation of what was about to take place. Beyond that, she was panicked about the big city. She’d only been to New York twice in her entire life and both times, she’d clutched Jonathon’s hand so hard, he’d joked she’d busted his bones.
“She’s going to understand, Cam,” Jennifer said again, as though she could read her mind. (Admittedly, all of the Sisters of Edgartown had psychic abilities when it came to one another.)
“I just don’t know how to break it to her,” Camilla whispered.
“Well, she knows Jonathon left in December,” Jennifer affirmed.
“And it’s not like she took that well, either. But at least she had school to take her mind off of things. And ugh. This wedding! She wants to get married in December. For a year, it’s been non-stop talk of a Christmas wedding. I don’t know how we’ll afford that at all.”
“One mess at a time, Camilla,” Jennifer said.
“I should have made him come with me to tell her himself,” Camilla said. “I wonder how he would phrase it? ‘Hey, honey. I made a series of bad investments and lost all the money your mother and I set aside for your college. It took us years and years to save it up and I managed to lose it in a matter of months! Impressive, huh? Now, get in the truck. Let’s get you back home to your childhood bedroom!’”
“Something tells me he wouldn’t be so upbeat about it, but I’m not quite sure,” Jennifer said.
“I just wish she didn’t have to drop out,” Camilla said. “It’s been her dream to go to fashion school since she was eleven or twelve. She had brochures for this place on her desk by the time she was fifteen. The fact that she didn’t even get to go until she was twenty-one was torture enough. She wanted to save up. But all that’s gone with city life and now, her tuition is gone, too.”
The drive from Falmouth to Brooklyn was approximately four and a half hours. They drove southwest along the coastline’s I-95, and they eventually did manage to find conversation topics that had nothing to do with Camilla’s devastating loss.
Around noon, with another two hours left, Camilla texted her daughter to let her know their ETA.
ANDREA: That’s great, Mom! I thought we could head out for a burrito before we get the boxes in the truck? You’d die for this place down the road.
Camilla arched an eyebrow. The last thing in the world she wanted was to feast on a burrito, mere moments before she destroyed the beautiful facade her daughter still saw around her.
But then again, this would allow her a few more minutes of normality. It would allow her to speak with her beautiful daughter in the wake of a successful semester, only seven or so months before she married the love of her life.
CAMILLA: Sounds great, babe. Jennifer is here, too.
ANDREA: Can’t wait!
Chapter Two
To his credit — perhaps his very last credit — Jonathon had been the one to find this quaint, safe, brick-walled apartment in which Andrea had spent the previous nine months of her life. Camilla remembered the day he had discovered it online. He’d jumped out of the office and waved his arms around like a child as he’d exclaimed, “Andy! I got it!” Andrea, who’d been at her breaking point with apartment-hunting, had hugged him mid-scream. Camilla’s heart felt stretched at the memory.
Camilla’s knock rang out through the apartment. Moments later, Andrea popped open the door, then swallowed her mother in a hug. Like Camilla, Andrea was blonde and blue-eyed, slender and fashionable, and the space behind her, which was mostly boxed up into many cardboard boxes, still reflected her personality, which was Type-A, artistic, and alive in ways that Camilla sometimes was jealous of. In all her years, all she had ever wanted was to work in health, but Andrea had wanted none of that. Camilla had said many times to Jonathon over the years, “It’s wild what our kid comes up with on her own.” At this, Jonathon had always said, “I guess it’s true what they say. All you can do is guide them, but they make up the path as they go along.”
Camilla really could have laughed at that “guide them” statement now, given the fact that Jonathon had made some of the worst decisions of any human she’d ever interacted with.
But it wasn’t really the time for that.
“Okay! So I have most of the boxes gathered up here at the door,” Andrea said as she swung a thick lock of blonde behind her ear. “I’m totally famished, so maybe we could run to that burrito place now, then finish up here. Jen, gosh, I’m sorry — I should hug you, too!” Andrea whipped toward Jennifer and hugged her, then dotted a kiss on her cheek.
“The city looks good on you,” Jennifer said mid-hug.
At this, Camilla’s eyes bugged out, and she shook her head menacingly. Jennifer realized her mistake. They couldn’t very well compliment Andrea’s way with the city, then immediately steal the concept of it away from her.
“I do love it,” Andrea said as she stepped back. “It’s so alive. Every day is a new adventure. But you know, the Vineyard will always have my heart. Isaac and I will build our lives there. Have a family. All that jazz.”
“All that jazz,” Jennifer repeated with a smile.
Camilla rolled her eyes back, then collected herself just as Andrea turned back to grab her purse. “All right, let’s go.”
The burrito place down the road bustled with activity. It was two-thirty, and therefore, in Camilla’s eyes, not exactly lunch time, but according to Andrea, New York operated on its own timeline. People freelanced; people had rich parents; people ate burritos whenever they pleased. Andrea ordered guacamole for her burrito — an upcharge of two dollars, and flashed her mother a knowing smile. Little did Andrea know that very soon, the concept of extra guacamole would be a very foreign thing.
The three of them sat in the corner. Just as Camilla had expected, Andrea told some stories from the past month, including a dramatic event with her final project, which involved making three separate “looks” from items you might find on the street.
“You should have seen me trying to make this little dress from the fabric I found on an old couch pillow,” Andrea said
as her eyes sparkled. “It should have been a disaster, but my teacher said I showed ‘ingenue,’ whatever that means, and gave me an A-minus.”
“Wow. You’ll be dressing all of us in no time,” Jennifer said as she held her burrito a few inches from her plate. She blinked at it strangely, then added, “And these burritos. They’re as big as your head.”
“Didn’t you read the sign?” Andrea asked as she pointed toward an aluminum plaque that said exactly that, which hung from the wall near the front window.
Camilla could sense how much her daughter loved to show off this world of hers, the one she had discovered all for herself, while everyone she’d ever known continued on back at the Vineyard. As Camilla chewed on the edge of a tortilla, she tried to drum up the strength to explain that everything Andrea now held dear, she would probably never see again. Not if it was up to her parents, who’d failed her.
When they headed back toward Andrea’s apartment for the ultimate pack-up, Camilla’s heart pounded with resignation and fear. When they reached the staircase landing, she turned to Jen and said, “Do you mind giving Andrea and me a few minutes alone?”
Andrea inserted her key into the door and then cast her gaze back toward her mother, confused. When Jennifer stepped back and turned to leave them, Andrea’s eyes shimmered.
“What’s up, Mom?”
They sat inside, on the couch they would very soon have to load into the back of the truck. Andrea poured them both cups of water as Camilla tried to collect herself. There, in that room, all she could think of was the day she and Jonathon had moved Andrea in. They had brimmed with joy and hope for the future. All the while, Jonathon had been in the midst of losing everything. He hadn’t mentioned it. The lie had been like a monstrous iceberg beneath the surface; they’d rollicked right into it.
“We can’t just sit here forever,” Andrea finally said. “The sublease tenant is going to want to move in tonight.”
“Right.” Camilla had to admit; she didn’t appreciate her daughter’s sarcasm just then. “Andrea, I don’t know how to tell you this.”
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