She sat down and breathed in as deeply as she could: it was the complicated, briny, utterly alive smell that meant she was home. Something inside her loosened and she began to cry, for her mother, for her father, who couldn’t drive, couldn’t haul traps, couldn’t see right. For the little baby who had never been born, who would never row a skiff from the dock to a mooring, would never giggle when he touched a piece of bait for the first time.
She wiped savagely at her face and thought, What if this is where I was supposed to be all along?
Lesson Number Four: When you’re choosing a cantaloupe, go by smell, not by feel. A ripe cantaloupe smells like a cantaloupe. An unripe cantaloupe smells like nothing at all. If you’re planting tomatoes mix a little limestone into the soil. And there’s so much more I wanted to tell you. I wanted to tell you about love and sex and how to shape your eyebrows and how to learn to drink coffee and choose a lipstick and what to do when you make a mistake and how to cook chicken cutlets the way your father likes them and not to be scared of childbirth and dozens, maybe hundreds, of things like that, but the truth is I’m running out of time
Her mother had died before she finished the letter. No more lessons. Not even a period at the end of the last sentence. That was the ending: no ending at all.
Her phone buzzed, giving her a start. A text from Evie.
I GOT THE PART! I GOT IT. FERN, IN CHARLOTTE’S WEB.
30
BARTON, MASSACHUSETTS
Deirdre
Deirdre was serving lunch to the decorating committee in forty-five minutes, and she was in a tizzy.
Judith Barnes had told Deirdre that there were always unanticipated disasters in the final few weeks before a big event, and, since Judith Barnes could raise tens of thousands of dollars with her eyes closed, her ears plugged, and a set of Crest Whitestrips on her teeth, Deirdre took her at her word. It was Judith who’d told Deirdre that the decorating committee could be one of the trickiest fund-raising committees to manage—they seemed innocuous, but, oh boy, did they ever have opinions.
At the moment, though, all was on track. She had most of the silent-auction items on deck. The RSVPs were coming in, and soon it would be time to finalize the seating arrangements, which were promising to be more complicated than the seating arrangements at her wedding fifteen years ago at the Wadsworth Atheneum Museum of Art in Hartford.
But she was almost there.
She had chosen the dress she would wear to the gala: an Ulla Johnson corded Japanese satin blouson dress in marigold. The Cleo dress, it was called. Not everyone could pull off marigold, but, with her natural skin tone plus the extra sun she’d gotten over the past couple of weeks, Deirdre could. (Sheila would never be able to pull off marigold.) Deirdre thought that the dress color would serve as a nice homage to Africa. She wouldn’t do anything more obvious than that. Well, maybe some ruby earrings and a touch of green around her neck.
Though the gala was still weeks away, she had secured a mani-pedi appointment for the day before at Nails! Nails! Nails! and a hair appointment with Shonda, her stylist at Luxe, in downtown Barton, for the morning of. Shonda had been known to nail a killer updo, though with the ruffle collar of the Cleo Deirdre thought wearing her hair down and ironed silk-straight might be the way to go. Or maybe soft curls would be better. Not that the EANY kids would or should care how Deirdre wore her hair to the gala. Get over yourself, Deirdre. Keep your mind on the task at hand.
But her mind kept returning to seeing Rob outside of St. Matthew’s.
“It was nothing,” Rob had said, about their encounter, first in the bar, and after in the Tahoe.
She disagreed.
It was only kissing, but it wasn’t nothing. Deirdre believed in being honest. It had happened, and calling it nothing didn’t change the situation, just like putting glasses on a dog and naming the dog Professor Sparkles didn’t make the dog any smarter.
She was getting a headache. It was a guilt headache.
Lunch!
Emily Boyd was on Phase 1 of the Fast Metabolism Diet: fruits, whole grains, lean proteins. Gabby Gardner was doing Whole30: no grains, all proteins, most fruits. Sheila could eat only protein, no fruits or veggies. Just one day a week, to keep her “plan on track.” But that day happened to be today.
Holy moly.
At least Deirdre didn’t have to serve wine with lunch. Nobody was drinking during the week anymore; half the women out on the last Ladies’ Night had only had seltzer. They were all “saving their drinks” for the night of the gala.
What was she supposed to serve for lunch? Bread and water, like a prison matron? No, of course not, don’t be an idiot, Deirdre. Nobody on the decorating committee would touch bread.
Her headache got a little bit worse.
This was normally something she would have called Eliza about—Eliza never dieted; her metabolism was naturally speedy—and she and Eliza would have snickered and felt nobly superior while Eliza worked her way through a package of Junior Mints and Deirdre ate salt-and-pepper potato chips straight from the bag.
But she couldn’t call Eliza, not now, not after the encounter.
The day after the encounter, while Kristi Osgood took Sofia to the club, Deirdre had arranged for a mobile detailing of the Tahoe. The guy came right to her house with all sorts of equipment, and she sat in her office, peering out the window at him, working out her complicated feelings.
She kept thinking of Lady Macbeth, consumed by guilt and handwashing. She’d seen a production of Macbeth on a trip with her parents to Stratford-on-Avon the summer between high school and college, and the image had really stuck.
Out, damned spot!
When the mobile car detailing guy rang the doorbell to present Deirdre with the bill he said, “I prettied her up as much as I could. But really that thing was already friggin’ pristine.”
“Not really,” Deirdre had said, remembering her hand on the back of Rob’s neck. “There was a lot of, um, invisible grime. I hope you got it all.”
Out, damned spot!
Lunch! Think about the lunch.
In the end, she put an array of beautiful salad fixings in her favorite wooden bowls and laid them out along the sideboard in the dining room. She added two pounds of poached salmon she’d picked up from Whole Foods. Then, on further consideration, a bowl of hard-boiled eggs. Peeled or unpeeled? She wavered, then peeled half. To each woman, her own salad. She left fruit out of the equation altogether. Fruit was too fraught.
She was bringing into the dining room some of the materials that EANY had promised to send in time for the gala—giant blown-up photographs of the children in their dirt-floor school, a super-close-up of a beautiful Malawi girl with intricately braided hair, pierced ears, and giant crooked teeth—when her phone buzzed.
Eliza.
Out, damned spot!
She hovered her finger over the answer button. To answer or not to answer, that was the question. Obviously, a different Shakespeare play, but relevant nonetheless.
She answered.
“Hey,” said Eliza. “I’m sorry if you’re busy, with the gala. I just needed an ear.”
“I have an ear!” said Deirdre. In her mind she rubbed away the damned spot. “In fact I have two.”
“It’s just—I don’t know what to do. I want to bring my dad to Boston for treatment. He won’t even entertain the idea. He’s totally against it. I thought if I stayed here for a while I could convince him, but. He hasn’t budged.”
“Oh, Eliza.” This was what real problems looked like—this, not some messy, drunken, college-like hookup in a bar. “Oh, Eliza. I’m so sorry.”
“I think I should come home for a while, give him some space. I’m driving him crazy. And I need to see the girls.”
A river of panic coursed through Deirdre. Talking to Eliza on the phone when she was safely four hours to the north was one thing; seeing her in person was quite another.
Her brain was thinking that of course Eliza should come ho
me and see her girls, but then all of a sudden her mouth was saying, “Oh, Eliza. Your girls are fine. I promise you. I think your dad needs you more than the girls do right now.”
Out, out, out damned spot.
“You think so?” Eliza’s voice wobbled, and Deirdre’s heart wrenched.
“I do.”
“No, you’re right. I should stay here. He does need me, even if he won’t admit it. I wish they could come up here. But I know Rob is swamped with Cabot Lodge, he can’t leave…”
Deirdre took a deep breath, swallowed her guilt and her remorse, and said, “I could bring them up to you.” She would do it. She would sacrifice the gala preparations, and she would bring the girls to Eliza. This would be her penance.
“Oh no. No, Deirdre. Thank you, but I know how much you have going on. I know this is the crucial time for the gala.”
Deirdre considered the salad bowls. She said, “Maybe you should see if your mother-in-law can bring them up to you?”
Out.
“I don’t know—”
Damned.
“Do you think Judith would do it? Really?”
Spot!
“I bet she would. And, honestly, Eliza, don’t you want the girls to see your dad now? Before, well—”
“Before it’s too late,” Eliza filled in.
“Well, yes.”
“You’re right. I’ll ask her,” Eliza said, suddenly and firmly. “What else are mothers-in-law for, right? You have to be able to ask for help when you need it. Whatever our differences have been in the past. Or the present.”
“Exactly,” said Deirdre. “Exactly. But you know if she can’t do it, I will.”
“I’m going to call Judith now,” said Eliza. “I needed this talk, Deirdre. Thank you. You’re such a good friend.”
Out, damned spot.
As soon as she’d disconnected from Eliza, the doorbell rang: there they were, live and in person, the three members of the decorating committee. “Hello!” Deirdre said, employing her gracious-hostess voice. “Hello, hello, come in!”
Once they were inside, the dining room seemed too small for the posters, the food, the people. Deirdre watched Sheila considering the posters. She tipped her head to one side and then to the other, as though this were the Met and she a discerning patron.
“What, Sheila?” asked Deirdre. She heard an edge in her own voice.
“It’s just—nothing,” said Sheila.
“What?”
Sheila sighed. “It’s just. Do you think we could get a different poster?”
“Why would we do that?”
“Maybe one where the children aren’t…so thin. I mean, it’s fine for them to look hungry, but too hungry? It might turn people off.”
“Of course they’re hungry,” Deirdre snapped. “In fact they’re starving. Literally.”
And Sheila rolled her eyes at Gabby Gardner; Deirdre could practically hear her say it: There goes Deirdre again. Overreacting.
“I’ll be right back,” said Deirdre. She clenched her hands into fists. “I just need to grab some seltzer—”
“I am so goddamn tired of salad,” she heard Sheila Rackley say cheerfully when she was out of the room. Then, sotto voce, “Do you think this salmon is wild?”
31
LITTLE HARBOR, MAINE
Mary
Andi and Daphne stood together in the doorway, looking at Mary like a set of proud parents. They were dressed up in flowered summer sundresses—not identical, but very similar—and Andi was wearing an unfamiliar rosy-pink lip gloss.
“You sure?” said Andi for the nine hundred and forty-eighth time.
“Positive,” said Mary. “Go ahead, I got this.” Daphne’s parents were up from Connecticut and Andi and Daphne were having dinner with them at Fathom in Bar Harbor. Mary hadn’t been to Fathom, she probably would never go to Fathom, but she’d looked up the menu on her phone and seen items like Drunk Shrimp and Massaged Kale Salad and cocktails called Bluette and Dirty Pearl. She wasn’t sure why kale would get a massage (Mary would kill for a massage herself), but she knew that a menu like this was right up Daphne and Andi’s alley. They ate that stuff up, literally. They had to leave before the café’s closing time to get to Bar Harbor for a seven-thirty reservation, so Mary would be in charge of emptying the canisters of milk on the sideboard, locking up the cash register, turning off the lights, and so on.
She’d never closed the café by herself before, but Mary was looking forward to her new responsibilities. If things went well, maybe she’d be asked to close up again, then again, and perhaps soon she’d get a promotion, maybe even a raise. Surely Andi and Daphne would like to enjoy their summer evenings away from the café sometimes; if you made it through winter in Maine, the saying went, you deserved summer. Actually, it was the other way around: If you can’t stand winter, you don’t deserve summer. But close enough.
“Have so much fun,” said Mary now. They really did look very pretty, dressed up like that. One of them, she couldn’t tell which, was wearing a light perfume that smelled like lilacs. Maybe they were both wearing the same perfume. Must be nice to be able to share things that way, with your partner. Your wife. Must be nice to be in love like that, in a flowered dress, on your way to Bar Harbor for dinner.
“Fun is relative in this situation,” said Andi. “Daph’s dad still refers to us as ‘the gays.’ ”
“No he doesn’t,” said Daphne. She rolled her eyes.
“Not us as in us,” Andi told Mary. “I mean us as in the community. Like he’ll say, ‘Did you see that the gays got that marriage thing through the Supreme Court?’ ”
“He’s come a long way, though,” said Daphne. “You have to admit that.”
“Do I?” asked Andi. Then, back to Mary, “And Daph’s mom just puts her lips together and looks into the middle distance and you can tell she’s trying hard to think about her book club.” She pressed her own lips together in imitation. “She prefers to think of us as roommates who are just sharing the rent until we can figure out what we really want to do with our lives.”
“Okay, Andi, that’s enough,” said Daphne. “We can’t all come from enlightened West Coast families.” (Andi had grown up in Portland, Oregon.) But Daphne was laughing, and Mary saw her put her hand on Andi’s waist as they exited, and Mary thought, Isn’t that what love is supposed to look like?
There were only four customers in the café at that moment, sitting together at table seven, two tailored yachting couples with cardigans and summer tans, and while Mary watched over them and fiddled behind the counter she felt all of her usual worries swirling around in her mind. When was she going to tell Josh? When her belly swelled to the point where they couldn’t ignore it? When she needed money for an abortion?
I don’t have a nineteen-year-old kid, if that tells you anything, Eliza had said.
Would Josh even have money to help pay for an abortion? He was a terrible lobsterman, really hopeless, and things never seemed to get better for him. Maybe he had some money from the drugs, but she didn’t like to think about that—or the little baggie collecting dust at the back of her closet.
Mary herself had some money saved from her paychecks, of course. But every time she thought about calling the clinic in Bangor to make an appointment, every time she pulled the number up on her phone and got ready to hit the call button, something stopped her. And every time she thought about telling Josh, she remembered the look in his eyes that night when she’d worn the yellow dress, and then how swiftly he’d turned from easygoing to angry at The Wheelhouse, and the same something (or maybe a different something) stopped her.
Anyway, she still had two weeks and five days to decide.
The customers were all drinking wine, three Chardonnays, one Cabernet. If they ordered another round, of course, Mary would have to serve them, even though, technically, she was underage. She hoped that they did order another round.
One couple owned a home on the Point and one couple was visi
ting; Mary could tell this from the way one of the men said things like, “We contribute a handsome sum to the Lobster Festival every year, though of course keeping the local flavor is really the thing.”
Mary wanted to tell him that we did not do anything, that it was us against them in this town, in case he hadn’t noticed, that if he couldn’t stand the winter he didn’t deserve the summer, but then he caught her looking at him and flashed a smile that really did look friendly and sincere and she figured that he was probably just a guy doing his best, like most people. And in fact it was true: the summer people did contribute a lot to the Lobster Festival. Daphne was on the committee.
Mary tried to imagine what it might be like to be these people, sitting with their wine, fresh off their sailboat, taking a small and relaxing break before heading back to their gigantic summerhouses, where they’d drink more wine before putting on silk pajamas and climbing into oversized beds.
Silk pajamas seemed, to Mary, like the height of luxury.
However. Mary should be keeping busy, not judging the customers. The customers could say whatever they liked, as long as they paid their bill and (hopefully) left a tip on the table or in the tip jar on the counter.
Mary spent some time organizing the milk and cream and sugars and wiping up the cinnamon that had spilled out of the container, and then she stood, surveying the café the way a farmer might survey his fields, with a certain pride of ownership and the satisfaction of a job well done. A sensation came over her that was so pleasant she didn’t recognize it. Then she realized that for the first time since she’d taken that pregnancy test the future stretched out before her in a way that didn’t look like something she had to be afraid of. She touched her stomach. She walked over to table seven and asked the customers if they needed anything.
“All set, doll!” said the man who’d been doing the talking. Doll. Ugh. Still, she wouldn’t mind a tip, so she smiled and retreated behind the counter, where she pulled out her phone and typed How big is a baby at eleven weeks.
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