Summer Beach Reads

by Thayer, Nancy

  They swept toward Nona in a wave of greetings, kissing, hugging, and, in Zoe’s case, drooling. Behind them strode Kellogg, bags in each hand and one hooked over each shoulder. “Hello, Nona!” he called heartily from behind his flock. “Girls, where do you want the luggage?”

  Grace struggled in through the French doors, also laden with bags. She blew Nona a kiss. “Mother! You look lovely! Does it matter where we sleep?”

  “Not at all. Charlotte’s in the attic, you know.”

  “I’ll take another attic bedroom, then,” Mee declared. “We spinsters can have our own floor.”

  “Can’t be a spinster if you’ve been married,” Mandy corrected. “It’s too bad Charlotte’s taken up the attic. The playroom’s up there. It would be much easier if we could have the attic bedrooms.”

  “Don’t be silly, Mandy,” Mee retorted. “The attic bedrooms only have single beds.”

  “Well, I don’t want an attic bedroom,” Mellie pouted, rubbing her round belly. “It’s going to be hard enough for me to climb stairs as it is.”

  “I’ll take an attic bedroom,” Mellie’s husband, Douglas, said. “Maybe I’ll be able to get some sleep without being bounced about by a great white wh—” He was skewered by his wife’s glance. “Sorry, Mellie.”

  “Why don’t you and Claus take the front bedroom,” Grace suggested to her oldest daughter. “The children can go in the old sewing room, and Daddy and I will stay in the room across the hall so we can help with the children.”

  “Is the crib still set up in the old sewing room?” Claus asked. “Christian, you’re getting heavy, Papa’s going to put you down.”

  “These bags are what’s getting heavy!” Kellogg announced. “I’m taking them up to the second floor. You can sort them out up there.”

  Bulging and joining and separating like some kind of amoeba shown on a Nature Channel special, the dynamic mass of Grace’s family made their way from the living room into the large hall and up the front stairs. Interesting, Nona thought, that Charlotte hadn’t come in from the garden, rushing into the room to hug her cousins and aunt and uncle. Well, Charlotte was serious about her work, and although she had to have seen the vehicles arrive, driving over the sandy path from the main road, she might have only waved and then returned to her weeding or watering or whatever she was doing. The years when they would have hurried to greet one another, all of them squealing like piglets, had passed.

  Mandy fluttered into the room. “Do you think you could hold the baby for just a minute? I’ll be right back with her diaper bag and her bouncy chair. There’s so much paraphernalia required for a baby.” She plunked the baby down in Nona’s arms and hurried out to the garden and through the hedge to her SUV.

  Nona gazed down at her great-granddaughter. Zoe’s skin had the smooth iridescence of the inside of a shell. She remembered this luminous skin from her own babies. Zoe was awake and looking around, puckering her mouth as if she were about to pronounce judgment on what she saw. When her eyes fastened on Nona’s, she smiled a toothless baby smile.

  “You darling,” Nona whispered, stroking the baby’s soft face with her gnarled, wrinkled old witch’s finger. She remembered this, too, from when her grandchildren were babies, how infants could somehow see past the disfigurements of age to the love within.

  Claus entered the room. Tall, thin, Scandinavian, he gave off the nervous energy of a purebred borzoi. “I was going to ask you to look after Christian, but I see Mandy got to you first. I need to bring in the co-sleeper for Zoe.” He looked hopelessly burdened.

  Kellogg appeared. “I’ll bring in the co-sleeper. Which room did you take? Come on, Christian, let Grandpop give you a ride.” He swept the four-year-old up onto his shoulders. “Nona, we’re going through the mudroom, okay? It’s closer to the cars.”

  Mellie waddled in and collapsed in a nearby wing chair. “I have the worst heartburn! I never dreamed pregnancy could be such a torment!”

  “We have baking soda in the kitchen,” Nona told her. “Mix some with a glass of water. It works wonders.”

  “Baking soda! Nona, you just have no idea the ferocity of this heartburn! Baking soda wouldn’t touch it. I’ve tried every over-the-counter medication there is; I live on Rolaids and Tums.” Her husband passed through the hallway, lugging duffel bags. Spotting him, Mellie said loudly, “I just wish Dougie had to experience some of what I’m going through. I just wish he could experience it for one day.”

  “Mmm,” Nona agreed vaguely. “Mother Nature always was unfair.”

  Grace came in, wiping her hands on an embroidered kitchen hand towel that Nona’s mother-in-law had once used. “Glorious and I are making several gallons of iced tea. We’re all so thirsty. I assume no one wants a real drink, not until evening, right?”

  Claus, wrestling two bulging duffel bags into the hall, stopped at the bottom step. “No alcohol for me. I want to play tennis this afternoon.”

  Behind him, Kellogg was struggling with the co-sleeper. “Yes, and I want to get the boat into the water.”

  The two men toiled up the stairs with their heavy burdens.

  “Okay, iced tea it is,” Grace told them, and went off.

  I could use an alcoholic beverage, Nona thought but did not say. So many people needing so many things.

  It was different with Charlotte. She was just one person, and she cared about Nona’s pleasure. Nona had found Charlotte good company over the past three years, while Charlotte lived in the attic and worked in her garden. Charlotte always made time to stop and chat with Nona, and she made the long winter months deliciously cozy, building a roaring fire, making cocoa from scratch, playing backgammon or cards with Nona. Also she had discovered a trove of brilliant British films on DVDs at the local library, and Friday nights had become their “date night,” when they sat together in the den, watching movies and eating a delicious and completely disreputable meal of pizza and ice cream. All that played havoc with Nona’s bowels the next day, but it was too delightful an occasion to give up.

  Other than that, Charlotte did not really impinge on Nona’s sensibilities. If she played music, she did so either on her headphones while she worked in the garden or up in the attic, from where the sound did not travel. Charlotte also had her computer up there, and a television of her own, so she did not interrupt Nona’s routine.

  Glorious had a large room on the far side of the kitchen, fitted out with a big new TV and a small sofa as well as a comfortable bed and private bath. Glorious had many friends in town and loved to socialize—needed to, Nona imagined, after a day spent dealing with an old bat like herself. Glorious didn’t complain about helping Nona. She was relaxed and seemed actually happy about everything. Still, Nona felt guilty about keeping Glorious later than six o’clock. It made a long day for Glorious, and of course Nona paid her well, but still she hated to be a bother. Nona never liked being a bother.

  So even before Charlotte had come to live in the house, Nona had hit upon a routine that satisfied her. She simply retired at six o’clock. She brushed her long white hair, braided it, and tied the braid with a plaid grosgrain ribbon. She cleaned her teeth, set her bridge into a glass of denture cleaner, and washed and creamed her face. She slipped into one of her flannel nightgowns and settled into bed, resting in the clever chair pillow Glorious had given her one Christmas. Its back was soft and plump and Nona could rest her tired arms on the arms of the pillow. That done, Glorious would settle the bed tray over Nona’s lap, and on the tray was Glorious’s latest splendid culinary effort for Nona’s dinner. Also, a glass of red wine. Also, the remote control. Glorious would kiss Nona on the forehead and hurry downstairs. Soon a friend would come by for her in a rackety old car and Glorious would go giggling out the front door into the evening. Nona would eat, watch the news, and shout her opinions at the overly groomed newscasters, and sometimes she watched her favorite television shows: As Time Goes By. Keeping Up Appearances. Masterpiece Theater. Often, she read. And more and more often, she d
ozed. She seldom slept for more than four hours straight anymore. She was amazed at what sorts of things one could see on the television at three in the morning.

  When Charlotte moved in, she made it clear she didn’t want to alter Nona’s routine. Of course Nona could hear Charlotte rattling around the big old house, preparing herself a meal—the aromas drifting temptingly up the stairs—or talking on her cell phone, or leaving the house and returning later after a movie or a meal with a friend. Nona enjoyed those signs of life. Somehow they had tacitly agreed that Charlotte would greet her grandmother in the morning but not at night. It had to do, Nona thought, with the fact that she didn’t like her family to see her without all her teeth.

  It was not just vanity. It was also about dignity and, more than that, about power.

  Every summer of her life since she was twenty-three, Nona had spent in this house surrounded by family. The summers had been splendid when she was young. When she had energy. She’d run the house, raised her children, and found time to go sailing or play a game of tennis. She’d orchestrated birthday parties, Fourth of July celebrations, clambakes for seventy.

  But not until five years ago, when Herb died, had she been responsible for Family Meeting.

  No one could ever call Nona self-effacing. But there truly was a generational difference in the way wives responded to their husbands. When Nona was a bride, women were more submissive. That was simply the way the world was. Nona wasn’t responsible for that and she would not accept any kind of guilt. In turn, she did not try to judge or condemn her daughter-in-law Helen for Helen’s attitude toward Worth. In fact, she admired Helen and thought Helen handled Worth pretty well. Worth was a lot to handle. He was the most handsome of Herb and Nona’s children, and the one who shouldered the inheritance of the bank. Of the three children, he was the achiever, bright, charming, ambitious, and political.

  Worth and his younger brother, Bobby, had always fought—there were only two years between them. Perhaps Bobby would have been more rebellious or perhaps he would have straightened out. No one would ever know. Bobby had been killed in Vietnam in 1970.

  One thing Nona was certain of, although she never had spoken of this with anyone, was that Worth’s sense of family responsibility increased the moment he heard of his brother’s death. It was understandable. Herb himself had changed when his second son died. He became driven. He spent less time at home and more time at the bank. It was as if the bank suddenly took Bobby’s place, and he needed to see it prosper and grow as if it were a living creature.

  True, the bank was one of the oldest institutions in the Commonwealth of Massachusetts, founded in 1878 by Herb’s great-grandfather, and in a way it did seem part of the family. Once simply named The Fourth Bank of Boston, over the years it had changed names and added officers and shareholders. Now Worth, Kellogg, and Lew Lowry were in charge. Lew’s son Whit, who was Charlotte’s age, worked at the bank, and Nona knew that Worth wanted Charlotte to date him.

  Nona still owned shares in the bank, but she had little power there and didn’t care to have more. She did have control of the Wheelwright personal monies and trusts, and she ran Family Meeting in Herb’s place. It had been subtly suggested to her that Family Meeting was too much of a burden for a woman of her age, but she had no intention of letting go of the reins just yet.

  The truth was, she was worried about Worth. She felt a need to keep her eye on him. Something wasn’t quite right. It was not just the fancy of an old lady, either. She was clear-sighted enough to see how Worth put pressure on his children. Well, on two of his children. He demanded the most of Charlotte, because Charlotte was the child who most adored her father. Charlotte had tried working at the bank and had disappointed Worth when, after three years, she told him it was not for her. Worth wanted his second son, Teddy, to quit his rogue ways and stop drinking so much. Well, everyone wanted Teddy to stop drinking so much. But Worth’s methods and manners of relating to his two younger children had changed. Worth could be so persuasive when he tried. He was handsome, charming, energetic, humorous—but this past year he had become a bit of a tyrant, which only turned his children more definitely against him. Even Charlotte, who worshipped her father, had begun to argue with him. The sound of their raised voices was not pleasant, nor was it in any way effective.

  It was not just Teddy that was worrying Worth. Nona wondered if perhaps Helen was having an affair. So often sex was at the root of an upheaval. Worth and Helen had just turned sixty, a dangerous age. Helen was hardly a siren, but in her own untidy way she was attractive. Perhaps she was sleeping with another man; that could explain Worth’s disposition. Nona cared for her daughter-in-law, but she did think Helen was a dark horse. Helen had never allowed herself to become a true part of the Wheelwright family. She had been and continued to be a good mother, though, and Nona thought her children were still her top priority. Perhaps it was only the burden of Teddy and his difficulties that was weighing Worth down.

  Oh, daughter Grace and her contingent were surely noisy and chaotic, but it was the thought of Worth’s arrival that made her feel so tired. Was this because she loved her son just a little bit more?

  Five

  Helen felt scattered as she settled into the limo. Worth, next to her, touched her hand. “Fasten your seat belt.”

  She did, hoping he wouldn’t notice how her hands were shaking.

  He didn’t.

  Lounging back in the buttery-soft cushioned leather of the limo, Worth talked on his cell phone with colleagues and assistants about bank business or tapped on his laptop computer.

  In self-defense, Helen opened her own laptop and tapped away too, making lists and memos for her various committees. Amazing, she thought, how her stifled emotions supplied a geyser of energy. Interesting, how all the modern technological gadgets designed to bring us closer together really provided a polite means for people to ignore one another.

  At the airport, they went through the rituals of checking in and getting their boarding passes pleasantly, automatically, as they had done a thousand times before. Their strides matched evenly as they walked swiftly through the crowded halls, past newsstands, fast-food boutiques, and coffee shops, from security checkpoint to gate. Worth tapped memos into his BlackBerry as they sat on the hard plastic chairs at the Cape Airlines gate waiting for their flight to be called. Helen read a book, or pretended to.

  In fact, her mind whirled with questions. With whom was Worth having an affair? Someone from the bank, a sleek young secretary or administrative assistant? Perhaps a widow or a divorcée? No. Worth would never call a woman of Helen’s age “Sweet Cakes.” It had to be a younger woman, a much younger woman, with her breasts still riding high above her rib cage and her skin free of stretch marks. How long had this been going on? What kind of wife was Helen, to have been so oblivious—to have gone about her life in such a carefree manner, unaware that her husband was having sex with another woman?

  Their flight was called and they boarded the nine-seater prop jet that carried them to Nantucket. It skimmed south, above the coast, humming and rackety and too noisy for conversation. The day was brilliant with sunshine, the water below infinitely blue.

  Worth’s sister, Grace, was at the airport to meet them in her father’s beloved 1949 Chrysler woody convertible.

  “Worth! Helen! On time! Good for you!” Grace hugged them, then grabbed one of their suitcases and led the way out to the car.

  It was a relief to be with Grace, who jabbered away enthusiastically about all the plans she’d made for Nona’s birthday the entire time it took to drive out to the house. Not that Helen could hear her. Grace liked to drive with the top down, and it was a beautiful day for a ride in a convertible, but Worth with his long legs got the passenger seat in front behind the windshield, and Helen was wedged into the back with the luggage, where the wind beat at her face and tugged at her hair. She felt oddly calmed, caught like a leaf spinning on the stream of the family’s life. She could only let herself be carri
ed along. Other thoughts had to wait.

  Grace slowed on Polpis Road for the turn onto Nona’s land, and there was Charlotte’s little market-garden stand. Charlotte was there, too, and now Helen’s thoughts receded in a wave of love and delight at the sight of her wonderful daughter.

  Charlotte was dressed like a farmer in striped overalls and boots and a straw hat, and Helen remembered all the costumes Charlotte had worn in her life. Her favorite pastime as a child was to play dress-up, raiding the trunks in Nona’s attics. Charlotte was Helen’s Gemini child, with at least two personalities. She was smart, hardworking, and kindhearted, but she had never been very practical. She was idealistic, a dreamer, and in spite of her attempts to seem businesslike with this garden, Helen was afraid Charlotte still had her head in the clouds.

  “Hello!” Helen waved at her daughter, who waved back.

  Charlotte was talking with Bill Cooper from the house next door. He was a handsome man, and Helen looked forward to seeing his parents tomorrow at Nona’s party. They were on the guest list, Grace had informed Helen, and she was glad. They weren’t close with the Coopers, but they’d known them forever, played tennis with them occasionally, had cocktails on the Coopers’ deck or in Nona’s garden or on the Coopers’ yacht. Felicity and Mark Cooper had had only one child, Bill. Helen thought Mark had wanted his son to follow him into his business in real estate. Instead, Coop had wandered around, trying different jobs, a bit of this, a bit of that, a bachelor’s degree in English literature, which would help him get no job at all, and, later, a master’s degree in computer science, which did, after a few years, pay off. Coop was self-supporting now with his software business, at least that was what Felicity had told Helen last summer. Of course, “self-supporting” was a relative term when someone lived at home without paying rent or mortgage as Coop was doing on the island.