Barefoot Girls (46 page)

“What? Who?”

Amy nodded at her, smiling a Cheshire Cat grin. “Go and see.”

Hannah ran to the door and threw it open.

Her mother stood on the front porch wearing jeans and a huge forest-green poncho, hand on hip, blond hair wild and curling in the moist air. She was leaning against her umbrella as if she was about to break into a dance number like something from
Singing in the Rain
. “Hannah-banana-fo-fanna, what are you up to? I hear you’re entertaining some middle-aged delinquents around here and I wasn’t invited. I mean, what’s up with that? Come on! I am the ultimate middle-aged delinquent. Huh? C’mere, you. Give me a hug,” she said and opened her arms wide, letting the umbrella drop to the floor.

“Oh, Mom,” Hannah said and went gratefully into her Keeley’s arms, which wrapped around Hannah’s waist as Keeley was almost a full head shorter than her daughter. Her mother’s hair smelled like lemon and sunshine and a little musk, her own personal scent like none other. She never wore perfume.

They stood, quietly hugging for a minute, and then Hannah opened her eyes and saw Daniel, standing a little ways off on the walkway to the house, hands in pockets. He pulled his right hand out of his pocket and gave a little wave at her while shrugging a little.

“Daniel,” Hannah said softly.

“That’s right,” Keeley said, stepping back and extending her arm and then waving him closer. “You two kiss and make up. Enough of these shenanigans. I’ve got a wedding to help plan, and you two are just being ridiculous. Come on! Kiss! Make up!”

Daniel stepped onto the front porch but then stopped, his gaze falling on Hannah’s bare left hand. Hannah stuffed her hands in the front pockets of her khakis.

Keeley looked back and forth between the two of them. “Oh, fine. You want some privacy? I’ve got a whole cooler of goodness right here that needs to get in the fridge anyway.” She turned around, stooped and picked up a large red cooler with a little grunt and then walked over and stood in front of the screen door. She yelled, “You know? You guys really are delinquents. Is someone going to help me with this door, or what?”

Then Amy and Pam came rushing out, chattering and laughing and hugging Keeley and then bearing the cooler away. The door snapped shut after them, the cacophony from their raised voices inside the little house sounding like a small party.

Hannah looked back at Daniel. “Will you let me explain this time?”

He looked at her sadly and shook his head. “Why? It’s obvious. I shouldn’t have even come out here. This was all your mother’s idea. She insisted. I shouldn’t have listened. You didn’t call.”

“You didn’t want me to call! You’re so mad at me, and you want answers that I just don’t know right now.”

“You’re right. I didn’t want you to call, not now anyway. I should go.”

She took two steps forward and grabbed his right hand that still dangled at his side. “Please don’t go. Please.” She looked up into his handsome craggy face, searching his eyes for that open warmth she had always taken for granted.

Chapter 42

Zooey’s steps slowed as her temper cooled, and now she was down to a stroll. Her parent’s house, her house now, was coming up on the left, only three houses away. She was that far up-island. When she’d left Pam’s she was so angry she couldn’t see anything - houses flew by in a colorful blur. She also couldn’t feel the cold and wet, but now it was a different story.  She was freezing and drenched to the bone from the rain, the jeans and fisherman’s sweater she’d put on that morning clinging heavily to her body, her canvas dock shoes making squishing noises with every step.

She kept walking, though, letting the last of her righteous fury dissipate, knowing it would be gone soon. Amy was right, of course. But it didn’t feel that way earlier. Zo was tired from a horrible night of tossing and turning and then there was that awful voicemail from Neil, saying he was coming out to Captain’s, that they needed to have it out once and for all. Couldn’t he tell they had already had it out, that it was over? Was he really that dense? She should have said it plainly before she left, been direct instead of subtle. But no, she wanted him to believe it was his decision to end their marriage. It would be better that way. She prayed he was lying about coming out here, that it was one of his empty threats, designed to get her to call him back.

She came to a stop in front of her house and looked up at it. It was huge and white, a Victorian showplace with high ceilings that trapped the heat and cooled the rooms, long tall windows that were always thrown open to the sea breezes, gleaming wooden floors that inevitably became strewn with sand despite the mat at the front door and the little shallow bath beside it for rinsing sandy feet. All the furniture was her parents’, lots of white-painted wicker, oriental rugs that had been too threadbare for their spotless house in Rye, the same old gas range and propane-run refrigerator and gray-painted hand pump at the wooden sink in the kitchen. The only thing she’d changed had been the old lumpy mattresses, bringing out new ones on the open flush deck of a neighbor’s antique clamming skiff.

Whenever an islander referred to the house, they either called it the Delaney house, her family’s name, or the “wedding cake house”. She used to love the romance of that, the celebratory air of it. Looking up at it now, she realized that she didn’t love it anymore. Three weddings under her belt, she was tired of white lace and overblown fantasies. She wanted something simple and small, a cozy bungalow down-island near her friends and their shared little house. That was it. She’d put the house on the market in the spring, start checking around to see who was selling down-island so she could be first to bid. It was time to move on - let go of the past and its hold over her life.

As she stood regarding her house, she felt the prickling feeling of being watched. She looked around. The wet windswept boardwalk was empty in both directions. She looked at the nearby houses, their beaches dusted with small tangles of seaweed, their long spare docks. Three doors down, there was a boat tied up to a dock. Someone was here, then. Watching her.

She narrowed her eyes and then widened them, realizing whose house the occupied dock belonged to. It was Rose’s house, a tall pale yellow house with a whale weathervane and scallop shell cut-outs decorating the shutters and a deep screened-in front porch. Rose, who used to be at the center of the social whirl when they were young, had retreated to the periphery of island life sometime in her thirties. They never saw her at any of the parties anymore. The house was locked up and empty most of the summer. But she was here now. And, somewhere in that house, she, or someone else who was staying there, was watching Zo. How strange.

She tried to picture Rose, but couldn’t. It had been too many years since they’d seen each other face to face. All she could remember was Rose in her late twenties, still as beautiful as her name suggested, still as cruel and cutting as that flower’s thorns. The last time Rose had shown up at a party, she’d brought a new boyfriend who promptly started flirting with Keeley. Keeley, not realizing whose boyfriend it was, flirted right back. Rose had left the party in a huff a few minutes later, while her boyfriend was the last to leave.

Zo shivered, both from the cold and from the eerie malevolent feeling she was getting from whoever it was that was watching her. Was it Rose? There was no movement in the house or on the porch, though she thought she could make out a figure there.

“Jeez,” she whispered, another shiver crawling up her back. She gave Rose’s house one last look, and then turned and started walking quickly back toward Pam’s, breaking into a jog after a few steps, a hunted feeling suddenly sweeping over her and propelling her away from that picture-perfect yellow house that was anything but cheerful.

Chapter 43

Keeley entered the sun room holding a large tray loaded with freshly-made lobster salad rolls aloft, and stopped in the doorway for effect. “It may be raining outside, babies, but it’s a sunny summer day at Pam’s. I present, drum roll please…lobster rolls!”

The group was seated at the table, a nearly empty pitcher of Mean Greens in the middle, and they all turned around and made gratifyingly appreciative ooh’s and ah’s. There was even a squeal of delight from Pam. Keeley had told them she had a surprise for lunch, winking at Daniel, who knew her secret, and then made them wait in the sun room while she assembled the sandwiches. She only hoped they were as good as they looked. She had not had time to make the lobster salad herself the way she usually did, and had to get it in an overpriced gourmet shop in Manhattan.

Zooey stood up and dragged the pitcher off of the center of the table to make room, her hair still drying and clinging to her face from an unexplained walk she’d taken in the rain that morning. Keeley was pretty certain she knew the reason for the walk, though, and didn’t add insult to injury by asking. She placed the platter down on the table, and then everyone reached greedily for a roll to put on their plate, lunchtime having passed hours before and several pitchers of Mean Greens consumed on empty stomachs because Keeley had forgotten about the lunch she’d brought; she’d been too busy putting on a cheerful face while surreptitiously watching Hannah and Daniel.

Things had changed between the two of them. That summer when they had visited the island, they had been cute and cozy, cuddling and kissing often. Hannah had been more clearly happy and at ease than Keeley could ever remember. Daniel had been relaxed then, too, more comfortable and confident than Keeley thought he had a right to be. He had to pass her test, didn’t he know that? But he had passed - with flying colors. He was a natural for Captain’s, rugged and athletic and never squeamish. He was also a kind person, had a great sense of humor, and it was obvious he genuinely adored Hannah.

Now, even after several drinks, the two of them sat stiffly beside each other, not touching. They engaged in the general conversation, but not with each other. When Hannah wasn’t looking, Daniel studied her as if trying to figure something out. His eyes lingered again and again on her left hand.

Keeley couldn’t believe that Hannah wasn’t wearing her ring. When Daniel had first told her about it over the phone, she had brushed it off. Of course, if he came without warning, Hannah may have had it off for a normal reason. Maybe she had been washing the dishes or something and forgot to put it back on in her haste. Keeley remembered when she first got engaged to Ben, how alien her engagement ring felt on her finger, how she worried about getting soap on it so she would remove it whenever she washed her hands or showered. Then she almost lost it in the ladies room at a restaurant, had a real scare halfway through her entrée when she realized the ring was gone. She’d leapt up from the table so quickly, she knocked over her glass of wine and it poured right into Ben’s lap. The ring had been there, sitting where she’d left it by the sink, but she’d been lucky. She didn’t take it off again.

She looked pointedly at Hannah, trying to catch her eye, but her daughter was fully focused on her sandwich, taking a huge bite. Keeley lifted up her own lobster roll and bit into it. Oh, thank God. It was great. Well, it could use a little more celery. And the hot dog rolls should have been toasted. But, otherwise, it was delicious.

Pam was complaining about some author and his book tour, but it was hard for Keeley to pay attention. She ate her sandwich and watched Hannah and Daniel and the space between them. How much of a role had she played in that space, that stiff polite way they were with each other now? She wasn’t the type to hash over past mistakes, had always simply charged ahead, focused on doing her best that day and then the next and next. But she could still remember the stinging shock of betrayal she’d felt reading the review of Hannah’s book, not just in any newspaper, but her hometown’s. Her decision to cut Hannah off had seemed like the only choice at the time, all she could handle. It was only now, seeing how miserable Hannah was and seeing what had happened to her and Daniel, that Keeley knew she’d made a terrible mistake.

Ben was right. It was time. Actually, it was long overdue. She just had to find the right moment, the right way.

Chapter 44

Hannah opened the bureau drawer where she had put all of her pajama sets and regarded them, the colors muted by the darkness of the room, the sole source of light a hurricane gas lamp she’d brought up to the bedroom with her which brightened the bedside area but left the rest of the room in shadows that flickered and shook.

What did you wear to bed with your ex-fiance, one you wanted back but who had apparently fallen out of love with you? One who had just told you that the only reason he was staying overnight was because he didn’t want to upset your mother and her friends by leaving too soon? One who wouldn’t listen, interrupted you every time you tried to explain?

She felt a sob welling in her throat and choked it down. No, no more crying. It wouldn’t fix anything. It would probably just make him even more annoyed with her. No, she was going to be strong now, have some dignity in all of this. If he didn’t love her anymore, then she was just going to have to accept that. She knew she wouldn’t be able to stop loving him, though. He was in her heart and there he would remain no matter what happened in the outside world. Would she ever love another man? She couldn’t imagine it.