The Identicals(62)

And sex with Ramsay was fine for a while, but then it became exhausting both physically and emotionally. Ramsay had wanted, so badly, to please her. He had done everything short of handing her a survey afterward. Did she like it better on top or on bottom? On her stomach? Lights on or off? How did she feel about massage oil? Were her orgasms more or less intense than the ones she’d had on Thursday? Because to him it sounded like she’d been more into it on Thursday. Also, Ramsay didn’t like to have sex after they’d been drinking, because he’d read that alcohol dulled women’s nerve endings and he didn’t want her to have a subpar experience—or, God forbid, one she couldn’t fully remember. Are you kidding me? Tabitha thought. What was the point of going out drinking if you weren’t going to enjoy some off-the-wall sex afterward? Alcohol consumption lowered inhibitions; that was the time to try the things that might have embarrassed you when you were sober. But Ramsay hadn’t seen it that way.



Tabitha doesn’t kiss Franklin so much as taste him, and then, soon after, devour him. He’s alive—sweaty, salty, strong. His fingers press into her arms, most likely leaving bruises; his mouth opens on her neck in a place that sends nearly painful waves of ecstasy through her. When his fingertips find her nipples, she groans. Nothing has ever felt this good—the sweet longing, the strain of not screaming, not swearing, not striking out. She locks her legs around him. For the first time ever, Tabitha indulges her animal instincts. She is a woman, Franklin is a man, they are coupling, it’s natural, it’s nature. How has sex never struck her this way before? It had been something to enjoy or endure, but it had never been a revelation.

Until now. Franklin.

This is happening.

She barely knows him, but that doesn’t matter. They fit. They lock together like two pieces of a puzzle. Tabitha rides him up and down until she cries out and he cries out, his hands clenching her waist. She falls on top of him, exhausted.

He says, “You are the most breathtaking woman I have ever seen.”

She laughs. “What about my sister? She looks exactly like me.”

“You’re so different from Harper,” he says. “More elegant, more pulled together, more graceful. It’s funny, because now I can see how distinctive you are.”

“Yeah, right,” Tabitha says. It wasn’t until they stepped out onto Circuit Avenue that Tabitha confessed she wasn’t Harper but rather her twin sister.

Ahh, Franklin had said. I heard there was a twin.

I’m Tabitha Frost, she said. Sorry to disappoint you.

That was when Franklin reached for her hand. Are you kidding me? he said. That’s the best news I’ve heard all night.



Now Franklin grabs her chin. “I would never have gone home with Harper. You need to know that. I was friends with her…”

“Was?” Tabitha says.

“Was? Am, I guess. I don’t know. She made some questionable choices…”

“She was sleeping with our father’s doctor,” Tabitha says.

“Reed Zimmer,” Franklin says quietly.

“You know about that?” Tabitha says. “Everyone on the Vineyard knows about that?”

“Pretty much,” Franklin says.

“I’m not Harper,” Tabitha whispers.

“I know,” Franklin says. “I can tell.” He starts to sing “Here Comes the Sun” by the Beatles. His voice is so clear and true that Tabitha is nearly encouraged to sing along. She does sing along, and the moment is so incredibly romantic that Tabitha allows herself to believe that she sounds okay. When they are finished—doo do doo do—she rests her head on his chest, and he rubs her shoulder.

“You know what?” she says.

“What?” he says.

“I’m starving.”

“Stay right there,” he says.



It’s the best meal she’s ever had at four in the morning, maybe the best meal she’s ever had, period: a pastrami-and-Swiss sandwich with tangy bread-and-butter pickles and horseradish mustard on Portuguese bread that Franklin has griddled until the bread turned golden brown and the Swiss melted and the whole thing became a gorgeous, gooey mess. They eat their sandwiches in bed, and Franklin pops open two icy Cokes, the first sip of which is so crisp and snappy it makes Tabitha’s eyes water.

The sandwich is ridiculously delicious. “You can really cook,” she says with her mouth full. She’s grateful her mother can’t see her in this moment, for many reasons. She pops a pickle that has fallen onto the sheet in her mouth. “So who are you?”



Franklin George Phelps: he has one sister, Sadie, eighteen months younger. His parents, Al and Lydia Phelps, are still married. They live in a house out in Katama, a house his father inherited from his own parents, who used it as a summer cottage. Al and Lydia winterized the house and raised Franklin and Sadie there. Al was the principal of Martha’s Vineyard Regional High School for thirty-five years, and Lydia baked pies. Now they go to Vero Beach in the winter.

“It’s amazing everyone on the Vineyard isn’t bipolar,” Franklin says. “This island is one place in the summer and another in the winter.”

“Same with Nantucket,” Tabitha says. She often wonders if this isn’t the cause of Ainsley’s troubles. The winter is quiet and boring. It’s too cold to go outside, but there is nothing to do inside. Everything closes down; everyone leaves. Then in the summer, there is too much to do and not enough time to cram it all in. Tabitha works all the time, and there are social commitments nearly every night. The people who come to Nantucket are wealthy and privileged, even the kids. Especially the kids! They have access to their parents’ boats; they have access to their parents’ pills. Girls like Ainsley and Emma struggle to keep up, Tabitha knows.