Family of Liars(10)

“Gag me,” says Bess. “But it’s probably not.”

“You could never unsee it,” I tell them.

“Okay, fine, whatever,” says Penny. “You brought it up.”





11.


TONIGHT, TIPPER CUTS early summer flowers from the kitchen garden. She lays the picnic table with a runner down the center. She wears a clean white apron and grills salmon. There are round slices of lemon in our glasses. After we eat, since Luda isn’t here yet, my sisters and I help with the dishes.

Later, Penny steals a bottle of wine from the cellar. I get a corkscrew and we leave to go to sit on the porch of Pevensie, Uncle Dean’s house.

Pevensie is not as big as Clairmont. It looks out across the newly built tennis courts and the wooden walkways that go from place to place. In the distance, you can see the family dock. The small motorboat (Guzzler) is tied up there, and so is the sailboat. The big motorboat is usually at the back dock, which the staff members use.

We pour the wine into paper cups and talk, mostly about school, even though we’re finally free of it. Penny’s friend Erin Riegert arrives tomorrow for an indefinite stay. The two of them were inseparable at North Forest.

“I hope she doesn’t hate me when she gets here,” says Penny thoughtfully.

“Why would Erin hate you?” I ask.

“She would never,” says Bess.

“She lives in an apartment. With only her mom. She’s like, on scholarship, I think.”

“You don’t know if she’s on scholarship?”

“She is on scholarship. Okay? She is.”

“I wish I could have had a friend up,” says Bess.

“You could have someone,” says Penny.

“Mother told me no. She said there’d be too many people and it was your year.”

That sounds like Tipper. She has never tried to parcel things equally among her children, but instead decides that it’s someone’s turn, or someone is the queen today.

“You can come with us out in the kayaks,” Penny says to Bess, “and down to the beach, and all that. We can all make ice cream in the machine. But if me and Erin are playing tennis, or we want to be alone in my room, or if we’re going to Edgartown, you have to leave us and go do your own thing.”

“You’re mean,” says Bess, pouring more wine into her cup.

“No,” says Penny. That is her usual way—to categorically deny having hurt anyone’s feelings. “I just said a ton of things you can do with us. The rest of the time you can hang out with Carrie.”

“Carrie will have Yardley,” complains Bess. And that is true. Our cousin Yardley is a year older than I am, and when she is around, we fall in together.

It is late, so we head back to Clairmont, but when we come upon the house, our parents are sitting on the porch. A record sings out through the screen door that leads to the dining room. Classical music, a string quartet.

“Oh damn. The wine,” I say. The bottle is empty, in my hand. Bess holds the paper cups.

“If they see it, they’ll lock us down all summer,” says Penny.

“I know,” adds Bess, who knows nothing. “Can we throw it over the edge?” She means the edge of the wooden walkway we are standing on. Below it are grass and low bushes of beach roses.

“No,” says Penny. “Someone will find it and know it was us.”

“We can scootch it under the walkway,” says Bess.

“Shhh,” I tell them. “I have an idea.”

I lead them back toward the northeast side of the island. “Where are we going?” asks Bess.

“You’ll see.” It is fun to have her wide-eyed and following. The feeling slides around me like a warm sweater. It was I who made that mean girl from the soccer team leave Bess alone in the locker room. It was I who thought to tell our parents that Penny was visiting Erin when she wanted to go off with Lachlan. It was I who got Penny reinstated on the tennis team. I am like our father this way. He always has a way forward. He’s a fixer.

We head to Goose Cottage. It’s a small house compared to the others, with four sweet bedrooms under slanted ceilings, and only a galley kitchen. No one is staying there at present.

I open the door—our doors are always unlocked on the island—and put the wine bottle in the recycling bin there. I take the paper cups from Bess, rinse the wine off them, and put them in the trash. “Problem solved.”

We stand in the empty living room, touching familiar objects and reacquainting ourselves with the space. The windows look out over the sea. The television set is dusty.

“Hey hey hey hey.” A sound carries on the wind. It is almost like a voice, very soft. It sings the words. Just a whisper.

“What was that?” asks Penny.

“Hey hey hey hey.” It comes again.

“It sounds like a cat,” says Bess.

“There can’t be a cat on the island,” I say. “How would it even get here?”

“It could be Gerrard’s,” says Bess.

“He doesn’t live here,” I say. “He goes home most nights.”

“It’s not a cat,” says Penny. “It—it sounds like Rosemary.”

“Hey hey hey hey.” The sound is musical, like the opening of a Simple Minds song that was popular a couple summers ago.