Golden Girl(50)

Willa and Rip have moved out to Smith’s Point, but Willa stops by every once in a while to check in. Rip is handling the police investigation because he’s used to logistics and following up in his job for the insurance company. He handled the claim for the Jeep Marissa totaled the night before Vivi died. She was so upset about Leo breaking up with her that she drove the Jeep right into the Bathtub out at Eel Point.

“How did you get home, then?” Leo had asked.

“I walked.”

This seemed very unlikely and Leo said so, then Marissa admitted that she’d hitched a ride with some rando coming down the Madaket Road. She couldn’t call anyone because her phone had been in the car. This explained why her calls stopped that night, and it also meant that Marissa hadn’t seen the photo from Peter Bridgeman.

Rip had Marissa’s Jeep towed and taken off-island. Marissa’s mother, Candace, not only replaced Marissa’s phone but bought Marissa a brand-new Jeep, an outlay of fifty grand, at least.

“Wasn’t your mom angry about the Jeep?” Leo asks. “You ruined it yourself.”

“So?”

“So it seems like another parent might have made you deal with the consequences of your actions.”

Marissa shrugs. “I was upset about our breakup. She understands.”

Leo and Marissa have been together long enough for Leo to realize that Candace Lopresti is the kind of mother who wants more than anything to be friends with her daughters. She never created any rules, mostly because she wasn’t home to enforce them; she was always traveling for work. She gives Marissa and her older sister, Alexis, whatever they want whenever they want it. A brand-new phone and a brand-new Jeep to replace the ones that Marissa willfully trashed is Candace’s way of saying I’m here for you, honey.



Nothing is normal, nothing will ever be normal again, but Leo tries to immerse himself in work at the Boat Basin—the clients, his golf cart, his walkie-talkie. He smiles and chats like everything is just dandy; for all the boat owners know, Leo is a cheerful, friendly Nantucket kid who is heading to the University of Colorado in the fall and doesn’t have a care in the world. Every time he pockets a tip, he thinks to himself, I deserve an Oscar.

Then, one morning when he’s at work, Marissa calls to say that Alexis had news. Vivi’s running shoes, which had mysteriously gone missing, were just found in the trash can of the Stop and Shop break room. The custodian who takes out the trash noticed them because—and no one was happy to hear this—he sometimes went through the trash looking for things of value that people threw away. He found Vivi’s sneakers, which he thought might be worth saving until he saw they were stained with blood. Then he called the police.

“I hate to say this but it’s not looking good for Cruz,” Marissa says.

“Why would you automatically think of Cruz?” Leo says. “Other people work at that store, you know.”

“Leo,” Marissa says. “Come on.”





Vivi




She needs Martha! She needs Martha! Where’s Martha?

Vivi approaches the green door. She puts her ear to the panel and hears faint singing. It sounds like…like “Fool in the Rain,” by Led Zeppelin. Is Vivi imagining this? It’s such a great song, a song totally worthy of the afterlife, but shouldn’t the choir be singing hymns or madrigals?

Ever so slowly, Vivi takes hold of the knob and turns…

“Vivian!”

Suddenly, Martha swings open the door from the other side, pushing Vivi back toward the bookshelves. A new scarf, lavender in hue, is tied around Martha’s ponytail, a 1950s-sock-hop look.

“What did I tell you about the door, Vivian?”

“I’m not supposed to open it.”

“I should dock you a week of viewing time,” Martha says.

“No, please don’t! I’m sorry! You said you would come when I needed you and I need you now. I want you to assure me that Cruz wasn’t the one who hit me. I would forgive him—I would forgive that child anything. But I’m afraid the world won’t forgive him. I’m afraid the court system, the judge, the Nantucket Police, and my own kids won’t forgive him. Please, Martha, tell me Cruz wasn’t the one who hit me.”

“You seem a little slow in learning the rules,” Martha says. “I can’t tell you who hit you or didn’t hit you.”

“Is that because you don’t know or because you don’t want to tell me?”

“Oh, Vivian, the same rules apply to us here as down there.”

That’s not really true, Vivian thinks.

Martha shakes her head and the scarf moves like a curtain in the breeze. “Some things you have to figure out on your own.”





The Chief




Dixon, again with the bad news. A janitor at the Stop and Shop found bloodstained sneakers in the trash in the break room and he called the police to report it. Dixon went himself to retrieve the sneakers, and they exactly matched the description of Vivi’s missing sneakers.

“For crying out loud!” the Chief says, because his mind travels right to Cruz DeSantis.

“This is good,” Dixon says. “They were lost, now they’re found. And you know, Chief, the DeSantis kid works at the Stop and Shop.”