Golden Girl(58)

The Vivian Howe Memorial Facebook page has over two hundred new messages since Willa last checked. Vivi starts scrolling through the messages—so much love, so much heartbreak. One woman, Eden F., from Niagara, New York, says she can’t stop crying and has personally called the Nantucket Police Department to demand justice.

This seems like a bit much. But Vivi inspired this kind of devotion. She shared unvarnished looks at her life—she would video the kitchen when there were dishes in the sink or the hallway when there was a pile of stuff at the bottom of the stairs—and her readers appreciated these details. We all have dirty dishes, dirty laundry, stuff waiting at the bottom of the stairs, even our favorite novelist. Vivi’s readers felt like they knew her. Of course they’re upset.



Willa thinks that finding the message from Brett Caspian might be a needle-in-a-haystack quest but only a few posts in, there it is—a message sent that very morning.

I hope someone in Vivi’s family will read this. I was able, with a few phone calls to the publisher, to receive an advance copy of Golden Girl. In high school, I wrote a song called “Golden Girl” that was inspired by Vivi. She was my girlfriend from September 1986 to August 1987. Once I read the book, I saw that she used more than just the title. She used our story. I’m going to go out on a limb and leave my phone number here in hopes that someone from the family will contact me so we can discuss this further. Thank you. Brett Caspian



Willa reads the message twice. Brett Caspian wrote a song called “Golden Girl” that was inspired by Vivi? Vivi used their story in her new novel? Willa has read only two of her mother’s thirteen novels (she prefers nonfiction, biography in particular), but this is two more than Carson and Leo have read. Willa knows the premise of Golden Girl; it involves a high-school romance and a song called “Golden Girl,” but she thought it was made up.

Willa googles Brett Caspian and Golden Girl. She gets a handful of hits about her mother’s novel, and the rest are about a sitcom featuring old ladies.

Vivi never once mentioned that she’d had a boyfriend in high school. She studied and had two good friends, Stephanie and Gina, whom she sometimes talked about but wasn’t in touch with, as far as Willa knew.

You’re a fraud, Brett Caspian, Willa thinks.

And yet.

She writes his number down, because what if he’s not a fraud, what if he opens a door to a part of her mother’s life that Willa knew nothing about? What if Willa learns about a secret Vivi kept until her death? This is exactly like something that would happen in one of her mother’s novels. The line between real life and fiction is becoming blurry indeed.



Even dialing the numbers feels illicit. Willa reminds herself that Savannah asked her to check this guy out and that she’s merely doing her due diligence with the Vivian Howe Memorial Facebook page.

He doesn’t answer and his voice mail is an automated recording. She leaves a message: “My name is Willa Bonham, I’m Vivian Howe’s daughter, I saw your Facebook message and I’m calling you as requested.”

She hangs up and not two seconds later, her phone rings with Brett Caspian’s number on the caller ID.

Oh, boy. Willa stares at it, one hand holding the phone, one hand resting on her belly.

“Hello?” she says.

“Hello, this is Brett Caspian. You just called?”

“Yes,” Willa says. The voice is appealing, she decides, strong and a little raspy. “My name is Willa. I’m Vivi Howe’s daughter.”

“Oh, man,” Brett says. He emits a whistling breath. “I can’t believe this. I’m…well, first off, I’m sorry about your mom.”

“Thank you,” Willa says, because although this feels awkward, it’s what one is supposed to say.

“So, listen…I’m not even sure where to start. I went to high school with Vivi.”

“And where was that?” Willa asks.

There’s a hesitation. “Uh…Parma High School? In Parma, Ohio? You do know that’s where your mother went to high school?”

Willa laughs. “Yes, I know. I just wanted to make sure that you knew. Because she never mentioned a boyfriend in high school. She said she was a nerd.”

Brett chuckles at this. “Yeah, she was a nerd. She was just about the most beautiful nerd you’ve ever seen, always with her nose in a book or raising her hand with the right answer.”

“And you were her boyfriend?”

“Senior year, yes. That was the year her father died.”

Okay, Willa thinks, this guy is for real. Her legs tingle and suddenly, she has to pee. “I’m sorry, but she didn’t tell me about you.” Why was that? Willa wonders. Did she not want JP to be jealous? Or was it for some other reason?

“Things got complicated at the end and the breakup was hard on both of us. She went off to Duke and I moved to LA and I never saw her again. I live in Knoxville, Tennessee, now. I’m a hotel manager and I play a little guitar, but I’m not into all that Facebook stuff or social media, so I haven’t kept in touch with anyone from home except the guys in my old band. Those guys held a big grudge against Vivi for reasons I can tell you about later, and we never bring her name up. Except last week, one of the guys, Roy, said he heard through his sister that Vivi had died. He told me she was a writer. So I looked her up and I saw her new book was called Golden Girl, which was the name of my song.”