What I Thought Was True (3 page)

I keep speed-walking down Low Road, my thoughts racing

ahead of my feet
.
The yard boy is everywhere on island, all summer long. Cass will haunt my summer the way he preoccupied my spring.

I hear a sound behind me, rubber on sand, skidding. I turn,

my breath catching. But it’s just Vivien, bouncing over the

speed bump on her old-fashioned, sky-blue Schwinn with

the wicker basket, legs kicked out. She looks, deceptively, like

an ad for something wholesome. Butter. Milk. Fresh fruit. Her

glossy brown hair is caught up in pigtails that don’t look stupid, her cheeks glowing in the heat.

“Hey!” she says. “Your mom told me where you were going.

Wanted to say good luck.”

“I thought you were meeting up with Nic.”

Vivien flushes the way she always does at Nic’s name, the

thought of Nic, the sight of him. Yes, things have shifted, rear-

ranging our childhood trio into something different.

She shakes her head. “I talked him into applying for the

island painting and repair gig. He’s interviewing with Marco

and Tony right now. If that works out, please God, he won’t

have to rely on Hoop’s connections to get sketchy painting jobs

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all over the state.” She rolls her eyes. “That was a good idea…

why?”

“Hoop’s an idiot,” I say. Nic’s best friend and partner for

the summer in the house-painting business, Nat Hooper, can

make a disaster of anything, and Nic is far too good-natured

to stop him.

I hear the
zzzzzzz
of the mower starting up again. It takes all my concentration not to look back over my shoulder. Did

Vivien see Cass? She must’ve.

“Hey, want to work a clambake with me Friday night?”

Vivie asks. “Mom and Al are catering a rehearsal dinner. Ver-ry

fahn-cy. It’s on the Hill—okay with that?”

“Absolutely. Nic up for it too?”

“Oh, for sure. We’ve got the bar covered, but low on waiters

and servers. Hoop’s not sure he can make it—might have ‘a hot

date with a special lady.’ Although I’m thinking the special lady

is digitized. D’you know any other guy who’d be willing?”

I can’t help shifting my eyes down the road. Vivien trails my

gaze, and then stares back at me with a little crinkle between

her eyebrows.

“Have you seen this year’s yard boy?” I ask, wary.

“Yup.” She watches my face. “I gave him the gate code when

he drove in to report for duty this morning.”

“You didn’t think to mention it to me? No warning text?

Nothing?”

“Oh shit, sorry.” Viv lowers her heels to regain bike balance.

“I tried once, but you know how cell reception sucks here.”

She sneaks another look over her shoulder. “I should have kept

trying.”

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I follow her eyes back to the Partridge house, where Cass

has dutifully returned to mowing the lawn. Horizontally. Shirt

off again, hair gleaming in the sun.

My God
.

“What, Gwenners? Thinking of asking Cassidy to be a spare

set of hands?” She tips her head at me, eyes twinkling.

“No! What? No! You know my policy. Hands
off
. Avoid at

all cost.”

Vivien snorts. “You sure? Because you’re getting that glazed

look that leads to bad judgment, impulsive decision-making,

and a walk of shame.”

Even though it’s Vivie, no real criticism there, I can feel my

face go red. I look down at the ground, kick aside a pebble.

“There were only two actual walks of shame.”

Vivien’s face sobers. She flings her leg over the bike and

knocks back the kickstand, moves closer. “Cassidy Somers . . .

right here on the island. Just . . . watch your step, Gwenners.

Be careful with yourself.” Her fierce expression is so at odds

with her sweet face and my childhood nickname that I want to

laugh, but there’s a little twist in my stomach too.

We all can’t be Vivie and Nic.

My cousin and my best friend have been an item since we

were all five, when I ceremonially performed their wedding

service on Sandy Claw Beach. Since we were more familiar

with boat launchings than weddings, I bashed them both on

the knees with a bottle of apple juice.

How many people, honestly, get the guy they’ve loved all

their lives treating them like they’re rare and precious and

deserving of adoration? Hardly anyone, right?

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Still, there’s a big gap between that and some unseemly

scuffling in the sand.

Or a bunk bed.

Or a Bronco.

“Gwen!” Vivie snaps her fingers. “Stay with me, here.

Remember your promise. Want your dad to catch you rolling

around on the beach again, like with”—she hesitates, lowers

her voice—“Alex?”

I cringe, turn my back on the Partridges’ lawn. Then I hold up

one hand, resting the other on an imaginary Bible. “I remem-

ber. From now on, I will not, no matter how tempted, get even

close to a compromising position with someone unless I love

them and they love me.”

“And?”

“And unless we’ve passed a lie detector test to prove this,” I

finish obediently. “But I have to say,
that’s
going to be awkward.

Carrying around all the equipment, setting it up . . .”

“Just stay out of the sand dunes. And far away from those

parties on the Hill,” Vivien says. “When it’s real love, no equip-

ment necessary. You just look in their eyes and it’s all there.”

“Go apply for that job at Hallmark
right this instant
!” I swat her on the shoulder. She ducks away, kicking the bike back into

gear, laughing.

I wouldn’t pass the lie detector test myself if I didn’t say that, oh, I want what Vivien and Nic found without even having to

search. I give one last look over my shoulder at the back of

Cass’ uptilted head, as Mrs. Partridge once again bellows at him

from the porch.

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The Ellington house is the last one on the beach—big, turn-

of-the-last-century, graceful, stretching along the shore like a

contented cat in the sun. It’s got weathered dove-gray shin-

gles and gray-green trim, two turrets, and a porch that sweeps

three-quarters around, like the tail of a cat cozying close.

Taken with all that, the carport where Mrs. E.’s Cadillac is

parked looks so . . . wrong. There should be a carriage house

there, an eager groom in livery waiting to take the reins of

your horse.

I walk up the side path to the kitchen door, wondering if

this is the correct thing to do. You never know on the island.

Half the houses Mom cleans welcome her in the front and

offer her a drink, the other half insist she go around back

and take off her shoes.

Toeing off my flip-flops, I look down at my feet, wishing

for a second I had dainty ones like Viv, or that my nails were

decorated with polish and not a Band-Aid from stubbing my

toe on the seawall.

Mrs. Ellington’s glossy oak side door is propped open by

a worn brick, but the screen door is closed. “Hi . . . ?” I call

down the shady hallway. “Um, hello? . . . Mrs. Ellington?”

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A television murmurs in the distance. A porcelain clock

shaped like a starfish ticks loudly. From where I am I can see

the gleam of a silver pitcher on the kitchen table, a tumble of

zinnias glowing in it. I put my hand on the screen door, poised

to push it open, then hesitate and call out again.

This time, the TV is immediately silenced. Then I hear
click/

thump
,
click/thump
coming down the hardwood floor of the hallway, and there’s Mrs. Ellington. Her hair’s whiter and she’s

holding a cane, one ankle tightly wrapped in an Ace bandage,

but she’s still beautifully dressed, pearls on, smile broad.

“Gwen! Your mother says you are Gwen now, not Gwennie.

I’m
delighted
to see you.” Propping her cane against the wall, she pulls open the screen door, then holds out both hands.

I slide my bag o’ lobsters down behind my back and take

her hands, her skin loose and fragile as worn silk.

“So you’re to be my babysitter this summer! How it does

come round,” Mrs. Ellington continues. “When you were tiny,

I used to hold you in my lap on the porch while your mother

cleaned. You were a dear little thing . . . those big brown eyes,

that cloud of curls.”

There’s a note of melancholy in her voice when she uses the

word
babysitter
that makes me say, “I’m just here to be—”A friend? A companion? A watchdog? “I’m just here to keep you

company.”

Mrs. Ellington squeezes my hands, lets them go. “That’s

lovely. I was just getting ready to enjoy a nice cool drink on the porch. How do you like your iced tea?”

I don’t drink tea, so I draw a blank. Luckily Mrs. Ellington

steams ahead. “It was quite warm this morning, so I made a

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big batch of wild cranberry, which should be perfect now. Per-

sonally, I adore it cold and very sweet with lemon.”

“That sounds good,” I say, glancing around the kitchen.

It looks the same as when Nic and I were little—morning-

sky-pale-blue walls, appliances creamy white, navy-and-white

checked cloth on the table, another Crayola-bright bunch of

zinnias in a cobalt glass pitcher on the counter.

When Mom makes iced tea it’s a two-step process—scoop-

ing out the sugary powder and mixing it with cold water. Mrs.

Ellington’s iced tea is a production involving implements I

never knew existed. First there’s the bucket for ice and spe-

cial silver tongs. Then the lemon and another silver thingie to

squeeze it. Then a little slanted bowl to set the tea bag in. Then another little bowl for the squeezed lemon.

Mrs. E.’s blue-veined hand opens the cabinet, flutters like

a trapped bird, hovering between two glass canisters. After

a second, she selects one, the one with rice in it. The one I

know from years of coastal weather must contain the salt. Rice

keeps salt from sticking in the moist heat. She places it on the

counter, starting to screw off the top.

I put my hand on top of hers gently. “I think maybe it’s the

other one.”

Mrs. Ellington looks up at me, her hazel eyes blank for a

moment. Then they clear, clouds moving away from the sun.

She touches her fingers to her temple. “Of course. Ever since

that silly fall I’ve been all in a muddle.” She shifts the canister back onto the shelf, takes down the other one.

Then scooping the sugar into a silver canister . . . and

some sort of scalloped spoon . . . This process was obvi-

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ously designed by someone who didn’t have to do their own

dishes. Or polish their own silver. Mrs. Ellington again asks

me how I like my tea, and I want to say “with everything”

just to see how it all works. But I repeat “Cold and sweet,” so

she removes a frosted-cold glass from the freezer. She blends

sugar in the bottom and finally pours tea for me, then does

the same for herself.

“Let’s have this on the porch,” she suggests.

I start to follow her, but remember Grandpa Ben’s gift. Just

in time. One of the lobsters is again crawling for its life, this

time scrabbling down the hallway toward the back door. I hast-

ily snatch it up and put it, indignantly waving claws and all,

back into the soggy paper bag.

I’d have expected Mrs. Ellington to be horrified, hand

pressed against her heart, but instead she’s laughing. “Dear Ben

Cruz,” she says. “Still setting those traps?”

“Every week all summer.” I open the refrigerator, shove the

bag in, hoping that Houdini the lobster and its cohort will be

stupefied by the cold before I have to slay them. I pass on Uncle

Ben’s message, translated entirely from Portuguese.

Mrs. Ellington sets down her cane again to clasp her hands

together. “Lobsters and love. Two essentials of life. Do come with me to the porch, Gwen dear—if you wouldn’t mind carrying

the glasses? There we can discuss the
other
essentials of life.”

The porch too—just exactly the same—all old white wicker

furniture with the worn, teal-colored hammock swaying in

the breeze. The Ellingtons’ wide lawn fades into sea oats, sand,

and then the azure ocean. To the far left is Whale Rock, a huge

boulder that looks exactly like a beached humpback whale. At

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high tide all you can see is the fin, but the water’s low now and

almost the entire rock is visible. The view’s so stunning, I catch my breath, with the feeling I always have when I see the pret-tiest parts of the island—that if I could look out my window

at this all the time, I would be a better person, calmer, happier, less likely to get flustered with school or impatient with Dad.

But that theory can’t really work, because Old Mrs. Partridge

up the road has one of the best views on the island—I mean

of the water, not of Cass Somers—and it doesn’t sweeten her

disposition at all.

Mrs. Ellington clinks her glass against mine. “Here’s to

another sunset,” she says.

I must seem puzzled, because she explains, “My dear father’s

favorite toast. I’m quite superstitious. I don’t think I’ve ever

had a drink on the porch without saying it. You must answer

‘Sunrise too.’”

“Sunrise too,” I say, with a firm nod.

She pats me approvingly on the leg.

“I imagine we should negotiate our terms,” Mrs. E. says.

Damn.
I stammer out something about the salary Mom

mentioned—she must have been wrong, it had to be too good

to be true—and Mrs. Ellington chuckles. “Oh, not money.

That’s all been settled by your mother and my Henry, I suspect.

I meant terms as in how we will rub along together. I haven’t

had a . . . companion before, so, naturally, I need to know what

you enjoy doing and you need to know the same about me,

so we don’t spend the summer torturing each other. I must

say . . . it will be good to be around a young person again. My

grandsons . . .” She trails off. “Are off, living their lives.” For 32

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a second, all eighty-plus years show on her face as her usual

smile fades.

I have a flash of memory of some big party she held for one

of the grandsons. His wedding? Twenty-first birthday? Big tent.

White with turrets. Almeida’s catered. There were fireworks.

Nic and Viv and I . . . and Cass . . . lay on the beach and watched them burst and glimmer into the ocean. A private party with a

public show. Like the ocean, no one owns the sky.

After a moment, she continues, resolutely. “As they should

be. Now, do tell me all about yourself!”

Uh . . . What “all” does she want to know? The kind of “all”

I tell Viv is different from the “all” I tell Mom, so God knows

what the “all” is to someone who might want to employ me,

and . . .

As if hearing my mental babbling, she again pats me on the

knee. “For example, how do you feel about the beach, dear

Gwen? Like it or loathe it?”

Does anyone on earth hate the beach?
I tell Mrs. Ellington I love the ocean and she says, “Good then. My friends—we call ourselves the Ladies League, but I believe there are others on the

island with less flattering names—the Old Beach Bats comes to

mind . . . Anyway, we like to swim every day at ten and again at

four—just as the light is shifting. Sometimes we make a picnic

and have a day of it. The beauty of age—we really don’t need to

worry about sunscreen and we can linger all day.” Her eyes get

misty as they look out over the water, her wrinkled face soft-

ening with a dreamy expression that makes it suddenly clear

how beautiful she must have been back then. The Rose of the

Island, indeed.

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For the next half hour we cover Mrs. Ellington’s likes and

dislikes, from her favorite and least favorite things to eat—“If

you ever make me egg salad I shall reconsider my good opin-

ion of you”—to her views on exercise—“I shall like good

brisk walks when this silly ankle recovers but when
I’m
in the mood. I don’t wish to be prodded”—to technology—“You

won’t be perpetually typing on or answering your cell phone,

will you? When I’m in the presence of another person, I want

them present.”

I guess I pass the test, because Mrs. Ellington finally pats

my hand and says, “Good then. Our new regime will start on

Monday.” She beams at me, lowering her voice. “I was dread-

ing this. I am a creature who enjoys solitude. But I think, bless

fortune, I may be lucky in my employee.”

I thank her, and then remember I have to cook the lobsters.

Hell.
Does she even want me to do this now? Or am I dismissed? If
I am, can I leave her with living lobsters? Should she even be using
a stove?
Nic got a concussion playing soccer in middle school and he was out of it for days. I’m about to ask her what she’d

like me to do when there’s a knock on the screen door, forceful

enough to rattle the loosely nailed boards. A voice calls, “Uh—

hello? Seashell Services!”

“I wonder what that can be.” Mrs. Ellington’s eyes brighten

as if a visit from the island maintenance crew is cause for

excitement. “The hydrangeas aren’t due to be pruned and we

had the lawn mowed only yesterday. Do let’s go see.”

Though her back is as straight as ever, her gait is so wobbly,

despite the steadying cane, that I waver behind her, trying to be

on both sides at once to break her inevitable fall.

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“Hullo?” the voice calls again, slightly louder. More recog-

nizable.

“Com-i-ng!” sings out Mrs. Ellington. “Do come in! My

progress is gradual, but we will be there in good time!”

I wish her progress were nonexistent, because far too

quickly we reach the kitchen, where, yes, Cass is standing,

looking particularly tan against the dainty ruffles of the sheer

white curtains.

“My dear boy!” Mrs. Ellington says.

How has he managed to be her dear boy after just one day

spent mowing her lawn? Does she remember him from that

one summer? Old Mrs. P. didn’t.

“Gwen, dear. This is Cassidy Somers, who will be keeping the

island beautiful for us this summer. Cassidy, this is my new”—

she hesitates, and then continues firmly—“this is Guinevere

Castle.”

I wince. Concussion or not, Mrs. E. recalls my whole, real,

hopelessly romance-novel name. Which I never use at school.

Or anywhere. Ever.

Unfazed, Cass extends his palm cheerfully. “Hello again,

Gwen.”

I ignore his outstretched hand. “We’ve met,” I say, turning