Alexander’s shoulders dropped.
“I know we said beautiful things,” Janie whispered. “I know we wanted that baby to have a life here, to grow up with your parents and your siblings. But I don’t know if I’m ready to get married. I don’t know if I’m ready to have a child yet. Maybe we could wait a little bit? Maybe we can get to know not only one another but ourselves better?”
Alexander alternated between waves of anger and empathy. He wasn’t sure where the anger was directed, but he decided it mainly was toward himself. He should have noticed how grim Janie had felt, how devastated the miscarriage had made her, and how the said miscarriage had opened up new lines of possibility for both of them—possibilities that could, ultimately, end Janie’s misery and get Alexander out from under his father’s shadow.
“But what about the Whitmore fortune?” he whispered.
Janie closed her eyes. “I know what I said about that. But now, I’m not so sure it matters. Maybe we can make our own fortune. Maybe you can still be a pilot. Maybe I can be whatever it is I’m meant to be.”
Overcome, Alexander closed the distance between them and wrapped Janie in a hug. Janie shook in his arms but burrowed deeper into him, as though she never wanted him to let go.He realized, at that moment, that Janie was his everything, his entire priority. If she wanted to leave the White Oak Lodge—once and for all, or just for now—he’d do whatever she needed.
Babies would come when they came. He could wait for her call.
It was six thirty when the bonfire began down the beach from the White Oak Lodge. Alexander and Janie walked hand in hand, giddy with their shared secret about their future departure, watching the sunlight play across the waves. Alexander felt cocooned in love for her. A live band played on a makeshift stage, guitars strumming and a gritty voice so emotional that it nearly brought Alexander to his knees.
When they reached his family, Nina quickly asked Janie to dance. It was a rare moment of Nina’s extroversion, and Janie was touched. “I’d love to,” she said, traipsing off with the littlest Whitmore. After grabbing a beer from the cooler, Alexander watched as they twisted and threw their arms in the air. It had been a long but wonderful day. He was grateful it was almost over.
Francesca appeared beside him and put her head on Alexander’s shoulder. “You have a beautiful future wife,” she said in Italian. “I look forward to showing you both the ropes about the Lodge and taking a much-needed, multicentury break.” She continued talking about the “terrible” day she and Benjamin had had on the water with the high-rolling guests, how she hated to pretend to like people for the sake of the Lodge, and how she couldn’t wait for Alexander and Janie to take over.
Alexander felt that familiar throbbing in his stomach. He never wanted to take over the Lodge. He never wanted this.
But he couldn’t tell his mother the truth, not here, not on the Fourth of July. He ate a hot dog and potato salad, had a lobster roll, and hung out with his mother, sisters, and a few friends. Jack and Tio Angelo were nowhere to be found, but Alexander decided to shrug it off, for now. Maybe when he and Janie took off to wherever they planned to go (Texas? California? Argentina?), he would call his father and figure out exactly what was going on and how to help Jack. But not now.
There was a first round of fireworks in the distance. Nina watched them in earnest, her eyes narrowed, until Alexander realized that Nina was exhausted and trying to force herself to remain awake. This felt useless to him.
“Nina-bug,” he said under his breath. “Why don’t you and I head back to the Lodge?”
Nina twisted her face in annoyance. “Why?”
Alexander shrugged, as though it was no big deal. “I’m getting tired. We could go to bed early and wake up tomorrow morning to catch caterpillars?”
Nina looked surprised but terribly pleased. She was on her feet with the last bit of energy she had left, taking Alexander’s hand for the briefest of moments before she remembered she was too old for that and dropping it. Alexander caught Janie’s eye a final time and promised her he’d be back for the bigger and better fireworks display. As they walked, more and more fireworks popped off, and the sky was filled with oranges and purples and pinks and reds.
“Do you think you’ll be able to sleep?” Alexander asked his kid sister.
Nina yawned in answer. Alexander guessed she could sleep through anything right now, especially in her cozy bedroom at the far end of the family house.
As Nina got into her pajamas, Alexander drew the curtains and pulled the bedcovers back from the pillow so that Nina couldleap in and get started on dreaming. When she was all tucked in, he kissed her forehead and told her to say her prayers.
“I love you, Nina,” he said as he walked toward the doorway and flipped off the light. His heart surged with sorrow as he imagined the future he planned with Janie had very little to do with Nina’s adolescence and teenage years. He’d call, he promised himself. He hoped he’d keep that promise.
She was so young, but it wouldn’t last long.
Back outside, Alexander paused on the veranda, his head tilted as he watched the fireworks surge and explode over the Nantucket Sound. Janie was far away at the beach bonfire, sitting cross-legged next to his sisters and mother, and this gave Alexander a cozy feeling. He prepared to return to them, eager to be near Janie again. But when he dropped into the darkness next to the veranda, headed for the trail that would loop him back to the beach, he realized someone else was standing on the vast stretch of the lush lawn.
It was his father, Benjamin, standing all alone in the dark.
“Dad?”
Benjamin was startled and nearly leaped out of his skin. “Alexander. Goodness, you scared me.” He clapped his chest.
Alexander walked through the dark grass toward his father. Finding Benjamin here felt like fate, like the universe was demanding that Alexander tell his father what he needed to say here and now, before he chickened out. He needed to do it for Janie, for their wide-open future. He needed to free them.
“Some firework display, huh?” Benjamin said. “Your mother insisted we buy from a new vendor this year. Apparently, she always thought the ones we got were lackluster. That’s just like your mother. Quietly hating something for years and not bothering to say anything till you get comfortable.” Benjamin chuckled.
Alexander squeezed his hands into fists. “They’re beautiful, yeah.”
“You always loved the Fourth of July when you were younger,” Benjamin said wistfully. “Your mother hated it at first. She craved Bastille Day, French food, and French wine. She hated Nantucket, hated the Lodge. She probably hated me. But then she had this funny little son who couldn’t get enough of the Fourth of July, or hot dogs, or parades, or any of it.”
