But Sophie had the wooden box on the ground and was using her fingers to pry the lid off.Her eyes glinted in the soft light of the attic.Celia felt a jolt of rage through her chest, one that she immediately tried to swallow down.Sophie was her only lifeline in a terrifying world.The last thing she wanted to do was show her how frightened and angry she was.
But the truth was, Celia had never found anything that belonged to her mother, not in all the years after she’d died.It was as if her father had cleansed the house and the inn of all memory of her.As if he’d painstakingly gone through every drawer, removing her bobby pins, forgotten notes, and photographs.She remembered Landon’s photograph on the fridge, the one of his children's mother, and realized that was normal.You were supposed to uphold the memory of the woman you’d lost.
“They’re journals!Diaries.”Sophie’s voice was as thin as a string.
Celia bent down and sat beside her daughter on the dusty attic floor.She felt her daughter’s eyes on her as she reached for the wooden top and set it back on the box.Her heart pounded.All her life, she’d protected Sophie from the darkness of her Harper past.She hadn’t realized that she’d been protecting herself, too.Her heart couldn’t handle it, couldn’t bear to read over her mother’s true thoughts.Not yet.
ChapterTen
October 2000
It was a week after the party at the cove, and Celia was still grounded.No surprise that being grounded in the Harper household meant that nothing was really so different from normal.It couldn’t run without her.Immediately after their newspaper meeting, she had to leave school, hurry home, work at the front desk of the inn, get her sisters ready for bed, and go to sleep, only for the entire day to repeat itself all over again.“It’s like I’m constantly grounded,” she said to Landon one day as he walked her back to the inn.“I won’t be free till next year.”
Next year felt like a bright light.It felt like the only thing she could really believe in.
This deep in the semester, Celia had been forced to decide upon a theme for the first issue of the newspaper.She’d landed on one that felt sort of lackluster but important—recycling in the town of Bluebell Cove and how they could improve it.Each of her journalists had chosen an industry—fishing, tourism, restaurants, real estate, or accounting—and analyzed how recycling was currently used in that field.The best articles analyzed Bluebell Cove’s environmental conditions and their effects on its surroundings.Celia was sort of happy with how the issue was coming together, although she felt it wasn’t inspired enough for Georgetown University to notice her.
Her real idea was still waiting for her, she knew.The idea that would make her career sing.
But Landon told her how thrilled he was with the idea.“It’s like we’re always saying.I don’t want to give up on the world yet.And we can use the newspaper to get the word out.We can spread actual knowledge!”It was cute how excited he was.
A few days before the newspaper was set to be printed, Celia returned home after a long shift at the inn to find that the fridge and cabinets were nearly empty, and she had nothing to make for her sisters for dinner.For days, she’d written food lists for her father, asking him to go to the grocery store or send one of his staff members.But there had been a steady stream of autumn tourists, and it seemed that he’d given himself over to them rather than helping her.Rage boiled her blood.She went to her room and said to Ivy, “I’m going out.”
Ivy didn’t look up when she said, “You’re grounded, remember?”
Celia rolled her eyes, grabbed her own wallet, and stalked down the street.She dared her father to come out of his office and see her leave.
At the grocery store, she stocked a basket with bread, cheese, eggs, rice, and vegetables.She felt uninspired in the cooking department but wanted to fill her sisters’ bellies before bed.She paid with her own money and returned home to find her father on the front porch, glowering at her.
“Where were you?”he demanded, his voice icy.
Celia didn’t have time for this.She tore up the steps, eager to hurry around him and start cooking.But before she could, her father stepped in front of her and blared, “You don’t respect me?You don’t respect the rules I’ve set for you?Why do you think I should respect you back?”
Celia was suddenly flustered and hated herself for it.She gripped her bag of groceries and said a very delicate, “Dad, I need to make dinner for the girls.They’re hungry.”
Her father flared his nostrils.“What you need to do is get back to the inn.A busload of tourists is about to arrive, and I can’t do it all by myself.”
Celia was flabbergasted.She’d been at the front desk of the inn since after school, and her father hadn’t spoken to her once about working overtime, nor about this busload of tourists.“The girls come first,” she stammered, trying to pass him again.
“No!”her father cried.It looked as though he wanted to reach for her again, wanted to whip her off the porch and across the lawn.He’d never actually laid a hand on her, not really, but fear ebbed in her heart.
He said, “The inn always comes first.It’s our lifeblood.It’s everything we stand for.”
Celia froze with surprise and made herself very small, like a hunted rabbit.When she couldn’t think of what to say, she dropped the bag of groceries and heard the crack of eggs on the concrete.No!she thought.I can’t take it.It’s too much!
Before she could stop herself, Celia turned on her heel and fled the house, fled her father, fled her thousand-plus responsibilities, her hungry sisters, and the world her mother had left behind.At first, she ran without a plan, tears lining her cheeks and drying in the chilly evening air.But then she realized that her feet were taking her somewhere she wasn’t entirely sure she should go.Still, it felt inevitable.When she bounded up the sidewalk to Hanson Smith’s immaculate Victorian home, the biggest and most elegant fortress in all of Bluebell, she let out a strained sob.What on earth was she doing?Her watch read eight, but none of the lights downstairs in the Smith household were on.The only light came from the second floor.Somehow, she knew that was Hanson’s bedroom.
It was lucky that his parents weren’t home, she supposed.If they were, she wouldn’t be standing there at all.Knocking on the door or ringing the bell would only announce her to no one.
Which meant there was only one way to do this.
Like something out of a movie, Celia picked up a small stone and threw it at Hanson’s window.She’d always had an okay arm and decent aim, though it was nothing she’d ever been able to pursue with her responsibilities at the inn.The stone clacked against the sill and dropped into the bushes below.
A second later, Hanson appeared in the window, looking down at her.Celia’s heart stopped.Since his note in her locker, they hadn’t spoken—only a few fleeting moments of eye contact in the hallways.She’d started to believe he regretted it now, and he didn’t like her after all.Or worse, that the note had been a joke, something he and his football friends laughed about when she wasn’t around.
But now, he raised his first finger, disappeared from the window, and appeared on the porch in his coat and hat.Wordlessly, he walked over to her, took her tiny hand in his massive one, and led her to a shadowy path that snaked around the back of his house and led them directly to the cove.The stones beneath their feet were slippery with moss, and the forest was remarkably tranquil.A half-moon curled in the darkening indigo sky.Celia’s tears had long since dried on her cheeks.All she felt was Hanson’s skin on her hand and her breath.
When they reached the beach, Hanson released her hand and turned to her.Usually at school, he wore a crooked and handsome grin, like he knew better than everyone else, but now, he looked deathly serious, as though he couldn’t believe this was happening either.
