Evan:Last summer the island was considering a proposal by Buchanan Enterprises to tear down a motel on Dodge Street and build a “boutique inn and spa.” I know the listeners can’t see me but I’m using air quotes because I can’t say it with a straight face.
Kelsey:Personally, I think a spa sounds amazing. Can I tell you how many hours a week I spend on my feet?
Betsy:People are real touchy on the subject of hotels since the Harborside burned down two summers ago. I mean, what if these Buchanans were involved? It’s not like they’d be the first people on Earth to commit arson.
Lou:Betsy!
Betsy:What? I’m not the one who thought of that. It was Catherine from the bookstore who said it first.
Evan:It was while that proposal was front and center that Instagram account started; @keeptheblock, it was called, and—
Kelsey:Sorry to interrupt. But I think it was @keeptheblocktheblock. I don’t know who started the Instagram account. Some of those comments were pretty harsh. The whole account is gone now.
Betsy:In retrospect, I wonder if we ganged up on Taylor Buchanan.
Evan:We who?
Betsy:We as a town. As an island.
Lou:We didn’t gang up on her.
Kelsey:I definitely didn’t. By the way, I would kill for her hair. Sorry. Bad choice of words. She has really pretty hair. No question, she goes off-island for those highlights. Goes? Went? I don’t know.
Betsy:You want the real scoop on what’s going on in this town, though? Don’t go to the town council meetings, or the zoning board meetings, which are even worse. It’s a snoozefest at the zoning board meetings.
Lou:I second that.
Betsy:What you want to do is go to the post office in the afternoon, when the locals go pick up the mail that came in on the boat midday. Better yet, better than the post office? Go to the dump.
Lou:Man, I love the dump.
Evan:That’s where I first heard about the body. At the dump.
Juliana
By the time six o’clock on Monday rolls around Juliana no longer feels like going on a moped ride with a stranger. What had she been thinking? She wasn’t even drunk when she invited Nicola! She never gets drunk at her own parties. She never has more than two drinks, period. Drunk equals loss of control and loss of control is what causes bad things to happen. She’s seen enough of that in her life.
Obviously she knows what she was thinking. She knows exactly why she wants to get to know Nicola. But she’s tired. She had a long day of meetings—an investment bank interview, prep for the upcoming board meeting, a check-in with the CFO.
Juliana peeks out the window in her upstairs office and sees her neighbor making her way across the grass between their house; she wills herself into a better mood. She can will herself into anything. She’s gone to school hungry; she’s gone to bed scared; she’s stood before a roomful of investors and conquered her terror only by telling herself that not a single person in the room has overcome what she’s overcome to be there. Just keep moving, she’d told herself in every one of these situations. Just. Keep. Moving. A moped ride is nothing.
Anyway, whyshouldn’tshe be in a good mood? The day had been cloudy, but an afternoon rain shower took the clouds and someof the humidity with it when it departed, and now the air is clear, the water in Great Salt Pond sparkling. She liveshere. She ownsthis house. Just keep moving.
Juliana greets Nicola and walks her around to where the two mopeds wait in all their gleaming black sleekness. She’s barely used one of them; the other one, she’s never used at all.
“Wow!” says Nicola. “These look a little fancier than what they rent down by the ferry. These look like the Cadillacs of the moped world!”
“Actually, they’re BMWs.” Immediately after the words leave her mouth Juliana chastises herself. Was that an obnoxious thing to say? She can never get this right, the line between being generous and arrogant. With the board? Sure. With potential investment bankers, journalists? No problem. She knows who she is and what she wants and how to get there. But put her with someone close to her own age and her mind goes off the rails, she flounders.
Nicola laughs. “Okay, then,” she says merrily. “BMW, Cadillac—honestly, it’s all the same to me!”
Juliana suggests they do a partial loop of the island, following West Side to Cooneymous to Lakeside, then take Mohegan Trail to Spring Street into town. They’ll end up at Ballard’s, where Juliana will treat them to a cocktail and dinner.
“Oh, gosh, you don’t need to treat,” says Nicola, and in her voice Juliana can hear a touch of Minnesota that makes her think of... well, of David. Of course, David. “But I do need a little moped lesson. I’ve only driven one once, and it was a long time ago.”
Juliana shows Nicola the accelerator, and how to brake and steer. She shows her how to balance with her feet on the ground, and where to place her feet on the running boards. Once Nicola has all of this down—she practices on Juliana’s driveway, and she’s a quick study—off they go.
The island looks spectacular as they cruise around toward the west side. Sunset is still nearly two hours away, but the sky is gettingready, and Golden Hour is almost upon them. The sunsets on this side of the island, off Dorry’s Cove and Stevens Cove, are said to be phenomenal, and Juliana makes a mental note to see one sometime this summer. The rolling hills of Mohegan Trail as it eases into Spring Street give her that roller coaster euphoria (a trip to Canobie Lake Park during a YMCA summer camp for underprivileged children unleashes itself from her memory), and, as they coast into town, the thought floats through Juliana’s mind, unobtrusive and wispy as a cloud, that she’s finally made it.
