Candice’s book was slowly becoming obsolete. Nobody read it anymore. It wasn’t even in print.
After downing the glass of water, Candice refilled her glass with wine and found herself in another conversation about writing, this time with Hattie. For the first time, Hattie asked Candice if she was working on anything, and Candice laughed awkwardly and said that she hadn’t had time to work on anything all semester. “I get bogged down,” she said.
Hattie grimaced. Almost everyone graduating with an MFA yearned for what Candice had: a professor position, anywhere.If they managed to find one, it probably wouldn’t be anywhere like NYU. It would probably be somewhere far from the literary excitement. Somewhere cheaper, certainly. But somewhere that would lead them to sigh and say, “I used to live in New York.”
“If you’ll excuse me,” Candice said, hurrying down the hall. Her stomach felt sloshy and strange. Maybe she’d had too many brownies. Perhaps she’d over-sugared and over-wined herself. In the guest bedroom, she collapsed on the bed without bothering to turn on the lights. The door was cracked, so she could still hear laughter and the hum of conversation. She rather liked being here, so far from the action, so far from anyone who needed anything from her. Maybe she should stay on the guest bed the rest of the night. Would anyone notice she was gone?
And then, she heard voices. Whispers.
“I swear, she knows.” It was a woman, a young woman.
And then, Nathan’s voice was next. “I don’t think so. Heck, I don’t think she’s even read it.”
“Your wife didn’t read your book?” The woman gasped.
Nathan groaned. “It’s not that I really wanted her to. Your notes were good. They were great, even. I can’t believe…”
“What?” It was a sweet voice, a girlish voice. The name landed in Candice’s mind: Janie, the blonde who wrote about South America. Nathan had called her writing derivative.
Had Janie readThe Human Agendaand given notes on it? Candice’s heart pounded, but she didn’t dare move. She wanted to hear the entire conversation. They’d snuck down the hall to have it, thinking they were alone.
“I can’t believe you’re only an MFA student, still,” he said tenderly, with love in his voice. “You write and give notes like a much more experienced writer.”
Candice felt the weight of the world, of this news, crushing her.
Janie answered sweetly, something that Candice couldn’t hear. And then, there was silence before Nathan murmured, “Not here.”
Janie sighed. “When are you going to tell her? I swear, everyone knows. Everyone! If she doesn’t know, she must be…”
“I’ll tell her when I tell her,” Nathan shot back.
Candice sat up gently on the bed, careful not to make the springs sing beneath her. She imagined the next seconds. She imagined herself opening the door and discovering Nathan and Janie in the hallway, embracing. She imagined what she might say. Aha! Or I knew it! Or Traitor! It all felt stupid, but it was what came to mind.
Candice couldn’t think beyond this moment. She didn’t allow her mind to consider divorce or the brownstone or Sarah and Peter. Oh gosh, did Sarah and Peter already know about the affair? Probably, they’d read the book and figured it out for themselves. They hadn’t been blind, like their mother.
Would they ever respect her again?
As Candice’s heart raced, her phone buzzed lightly in her pocket. She pulled it out to see: GWEN - MOM ASSISTANT. She rolled her eyes, although she was intrigued. Gwen hadn’t called her in a very long time. Did she want Candice to come to the fundraiser and make an appearance in front of all those high-society, deep-pocketed people?
Nathan and Janie were still on the other side of the cracked door, whispering. Candice couldn’t take it. But rather than accost them, she answered Gwen’s call, her voice louder than it needed to be. Proof that she’d heard everything Nathan and Janie were saying.
“Gwen? Hi,” she said. “How are you?”
She could feel Nathan and Janie stiffening with shock. She’d gotten them.
But then she heard Gwen’s panicked, shaking voice. “Candice? It’s your mother. They’re rushing her to the hospital. I don’t know what happened. I just don’t know.”
3
The next three weeks were a whirlwind. Candice watched it all as though it were happening to someone else. Throughout, she waited for the story to end. She waited for the climax, but everything just kept going and going. Such was life, she knew. Or at least, as a novelist, she’d always thought she knew.
After a wild taxi ride to the hospital the night of her mother’s heart attack, Candice was told by the doctor that it was too late. Stella Vanberg had died in the ambulance on the way there. They hadn’t been able to revive her. Candice gaped at the doctor, waiting for him to tell her it was some kind of joke. But doctors didn’t joke this late at night in Manhattan hospitals. They had other things to do.
Candice called her sister after that. Lindsey didn’t answer, and Candice couldn’t reach her until the following morning. Their brother, Henry, made arrangements to fly to Manhattan immediately, but when he arrived, he stayed with old friends and hardly saw Lindsey and Candice at all. They hugged at the funeral. They attended the wake and said all the right things toall the people who’d come to pay their respects. But just like that, it was over. Their mother was gone.
Of course, there was still the will to consider. Their mother had been a very wealthy woman who owned three properties: an apartment in Manhattan, a house in Florida, and an estate on Martha’s Vineyard. There was an enormous fortune to dole out, Candice knew. And it remained to be seen what would happen to the properties.
It was Candice’s idea to go to the Harbor Estate for the reading of the will. Lindsey agreed that this was practical, as their mother’s lawyer, Ralph Conner, lived on the Vineyard during the summertime. Henry put up a little fight, if only because he’d had a business meeting planned in LA that week in June. But eventually, he rescheduled, and the three Vanberg siblings made their way to Martha’s Vineyard.
