Candice was in the car when Nathan called to check in. She answered it via the in-car speaker system, brightening her voice. “Hi! How are things?”
“Just wanted to see where you were,” Nathan said.
“About two hours outside the city,” she said. “Thinking about stopping for food soon, although maybe I should wait for something delicious on the Vineyard.”
She could feel the strain between them, the hesitation. On the night of her mother’s heart attack, Candice had learned about Nathan’s affair with Janie, the MFA student. More than that, Nathan knew that Candice knew about it. He’d realized she was mere feet away when he and Janie had been talking about when they could be together—dreaming about making their future work.
But in the wake of her mother’s death, in the wake of the funeral and everything that needed to be taken care of, and in the wake of their children’s sorrow about losing their grandmother (a grandmother they hadn’t known very well, ofcourse), Nathan and Candice hadn’t found a way to talk about Nathan’s affair. Mercifully,The Human Agendawas no longer at the top of the bestsellers’ lists, and copies of it no longer filled every bookstore window. A part of Candice wondered if Nathan had decided to put his affair with Janie to rest. Maybe losing Stella had reminded him of how little time we have on earth. Maybe it had reminded him to cherish Candice and their kids.
“What’s on the docket today?” Candice asked.
“I’m outlining a new book,” Nathan said, a tinge of pride in his voice.
Candice bit her tongue to keep from asking,“Is it about cheating on your wife while she leaves to take care of her mother’s will and estate?”
“Wow,” Candice said. “It’s so good that you can take the summer to write.”
“Yeah. I’ve been meaning to say, I don’t want to go back to teaching,” Nathan confessed.
“I guess you don’t have to!” Candice said. The money he was bringing in from book sales was far more than she earned as a professor at NYU. He could spend long hours alone in his head, rewriting the same few sentences, if he wanted to.
Nathan went on, explaining that his editor was “really excited” about his notes. “I’ll let you read some of it, if you want,” Nathan offered tentatively.
Candice remembered how Janie had given Nathan notes onThe Human Agenda, and he hadn’t even bothered to ask Candice. Was this a peace offering?
“I’m sure you’ll be busy in the Vineyard,” he hurried to add.
“I’d love to read any and everything you write,” she said. “I fell in love with your writing before I fell in love with you, remember?”
Nathan was quiet for a moment. It felt as though they both dipped into the past, seeing themselves as twentysomethinggrad students, each with writerly dreams. They’d seen something magical in one another and had built a gorgeous future. Maybe that still mattered, despite Janie. Maybe they wouldn’t have to talk about the affair.
Soon after, Candice said she had to go. “Love you, Nathan,” she said, her voice shaking.
“I love you, too.”
They hung up. But Candice’s head rang with the chaos of it all.
Am I the pathetic woman who goes back to her husband despite his affair?
Am I pathetic because I haven’t even talked to him about it at all?
She didn’t have the will to answer either question.
She reachedMartha’s Vineyard at five thirty that afternoon. The last time she’d been at the Harbor Estate was Christmas, the last time she’d seen her mother, when the ocean had been a slate gray, and the sky above had spit snow and rain. Now, the waters were turquoise, and tourists and those who summered here yearly wore all white, their hair styled beautifully, their tanned legs slipping into boat shoes. In her all-black city outfit, Candice felt like an outsider, which was ironic. After all, Candice and her siblings had been raised here on the Vineyard.
Candice drove from the ferry and out to the Harbor Estate with the windows down so that the salty breeze swept through her dark hair. At the gate, she leaned out of the car to press the code into the touchpad so that the iron bars unlatched and let her in. She drove to a little lot beside the garage, then got out and stood in front of the gorgeous mansion, a place thatseemed to live in a different century. Rather than going in first, she walked around to the other side of the house to put her feet in the water. It was cold and exhilarating. With her eyes closed, she could almost imagine she was ten or eleven, and her mother was watching from the veranda, making sure she, Lindsey, and Henry were all right.
“Candice!” Lindsey called from that same veranda now, and Candice yanked around to see her pretty younger sister, sweeping down the stairs and coming toward her.
“When did you get here?” Candice asked.
Lindsey gave her a strange half hug. “I drove up right as the gates were closing behind you. It took me forever to remember the code. I was calling your name for help, but you ran around the house before you heard.”
Candice groaned. This was not an especially good start. “Sorry. I’m lost in my head right now.”
Lindsey raised her shoulders, as though to say,I get it. But Candice wasn’t sure if she and Lindsey had ever seen eye to eye. They’d always squabbled as teenagers and had never purposely hung around each other as adults. Save for now, of course.
“Henry will be here in like an hour,” Lindsey said. “What are we doing about dinner?”
