Page 14 of Bluebell Tides

Quentin crossed his arms tightly over his chest. “You know, I want to meet them. Your family. All your siblings.” He wet his lips. “Do they know about me?”

Ruth nearly gasped with laughter, then sucked it in at the last minute. How could she explain the existence of Quentin to her family, a family who clearly didn’t care about her enough to write to her, call her, or visit her? Not that she blamed them. There was no money.

“They’re so busy. They’re so far away,” Ruth said tentatively, touching Quentin’s shoulder. She didn’t want him to know that he didn’t matter to them. Quentin wasn’t accustomed to not mattering.

“But what are you doing for Christmas?” Quentin asked. “You must be going home.”

Ruth hadn’t really considered Christmas. During December, the dorms would be closed, and everyone would be forced to vacate, but she hadn’t considered where she might go. Maybe, she contemplated, she could go back to Nantucket and visit Missy and her restaurateur boyfriend. Maybe she could celebrate with a long, gray walk along the sand.

“I’ll work something out.” Ruth shrugged.

Quentin leaned back, his face marred with surprise, as though the idea of not going home for Christmas was sacrilegious. And then, he said something that Ruth knew he would regret. “Why don’t you come home with me?”

Ruth gave him a look. “Come on, Quentin. You don’t mean that.”

“Why not? I mean everything I say,” Quentin told her, throwing a hand to the side. “Haven’t I always kept my word? I told you that my family would get you into Yale and look at you. You’re like the best student Yale’s ever had.”

“I don’t know about that.” Ruth’s heart swelled.

Quentin took her hand and covered it with kisses. “I want you to meet my family. I want you to sit in my parents’ house and eat all our incredible Christmas foods. I want to hear you argue with my mother about the Brontë sisters and Moby-Dick. Please. It would mean the world to me.”

And at that moment, Ruth knew she needed to say no. She knew she needed to tell him that he was delusional, that their worlds couldn’t come together, and they would regret it. But Quentin’s eyes were enormous, expectant, and filled with love. How could she refuse?

Over the next six weeks, from November 1st to their December 16th departure to his parents’ place, Ruth bubbled with fear. Dina, Reese, and Kelly were overjoyed for her, frequently taking her shopping and trying to help her decide what to wear for every iteration of the Caldweck family parties—from small affairs to bigger celebrations. By now in the semester, her friends had caught wind of how little money Ruth came from, and to Ruth’s surprise, they didn’t care at all. Because Dina’s family was very, very wealthy—if not as wealthy as the Caldwecks—she often purchased outfits for Ruth, or pretended that she’d purchased them for herself and then given them to Ruth, saying they didn’t fit her.

Ruth couldn’t believe she had such wonderful friends. She couldn’t believe she’d gotten so lucky. Sometimes she felt like Cinderella, after she’d met the prince and moved into the castle.

During Thanksgiving, Ruth stayed on campus, while Quentin returned to Bluebell Cove, Maine, to dine with his family and tell them she was coming home with him for Christmas. Ruth teamed up with a few other stragglers on campus, eating in a Chinese restaurant not far from the dorms and laughing together over crab rangoon. All the while, she was anxious about how Quentin’s time in Bluebell Cove was going. What if his parents flat-out refused to let her visit?

Quentin returned to Yale Sunday evening, his belly swollen from so many treats. He picked her up and kissed her and said, “My family can’t wait to meet you.” But there was a glint in his eye that told Ruth something was amiss. She couldn’t say what.

On December 16th, Quentin and Ruth packed up Quentin’s now fully closed convertible and headed up to Maine. Throughout the drive, soft snow fell and melted on the windshield, and Ruth felt as though they were moving through an enormous snow globe, bubbling with love. They couldn’t shut up, not about what had happened last semester, not about Ruth’s recently written paper about W.G. Sebald, not about anything. Quentin couldn’t stop kissing her hand.

Bluebell Cove was a quaint little oceanside village, with enormous cliffs that gave it a romantic, dangerous feel. Quentin parked near the cliffs, not far from a ramshackle inn called the Bluebell Cove Inn, and they stood at the edge, gazing at the thunderous water below.

“I can’t believe you grew up here,” Ruth said, shaking her head. It was the polar opposite of her swampy Virginian home.

After that, Quentin drove them the rest of the way to his parents’ iconic mansion: a gothic structure with thick pillars, trailing vines, and high fences surrounding the property. As she stepped up the stairs to the front door, Ruth’s legs shook. Quentin looked pale with nerves, too. But as soon as the door opened, they were rushed into a world of warmth and wealth and books and intellectualism and beautiful firelight. Ruth couldn’t believe it. What had she been so worried about?

Quentin’s parents, Henrietta and George Caldweck, were in their mid-forties and incredibly good-looking, with clothing that spoke of having shopped only for the finest fabrics in Europe. Henrietta took both of Ruth’s hands in hers and said, “I hear that you’ve been Yale’s most wonderful new addition. Congratulations, darling.”

“I wouldn’t be there without you both,” Ruth said. “Thank you again.”

“Oh, it was only a phone call or two,” George said, turning around from the drink cart and handing over two exquisite cocktails.

Ruth sipped hers, surprised at the intensity and complexity of flavors. It was nothing like the alcoholic juice she often drank at frat parties.

That first night, George and Henrietta showed endless curiosity about Ruth’s educational career, the professors she’d worked with, and her dreams of the future. Ruth played along, showing off her intellectual curiosity. Often, she looked over at Quentin, expecting him to be smiling. After all, wasn’t this going well? But Quentin seemed to drop deeper into himself. He rarely smiled, and he hardly ever joined in on the conversation. Ruth chalked it up to him being tired from the drive.

Over the next few days, Ruth fell into a rhythm at the iconic Caldweck house. She met everyone from famous writers to diplomats, to professors at other universities, to colleagues at George’s firm. Ruth was always ready for a conversation. She was always ready to turn her brain on.

Quentin’s brother and sister, Ren and Sissy, were maybe the cagiest around her. They didn’t speak to her often, and when they did, they asked her questions about Virginia that she tried to skirt around. After five days at the Caldweck house, as they got ready for bed, Ruth finally mustered the nerve to ask Quentin about them. He shrugged and said they were just curious.

“I can’t help but think they’re trying to point out how different we are,” Ruth said, pulling a brush through her hair.

“Well, we are different,” Quentin said.

Ruth felt it like a slap, then told herself it was fine. Quentin was only speaking the truth.