Page 155 of Summer After Summer

I laugh. “It’s been fifteen years … what’s one more month?”

“Good point. But it seems risky.”

“I don’t think so.”

“Why?”

I bring my hands up to the table and put them flat on the tablecloth. “Because I know what waiting is like. We both do. It’s the together part that scares me.”

“Olivia …”

“No, I’m going to go.” I stand, walk to him, and lean over. I kiss him on the cheek. “Wish me luck?”

“Always.”

He reaches for me, but I sidestep him. If we touch for real, then I’m going to crumble, and I need to keep myself together. I need time to examine what the hell I’m doing. To think about Wes and whether I want to throw that all away.

So instead, I say nothing and walk quickly out of the restaurant without looking back.

CHAPTER THIRTY-SEVEN

August 2023

There are more people at the cocktail party tonight, sensing that they’re about to be over for good. All the familiar faces and ones I’ve never taken the time to learn.

It took an effort to be here after reading that letter from my mother. I took the pages back to my room and lined them up against the ones missing from her diary. They matched exactly as I knew they would. So now I know why my mother wanted me to wait to get married. Because she wanted me to choose myself and not be trapped by circumstance. I don’t know what to do with this information. Tell my sisters? Bring it up with my father? Or tuck it away like she tucked the pages into her favorite book and left them hidden, maybe forever.

When I come outside, Wes is across the lawn, talking to Charlotte and Ann. Colin and Sophie are making the rounds with Aunt Tracy, like a leave-taking. My father is standing on the veranda, drink in hand, looking out over it all. What must he be thinking? Despite our confab in the library, I don’t feel any closer to knowing him or his thoughts. But maybe that’s okay. I don’t have to access the thoughts of everyone around me all the time to know them.

“What do you think they’re talking about?” Fred asks, appearing at my elbow like the ghost that he is.

“When did you get here?”

“Just now.” He’s dressed more casually than I’ve seen him in a while, more like the Fred on the beach a couple of weeks ago than the Fred of the club, of finance, of stranger.

“Where were you?”

“I had some business in London.”

“Ah.”

“So?”

I look back out over the lawn. “So, what?”

“Are they plotting?” He nods toward Charlotte and Wes and Ann.

Charlotte has her back to them, talking to one of the neighbors, and Wes and Ann’s heads are tipped together. They do look like they’re in a conspiracy, but that’s silly.

“What would they have to plot about?”

“I don’t know … Only, Olivia … are you sure you know everything about …”

“About what?”

He hesitates. “Ann.”

“She makes Charlotte happy, that’s all I need to know.”

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