Page 106 of Summer After Summer

Great match today! Fred writes.

My heart accelerates as I read it. Just above the message are the last texts we exchanged five years ago that I never erased, just let be buried in my phone. Let’s meet at the summer house, I’d written then. He’d texted back a heart.

Thank you. I pause. Were you there?

Yes.

I can’t believe it. Fred came to my match, but I didn’t see him. Not that I paid much attention to the crowd. It’s important to focus on the game—the opponent—in front of me.

Is that okay? Fred writes.

It’s a free country.

Olivia.

Fred.

What are you doing right now?

Eating boring food. Working on visualizing for tomorrow.

Do you have time for a walk?

I breathe in and out slowly. I do have time, but I can’t do it. Any conversation with Fred is an emotional quagmire. I need to keep things cool, calm, and collected so that I can win my next match. I can’t walk into a situation I can’t control.

I’m sorry, no.

At some point?

I’ll have to think about that.

Fair enough. Good luck tomorrow.

Thank you.

I watch the screen, wondering if he’ll text again, but he doesn’t.

Eventually I put the phone away, our text thread at the top, something that’s been unearthed that should’ve stayed buried.

CHAPTER TWENTY-SEVEN

July 2023

The weeks roll by slowly, that uncertainty of summer settling in, where you never know what day it is unless you check.

Wes and I have dinner at Bonne Amie. I tell him about Ash’s and my discovery about Claude, once again attentive with his “oui, ouis” and zero French behind it. He tries to keep the evening light, but it feels heavy.

Not enough time has passed for me to forget the images I saw on his phone. That perfect breast, cupped in an elegant hand. That metal-clasped belt around her waist, with nothing else adorning her delicate body.

I didn’t want to know who it was, and Wes didn’t volunteer. I didn’t press it. The details weren’t going to help me; they’d only make me feel worse.

I haven’t forgotten, though. I don’t know yet if I can.

So I drink the expensive wine Claude brings us and distract us both by telling Wes about some of the early entries I found in my mother’s journal.

I’ve been reading them at night before I go to sleep, loving falling asleep with her voice in my head. She had a deft hand describing the parties they went to in New York and Southampton, gently poking fun at William and his obsession with beautiful people. It feels like it came from love, and it’s a nice window into their life together. I haven’t found any other revelations. Not yet.

After dinner, Wes drives me home, and I trip out of the car before he can say whatever it is that’s playing across his face.

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