Page 101 of Swan Song

Coco checks the Nantucket Current to see if there’s any breaking news about an untimely death or accident—nope. She heads downstairs—she has books to switch out in the library—and hears Leslee sobbing and Bull murmuring, then Leslee lets out a blood-freezing shriek and Coco thinks, I will not get pulled into their drama.

In the library, she replaces Life After Life by Kate Atkinson and takes May We Be Forgiven by A. M. Homes, geniuses both, in her humble opinion. When she’s back in the hall, she hears a door close. She turns around to see Bull leaving the primary suite.

“Everything okay?” Coco asks.

He shakes his head. “We didn’t get into the Field and Oar Club.”

That’s why the world is ending? Coco thinks. Spare me.

Leslee doesn’t come out of her room at all on Thursday; Coco reads on the curvy white sofa in the party room, listening for signs of life downstairs. She gets a text from Kacy asking if Coco can go to the Chief’s retirement dinner. Coco is surprised at how happy the text makes her. Time is a miracle worker; Coco’s feelings about the selfies have mellowed. But before Coco can say she’ll go, she has to check with Leslee. Can I let you know? she texts back. It’s crazy around here right now.

Friday, Bull leaves the house in the G-Wagon, and when he gets home, Coco is unpacking yet another wooden crate stuffed with straw that cushions yet another dozen Amalfi lemons.

“Those should cheer Leslee up,” he says and Coco checks to see if he’s kidding. “Listen, will you keep an eye on her, please? I have to travel for the next few days—a car is coming to get me in a minute.”

Coco wants to tell him he can’t just pawn his pathetic excuse for a wife off on her while he gets a hot-stone massage in Ubud. “When will you be back?”

“Tuesday night,” he says. “I’m sorry. This situation in Indo is proving to be a sticky wicket.” He claps Coco on the shoulder like they’re best mates.

Leslee doesn’t emerge from her room on Friday. What is she doing about food? Coco wonders. When Lamont sneaks up to her apartment early Saturday, Coco fully expects him to tell her that he’s taking Leslee out on the boat. Coco steels herself for this news, but he says he hasn’t heard from her.

Coco waits until noon and then taps on Leslee’s door. “Hey,” she calls into the dark bedroom. “Can I bring you anything?”

“Go away,” Leslee says.

Oh, how Coco would love to take these words to heart so she can go out onto the beach and read, but she can’t let Leslee continue her hunger strike. She thinks back to her own worst story: the time she stole money from the diner in Rosebush. Coco arrived in the pinkish-gray light before sunrise, let herself in with the keys Garth had entrusted her with, opened the register, and took what was there. She was pulling money out of the safe when Garth walked in and caught her. He could have called the police or fired her, but instead, he said, “Are you really that desperate to get out of this town?” And when she nodded, tears of shame rolling down her face, he made her breakfast.

Coco preheats the oven, lines a baking sheet with tinfoil, pulls out the waffle iron and gets it smoking hot, beats eggs with some heavy cream. She melts butter in a pan.

Twenty minutes later, she has scrambled eggs, a tray of bacon, and—thanks to some wizard on Instagram—golden hash-brown waffles. She’s about to take a plate down to the primary suite when she hears a shuffling on the stairs. It’s Leslee—or, maybe more accurately, the woman who used to be Leslee. Her skin is the color of putty; her hair is straight and frizzled at the ends; she’s wearing a pair of hideous purple drawstring shorts and one of Bull’s undershirts.

“I smelled bacon,” she says.

Coco sets the plate down at the kitchen island. She pours Leslee a cup of black coffee and a glass of ice water.

Leslee digs into the food with such naked appetite that it feels almost indecent to watch her. She shoves a bite of one of the hash-brown waffles in her mouth, then mumbles something, and Coco pulls ketchup from the fridge. As Leslee is shoveling in the eggs, Coco toasts two pieces of sourdough, butters them, then replenishes Leslee’s eggs. Half a pound of bacon is consumed in seconds. Leslee eats every bite of food down to the bread crusts, which she swipes through the remaining ketchup. She finishes the coffee and the water and burps.

Leslee’s eyes, which resemble small dull pebbles in their swollen sockets, fill with tears. “Thank you.”

“Bull told me about the Field and Oar. I’m sorry, I know how much you wanted to join.”

“I can’t believe we didn’t get in,” Leslee says. “I just don’t understand it.”

You don’t? Coco thinks. Leslee masterminded all the debauchery at Triple Eight this summer; she shamelessly flirted with Lamont, with Benton Coe, with Romeo, and with the freaking chief of police! Everyone has been keeping receipts.

“Busy explained what happened at the membership meeting,” Leslee says. “Sharon voted against me. People told me to watch out for her, you know. And then Phoebe voted against me.”

“Phoebe?” Coco says with genuine surprise.

“I told her I’d donated a hundred thousand dollars to Tiffin Academy so they’d let in her son. I chose her as my pickleball partner even though she sucks so bad she shouldn’t even be let on the court. I invited her boring friends to all my parties—except for Delilah at the end.”

Coco thinks about the check to Tiffin Academy that Leslee ripped up and threw away. She told Phoebe she’d donated, but had she actually donated?

“We did everything right,” Leslee says. “But everywhere we go, we fit in for a little while and then people shun us. Why?”

Because you aren’t genuine? Coco thinks. Because everything with you is transactional? Because you’re an egregious social climber?

“Bull tells me I shouldn’t care. Easy for him to say—he’s consumed with his work. He’s always traveling, trying to keep his business from going down the toilet.” Leslee taps her phone. “Come look.”

---