Page 7 of The Summer We Started Over

“Liz. Sara. Emily.” Eddie named Dinah’s editor, agent, and publicist. “They have all been begging you to go to lunch or dinner with them.”

Dinah shook her head. “No. Not for a month. I’m at acrucialplace in my novel.”

“Dinah, you are always in a crucial place of a novel.” Eddie was surprised at the strength of her convictions. “I haven’t had a vacation in two years.”

Dinah argued, “But we’ve been to Paris! To London! To Hawaii!”

“That’s right, Dinah.Wehave been. I’ve never gone off on my own.”

Dinah sniffed. “I see. I hadn’t realized my presence was so distasteful.”

Eddie took a deep breath. “Dinah, stop. I know that deep down you are a really kind person. You know thatright nowwe are not in one of your books. I’m a real person with a troubled father and a sister who needs me. You will be just fine here. I’ll bet you’ve got a dozen contacts who would wine and dine you.”

Dinah sweetened her voice. “What if I gave you a raise?”

Eddie laughed. “Dinah, I have to go. I’ll call you every day. Now you go choose a movie and I’ll make us hot fudge sundaes.”

Dinah froze for a long, dramatic moment.

Then she asked, “With sprinkles?” Dinah grinned, letting Eddie know she was well aware of her little girl act.

“With sprinkles.”

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Eddie wrote in her journal that night. She hadn’t written in it since she moved to be with Dinah. Her time in New York had been so busy, crowded with work and play and fabulous restaurants and theater. She’d shot photos with her iPhone instead. Now she realized that those photos were all about the surface. She hadn’t caught her deepest thoughts, and now she needed to write in her diary to delve into her extremely confused soul.

Barrett is so brave. So certain. My desires, my life plan, my vision of the future wobbles like a tower of Jell-O compared to Barrett’s confident decisions.

I think of my mother now, and it always hurts to think of her—how little pleasure she took from being our mother, how little interest she had in us—and I’m afraid that I’ll be that kind of mother, resentful and erratic.

I don’t want to be a mother. I shouldn’t be a mother.

I won’t be a mother.

My most secret, most haunting dream of my future is, at the best, fantasy. It is completely unachievable. I must harden my heart against sentimental longings. I think of Jeff as the love of my life, but I must be the love of my life, even if it breaks my heart.

two

In the farmhouse on Nantucket, Barrett made a peanut butter, lettuce, and mayonnaise sandwich and put it on a plate, covered by a napkin. She taped a note for her father on the top:Your sandwich is under here. Your favorite kind!

She moved around the kitchen, putting away the clean dishes from the dishwasher, scrubbing the counter and the spacious old porcelain sink. She washed her hands and leaned against the sink, rubbing hand lotion into her skin, exactly the way her mother had done every day and evening before she went away.

Eddie had also gone away, for two whole years. But she’d promised she’d come back in May, to help with Barrett’s shop opening and with their increasingly dotty father. Eddie often sent money, enough to pay for a new water heater or storm windows on the east side of the house. Mostly Eddie had sent wonderful, usually useless, gifts from Paris orTuscany or wherever Dinah Lavender took her. But Barrett needed her sister here, now.

“Buck up, buttercup!” Barrett said to herself. She tapped her leg. “Come on, Duke. Let’s go feed the horse.”

Duke, their sweet rescue dog, went to the back door, his black and white tail wagging. The odd-looking dog was a happy creature, pleased to go with anyone, or curl up anywhere, preferably next to a person’s warm body, and snooze.

Together Barrett and Duke walked out into the May morning. Spring could be fickle on Nantucket. Today the wind was playful and the sun shone bright, unobscured by clouds. They walked to the small barn, originally built in the 1800s to shelter animals and store bags of grain, and now not used for very much at all. Although it stood strong and steady, it had an air of emptiness. And itwasempty, except for the few bales of hay and oats kept over the winter to feed the arrogant horse.

Duchess had come with the farm when William Grant bought it three years ago. Actually, it was in the terms of the sale that the horse remain on the farm, because the relatives of the owners who had died didn’t want to take the time and trouble to find someone to buy her, and they assured the Grant family that the horse was very happy here and would be no trouble. They had been right. The horse was no trouble. But also wrong, because she certainly didn’t seem happy. She was a buckskin bay with chocolate mane and tail, sixteen hands, beautiful and standoffish. The first year Barrett lived here, she’d tried her best to befriend Duchess, and as a new girl in town, she could have used a good friend on the island. But the horse would bolt if Barrett tried to touch her. When Barrett held out a carrot or an apple, the horse would approach warily, extending her head and sniffing, her rubbery nose touching the apple, then snatch the apple with her huge horsey teeth and race off to the opposite end of the field.

Gradually, Barrett made human friends and stopped spending time with the horse. That first year, Barrett and Eddie were frazzled, doingten things at the same time, unpacking boxes, buying groceries, cooking meals, trying to stir their father into a semblance of life—after all, he was the one who had moved them here! But their father had sequestered himself in his office on the first floor near the kitchen. He was, he said, working on a book. He wandered the house day and night, eating whatever was around, not interacting with his daughters. His only pleasure seemed to be ordering used books from literary internet sites and receiving them in the mail. Eddie stayed for the first year, settling their new, smaller, family into the farmhouse and working at the bookshop. Barrett waitressed at night, worked in retail all day, and babysat when she had time, to save up money for her shop.

“Good morning, Duchess!” Barrett called. “The sun is shining, it’s almost summer, and I’m going to open my shop in one week! I’ve got to stop mooning around. Eddie will come home and deal with Dad, and I’ll get rich for all of us.”

She knew that wasn’t true, that she’d get rich, but she did have high hopes for her shop.

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