Page 5 of Dead of Summer
“I’m sorry. I’ll go soon,” he says quietly, a hard lump in his chest. He turns his attention back to the ferry, but he’s missed it docking and the passengers have already scattered around the village.
“What do you see?” she finally asks.
“Well, the Clarkes are back for the summer,” he says, knowing it will get her worked up enough to hopefully leave the other topic behind. She coughs, and it rattles like a warning in the back of her throat. Henry winces.
“Those monsters,” she says. At one point he would have told her she was overreacting. But this time Henry doesn’t correct her.
FAITH
Faith spends the entire morning lounging on the bed scrolling aimlessly on her phone, allowing herself to look at pictures of wedding dresses for longer than she’d ever admit. But by the afternoon David still hasn’t emerged from Geoffrey’s office. Slightly annoyed, she goes to the closet to put on one of her new bikinis. It took three suitcases to get all her clothes here. She unzips one of them and runs her hand across the carefully folded fabrics.
Her friend Elena squirmed with envy when she told her she was going to Hadley Island. “The whole summer? Jesus, Faith, that man must be really into you.”
“You think?” she’d asked innocently. But she knew it was true.
“You have to buy all new clothes, you know. You can’t be wearing this city stuff up there. Hadley Island is the real deal. Old money. These are people with yachts, Faith. Not boats.Yachts.” Faith had laughed but agreed to let Elena help her pick out a pile of new things at Bergdorf Goodman. She steered Faith around the floors of the store, stacking her arms with bright printed Ulla Johnson and Zimmermann sundresses, a Celine beach bag, preppy shorts,twopairs of Hermès Oran sandals, an embarrassing assortment of straw hats.
“You’ll have to look the part if you want to stop people from asking too many questions. These people can smell someone who isn’t like them; they love nothing more than to dig around in someone’s past.” Elena stopped at a display of handwoven beach bags and gave her a hard look. “And we don’t want that.”
No, Faith certainly did not. Elena was the only person in the city she had ever told about her life before and the tragedy that had shaped it. She was the only one Faith felt she could trust with her secrets.
At the register Faith had balked at the total, over six thousand dollars. Spending that kind of money felt straight-up irresponsible. The marketing firm paid her barely enough to live on, and unlike Elena, who seemed to have access to some free-flowing fountain of wealth, Faith had nothing to fall back on in terms of money. There was no aunt or uncle with a penthouse on the Upper East Side, no rich parents up in Westchester to ask for help if she ever needed it.
“It’s an investment, trust me,” Elena had said when Faith hesitated. And so, Faith had sucked it up and handed over her Amex card to the cashier, praying she was right.
Faith reaches into the suitcase and chooses a blue one-piece patterned with tiny yellow stars. She puts it on, swiveling to admire the scooped back and the high hips in the full-length mirror. She covers it with a loose white button-up and pads through the empty house and out to the pool with a book. She stations herself on one of the plush lounge chairs, her long legs angled to catch the sun. But she can’t focus. Faith’s mind keeps going to that ring, hidden away in its tufted box. Waiting for her.
She wonders when David is planning to propose. In their nearly one year together he’s always been a thoughtful boyfriend, taking her out for dinners at five-star restaurants, on special outings to baseball games and museums, and even once on a surprise helicopter ride over the city. He probably has something magical in mind—by the water, no doubt. Atsunset perhaps? Maybe a bottle of their favorite champagne to celebrate after. She holds her hand out and squints at it, trying to imagine the way the massive diamond will look on her delicate finger and what color nail polish would best complement it. A light pink, she thinks. Nothing too garish. Nothing that will take attention away from that diamond.
Where will the ceremony be? If they were getting married in the city, she could see it being at the Plaza Hotel. Faith allows herself to picture the dress she’d wear if it were there. A strapless column with a short train. Classic but still very feminine. Tailored within an inch of its life.
A ding comes from the inside of her straw Chloé bag and Faith pulls out her phone to find a text from Elena.
Hey girl! Are you on Hadley now? I’m so jealous of your glamorous summer while I’m toiling away in this cesspool of a city omfg. Meet anyone famous yet?
Faith’s best friend is an amazingly adept social climber. She has no doubt that if Elena were here, she would already have finagled them both onto the invite list for every major event of the summer. Their lives in New York were orchestrated around her friend’s social schedule.
She’d met Elena two years before at an event Faith had put together at the Whitney Museum. It was a cocktail hour for her boss, who was desperately trying to woo clients. It was Faith’s first time arranging something like this, and it had been off to a great start. The wine was flowing. The way the tables were arranged made people turn and talk to one another. Even her dour boss looked happy.
In the midst of the event a woman strode up to her. She was wearing a black jumpsuit with a sheer V of lace cut down from her chest to her navel. “I’m looking for the host. Someone said it was you.” Being in the woman’s presence made Faith’s face go hot and the words dry up in her throat.
“No, I, um, I just helped organize it. My boss is over there. The one in the gray jacket,” she’d said nervously, gesturing into the crowd of gray-toned jackets. Not knowing how else to identify him, she’d whispered, “The one who smells like tuna fish.”
Elena gave her a big laugh. Then she looked at her again and this time Faith felt that Elena could see right into her. She had leaned in conspiratorially. “Are you happy with him? BecauseIhave a strong suspicion you are being underutilized. Let’s connect.” She’d said it with the kind of confidence that made Faith immediately agree and give out her phone number. Then she’d watched Elena swish back toward the group, folding into the crowd with a sense of belonging that made Faith’s throat catch. What she wouldn’t give to no longer be watching from the periphery.
True to her word, Elena called her the next day, inviting her to an intimate dinner for young businesswomen in Manhattan. Faith had instantly been intimidated by the group. The glossy hair and fitted trousers, the bottles of wine and sparkling water being passed back and forth. A chasm opened in her chest.
“What do you think, Faith?”
“Faith is in event planning,” Elena had said, stretching the truth. “I met her at the Whitney.” The smile she gave Faith from across the table made her feel both seen and important. As Elena launched into a story about the event, for the first time Faith felt she might actually deserve to feel that way.
Ha! I wish. Faith writes back, quickly, happy for the distraction.We haven’t even left the house yet.
Elena, bless her, misreads the situation entirely.
Oooh sexy. I love it. So, what have you two been doing? Besides the obvious.
Faith pauses but doesn’t correct her. She almost starts to tell her about the ring but stops herself. As much as she loves her friend, Elena is well connected and can’t resist sharing a juicy piece of gossip. A fatal combination for a secret. There is a good chance that anything Faith says will make its way through her own social circles and beyond. And Faith can’t have all Manhattan knowing that she snooped through her boyfriend’s bag. Plus, she thinks, looking down at her bare hand, it’ll be better when she can show it to Elena on her actual finger. More impactful.
