Page 40 of The Cottage on Blueberry Bay

“Meredith!” Remy yelled from the trail. “I’m here!”

CHAPTER16

Meredith watched as Remy unlocked the windows in the living room and opened them up. Her sister had started in the kitchen and went around opening the shutters, then each window, letting the stale air escape.

“I love the clapboard,” Remy said as she ran her hand against the wall.

“The whole house has it.” Meredith folded her arms against her chest, watching as her sister explored the room, carefully touching Jacob’s things as if they were in a museum.

“You could really fix this place up,” Remy said, running her finger along a table’s surface, then inspecting the dust residue built up on the tip.

Meredith shook her head. “To turn around and sell it?”

“You really want to sell this place?” Remy said.

“I don’t have the money to keep both houses,” Meredith pointed out the obvious. She wasn’t married to a fancy attorney anymore. She didn’t have a husband to share the finances like Remy did.

Remy pointed to Jacqueline’s painting on the mantel. “That’s Mom’s.”

Meredith nodded. “There are a lot of Mom’s paintings here.”

Remy’s forehead wrinkled. “Really? What’s upstairs?”

“I haven’t been up there yet,” Meredith said, feeling silly she hadn’t explored the whole house.

“Why not?” Remy asked, as though something bad might happen if she went up there.

“I don’t know, I just…”Don’t want to lose it again, she wanted to say. But then she said, “I just didn’t feel like it.”

Remy didn’t hesitate and climbed up the narrow staircase to the second floor. She disappeared off to the right where Meredith assumed there was a bedroom.

“There are three decent sized bedrooms,” Remy called down. “And a smaller room that you have to cut through another room to get to.”

Meredith felt weird going up into the more private areas of the very private Jacob.

But when she heard Remy opening and shutting doors, she went up.

Four bedrooms were up there, two on one side of the cottage and two on the other. All had a view of the water. The rooms on the right looked out at the crescent bay, where Meredith had walked that morning. The rooms to the left looked out toward the other end of the beach, where the cliffs towered over the water.

Remy walked to the right, opened the window, and leaned out.

“This place is so beautiful!” Remy said as she leaned out further. When she came back in, her face radiated the same happiness Meredith had seen on her mother’s face in the painting. “Meredith, you can’t sell this place.”

“Well, I can’t hold onto it.” Meredith shut the window and locked it as soon as Remy moved from the area.

“At least go through the place and take some time before making any decisions,” Remy said. “I mean, there’s probably a lot you can learn about your dad here.”

“I have a dad, remember?” Meredith said.

“Come on, Merry, you know what I mean.”

“Do you have to call me that?”

“When you’re acting ridiculous, yes, I do.” Remy opened the window again. “Where do you have to go?”

Meredith clenched her jaw. Of course her sister wouldn’t understand. She didn’t need to. She was happily married and financially stable.

“I’m about to lose the house, okay?” Meredith didn’t like discussing what a disaster she was, but there it was. “I don’t have the kind of lifestyle I used to. I need to sell this place so I can keep mine.”

---