Page 75 of The Cottage on Blueberry Bay

Carolyn shook her head. “At that point, Jacob’s drinking was out of control. He was barely around.” Carolyn shook her head as she wrapped her hands around the mug. Meredith handed her a napkin as Remy set down a small plate of blueberry coffee cake with a silver fork. “Your mother tried to make it work, but how much can you have your daughter exposed to before you need to make a better choice?”

Her mother had to leave.

Carolyn sunk her fork into the coffee cake. “And look at how wonderful you turned out to be!”

Meredith smiled at the elderly woman.

“But he sobered up,” Meredith said, but it was more of a question.

“There were times he could stay away from drinking,” Carolyn said after she finished chewing. “But he was a very private man. Hardly left the house. Ever.”

Remy bit into the coffee cake. “Oh my goodness! This is good, Carolyn.”

The older woman didn’t look surprised by her reaction. “It’s your blueberries.”

The pronoun made Meredith take her own bite. The sweetness of the blueberries and the sugary crumble mixed in with the light and fluffy cake was heavenly.

“This is amazing,” Meredith mumbled. She had never tasted anything like it—just like with the scones and the blueberry muffins before that. “There really is something about the blueberries around here.”

“They’re one of a kind,” Carolyn said. “Very few places in Maine grow this kind of wild blueberry.”

Meredith took another bite and thought about that winter with her mother and Gordon. It held some of her first memories. She didn’t remember a dying grandmother or an alcoholic father, only a mother who had taken her to the beach in her snowsuit and a man who had dinner with them, who was Gordon.

“You girls really did a nice job in here,” Carolyn said again, looking around the room.

Meredith hadn’t noticed all the changes Remy had made just this morning. Purple, pink, and white lupine sat in a vase on a buffet. A large painting of the vista, which Meredith referred to as the beach plum trail, hung above it. The windows shined as light streamed in from outside. Instead of paintings stuffed and piled everywhere, a cute fireplace now became a focal point with built-in shelves surrounding it.

And like finding that last piece of a puzzle, Meredith could see the whole picture.

“My parents didn’t start dating until she moved to Boston that following spring,” Meredith said. She scratched her forehead, trying to focus a foggy memory. “Did you visit us in Boston?”

Carolyn nodded. “That’s right. We helped you and your mother move into your apartment down there.”

Meredith suddenly remembered women helping her mother with boxes and a van. That memory now vivid and alive in her mind.

Carolyn stayed for over an hour talking about everything, including the local theater group. “I heard you play the piano.”

Meredith didn’t know what to say because she wasn’t sure where this might be going.

“We’re looking for a pianist at the local theater,” Carolyn said. “I’ve been all they’ve had for years, but I’m afraid these old girls aren’t as they used to be.”

Carolyn held up her arthritic hands, and Meredith flinched at the sight.

“It’s why I can’t work in the fields with the Queens,” she said, looking down at her fingers, then waving them. “But I can still bake some blueberry coffee cake.”

“Thank goodness for that,” Remy said, taking her finger and picking up the last few crumbles on the plate.

When Carolyn left, Meredith grabbed a few things and took out a wicker picnic basket she’d found in the garage. She stuffed it with the beach essentials, sunscreen, a few books from the bookshelf, jugs of water, snack foods that had either salt or chocolate in them, and more of Carolyn’s coffee cake.

She changed into a bathing suit she had picked up at the beginning of summer that she had never worn. The one she forced herself to buy with her friend but would never be brave enough to wear in public.

“I think I’m going to call the kids today,” she said. She thought about the Fourth and if she would go back to the house in Andover, just in case Ryan decides to come back.

“You should invite them up here,” Remy said. “We could get the other rooms ready. How great would it be to have everyone here?”

“We should include Dad,” Meredith said.

Remy smiled. “I bet he’d love that.”

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