Page 3 of What Happened to Nina?

“Andy, come on. She was completely out of line.”

“Not saying she wasn’t.”

“It sounds like that’s exactly what you’re saying.”

He smiled. One of those slow smiles that tug right at the center of my stomach. He crossed over to me, took my hand, and pulled me up to standing.

“She was supposed to be back yesterday,” I said. “She said she’d be here by nine A.M. at the latest.”

“College don’t start until Tuesday. My guess is she’ll come home tomorrow.”

Andy had a stronger accent than I had. He still flattened some of his vowels and swallowed his t’s in the Vermont way. “Until” became “Un-ill” in his mouth. I used to have the same accent, but a little more than a year in college in Boston had been enough time for me to shed my heritage like it was a bad smell, and I’d never been able to get it back. I liked Andy’s accent. It was a sign of his character, that he didn’t feel the need to change for anyone.

“You want me to pick up Grace?” he asked.

I’d completely forgotten about picking up Grace. Our younger daughter. Fifteen years old and horse crazy. After eight years of regular begging and pleading, we’d finally given in and bought her a seven-year-old quarter horse named Charlie. The plan was that we would build a stable at one end of the barn and clear some trees for a paddock. In the meantime, Charlie was stabled at Grace’s friend Molly’s house, which meant that Grace now spent all her time there and the only time we saw her was when we were picking her up or dropping her off.

“I forgot,” I said. Andy wrapped his hand around the back of my neck. His hand was warm and comforting. He stroked the back of my head with his thumb.

“Don’t worry about it. Stop worrying, period. Nina’s fine. Simon would have called us if she wasn’t.”

He took his jacket from a hook on the wall. I followed him out of the barn, across the courtyard, and into the kitchen. Our dog, Rufus, was half-asleep on his bed near the stove. He looked up hopefully when we came in. Rufus is nearly ten now, and slowing down, but he loves a walk.

“Andy?”

“Hmm?”

“Do you think I’ve been too hard on her? I mean, generally speaking. Do you think I expect too much of her?”

Andy thought about it. “Maybe, a little. She’s a good girl. She deserves to have some fun.”

“Okay, but she left me completely high and dry. It’s not like I can call around and get someone else at the last minute. It doesn’t work like that, and she knows it. So I had to do my work and Nina’s work too, while she’s off having fun with her boyfriend.”

“That’s true.”

“Andy...” He turned to look at me. “Which is it?”

“It’s both. Nina was out of line to blow off her work, and maybe, sometimes, you’re a little hard on her.” He kissed me briefly on the mouth, found his keys, and left.

I made coffee and took a mug into the living room. The fire had burned a little low, so I added some wood, then I sat on the couch with Rufus curled up at my feet. I opened Instagram and went to Nina’s account. She hadn’t posted anything new since Thursday. Her last post was a close-up of a red-bellied woodpecker sitting on a branch, head turned to the camera. The one before that was a picture of Nina and Simon together, in climbing gear, on the top of a cliff with deep green forest in the background. They had their arms wrapped around each other and they were grinning.

I put my phone away, picked up the TV remote, and found a season of Love Is Blind that I hadn’t seen yet. I turned on the first episode, then spaced out completely during the intro. I took out my phone again, opened Nina’s Instagram, and liked two of her recent posts. There. She’d see that and know that I wanted to be friends, and she’d call me. The thing about Nina is that she doesn’t hold grudges. Also, she’s a hard worker. It really wasn’t like her to blow off work.

The thought had been nagging at me. Nina had been two years old when I bought the inn. Back then, the only reason I was able to afford the place was because the roof had a huge hole in it, and because the plumbing didn’t work. Also because the previous occupant had been a hoarder and the realtor had been so grossed out by the place that he’d taken the first, lowball offer, which had happened to be mine. Even at two years old, Nina had been a tough little girl. It had taken me months of hard work to clean the place out, scrub it, paint it, and make it habitable. I didn’t have the money to pay for childcare, and I didn’t have family to help, so Nina came with me, every single day. Every day I’d give her some little task to do, to keep her occupied, and she took it all so seriously. She wore her overalls and her little headscarf, and she ran around the place with her small broom or scrubbed at the stone steps with her scrubber. She was always so proud of herself for helping me. When she finished, she’d lean back and press her hands into her lower back and survey her work, like she was a tiny grown-up. And that attitude had never changed. Grace hated working in the inn. She did everything she could to wriggle out of even the small commitments she made. Whereas when Nina said yes, she showed up and followed through.

Andy was right. I must have pushed her way too hard. She was a sophomore now. Maybe she needed more time to study. Maybe we could make some changes. We could look at hiring someone to lighten the load. Not full time, but a few hours would make a difference. I’d talk to Nina about it.

After she apologized.

By the time Andy and Grace got in, I was half-asleep. It used to be that Grace came straight to me for a hug if we’d been apart for any length of time. Sometime in the last couple of years that had stopped. I knew that new distance was a necessary part of Grace’s growing up, and mostly I respected that, but sometimes you just need a hug. I got up from the couch and went to her. I kissed her head; her hair smelled like sweat and horses.

“Did you have a good time?” I said.

“The best.” She pulled away. “I’m so tired I might die. And I’m starving. What’s for dinner?”

“Leftovers.” Her answering groan was predictable. I started to follow her to the kitchen. There was plenty of food in the fridge, but if I didn’t put something together for her she’d eat cereal and chips. Andy was leaning in the living room doorway. He put out his hand to stop me before I could leave the room.

“Got a minute?”

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