As tired as she was from her long day of travel, Caitlin decided she’d swing by Jonathan’s place to return it to him.I’d better let Melanie know I’m leaving so I don’t scare her again when she hears me coming in.
She shuffled into the kitchen and abruptly came to a halt, barely able to process what she was seeing. A half-empty skillet of paella was cooling on a trivet beside the stovetop. Two place settings of dirty dishes littered the table in the dining nook. And, in the center of the room, Jonathan was touching the small of Melanie’s back, and her hands were clasped behind his neck.
They were kissing so aggressively that for a second, Caitlin felt embarrassed, almost as if she were intruding on theirprivacy, and she momentarily had the impulse to tiptoe from the room. But then a bitter taste stung her mouth and when she cleared her throat, Jonathan and Melanie sprang apart.
“Caitlin!” he exclaimed. With Melanie’s lipstick smeared around his mouth, he looked clownish, and he sounded ridiculous, too, as he uttered the biggest cliché of all time, “This… this isn’t what it looks like.”
“What it looks like is that you and Melanie were kissing.” Caitlin retorted sarcastically, “But if you weren’t, then I must be more jetlagged than I thought I was, and I’m hallucinating.”
Melanie layered her hands over her heart, her forehead puckering into an expression of earnestness. “I’m genuinely, truly sorry, Caitlin. I didn’t want you to find out this way, but I didn’t expect you back until tomorrow,” she said. Then, she iterated thesecondtritest cliché of all time. “We didn’t mean for this to happen.”
“Yeah, it’s not as if I planned it,” asserted Jonathan. “Yesterday on my way home from work, I stopped by to replace the lightbulb in the foyer and we?—”
“Spare me the details,” Caitlin snapped, but Jonathan continued.
“To be honest, we spent most of last evening talking aboutyou,” he said dolefully. “Melanie was consoling me because I was so disappointed that the minute you finished the campaign you’ve been working on all year, you took off for New Hampshire alone.”
“I went to my aunt’sfuneral, Jonathan, not on a singles’ cruise!” sputtered Caitlin.
“Yeah, but did it ever occur to you to ask me to come with you for moral support?”
“Did it ever occur toyouI needed time to process my aunt’s passing by myself?” Caitlin shot back.
“Can I just say something?” interjected Melanie, one finger pointed in the air.
Since when does she ask permission to speak?Caitlin resolutely replied, “No, you can’t. I don’t want to hear another word from you, Melanie, and there’s no need for you to say anything anyway. If you and Jonathan want to get together, please, be my guests. I’m through with both of you.”
“Wait a second, Cait—” Jonathan started to say but Caitlin didn’t let him finish.
“You know something, Jonathan? You really should be more careful about where you leave your phone,” she advised, holding it up and moving toward him. “It could get lost. Or ruined.”
Shame-faced, he extended his hand to accept it but at the last second, she swung her arm sideways and dropped the phone into the skillet of leftover paella. Then she spun on her heel to go pack her other suitcases.
Whether she was ready or not, and no matter how much she dreaded it, for the first time in twenty years, Caitlin was going back to Dune Island.
TWO
Before Caitlin’s flight to Massachusetts she wound up staying at her brother’s house after all.
The air mattress was tolerable the first night, and when her young niece, Maya, and nephews, Logan and Archie, got up in the morning, they scampered into the room to snuggle in bed with her, which Caitlin thought was very sweet. She figured being their auntie was probably the closest she’d ever come to having children of her own, and even at 6:00 in the morning, she loved lavishing them with attention.
But the moment she rose to make coffee they began jumping on the air mattress as if it were a trampoline. Unsurprisingly, it must have developed a slow leak because it partially deflated the second night she used it. Caitlin woke during the wee hours with her right hip and shoulder pressed against the hard, cold floor, and a crick in her neck. At sunrise, the children came in to cuddle again, and for the rest of the day, their amusing antics kept her so busy that she barely had a chance to sit down or to even think about her trip until she reached the airport.
Now, after flying overnight from Albuquerque to Boston, and then driving a rental car from Boston to Hyannis, Caitlin was exhausted. She boarded the Dune Island ferry, parked on thevehicle deck and went upstairs, hoping the fresh air would help her feel more awake and gather her thoughts.
During peak season, the seats would’ve been filled with cheerful travelers sunning themselves, sipping beverages, and chatting as the vessel crossed the scintillating aquamarine waters of Dune Island Sound. But on a cloudy, misty weekday in October, the weather deck was nearly empty except for Caitlin and a group of six people who appeared to be tourists. Although she didn’t understand the language they were speaking, their excitement was obvious from the way they grinned as they stood at the railing and pointed to the greenish-gray oblong shape of the fog-enshrouded island barely visible in the distance.
Twenty years ago, Caitlin would have been on pins and needles with anticipation, too. She smiled, remembering how her uncle Albert would greet her inside the ferry terminal with a bear hug.
“Your aunt wanted to come, too, but she couldn’t leave the guests on their own,” he’d say. Then he’d hand her an insulated thermal bag and joke, “She thought you might be hungry after your long voyage at sea.”
The food Lydia packed always included a note that said, “Welcome to your island home, Caitlin—I’m so glad you’re here!” Nothing ever tasted as delicious as her first, simple lunch of the season; a tuna fish sandwich, chips, and a pickle, which she shared with her uncle as they inched toward the cottage in the slow-moving summer traffic.
Today, however, her stomach was knotted with apprehension about returning to Hope Haven. So instead of focusing on what lay ahead, she tried to concentrate on putting her feelings about Jonathan and Melanie behind her.
She was still more than a little ticked off at them. Oddly, however, she found she wasn’t nearly as angry about their betrayal as she was about their timing.If they want to betogether, that’s fine with me.They’re both so needy they make a perfect pair, she thought.I just wish they would’ve waited untilaftermy ceiling was repaired to get involved with each other, so I wouldn’t have to scramble to Massachusetts just because I need a place to stay…
Yet as much as she regretted being forced to make the trip, Caitlin recognized how privileged she was to inherit the cottage just when she needed it most. Not only was the housing a godsend right now, but once she sold the property, she’d have enough money to move out of her crummy apartment for good and buy a place of her own. She hoped to help her brother and sister-in-law purchase a more suitable home for their growing family, as well. But while she wasthankful deep down, Caitlin’s gratitude was tinged with conflicting emotions and confusion.
