Na na na na, na na na
Our voices meld and lift to the epic black sky.
Tatum is smiling, his face lit up by the fast-melting candles. My heartbeat is slow and steady. I am filled with love for this place I wanted to leave this morning.
35
I am alonein the living room the next morning when someone knocks on the door.
This has never happened. We don’t have visitors.
There is no support staff. No repair workers come. All deliveries go to a post office box.
The knock comes again. June is somewhere upstairs, as usual. Tatum is at work, and Meer and Brock have gone to town for groceries.
When I answer the door, Holland Terhune stands there. Holland from the airport. She’s wearing baggy jeans, a tank top, anda baseball cap. “I was hoping this was the right place. Some guy coulda come out with a shotgun and ordered me off his property, right? But instead it’s you. Yay.”
She’s such a flirt.
“You didn’t answer texts,” she continues, “so I came over to see if you want to hang out. It’s not just me and Winnie. All my girls are here now. I had a lot of family stuff going on last week. It ate me alive and I couldn’t even function. But it’s done and now my life is basically just one big rager.”
“How did you find me?” I ask.
“You told us where you were staying.”
I don’t remember that, but I was a wreck when I met her. “Sorry I didn’t answer,” I say. “We’re mostly unplugged.”
“Whatever. You’re a poor communicator. It’s not the worst thing. Are you going to invite me in to see the castle? I feel like that’s what people do. The home of the great Kingsley Cello. I’m insanely curious.”
Realization washes over me. She didn’t come here to make friends.
Holland knows who my father is. She came here in search of him, and he is the reason there are so many texts from her on my phone. “You want to know about my father,” I say, accusingly.
“I’m sorry. Yeah.”
“I remember now. At the airport, you said I looked like someone you knew. And you talked about something you’d just shown Winnie on your phone. Right?”
“We’d been looking at one of his paintings. Online.” Holland ducks her head apologetically. “You look just like Persephone. The Kingsley CelloPersephone.”
“So you figured I was related to him? That doesn’t even makesense. He’s painted tons of models. He didn’t havechildrenwith all of them.”
“People on this island know he lives here. And they talk. Half of them would actually have driven me here for a couple hundred dollars.” She grins as if it’s cute that she bribed people to find out if I really was the person she thought I was, and got them to tell her where my father’s property is.
“You would have shown up here whether you’d met me at the airport or not,” I say. “Right? You would have found a way to get access to Kingsley, whatever happened, because people go on these pilgrimages to him.”
“Kind of,” she says.
“He’smyfather, Holland,” I say. “I came hereinvited.Kingsley wants me here. You don’t get to just show up and try to lay claim to him. He’s a private person and this is a private home and you’re intruding on someone you don’t even know by pretending you want to be friends with his kid. Don’t you see how obnoxious that is?”
She steps back, startled at my burst of anger. “Look, I went about this all wrong,” she says. “I’m sorry. Really. I should have just asked you about Kingsley. I should have asked if I could come over.”
“Ya think?” I’m about to shut the door in her face, but she puts her hand against it and looks me straight in the eyes.
“Matilda. Seriously. Listen.”
“What?”
“I’m sorry. I’m a dolt and a wench and I’m not even going to bore you with the whole story ofwhyI acted like such an idiot in this particular situation, but can I talk to you like a person for a minute?”
