Hannah laughed again. She sounded carefree and entirely lovely. Ada reminded herself that plenty of kids experimented with alcohol when they got to college. It was the norm, and Hannah was responsible. But a sharp part of her wanted to start the car, drive to the ferry, and take the first one that would bring her to the mainland. She’d pack up Hannah’s things in a jiffy and have her back here by tomorrow morning.
“Mom?” Hannah was confused by Ada’s silence.
Ada cleared her throat. “How are you, honey?”
“I’m great! We were just hanging out in Bethany’s dorm.”
“But you’re not far from home?” Ada asked, hating how frightened she was.
“Nah. I just got back to my room,” Hannah said. “I have a class tomorrow at ten. Isn’t that crazy? I don’t have to wake up till, like, nine.”
Ada smiled and let her head drop on the seat. Hannah was back in her room, safe and making friends. Through the kitchen window, Ada could see Peter’s shadow, moving from one end of the counter to the other. He was always a late-night snacker.
Ada begged Hannah for more details about her first week, and Hannah supplied them, yawning between explanations of various Vassar traditions and how good or bad the food was depending on where you were on campus. Ada listened intently, wanting to absorb it all. But just before she was about to ask another question about the university gym, Hannah surprised her.
“But actually, I’m calling to see if you’re okay, Mom,” she said.
“What?” Ada laughed.
Hannah groaned, as though Ada were forcing her hand. “You know, Mom. You haven’t been exactly yourself this summer.”
Her heartbeat quickening, Ada decided to play dumb. “What are you talking about?”
“Come on. Kade, Olivia, and I know something is going on with you. But we know you won’t tell us,” Hannah said, her words slightly slurred.
Ada closed her eyes, thinking about how “covert” she’d thought she was all summer long, hiding her broken heart while sleeping down the hall from their father. It was clear that thekids had noticed something. They weren’t dummies. They’d just been too polite or too confused to say anything.
“I don’t want you to be sad,” Hannah said gently, as though she were sitting right beside Ada, whispering to her in the car.
“I’m not sad, honey,” Ada said, her voice breaking and giving her away.
“Okay. But imagine if you were one of your patients,” Hannah suggested. “What would you tell yourself?”
Ada sniffed, thinking,She’s too smart for her own good.
But before Ada was forced into an answer, Adelaide returned to Hannah’s room, and Ada said she had to go. “I love you, Hannah,” she said. “I love you so much.”
Hannah said she loved her, too. But she added, too quietly for Adelaide to hear, Ada hoped, “Make sure you’re okay.”
Ada hung up, closed the garage door, and entered the kitchen to find it empty. The counter was filled with crumbs, and the dishwasher was half cracked because nobody had thought to run it. But Ada didn’t care. Rather than spend the three minutes required to clean everything up, she walked upstairs and hovered outside of the bedroom she’d shared with Peter for twenty years. She felt shattered, but she knew she couldn’t go on like this. Hannah, Kade, and Olivia saw the truth, or a version of it. Ada had to be brave enough to claim it.
She knocked on the door, and Peter said, “Come in.”
Ada entered, just as she had a thousand times before, and closed the door behind her. Peter was propped up in bed, reading a sports memoir. He watched her intently, so surprised to see her that he was unable to speak. Ada sat on her side of the bed and stretched her legs out in front of her. The room smelled different since she’d stopped sleeping here. It smelled purely of Peter. It smelled like Peter’s bedroom back in his apartment in Manhattan, like they’d gone back in time.
“Hannah called me out,” she said quietly.
Peter closed his book and put it on the bedside table. “She’s been asking me what’s wrong with you. She’s worried.”
Ada let out a wry laugh. But she didn’t want to be cruel, not now. “What did you say?”
“I told her you’re going through a lot right now, but I left it at that,” Peter said.
“She knows it isn’t just about her,” Ada said. “She’s smarter than we are.”
“Thank goodness,” Peter said.
Ada eyed him, her heart pounding like a bouncy ball. “I’m surprised you’re here.”
