Once when Sam and Isabel were at the beach with Julie, they overheard Cammie Alquist bullying her.
You don’t look different, but you ARE different, hahaha,Cammie had said, and Isabel had grabbed Cammie by the back of her neck and said,Different is better than shitty like you. Seeing Isabel defend Julie had made Sam wish she had a sister—someone who had her back, while Sam had hers, just like her mother and Aunt Kate.
“Bad dream,” Julie said.
“You had one?” Sam asked.
“She has nightmares,” Isabel said. “Let’s get out of here.”
Sam wanted to stay and hear more of what Julie was talking about, but she could tell that Isabel had lost her patience and seemed ready to explode.
“Foley’s?” Sam asked.
“Yeah.”
They took the long way around, the road that looped along the marsh. They were beach girls and walked barefoot, the tar warm and soft beneath their feet.
“What’s bothering Julie?” Sam asked.
“I can’t tell, exactly. She’s very upset about your mother, obviously,” Isabel said, glancing at Sam. “But I think it has more to do with your father.”
“What did he do?”
“Well, he came over to pick up my dad the day they left, and we all talked to him. Julie hears everything, and she knows he’s a suspect.” Again Isabel looked at Sam. “Sorry.”
“Don’t worry; I’m aware of it,” Sam said, knowing she sounded stiff. Every time she thought of her father killing her mother,shewanted to die. It wasn’t possible. He wasn’t the greatest dad sometimes, but he would never do that. She dug her nails into the palms of her hands.
“Julie’s just scared. That cop came to talk to me about the dumb book. Why my mother had to mention it to him I have no idea. It was just a thriller my mother picked up at the library book sale. I read it, and then my dad did, and I guess he gave it to your dad.”
“What book?” Sam asked.
“Meat Locker.This restaurant owner kills his business partner and hides the body in a refrigeration unit to slow the decomposition of the body. I mean, there’s more to the story than that, but that’s the part the cop wanted to know about.”
“I don’t remember seeing it around our house,” Sam said. “And you never mentioned it before.”
“Well, I forgot about it,” Isabel said. “Mom’s the one who called the detective to tell him about it.”
“Your mom?” Sam asked, shocked that Mrs. Waterston would get involved, would say anything that might implicate her dad. “How could she do that?”
“Well, she’s worried about you, Sam.”
“I’ve lost my mom, and now she wants to help them take my dad away too?” Sam asked.
“No! She just wants ... to do what’s right. For everyone. For your mother. And you too, of course. I mean, if your dad did it, it could be dangerous. Sam, don’t be mad!”
Sam started walking faster, and they didn’t talk the rest of the way. Foley’s was a general store, set in the midst of Hubbard’s Point. Only locals went, or even knew about it. It stocked basic food and supplies along with beach toys, and in the back, it had a snack bar with the best lemonade and grilled-cheese sandwiches in the world. Isabel and Sam sat at one of the old scarred oak tables. Generations of kids had carved their initials into the wood, and it was not only allowed but encouraged.
“Ha, look,” Isabel said, pointing at her parents’ initials: SB & NW. “Hello, hypocrites. Is this that different from graffiti?”
“Well, it’s allowed here,” Sam said.
“Where are your parents’ initials?” Isabel asked. “You’ve never shown me.”
“They didn’t grow up in Hubbard’s Point,” she said. “So they’re not here.”
“Maybe you should carve them. To commemorate ...”
Everything Isabel had said on the way here reverberated through Sam like seismic waves. People thought her dad had killed her mom. Did Sam think that? She told herself no. But right now, despair bubbled up and boiled over.
