Elin Hilderbrand - The Castaways

“And they still offered three million dollars?”

“Yes!” Florabel said. Her wide blue eyes were about to pop into bouquets of violets. She was genuinely happy. All it had taken was money, a 6 percent commission on three million dollars.

“Okay,” Addison said. “Great. Good for you. Write it up.” His voice was maudlin. He could not summon even a trace of perfunctory congratulation. He, Addison Wheeler, Wheeler Dealer, who loved nothing more than fresh ink on a purchase-and-sale agreement, who had been known to throw his hat in the air when a financing contingency was waived, who had been known to treat the entire office to a five-course lunch at the Wauwinet when a major property closed, could not even fake a smile in response to the news that an unsellable property had sold.

Florabel, thank God, could not have cared less about Addison’s underwhelming response. She just wanted to be smug about her news with everyone in the office, and Addison was her first stop. He had given her the listing, but it had been something of a gag, a white elephant. Florabel had had beginner’s luck-well, either that or she had true Realtor’s skill, the ability to interface the right buyer with the right property.

She moved on to Arthur Dimmity’s desk; Arthur could be counted on to scowl with undisguised envy, which Florabel would find gratifying. Addison should have given the listing to Arthur, he realized now; Arthur would have a hard time with a lemonade stand in the desert. He handled only rentals.

Addison wanted to run out of the office-but wait, he couldn’t be too obvious. He counted to ten. The phone rang and no one answered it; it was Florabel’s job, but she was too busy gloating. Addison should answer the phone, he knew, to show that answering the phone was not beneath him, and as a tiny concession to Florabel’s good news. For all he knew, too, it could be the Puffy Drenmillers, calling to renege. But Addison was too upset to talk to anyone on the phone; he let the call go, so it would be picked up by the general voicemail box.

Behind him, he heard Arthur’s strained congratulations. Arthur said, “How did you meet these people, the Drenmillers?”

And Florabel said, “Believe me, you don’t want to know.”

“Okay,” Arthur said amiably (and this was why he wasn’t a great salesman; he never pressed the issue). But this time Addison agreed-okay, who cared, nobody, not Arthur, not him, he was having a hard time holding steady. He had to get out of there! He surreptitiously unlocked his top drawer. Tess’s iPhone was still there, hidden in the back of the drawer. He checked it every day, and every day it was cold and silent, though to him it hummed and glowed with radioactivity. Today, however, he was looking for keys, but the keys he wanted were not in his drawer-of course not, Florabel had them-but then he found a different set of keys and a thought came to him. Whoa. So many weeks since Tess had died, and he had not thought about the can of bug spray in her garage.

Addison found he could speak to Tess when he was driving because he was alone and moving forward, and the combination of these two things put him in a psychic state where he could communicate with the dead.

They’re selling our cottage, he said. It sold. It will belong to someone else at the end of August.

His heart was dust. His spirit was the frilled brown edge of a badly fried egg. He was desiccated and dry; his body was filled with crumbly sand. He and Tess had loved that cottage. Addison had told her that he would buy it, he would pay the three million, she could leave Greg and he would leave Phoebe and they could live together in the cottage. Tess had laughed nervously. He was delusional, this wasn’t real, it was a fantasy. No one could actually live in that cottage; she couldn’t live there. What would she do with her kids?

She had never seen it the way he saw it. She had never been willing to give it all up, to give any of it up. Their affair had been… what, to her? A way to spend a few hours? A safety net, a security blanket, protection from the marital whiplash that Greg provided daily?

They had fought about it. Addison did not like to admit to himself that they had fought, but they had fought. He loved her insanely, he looked at her across the room when they were all together and couldn’t believe she didn’t belong to him. He had to endure watching her hold hands with Greg, and kiss him, and call him Hon . Addison told Tess that seeing her touch Greg made him want to set himself on fire. She said she tried not to touch Greg when Addison was around, but sometimes she forgot or couldn’t avoid it. This made Addison boil over with jealousy and resentment: she tried not to touch Greg when Addison was around, but what about when Addison wasn’t around? Did they make love? Did she make love to Addison in the cottage and then go home and make love to Greg? She said no, she was offended by the suggestion, but Addison was suspicious. Greg had animal magnetism; women threw themselves at him.

How often do you make love to him? Addison asked her.

Not very, she said.

I want you to leave him, Addison said.

I can’t, she said. The kids …

The kids were her zone of immunity. Whenever Addison pressed her, she brought up her kids. She could betray Greg-God knows, he had betrayed her-but she could not betray her kids. She did not want her kids to have divorced parents, she did not want her kids to have a stepfather, and she, Tess, did not want a separation, a divorce lawyer, shared custody. She had left Greg for that one godforsaken week in November and she had said all those words out loud, she had chewed them up and eventually spit them out.

Addison pulled into Tess and Greg’s driveway. He had shown their house only three times since it had gone on the market, all three times to visitors who did not know what had happened to the owners. No one had gone back to look a second time. Addison was thinking of lowering the asking price.

Tess had her own key to the Quaise cottage. Addison had not remembered this when he went through her house the first time weeks ago, but he remembered it now. He had asked her once where she kept the key-Tess was paranoid about getting caught; where would be safe enough?-and she had said, I keep it hidden under the bug spray in the garage.

He found it there. On one of the many shelves for house and garden necessities was an orange-capped can of Raid, and underneath it lay the key.

The day was sunny and dry after three days of showers, heavy fog, and thunderstorms. The Polpis Road looked scrubbed and squeaky-clean, like something that had just been removed from the box. The fields to the right side of the road were green and freshly cut; the view of the harbor to the left seemed polished.

Did you ever really love me? he asked.

Oh, God, she said. Of course I did. But…

But what?

It was complicated . Wasn’t it?

She used to send him song lyrics (which he quasi-resented; it seemed so Greg-like). Her favorite line was from a U2 song: You say in love there are no rules. Tess liked to believe that her love for Addison was renegade, something beyond her control, something she could not be held accountable for, something that had happened to her, not that she had made happen. In this way, she was not responsible. Love had been visited on them from above at some point during their lunch together at Nous Deux. Sandrine had done it; Sandrine was a witch.

Addison pulled into the driveway of the Quaise cottage. Was he going to cry? It didn’t matter if he did, he cried all the time now; he had stopped feeling embarrassed by it. He had not been to the cottage since, well, since the seventeenth of June, a Friday. Tess had met him while the twins were at camp. She had reminded him, on that day, of her impending anniversary; on that day, she had gently told him about the planned sail to the Vineyard.