Elin Hilderbrand - The Island

Everyone else was jealous, Tate decided. Her mother, her sister, India-and India was the only one who might admit it.

Tate decided that the three of them could go suck eggs (she was sad that she even had to think this about her mother). She would spend more time on Nantucket with Barrett and the kids.

When Barrett pulled up in his boat for his usual late-afternoon stop, Tate was waiting on the beach with her overnight bag packed.

“What’s this?” he said.

“I’m coming with you.”

His face registered a look she hadn’t seen before (she had been cataloging all of his expressions): it was discomfort, unease, fear. Immediately, Tate felt like a fool. He had asked her four times in the past seven days to spend the night with him on Nantucket, and three of the four times she’d declined because she felt she should be with her family. Now here she was, ready to go, and he didn’t want her.

“I’m not coming with you?” she said.

He shook his head. “I’m sorry,” he said. “I had no idea you were planning-”

“I wasn’t planning, ” she said. “It was a spontaneous decision.”

“I like spontaneous,” he said. She knew this; he had told her this. “But there’s something I have to do tonight.”

“What?” she asked, though it was none of her business.

“Something for work,” he said.

“That’s awfully vague,” she said. But he didn’t elaborate. Instead, he did his job: he carried two bags of groceries and a bag of ice up to the house. There was an envelope in his hand. “What’s the envelope?” Tate asked.

He said, “Boy, you are just full of questions today.”

Tate didn’t like the way he said this. They were lovers, right? They had made love and slept in each other’s arms; they had told each other intimate things. She should be able to ask him anything and get a straight answer. But here he was, making her feel the way she’d felt most of her life: like a pesky ten-year-old boy. And to make matters worse, she had to follow him up the stairs with her overnight bag, which she would now have to unpack. Birdie, India, and Chess were all watching from their usual spots on the beach, and they would all guess what was happening.

Humiliating.

She trudged up the stairs behind Barrett, hating him, hating herself, hating her anger and her hurt. It could have been exactly the opposite: he could have been thrilled she was coming, and she could be waiting smugly in Barrett’s boat while he made the delivery. Birdie and Chess and India would see this was not a fantasy, not a figment of Tate’s goddamned imagination: it was real, they were in love, and Tate was going to Nantucket to spend the night.

Love was awful. It was unfair.

Tate stormed into the house behind Barrett and blew past him up the stairs. “Have fun tonight,” she said. “Whatever you’re doing.”

He said, “The envelope is a letter for your aunt.”

“I don’t give a shit about the envelope,” she said. She turned on the second floor and stomped up to the attic, where she threw her overnight bag willy-nilly into the air and it landed with a splat that she hoped Barrett heard. She threw herself facedown onto her bed. He would come up after her, right? This was their first fight. Certainly he would come up. She waited. She couldn’t hear anything, and because there was only the one inaccessible window, she couldn’t see anything.

What seemed like a long time later, she heard footsteps on the stairs and held her breath in anticipation.

Chess said, “Are you okay?”

Tate looked up. Her heart spluttered like a dying motor. Chess? No! “Where’s Barrett?” she asked.

“He left.”

“He left?”

Chess sat on the edge of Tate’s bed. She looked concerned in a very annoying, older-sisterish kind of way. “Do you want to talk about it?”

The irony wasn’t lost on Tate: Chess asking her if she wanted to talk about it. Ha! This was too good.

“No,” Tate said. “God, no.”

For the first time since they’d been on Tuckernuck, Barrett Lee didn’t show up in the morning. At first, Tate didn’t believe it. She ran as usual, she did her sit-ups from the tree branch as usual, she ate the breakfast that Birdie had prepared as usual-and the whole time her stomach was churning with nerves about the moment that Barrett arrived. Would he apologize? Should she?

Tate checked her running watch: 9:15, 9:29, 10:07, 10:35. At eleven o’clock, Tate took her running watch off and threw it into the living room, where it skittered under the lobster-trap coffee table like a mouse. It was pretty clear Barrett wasn’t coming.

Birdie said, “I wonder what happened to Barrett. This isn’t like him.”

“Maybe one of the kids is sick,” India suggested.

“That must be it,” Birdie said. “Good thing we haven’t run out of anything. Well, we only have one egg left. And I do like to read the newspaper in the morning.”

Tate didn’t comment. She doubted one of the kids was sick, and when they did get sick, Barrett’s mother took care of them. So Barrett hadn’t come… because of her? Because the unthinkable had happened and he didn’t want to see her anymore?

He finally showed up at four o’clock. Tate heard the boat’s motor; she had been listening for it so intently for so many hours that when it finally materialized, far away at first and then nearer and nearer, Tate feared it might be a figment of her imagination. She turned her head ever so slightly from its position on her towel and opened one eye. His boat. And-holy expletive expletive expletive-she couldn’t believe it. He had a woman with him in the boat. Anita Fullin.

Tate closed her eyes. Her heart was slamming in her chest. He’d brought Anita Fullin.

Birdie said, “Who is that woman?”

India said, “She’s very attractive.”

Birdie said, “Oh, look, Barrett brought flowers again, Tate.”

Please be quiet, Mother, she thought. She tried to put herself in a Zen state-for Tate, this was most easily achieved when she was in front of a computer screen-but she couldn’t keep herself from listening to Barrett help Anita down off the boat, and Anita saying, Honestly, those flowers are exquisite. Someone is very lucky! And Barrett saying, You wade on in. I’ve got to get these bags.

Tate didn’t move, didn’t turn, didn’t look. She heard Birdie get up from her chair.

“Hello, hello!” Birdie said in her meant-for-company voice.

“Hello!” Anita Fullin said. She had reached the beach; Tate could tell by the proximity of her voice. “My, what a wonderful property you have! I hope you don’t mind my intruding, but I told Barrett I just had to see Tuckernuck. And he talks so much about your family, I feel like I know you.”

Birdie clucked and cooed and Tate felt herself heating up. Her mother was such a pushover. “How about that! Well, I must say, it’s nice to have a visitor. We’re getting awfully used to one another around here. I’m Birdie Cousins.”

“Anita Fullin.”

“And this is my sister, India Bishop.”

“Hello,” India said. “Nice to meet you.”

“And this is my daughter Tate. Tate!”

Tate wondered if she could continue with the charade of being asleep. Chess, lucky bitch, was actually asleep up at the house. Slowly, Tate rolled over. She lifted her head and had to go to the trouble of seeming surprised to find Anita Fullin on her beach.

“Hello.” Tate now understood why Adeliza Coffin stood on her front step with a shotgun. “What are you doing here?”

The question was rude, Birdie would be positively verklempt about Tate’s lack of manners, but Anita Fullin just laughed her deep, dusky storm cloud of a laugh and said, “I finally convinced Barrett to bring me over.”