Page 20 of The Book of Summer

“Actually, she is the very worst.”

With a sigh, Ruby slipped her wedding frock off its hanger and tried to wade through the froth to find its center.

“I’m sure Mother wants to help you with that,” Topper said. “You being her only daughter and all.”

“Probably.”

Ruby wiggled it up toward her chest, then over her shoulders.

“We are a sorry lot.” Topper tossed the ball one final time. “This family. Poor manners. No decorum. Thank God money covers most ills.”

11

Monday Morning

For the second day in a row, Bess wakes up in a blind panic. And her first thoughts aren’t even about the cliff.

Not that the rapidly eroding bluff isn’t terrifying. It is and very much so. On some mornings, the fog is too dense to see the veranda. As a little girl, Bess would sit in her window and gaze into the white, pretending she was a princess in a cloud. And while the haze is thick this morning, the very best of princess dreams, Bess can see straight past the edge of the yard and down to the shoreline. There is no space left for make-believe.

Alas, it is not impending doom that brings Bess the initial wave of heart-knocking nausea but the date itself, glaring up from her phone.

Monday, May 20.

Cissy’s meeting is tomorrow; Flick’s wedding in a week. In between, two women must move the contents of a house. Bess is a damned good procrastinator, a near-expert embracer of denial. But even she has to acknowledge that there won’t be a return trip to California. Which means Bess must address Wednesday through Saturday, and the meetings and appointments waiting for her back in the Bay.

“Crap,” she says, scrolling through her calendar. “What am I going to do?”

The question applies to so many things.

Suddenly, the door pops open and claps the far wall.

“Cissy!” Bess yelps.

She socks the phone against her chest, as if Cissy might see the screen.

“How about some privacy?!” Bess says as Cissy hard charges in, an empty box between her hands.

“Gimme a break. What do you need to be so private about? I pushed you out of me, tore myself from stern to bow.”

“That’s lovely.…”

“So your flimsy getup is hardly worth noting. You look great, by the way.”

Bess glances down at her camisole and underwear.Great?She doesn’t feel the least bit so.

“Thanks,” she mumbles nonetheless.

“Let me know if there’s anything in this bedroom you’d like to keep,” Cissy says, yanking open the door to the pink wardrobe, which, come to think of it, has been in that same corner Bess’s entire life. “Let’s see. What relics has Bess Codman abandoned in here? Cap and gown… letterman jacket… wedding dress.”

“Ha!” Bess yaps. “Feel free to let the dress fall over the cliff.”

“Don’t be so negative. Maybe you’ll have a daughter one day who’ll want to wear it. Vintage, you know.”

“Too true. Who doesn’t love the nostalgia of a failed marriage?”

“What about these?” Cissy asks, reaching for the top shelf.

She removes four yearbooks, two from Choate, and two from Nantucket High.