Page 19 of Summer on Lilac Island

Tables at the Pink Pony filled up fast. The restaurant and bar were first come, first served, no reservations allowed.

Juxtaposing the Grand Hotel, the Pink Pony was Mackinac’s go-to spot for casual diners. Bachelor and bachelorette parties,

families who didn’t trust their kids to behave, tired tourists needing revival in the form of funky cocktails and burgers.

Located at the end of Main Street, with an outdoor patio overhanging the lake and a music podium where up-and-comers strummed

country and indie rock covers, the Pink Pony was the place to kick back and relax.

Except for Lillian Tong, who stood sweating in the restaurant’s sweltering kitchen waiting for another batch of orders.

“What is Gigi Jenkins doing here with Dr. Kentwood?” Lillian’s mother hissed.

Trina Tong’s petite frame quaked beneath her general manager uniform: a loose-fitting skirt that fell below the knee, swallowing

her legs, along with a tailored blazer stitched with a pony logo, the galloping emblem of her American dream. The lunch-rush

ruckus was in full swing—chefs barking, pans clanking, timers dinging. “Does that girl have no shame?”

“It’s okay, Mom.” Lillian wiped her clammy palms on the black apron she wore over the bubblegum-pink server shirt.

She’d slipped back into her waitress role as if she’d never left for college, even braiding her hair in the fishtail pigtails that used to be her signature.

“Men and women are allowed to have lunch together.”

“Don’t let your grandmother hear you saying that,” Trina said. Lillian’s parents immigrated from Vietnam decades before for

her dad to study hospitality at Michigan State. That Trina had also earned a degree of her own and now comanaged the Pink

Pony were secrets they sheltered from Lillian’s grandparents. Along with the fact that she went by Trina, instead of her given

name, Tuyen. “Gigi has always been jealous of you, ever since you beat her out for first chair on the clarinet.”

“I don’t think clarinet auditions had anything to do with it,” Lillian said. “And I’ve only known James a few weeks. He’s

not my boyfriend.”

James had told Lillian that Gigi asked him out to lunch. He’d asked Lillian’s opinion on what to do. “Go ahead with it,” she’d

said. “It’s not like we’re exclusive.”

“He’s not your boyfriend because he’s practically your fiancé,” Trina said. “He’s besotted. The whole island is saying so.”

Lillian tried not to smile, sewing the edges of her mouth to keep them from untying. “I just got out of one engagement. I’m

not looking to jump into another.”

She’d only meant to stay a week or two with her parents while Alex was moving out of their Chicago apartment and Lillian was

canceling the wedding vendors, recouping as much of the deposits as she could. But it had already been a month. Her parents

needed her. They were short on staff. For better or for worse, Lillian was not wired to forgo family duty in pursuit of her

own dreams. Not that her dreams felt much like dreams anymore. They were shells of their past selves, dusty relics.

“Now is the best time to do it, though,” Trina said. “You were already preparing for marriage. You just have to switch out

the groom.” Her dimples pleated.

“Oh, is that all?” Lillian checked on the orders for her tables.

“Dr. Kentwood is probably scared of Eloise,” Trina said. “I heard she paid him to take Gigi out. Only way that girl could get a respectable date. The scandals she has to her name.”

Gigi, who had run away with the governor’s son the week before high school graduation. Gigi, who had worried her family and

the whole town sick before they found her. Gigi, who had once been Lillian’s best friend and then turned on her the summer

before ninth grade. Lillian still didn’t know exactly why. She thought it might have had something to do with the turmoil

of Gigi’s father coming and going that summer, but mostly Lillian figured Gigi had gotten sick of her the same as she’d gotten

sick of soccer and clarinet and choir.

Or maybe it was because Lillian had been too intense with friendship bracelets and sleepovers and the secret forts they’d

built in the woods. She had suffocated Gigi, just like the island had. So Gigi had left both of them in the dust.

The governor’s son hadn’t even been that good-looking or charming. The glamorous lifestyle had turned her head. Or maybe she’d

just been determined to make her escape and he’d been the closest accomplice, the getaway car.

“Mom,” Lillian said with a spasm of longing. “Gigi isn’t a threat. Believe me.”

“Of course she’s not. You’re in a different league—tennis state champion, valedictorian, prestigious Chicago lawyer.” Reciting

Lillian’s résumé worked like lotion in Trina’s worry lines. Lillian needed it too, still clinging to her parents’ pride.

“ Former Chicago lawyer,” Lillian said, her body flinching with failure.

Trina smoothed her skirt. “They’ll take you back whenever you’re ready. You said so yourself.”

Lillian had, but only so her parents wouldn’t worry.

Her decision to stay longer on Mackinac wasn’t just to help out at the restaurant.

The island swaddled her in the woolliness of youth.

Someone else making the decisions, folding the laundry.

A hood had been pulled back over her head.

She liked it more than she should for how it narrowed the scope of her vision.

With abdication of responsibility came ease, or some look-alike.

The thought of plunging back into the shark-filled waters of her corporate law firm, toiling away in that skyscraper on deal

terms for mergers and acquisitions when her relationship, her entire life path, had veered off course, was enough to scare

the fear of quitting right out of her. She’d put in her notice last week. The same day Gigi returned, her presence complicating

things like always.

Lillian scooped up baskets of onion rings and smoked whitefish dip to bring out to one of her booths. “I’ll cover James and

Gigi’s table.”

Trina nodded. “Keep a close eye.”

Lillian found them out on the patio, overlooking the harbor where a small cruise ship was docked. The tables’ pink umbrellas

rippled, wooden poles rocking in the wind. Gigi had moved her chair into the sun, her body long and bendy like a question

mark. James sat up straighter, sliced by shade.

Lillian fought the impulse to tug her braids, pull them like a fire alarm. “Hey there,” she said.

Gigi flicked the bangs out of her eyes, revealing the drops of green beneath. “Look who it is,” she said. Her creamy lips

curled. Nearly a smile, almost a sneer. “It’s been a while.”

Ten years. It had been ten years since they’d seen each other. “Yes, it has been,” Lillian said.

Gigi had always been confident, but there was a flippancy to it now, like she couldn’t be bothered with showing off. A stud

on her freckled nose, bold with its subtlety. Short hair suited her, edgy and free, falling just below her chin, the skin

of her swan neck exposed. The bleach didn’t do her any favors, washing her out. But she pulled it off, just as she did with

her overalls. No shirt underneath, just the skim of cleavage and sunburn, clavicle bones jutting like jewelry.

“I hope it’s not awkward that we’re here,” Gigi said. “We can go somewhere else.”

“No, it’s all good,” Lillian said. She’d suggested that James bring Gigi to the Pink Pony so she could observe the date. Removing her notepad from her apron, Lillian clicked open the pen. “What can I get you to drink?”

Gigi ordered a frozen rum runner. James opted for an Arnold Palmer.

“Let’s go in the hot tub,” Gigi was saying when Lillian returned with the beverages.

The Pink Pony had a large jacuzzi next to the patio, open to guests. Lillian’s parents had tried closing it several times,

but the attempt was met with too much pushback. But in the privacy of their own home they ranted about the skimpy bikinis,

the sloppiness of the clientele.

James perused the menu. “I didn’t bring my bathing suit.”

“We could get some from the gift shop,” Gigi said. She laid a hand on James’s forearm. He didn’t pull away. “Though on second

thought, not with the mayor in there.”

Camille Welsh was in the hot tub, sipping a Mackinac mule and loudly introducing herself to tourists. She had been mayor since

Lillian was little. No one ever ran against her, and term limits hadn’t made their way to the island. It wasn’t the kind of

community to disturb the status quo.

“I’m the mayor for the last sixteen years, you know,” Camille was boasting now. “You wouldn’t have even heard of our island

before I took office. And no, I wasn’t elected as a teenager, I know what you’re thinking,” she told a fudgie. “I’m older

than I look! It’s all the fish I eat from the Great Lakes. The oils are very good for the skin.”

“We wouldn’t fit in there with the size of her head,” Gigi commented.

“It’s become part of her post-cycling workout routine,” Lillian said. “A hot tub town hall, people are calling it.” She felt

guilty gossiping, but something about Gigi brought it out in her.

Gigi smiled, her canines flashing something feral. “What a dedicated city government we have.”

Lillian wasn’t a fan of the mayor either. “At least our doctors work hard,” she said, meeting James’s eyes, their warm hues holding the line like allies.

“Trying to,” James said. “This is the first lunch break I’ve taken in weeks. Appointments have been booked solid. Something’s

going around.”

His modesty was adorable, not an ounce of it affected. “Yes, I wonder why everyone’s flocking to see you,” Lillian mused.

“The great mystery of Mackinac Island.”

Gigi pointed at all the tropical cocktail picks crammed into her glass. “What’s with all the umbrellas? It’s a waste of paper.”

When the Tongs first moved to the island when Lillian was in fourth grade, Gigi was entranced by the Pink Pony. She loved

those little paper umbrellas, begging Lillian to bring them to school so Gigi could prop them in cafeteria milk cartons, wave

them around like flags, like swords, like wands. Lillian had gifted a whole bag of them for Gigi’s pony-themed tenth birthday

party. Gigi had been sure her dad was getting her a real pony, but he had only sent a Beanie Baby pony instead. That was back

when they’d been inseparable, before everything was severed.

Lillian’s feet ached. She was tired of standing, suddenly desperate for the sedentary luxury of her Chicago life. Sitting

in an air-conditioned office, the plush back seat of a cab, a chic restaurant booth where someone else was serving her. “You

used to like the umbrellas,” she told Gigi.

Gigi’s expression smudged. A remembering or a forgetting? The smear of it looked the same from this angle.

“I can throw them away.” Lillian offered her hand, aware of its bareness since she’d given back the ring. The way skin rubbed

against skin, no golden barrier.

“No, it’s fine,” Gigi said. “I’ll give some to James.”

“I’m good,” James said, casting Lillian an apologetic look. But he let Gigi put three umbrellas in his iced tea anyway.