The Beach at Painter's Cove

by Shelley Noble

  “You watched television all morning and cleaned a few stair spindles,” Issy said.

  “You can’t work when you have company. It would be impolite.”

  “We don’t have company.”

  “Grandma is here,” Griff said.

  “We’re not supposed to call her that,” Mandy said. “Mommy said so.”

  “It’s not fa-air,” Griff whined.

  “It’s life with Jillian York,” Issy said. “I’m going back to the house.”

  “I’ll stay here with the kids for a while,” Chloe called after her.

  “And, Issy,” Leo called. “Tell Mrs. Norcroft to set the dining table for dinner tonight. In Jillian’s honor.”

  Issy waved and kept walking.

  “I’ll come with you,” Steph said, and fell in step.

  “You don’t have to,” Issy said. “Stay and hang out on the beach.”

  “I don’t mind what we’re doing, and if you don’t need me, I can finish my book.”

  “What are you reading?”

  “Something Aunt Fae gave me.”

  Issy nodded. “The Otherworld,” she guessed.

  Steph looked sharply at her. ‘You’ve read it?”

  “A long time ago.”

  They walked along in silence until they were almost back at the house.

  “I guess everyone in the family has read it,” Steph said.

  Issy stopped, sensing the girl’s sudden disappointment, and in a moment of clarity that hit her hard, she understood her reaction. “Didn’t she tell you not to tell anyone about reading it?”

  “She said not to tell Mom. Because it’s, you know—”

  “It’s not that. It’s because only one person in each generation gets to read the book,” she extemporized. “It’s because you and I are special.”

  Chapter 14

  Issy sent Steph off to read her book while she got organized. What she really needed was a little time to herself. She’d come close to bursting the kid’s bubble and it had unnerved her. She of all people knew how important it was to have something all your own, something that picks you out from all the glamorous people surrounding you, from all the perfectly perfect people at school.

  Aunt Fae had loaned Steph the book of stories for the same reason she’d let Issy read it all those years ago. Just a forgotten collection of Victorian tales of the Otherworld with some Victorian eroticism thrown in for good measure.

  Not children’s fare but wildly romantic and shocking for a teenager; a rite of passage into a special world. And Issy had almost wrecked it for Stephanie. Fortunately she’d caught herself in time.

  Aunt Fae was good that way. For knowing just what you needed and when. Some people, including people in her own family, thought she was just an old hippie who’d never grown up, but they were wrong. Fae belonged to the spirit world, not peopled with real fairies and Elf Kings, but the possibilities of them. The possibilities in life.

  She wondered if Fae had taken Steph to her cottage yet. It was a delightful place, a safe place, where Issy had stayed many times when she felt the differences between herself and the kids whose parents lived at home, or when the talk among the artists grew too passionate or theoretical. Or filled with despair. Once, when Henderson Clark had slit his wrists in a fit of depression, he’d rushed down the stairs crying, “It’s red. It’s red!” So startled by the color of his own blood that he fainted at Issy’s feet. Issy ran to Fae’s and stayed there for two days.

  She wandered through the rooms rearranging cloisonné boxes, touching Fabergé eggs and pieces of sea glass, mainly remembering. She was acutely aware that her mother was upstairs, sleeping off jet lag and most likely several in-flight gin and tonics. She would come down for dinner refreshed and looking for a way to make their lives more complicated than they already were. And Issy would long to run to Fae’s and take Steph with her.

  Chloe came back ahead of the others. And they set the dining table as per Leo’s request.

  “You only got out seven plates,” Issy said.

  “I’m not eating with you guys, thank you very much. Besides, who will serve?”

  “Nobody’s serving. She’s not the bloody queen. We’ll put the food on the table and let everyone pass it around like a normal family.”

  “Fine, but I’m still not eating with you.”

  Issy gave Chloe an impulsive hug. “I owe you big-time.”

  “Then promise you’ll come to the Den tonight.”

  “Deal.”

  They were just finishing up when she heard someone rummaging around in the parlor.

  Issy headed for the door, not sure what she was going to say, but making sure her mother, like her sister, wasn’t attempting to help herself to the artwork.

  She found Jillian headfirst in the drinks cabinet.

  She stood as Issy walked in. She was swathed, no other word for it, in silk pants and a tunic in a pearl-blue color that changed shades as she moved. Issy could kick herself for the admiration she felt.

  She left you behind, remember.

  “I swear this is the same bottle of vermouth that was here last time I was in town. Do you think McBready’s is open on Sundays? I think we should order new everything. Do you have your cell on you?”

  “No, I don’t, which is academic, since we’re all broke and we won’t be ordering from anywhere.”

  “You, too?”

  “No, not me, but I will be trying to keep all of us together until further notice.”

  Jillian put the vermouth bottle on the cabinet top. “Are you sure you’re not exaggerating?”

  Issy lifted an eyebrow. It was the mirror image of Jillian’s. The only reason she knew this was because everyone who knew Jillian remarked on it.

  Jillian broke first, gave a dramatic sigh, and reached for a glass. “We do have ice?”

  “In the kitchen,” Issy said, and left before Jillian could hand her the glass.

  Issy went straight out the back to the lawn, where she couldn’t be seen or found by Jillian or anyone else. She slipped into a sheltered nook out of the wind and called Paulo.

  “Cara, how are things in Connecticut?”

  “My mother showed up.”

  “In the flesh?”

  “Yes. Evidently she’s broke. Not only can’t she lend us money, she had the nerve to ask to borrow my apartment.”

  He laughed. She felt better.

  “Was the museum pleased with the installation?”

  “Of course. And Mark Darwin said if you ever wanted to leave New York . . .”

  “He says that every time I see him. I think it’s a kind of flirtation.”

  “Perhaps. Anyway, everything went fine. Dell is going down tomorrow for the opening, and guess what, taking Deirdre with him since you’re en vacances.”

  “Some vacation.”

  “So Mama is there. Do you want me to postpone my trip? I could overnight the specs to you. But really we should look over them together. Major coup for us.”

  “No. Come. Stay.”

  “Because of the plans or because you need reinforcements?”

  “Both.”

  “I’ll be up first thing tomorrow. Wait, I have a debriefing, but if I hurry that along, I can beat the afternoon rush-hour traffic at New Haven.”

  “Perfect. Bring your swimsuit.”

  They rang off, and when Issy walked back to the house, she felt almost cheerful.

  Issy changed for dinner, but only into clean slacks and a T-shirt not saturated in dust and dirt.

  Jillian sat in the parlor like she was the hostess, and Issy had to grit her teeth not to mention it. But as people often told her, Jillian wasn’t mean-spirited, just self-absorbed. Issy never really understood the difference. She still didn’t.

  Leo had pinned up the wisps of hair that had blown free in the beach breeze. And changed into a pantsuit that managed to trump Jillian’s. Griff and Mandy were relatively clean. Fae looked absolutely the same, except perhaps her hair was even more
windblown than it had been at the picnic.

  Steph got the prize for dinner couture. She came in after Fae, and was wearing what had to be one of Fae’s summer shifts. Yellow, blue, and mauve, with a gathered shoulder cape that opened like butterfly wings when she moved.

  She was looking at the floor when she entered, but cast a quick look at Issy from beneath her lashes as she passed.

  Issy gave her a “nailed it” look back.

  “I wanna wear a costume, too,” Mandy whined, destroying the moment.

  “It’s not a costume, stupid.”

  “It’s beautiful,” Leo said. “Come, Stephanie, and let me see.”

  Stephanie stepped toward her.

  “I remember that dress,” Leo said. “Fae wore it to the open house we had . . . when was that?” She looked at Fae.

  “Oh, 2004 or five.”

  “I remember it was a beautiful June day—”

  “That it was, just beautiful. Shall we go into dinner?” Fae started toward Leo but Jillian stood. “Shall I help you up, Mother?”

  Leo smiled up at her. “Thank you, dear, but I’m capable of getting out of my chair.”

  And she managed it just fine. Jillian did take her elbow going into the dining room.

  “She’s up to something,” Fae said as she passed. “Be sure to count the silver.”

  Issy snorted. “We’re using the stainless steel.”

  It was late when Issy and Choe arrived at the Fisherman’s Den, a mostly local bar and grill nestled between the road and the water at the far edge of Painter’s Cove. Constructed of wood and stone, it had survived several fires and hurricanes, had been rebuilt more than once, and other than that had done absolutely nothing to keep up with the gentrification of the shoreline.

  It was packed, even on a Sunday night. The music blared out into the evening along with a billow of smoke from the outdoor kitchen.

  Chloe pulled Issy through the crowd, nodding at several people as she passed. Issy didn’t recognize anyone, not that Chloe was giving her time to. They headed straight to the deck out back and several steps down from the main building, where it was considerably quieter, less smoky, and cooler by a good ten degrees.

  Ben was leaning on the rail, a bottle of beer sitting on the eight-by-four that served as extra table space. He saw them and raised a hand to call them over.

  When they reached him, he leaned over and looked into Issy’s eyes, leaning so close that their noses nearly touched.

  He swiveled his head toward Chloe without standing up. “I think she’s going to make it.” He straightened up. “Chloe gave me a heads-up about Jillian showing up.”

  Issy threw her head back and looked at the night sky.

  “If you’re going to howl at the moon, could you pretend like you don’t know us?”

  Issy dropped her head. “I wasn’t going to howl. I was just communing.”

  “How was it?”

  “It wasn’t. I call for a loan and get her on my doorstep instead. Something I did in a former life no doubt.”

  “Well, the good news,” Ben said, summoning a waitress, “is that she never stays longer than necessary.”

  The waitress appeared with two more beers.

  “How did you know I still drank this label?” Issy asked as she took the bottle from Ben.

  “I just assumed,” he said. “My bad.”

  “Not bad. Lucky.”

  “But don’t make a habit of it,” Chloe added.

  “It’s a guy thing.”

  They drank beer, saw a few people Issy knew, danced a little, and fell into the way it always used to be, maybe the way it should be.

  “You’re dead on your feet,” Ben said.

  “I am not,” Issy said, stifling a yawn.

  “Well, you were dead on my feet. I’ll drive you home.”

  Issy started to say that the Muses wasn’t home. But it was and it would always be, no matter where she was.

  She and Chloe hugged good night. “Thanks.”

  “Don’t think you’ve seen the last of me,” Chloe said. “Ben and I mean to stick around and make ourselves useful. Oh, I forgot to tell you. I’m taking Mandy and Griff with me tomorrow morning, if that’s okay. There’s a day camp at my school and I just happen to know the registrar. I told Fae.”

  “It sounds like heaven. And they had room for them?”

  Ben laughed. “Chloe’s the only one who knows how to run the new computer system the school installed.”

  “Well, double thanks.”

  “All right, come on, you.” Ben took Issy by the arm. “Chloe, are you coming?”

  “In a minute. I see some people I know. I’ll meet you back at the house.”

  Issy and Ben walked arm in arm to the parking lot and Ben stopped her in front of a battered pickup. He opened the door and unceremoniously hoisted her into the front seat.

  “This isn’t the same truck you drove me to college in, is it?” Issy asked as they rattled out of the parking lot and onto the paved road.

  “No. That one lost the battle of bumper meets bog. This is its replacement.”

  “Ben?”

  “Yeah?”

  “I haven’t been too good about staying in touch.”

  “No, you haven’t. But I expect you had your reasons.”

  “Had,” Issy agreed. “No more. I can’t tell you how—”

  “Don’t say thank you again. It’s just like it always was. Back and forth, help out when you can, get help when you need it in turn. We’re all the same. You’re the one who’s forgotten, so it seems odd.”

  “You’re right. I had forgotten.”

  He turned into the drive of the Muses. The lights were off except the porch and vestibule.

  “Good. It looks like they’re all having an early night. You get them up early to help you catalog.” He pulled to a stop in front of the steps and gave her a wicked grin.

  “And I’ll enjoy doing it,” Issy said. She leaned over and kissed his cheek. “Thanks,” she said, and jumped out of the truck and ran inside without looking back to see Ben’s reaction.

  Everyone had gone to bed. Steph was in her room but she couldn’t sleep. She sat at the window reading. She was tired, but every time she lay down her mind started running like crazy. Like, what was with Issy and Jillian? And why did they let Jillian come home like she hadn’t ignored them all her life. And what was going to happen to them, Griff and Mandy and her? What if her mom and dad never came back?

  Grammy and Jillian had a big discussion about it. Jillian said they should definitely put out a missing-person report. She could go on television and make a plea for her child to be returned.

  Then Aunt Fae reminded her that as far as they knew, she’d left of her own free will, and hadn’t been kidnapped.

  Steph wouldn’t mind staying with Grammy and Aunt Fae except Aunt Fae normally lived in her own cottage, and the Muses was a really big house for just two people. And probably could get really spooky when there weren’t a lot of people staying.

  Her room was on the northeast corner of the house, so she could see when headlights appeared in the drive and came toward the house. For a minute she wobbled between hope and something else. She wanted her family back, but back without the yelling and the anger and her mother always carping on how Steph should behave and dress and act. But she also wanted to stay here where life was full of . . . specialness.

  But it didn’t matter. It was just Ben bringing Issy home from the bar. Issy went inside, Ben drove away.

  If Steph was older she could have gone with them instead of having to sit in the living room and listen to Jillian and Grammy talk. Aunt Fae took the kids to the other side of the room to play some game that she and Great-Grandfather Wes used to play when they were little kids, but it looked really dumb, so Steph had just looked around the room at all the stuff they’d have to catalog the next day.

  Every room was like an episode of Hoarders, only good stuff. They needed a whole army to write down everyth
ing that was in here. Especially if Grammy was going to tell a story about every one of them. Though she had to admit it was pretty interesting stuff. Much better than the trips to galleries with her mother where all the paintings were named Abstract #1, Abstract #2, Abstract #3. And you had to look thoughtful and pretend like you knew what they were about.

  Steph sat; she might as well get used to it because she just wasn’t going to be able to sleep. Ever again. She’d be one of those people who can’t sleep then goes crazy and dies.

  She yawned, rested her elbow on the windowsill, and saw the first little circle of light. She sat up, moved closer to the glass, not taking her eyes off the little circle. It was going up and down like it was floating on the water; but it wasn’t on the water, it was on the lawn and it was headed toward the woods.

  Fairies? Stupid, there was no such thing as fairies. Maybe not fairies, but faeries maybe. They might exist. They might come and exchange children in the night.

  They could take Mandy if they wanted her. But Steph was pretty sure they only took babies. She’d buy that, because Steph never felt like she belonged in her family. But if faeries existed, it was a long time ago. Aeons. These days there were just psychopaths and divorced people who kidnapped children.

  The light entered the woods. She kept losing sight of it, then it would suddenly reappear, and she knew it was going through the trees. And it was getting smaller. She wanted to run downstairs and outside to chase it. But it would be gone before she could reach it.

  Even now it grew dimmer; then it winked out altogether and didn’t come back on. She waited for a really long time, and the next thing she knew it was morning.

  Chapter 15

  The next morning Issy drove across town to see Mrs. Norcroft. She hated that she had to meet the old housekeeper again under these circumstances. It was a daunting task. But someone had to thank her for her decades of service, apologize for the lies Vivienne and Dan told, and then beg her to come back to work.

  It was nearly ten when she pulled up in front of the wood-frame house that belonged to Mrs. Norcroft’s sister and saw the first indication that she might be too late. A “Sold” sign was stuck in the middle of a well-manicured yard.