The Islanders

by Meg Mitchell Moore

  “I have to go to work,” said Cassie, once she was showered and dressed. She worked as an assistant at a gallery on Harrison, in the South End, and concentrated on her own art after hours. She was beautiful and creative. Anthony had won the lottery.

  “Don’t go,” said Anthony. He was still in bed, rejoicing. She leaned over him and her long blond hair tickled his bare chest. She’d used the toothbrush that came in the overnight kit in the hotel bathroom; her breath smelled minty, pure. Her skin looked like snow and felt like butter.

  “But I’ll see you again, Anthony Puckett.”

  His sort-of girlfriend called, and called again. When Anthony was cagey on the phone, the sort-of girlfriend said she wasn’t interested in a long-distance relationship: Anthony was away so much! Distracted all the time, with the book. Was there really a future for them?

  Anthony agreed: He was away. He was distracted. “You shouldn’t have to put your life on hold, waiting for me,” said Anthony. “It’s not fair to you.”

  She sighed, relieved. “So, we’re cool, then?” she asked.

  “Very cool.” He thought about the way Cassie’s enormous eyes tipped up at the corners.

  Huxley Wilder reported in. The publisher was very, very happy with the sales numbers.

  Anthony’s publicist was a nervous young man with a twitch in one eye. “This is going phenomenally well,” he told Anthony. “We’re booking you into more venues. You’re available, right?”

  Available? He was available. He was on top of the world.

  “I’m pregnant,” said Cassie, six weeks later.

  Something turned over in Anthony. He felt a click that told him everything was falling into place. “Marry me,” he said. He got down on one knee, though he had no ring. He’d buy one! He’d buy the nicest one. The book was selling and selling. Number eight on the list, then five, and then it cracked the top three. Then one.

  He called his mother. “I’m going to be a dad,” he told her. “I’m going to be a husband and a dad.”

  “Are you sure?” asked his mother.

  He’d never been more sure of anything.

  He and Cassie got married under a wildflower arch and walked down a path made of cedar chips. Now Anthony was a husband. They bought the house in Newton, because the schools were excellent and Cassie wanted to keep her job at the gallery, working for a visionary named Glen Manning. Anthony could work anywhere, and was ready to leave New York. Now they had a garage, neighbors, real estate taxes.

  After a seventeen-hour labor with no epidural, in the obstetrics wing of Newton-Wellesley Hospital, Max was born. Max came out blue and Anthony thought he was going to lose his mind. Then Max started crying and his color developed: he scored 9.6 on his second Apgar test. He was perfect. Anthony had never known a fierce and unshakable love like this.

  Anthony and Cassie brought Max home to a nursery that belonged in a magazine shoot: everything was white. Anthony was scared to touch anything for fear of messing it up.

  “I know it seems hard to believe,” said Huxley Wilder, “but someday A Room Within will stop selling. Do you have your next idea ready?”

  But it didn’t seem possible that the book would ever stop selling. Anthony got royalty checks every six months, enormous royalty checks. The view from the top was distorted, sublime. The money that had come pouring in poured right back out again. Cassie quit her job to care for the baby and to concentrate on her own art. Her taste, once unleashed, was impeccable, expensive. She needed an art studio. They could build one in the back of the house, detached. They had an acre! They may as well put a pool in, why not? And a pool required a pool house. The master bath was outdated. Good shoes cost a lot.

  “Even Gone Girl fell off the list eventually. Even The Help,” said Huxley. “Now’s a good time to pitch the next one.”

  Anthony wrote a first chapter, an outline. “It’s called Simon’s Rock,” he told Huxley.

  “I love it,” said Huxley. “Let’s present it.”

  A deal was proffered. A number so big it made Anthony feel anxious. What if he couldn’t follow through? What if he wasn’t capable? He tried to express his doubts to Huxley, but Huxley didn’t want to hear about doubts. Huxley said, “You know what two words a publisher most wants to put on a book jacket?”

  Anthony thought about it and said, “Stephen and King?”

  “Ha!” said Huxley. “Hilarious, man. But, no. Debut and novel.”

  “But this isn’t a debut.”

  “Exactly! You had those two words last time. You never get them again, not in your whole career, not ever.”

  Anthony was confused. “I don’t understand how that helps me.”

  “It doesn’t help you. That’s exactly my point. Debut novels are what every publisher wants. Nothing sells a book like the promise of new blood. So if they’re offering you this fucking insane amount of money for a second book you would be an idiot not to take it.”

  “I’m just nervous,” said Anthony. “About selling something before I’ve written it. Does that make you nervous at all?”

  “You’d be an idiot,” repeated Huxley. “Not to take it. Let’s do this. Let’s sign, and then let’s go celebrate another amazing Puckett book. Sign now, write later, my man. That’s how the game is played, in the big leagues.”

  “It is?”

  “Absolutely it is.”

  Anthony signed.

  Anthony showed Huxley a few more chapters of Simon’s Rock. Huxley took a little time to call back. “It’s good,” Huxley said. But was there a hitch in his voice? “You keep the fuck writing, man. You just keep it up.”

  Max turned one. The publisher established a deadline.

  “I need more time,” Anthony told Huxley. The deadline was pushed back.

  Max turned two. The words wouldn’t come the way they had the first time around.

  A Room Within fell off the list.

  “We knew it would happen,” said Huxley. “That’s why we took this deal.”

  Max turned three. It was hard to remember what it had felt like to be on top of the world.

  Ferocious dreams visited Anthony in the night. You’re not good enough! thundered his father. You had just the one book in you, and now it’s over. You’ve spent it! Anthony was going to be a one-hit wonder: the “Tainted Love,” the “Come On Eileen” of the literary world.

  Max turned four.

  “They need to see a draft,” said Huxley. “They’re getting antsy. Whatever you have, let’s send it.”

  How many books do you have in you? dream Anthony asked his dream father.

  His dream father laughed so long and so hard Anthony could count his fillings: two on one side, three on the other. I have an unlimited number, said his father. They just keep coming and coming.

  Anthony cowered under the covers, a little boy afraid of monsters in the closet. But you said I was good enough, that night when I was in college. Remember? When I brought you the story?

  I never said that! Leonard Puckett’s voice rose and rose. I never ever ever ever said that. I never would. That story was nothing special.

  Huxley emailed: How’s it going?

  Great! emailed Anthony back.

  Anthony took up drinking—it had always been a casual habit, weekends mostly, but now it felt like a second job. Alcohol softened the sharp angles of his stress, blurred the lines between can and cannot.

  Geez, Dad, Anthony said in his dreams. Writing a book is hard!

  Not for me, said dream Leonard. You’re not good enough. Not good enough not good enough you can’t do it you’re not good enough.

  Only when Anthony was with Max did he feel okay. Max wrapped his arms around his neck and held on tight. “I love you, buddy,” Anthony said. “You can do anything you put your mind to,” he added.

  “I know,” said Max easily. “I know I can, Daddy.”

  The deadline drew closer and closer. Anthony thought about the book all the time. The plot curled itself around his thoughts like
blood vessels around a tumor.

  Huxley checked in: “The publisher is super-excited!”

  “Great,” said Anthony. “I am too.” His voice was a stranger’s.

  “We’re going to hit that deadline, right?”

  “Of course we are.”

  It was never too early to get some buzz going for a big book. Anthony’s editor sent him copy for Amazon, even though she hadn’t read a word. The long-anticipated follow-up to A Room Within! A second book that was better than its super-smash-hit predecessor!

  Anthony dabbled in energy drinks, in caffeine pills. They made him too excited, so he dulled them with more alcohol.

  His draft was almost complete. He wasn’t happy with it.

  Huxley emailed. We need to send what we have.

  One night Cassie went out for the evening. “Girls’ night out,” she’d said offhandedly. “Super-casual, dinner and drinks.” Her dress didn’t look casual, and she had on her highest heels. Anthony didn’t have the energy to figure out if she was lying. Thinking about the book took up every ounce of him.

  Anthony put Max to bed, and then he sat down with his incomplete manuscript and a glass of scotch. There was an elephant sitting on his lungs, and on top of that elephant was another elephant, and the elephant on top was holding a large refrigerator.

  He finished the scotch and opened a bottle of good Cabernet—why not? He wouldn’t write anything new; he’d focus on tying up all the unfinished bits. A glass of wine (or two) would help with that, help him find the connections he knew were missing.

  He couldn’t end a crucial scene. He couldn’t get it right. The scene was halfway through the book, when the main character, Simon, was confronting his sister about the family secret they’d both kept hidden for decades. The sister was on her deathbed. It was a critical turning point for the narrative, and everything—everything!—that followed sprang from that single interaction. Anthony had already written the scene, but he hadn’t ended it properly. He hadn’t ended it beautifully, in a way that would knock a reader’s socks off. It didn’t feel right, the way A Room Within had felt when he was writing it. Nothing felt right.

  One glass of the Cabernet gone, then two, then a third. Anthony prowled the house, thinking. He checked on Max: sleeping. Back downstairs, in his office, his eyes fell on his old copy of There Comes a Time. His mother had given it to him in high school—her own copy, already dog-eared, and Anthony dog-eared it further. (Leonard, who read only commercial fiction, fast-paced, sometimes un-beautiful commercial fiction, had never taken the time to recognize its allure.)

  Anthony took the book from the shelf. He flipped through it. What a perfect book. How had O’Dwyer done it? Everything about it was enviable. The dialogue rang true, the transitions were seamless, the chapter endings were perfection.

  The chapter endings were perfection.

  No, Anthony.

  The bottle of Cabernet was empty. He stowed the bottle in the recycling bin in the garage, under yesterday’s copy of the Boston Globe and a doorstop catalogue from Restoration Hardware. Good thing they’d gone to single-stream recycling; easier to hide a bottle.

  The chapter endings were perfection.

  Just this once, he thought. Just this one paragraph. That’s all I need to finish off the chapter.

  I’ll go back, he told himself, as he took—no, as he borrowed—O’Dwyer’s words. I’ll go back and take out that paragraph a little later, when I’ve had a little more time to think. I’ll put it in my own words. I just need to turn it in.

  He turned it in.

  He got back his editor’s notes on the draft. And what did it say right there, right after O’Dwyer’s words? This is beautiful! Don’t change a word.

  There was a second, more ominous note: More like this!

  A couple of other chapters required work in the next revision. And so it turned out it wasn’t just one paragraph Anthony borrowed—it was, as the Times article noted, about twelve hundred words. It was a few pages in total, scattered throughout the book. Unbelievable! wrote his editor. I’m practically crying, this writing is so gorgeous.

  His editor circulated the manuscript in-house. She called Anthony. “They’re going wild for this book,” the editor said. “Especially the deathbed scene, with the sister. Brilliant stuff, Anthony. Brilliant, brilliant stuff. I was worried there, for a while! But you pulled it off.”

  “Okay,” said Anthony. He couldn’t believe it was possible for a heart to beat as fast as his was beating. The elephants shifted. Another elephant was added on top of the first two.

  “They’re talking a very big print run,” Huxley Wilder told him. “Some people are talking prizes.”

  Anthony drank more. He poured vodka into his morning smoothies. Cassie stood at the door of his office, shaking her head. She had a meeting with Glen Manning while Max was at preschool.

  “But you’re not working for him anymore,” said Anthony.

  “Other way around,” said Cassie. “He’s interested in some of my pieces.”

  Anthony’s mind was too addled to ask out loud if that was a euphemism.

  “What are you working on, anyway?” she asked. “I thought the book was done.”

  “Revising,” he said, sweating.

  Galleys were printed; they began to circulate. Cassie thought they should hire a freelance publicist to redouble the already robust efforts of the publisher.

  “I don’t think we need one,” said Anthony.

  “I think we do,” said Cassie. “I think we should really invest in this book.”

  The publicist’s name was Shelly Salazar. She’d worked with some big names. “I am going to get you to the next level,” said Shelly. She named a very large number. Cassie agreed to it.

  “Fine,” said Anthony. He had no energy for arguing. He hid a bottle of Monkey Shoulder in his sock drawer, and one in the basement, near the hot water heater.

  Huxley Wilder called. “Puckett,” he said. “We have a problem.”

  Anthony’s editor emailed. A strange thing has come up, she wrote. Let’s talk about it with the attorney. An anonymous source, who’d read one of the early galleys that was circulating, had leveled a pretty serious charge.

  “Who was it?” asked Anthony.

  “Could be anyone,” said Huxley. “Once those galleys are out, anyone can get their hands on them. You know how it is.”

  I’m sorry, he said, again and again, to his editor, to Huxley, to Cassie. But Cassie didn’t want to hear it; nobody wanted to hear it.

  He called his mother. “It’s going to get pretty bad,” he said. “It’s going to get messy.”

  It was confirmed. The Times article came out. “Everybody knows,” said Cassie. “Everybody knows now. You’ve ruined everything, Anthony. You’ve ruined everything.”

  There was the sense of a thing having been done that could never completely be undone.

  Chapter 42

  Lu

  Early the next morning Anthony’s phone rang, making Lu jump. Cassie’s name showed up on the screen. Lu waited a fraction of a second, unsure if she should answer or not. But the alternative was waking up drunk Anthony. She had to answer.

  “Hello?”

  A woman’s voice. “I need Anthony.”

  “I’m sorry,” said Lu. “He’s sleeping.”

  “He’s sleeping?”

  “He, ah . . . wasn’t feeling well.”

  “I’m sorry to hear that,” said Cassie. The sarcasm dripped from her words like sauce off barbecued ribs.

  “But you can pass any message to me, and I’ll give it to him,” Lu said hastily. She had slid a pillow under Anthony’s head and his cheek was squished against it. He was drooling.

  “Who are you?”

  “I’m Lu. I’m his friend.”

  “Anthony doesn’t have friends who are girls.” That seemed like a rule that must be of Cassie’s making, not Anthony’s. Anthony was quite a good friend.

  “He does now,” said Lu.


  “If he cares,” said Cassie, “please tell him the police found a note.”

  “Of course he cares,” snapped Lu. “What did the note say? I mean, if you want me to pass on the message.”

  Cassie sighed. “It said, Don’t worry, we went on a little trip.”

  “A little trip!” said Lu. “That seems innocuous enough. What a relief. So we don’t need to worry anymore?”

  “You never needed to worry, Lu-whoever-you-are,” said Cassie. “Because this doesn’t concern you.”

  Chapter 43

  Joy

  Bridezilla’s mother, Linda, was wearing the silver Birkenstock Gizeh sandals that every woman over forty on the island seemed to own. She was also wearing a printed maxi skirt with a generous helping of pinks and blues and a knit top that matched the pink of the skirt. All in all, it was a very rosy getup. Something that was not rosy, though, was her expression. Her normally placid face—as innocent, as sweet as a dairy cow’s—looked drawn and anxious. Well, who could blame her? It must be exhausting to be the mother of the bride! Especially that bride. Joy was beginning to hope that if Maggie wanted to get married she might be so kind as to elope and save Joy the trouble. Maggie could wear a funny bride-themed T-shirt and a pair of white Converse high-tops. She could marry a boy or a girl. She could marry anyone, or no one! (As long as she didn’t marry Hugo from the Roving Patisserie.)

  “Linda!” said Joy. “Such a nice surprise, to see you in the shop. What can I get you? A coffee? Whoopie pie? Yesterday Maggie and I were experimenting with a double-chocolate fudge flavor, and we have some left over. I can give you a sample if you’d like.”

  “No, thank you,” said Linda. She sighed as if the very idea of a whoopie pie made her feel weary. “We ate at the Spring House Hotel last night and if you can believe it I am still stuffed to the gills.”

  “Ooooh!” said Joy. “I believe it. Their menu is fantastic this summer. What’d you have? Did you try that cod special?”

  “I had a little bit of everything,” said Linda. “The rehearsal dinner is there, you know, in the Barn, and we were sampling.” She put a hand over her small pouch of a stomach. “But anyway, I didn’t come to talk about that. I came to apologize.” She pulled out a chair and sat at an empty table.