Julie never pressed. Sophie was a good kid and besides, if she had a problem with one of her coworkers she would come to her mother. Or she would go to her grandmother or to Nicola. Sophie was fine.
It was her mother who was not fine.
Julie was depressed and it showed. She had forgotten about her last hair appointment and hadn’t bothered to make another. She had gained weight. She was still gaining weight. She felt sluggish but had no energy to do anything about it. She hadn’t been for a hike in weeks. The last time she had been on her bike had been back in the spring. The bike was propped against a wall of the garage. The tires needed air.
There was more. The house was getting out of control. Julie wandered over to the foot of the stairs that led to the second floor and picked up a crumpled T-shirt draped over the banister. It was Sophie’s and it was dirty. When had Julie last done laundry? When had she last dusted the blinds or vacuumed the rugs?
She dropped the T-shirt back onto the banister. The laundry would get done when it got done.
Julie made her way into the kitchen. Several photographs of Sophie were stuck to the fridge with magnets in the shape of oranges, apples, and bananas. In the most recent photo, Sophie was proudly modeling the new coat her grandmother and her cousin, Judith, had chipped in to buy her for Christmas.
Sophie had her father’s build, tall and slim. She wore her dark brown hair long, as did most of the girls at Yorktide High. She had her mother’s eyes, which were wide set, very blue, and surrounded by long, thick lashes. When Sophie was thirteen, a boy at school had told her that her eyes were beautiful. That afternoon she had spent almost forty minutes and all of her allowance in the makeup aisle of Hannaford’s pharmacy department, choosing eye shadows and pencils and liners. Julie had talked to her about not allowing a boy’s opinion—good or bad—to influence her decisions, and about how real beauty was found in nature and not in artifice. Sophie had seemed to listen but had stuck with the heavy makeup for a while until, Julie supposed, she simply got tired of spending so much time layering it on and scraping it off. The half-empty tubes and used brushes were still piled in the top drawer of Sophie’s dresser.
Still, Sophie was undoubtedly vain. Of course, it was possible that what Julie saw as vanity was in fact simply a realistic appreciation of the self. And, Sophie had never displayed any signs of the anxiety and depression that had plagued her mother at various times in her life. That was a very good thing.
The ringing of the landline brought Julie back from her musings. She recognized the number on the phone. It was one of her neighbors. She debated letting the call go to voice mail. Then, on the fifth ring, she picked up the receiver. She didn’t know why she did.
“Hi, Janet,” she said flatly.
“Did you hear the news?” Janet asked, her voice squeaky with excitement. “Your aunt Carol is back!”
“What do you mean?” Julie asked wearily. There was absolutely no privacy in a small town. It was a big part of why she was suffering so badly in the wake of Scott’s betrayal.
“I mean, she’s here in Yorktide. Rumor has it she’s staying at Ferndean House instead of one of the big hotels she usually stays at.”
“She’s probably just on vacation,” Julie said. She didn’t really care one way or the other.
“Maybe,” Janet admitted. “But don’t you think it strange that she’s at the Ascher family homestead? I mean—”
“I have to go,” Julie said abruptly. “Goodbye.”
Only after she had hung up did the news begin to sink in. If it was true that Carol Ascher was staying at Ferndean . . . But so what if she was? It didn’t necessarily mean that Bonnie’s plans to sell the cottage and move into Ferndean were in any danger. Unless . . .
Julie reached again for the receiver. As she punched in her mother’s number, she realized that for a few moments at least, Janet’s news had served to turn her attention away from her own emotional pain.
That was interesting.
Chapter 5
“You looked stressed,” Judith said. “Sit. Relax.”
Bonnie’s cousin, Judith, was the only child of Shirley Ascher’s sister Mary and her husband, Matthew. She wasn’t much older than Bonnie, but she often acted like a mother-figure. Though Bonnie might never have said so, she appreciated the fact that Judith was strong and wise.
Nicola took her aunt’s arm and led her to the kitchen table. “Judith is right. I’ll make some tea.”
“I don’t want any tea,” Bonnie said, sinking into a seat.
“Julie came and went in a hurry,” Judith noted.
Bonnie restrained a sigh. Julie had stopped by earlier, but finding her mother with Nicola and Judith she had rapidly taken off again.
“She looks so sad,” Nicola said, taking the third seat at the table.
“She has reason to be,” Bonnie murmured.
Truth be told, from the very start of her daughter’s relationship with Scott, Bonnie had been doubtful about the long-term success of the pair. It was an unpalatable fact that often in relationships where the man was markedly more attractive than the woman things would go wrong. And if Scott wasn’t exactly vain, he was not unaware of his physical appeal. If only Julie had fallen in love with an average-looking guy with a manageable interest in sex. But no one could dictate matters of the heart. More was the pity.
But while Bonnie was angry with Scott for messing up so badly, she still loved him. He had always been respectful of her and of Ken; in a way, with his parents gone to Florida many years ago, he had come to treat the Elgorts as his parents. And he was a good father to Sophie, if a bit lenient in ways Bonnie thought he shouldn’t be. But that was the Millers’ business, not hers.
What bothered Bonnie most about the situation was the fact that her daughter was being forced to heal in the full glare of the publicity surrounding Scott’s actions. Not that Julie was healing; she seemed to be suffering more keenly as time went on. It was all so unfair, but then again, no one had ever promised that life would be fair.
Bonnie turned to Judith. “Did you know my sister was planning to show up unannounced?” she asked.
“Of course not. I haven’t spoken to Carol in ages. And if I had known she was intending to resurface in Yorktide, I would have told you immediately.”
“Why did you allow her into Ferndean?” Nicola demanded.
“The house is half hers,” Judith pointed out.
Bonnie nodded. “Judith is right. I couldn’t exactly push her off the porch or slam the door in her face.”
Nicola folded her arms across her chest. “Well, I don’t want to see her.”
Judith sighed. “Don’t be ridiculous.”
“Why should I want anything to do with her? She threw me out when I was only fifteen!”
“That’s not what happened and you know it,” Judith said sternly.
Bonnie frowned. That was debatable. “There’s more,” she said. “Though she says she doesn’t want the town to know yet, she’s intending on making Yorktide her home again. She wants to buy me out of my share of Ferndean.”
“She can’t do that!” Nicola cried.
Judith whistled. “So, what are her terms, exactly?”
“She didn’t give me details. I . . .” Bonnie swallowed hard. “I ran off before she could. I was just so shocked.”
“You need a lawyer.” Nicola reached for her cell phone. “I know someone who might be able to help.”
Judith put her hand on Nicola’s. “I suggest we all calm down. There’s no need for panic. We need to hear what else Carol has to say.”
“What’s the point?” Bonnie sighed resignedly. “Carol always spoils things for me.”
Judith raised an eyebrow but said nothing.
“We won’t let her spoil this for you,” Nicola said firmly.
Bonnie wished she could believe her niece. But since Carol Ascher had abandoned her family when her younger sister was only sixteen, Bonnie had become increasingly aware that Carol got wh
atever Carol wanted, no matter who or what stood in the way. She was a force of nature; she always had been. Way back when they were children, Bonnie had been happily in thrall to Carol, awed by her, entertained by her. And, she had thought, loved by her.
But then . . .
“Aunt Bonnie?” Nicola was frowning worriedly. “Are you okay? You look—gray.”
“I’m making that tea,” Judith said, rising from her seat. “And if you happen to have a bottle of brandy, a bit of that wouldn’t go amiss, either.”
Chapter 6
Growing up, friends had envied Carol Ascher living at Ferndean, but she had never shared their enthusiasm. Something about the proportions of the big, old house were unpleasing to her eye. The windows, with a few exceptions, were too small, and the slope of the floors, grown worse over time, made her feel slightly queasy. Add to that the fact that Carol’s personal tastes had always been very different from those of her mother and the other Ascher women who had gone before. She found the flocked wallpaper in the hallways fussy, the muddy brown paint in the living room depressing, and the hugely hideous sideboard in the dining room an eyesore.
Carol wandered into the den and over to the room’s one window. She touched the heavy draperies and cringed. They were dreadfully ugly. Carol remembered when her mother had bought them; she had hated them from the start. The draperies would go into the trash; the room would benefit from as much natural light as its one window would allow. And the rug would go, too. It was threadbare.
Having had enough of the gloomy den, Carol returned to the living room. Knickknacks and doodads and tacky souvenirs of the seaside covered every surface. Nothing in the room worked harmoniously, at least not for someone with Carol’s aesthetic sensibility. Colors clashed, textures argued with one another, and furniture from various periods clamored for attention.
But the décor could be dealt with later. At the moment, the most interesting matter for Carol to consider was Bonnie’s reaction to finding her sibling on the doorstep. Carol had anticipated Bonnie’s being surprised, but she had not imagined that she would literally run off after only a brief conversation. Carol lowered herself gingerly onto a small love seat. The cushion was rock hard but at least it supported her.
It seemed that reuniting with her family was going to be more of a challenge than Carol had anticipated. She would need to convince them that she was in earnest about wanting to become part of their lives again. But so much time had passed. And Carol herself had been the architect of the family’s existing emotional structure. Carol Ascher versus Bonnie and the others.
There was a reason for this. There had been a period in Carol’s life, after a major surgery, when she had become addicted to prescription opioids. That addiction had been a major factor in her decision to send her daughter away from home to live with her aunt and uncle in Maine.
No one in Carol’s family or among her acquaintances had ever known about the addiction; in order to keep fast her dark secret, Carol had grown more reserved, self-sufficient, even isolated over time, and though the addiction had been conquered years ago, the habit of secrecy had survived its death.
Now, Carol knew that she had been too much alone for too long.
And she was tired. She was sixty-five and while that was not aged by contemporary standards, she had been on the go for so many years that sometimes she felt as if she were seventy-five. Or eighty.
And there was no one in New York to stay for. She had friends, but they were not close friends. It was the way she had always been, a casual connector. But now she was seeing the end of her life—even if it turned out to be fifteen or so years away—and it didn’t feel quite so good being solitary and self-sufficient.
And there was the death of that poor little boy. It had hit her so hard.
The solution seemed easy. She would settle at Ferndean, secure in the knowledge that her family was living close by. She could see them whenever she wanted.
Assuming they wanted to see her.
Suddenly, Carol felt afraid. A picture of Nicola’s empty bedroom back at the New York apartment flashed before her mind’s eye.
So much in her life had been lost. And what had been gained?
Carol got up and headed for the kitchen. She wasn’t hungry, but she would find something to eat among the groceries she had brought in earlier. She would need to keep up her strength.
Chapter 7
Nicola sat curled up in the one armchair she owned. It wasn’t very comfortable, but she didn’t really mind. She had bought it at a secondhand shop; it had been cheap and relatively clean. She was trying to read a jaunty popular mystery, but her mind would not let go of the crisis suddenly facing her family. The audacity of her mother, to show up out of the blue and announce what was basically a coup d’état!
Well, sort of.
How she missed her uncle Ken! Nicola sighed and let the mystery novel drop to the floor. She wished he were still around to tell her mother to go away and leave them alone. People listened to Ken.
But Carol Ascher never listened to anyone. She did what she wanted when she wanted. Which was probably the reason she had chosen to have a child in the way that she had. Entirely on her own terms, terms she had attempted to explain to Nicola when Nicola was five.
There was no daddy in the house because her father was an anonymous man who had donated his sperm so that she could be born. A simple story that meant absolutely nothing. For a while, Nicola had thought her father’s name was Andyomous. That was what her mother had said, wasn’t it?
Growing up, Nicola had never given all that much thought to her anonymous sperm donor father. Lots of her New York friends’ parents were divorced, and missing—or too many—parents were almost the norm. For some, it was even a point of honor to be the child of an “interesting” home, not one of those deadly boring two-parent, heterosexual households that had been done to death and badly by just about everyone who was no one. There were even a few other kids at Nicola’s school whose fathers were anonymous sperm donors. No big deal.
Still.
At the age of ten, Nicola told a new girl at school that her father was in hiding, the hereditary prince of a country she was under strict orders never to name in case the information somehow led to his discovery.
At the age of twelve, Nicola told a cute boy she met at summer camp that her mother had shown her the résumé her biological father had submitted to the agency that had arranged for her conception. He was a brilliant scientist. He had three doctorates and spoke seven languages. He was also a descendant of George Washington.
When she moved to Maine at the age of fifteen, Nicola finally found herself with a very satisfactory, flesh-and-blood father figure. Pretty much all thoughts of her biological father vanished. She was happy to consider Ken her dad.
Only when Ken died did Nicola begin, for the first time in her life, to experience a sense of curiosity about her biological father, the real man, not a figure of her fantasy. The fact that she knew nothing about him—What month was he born? Who was his favorite artist? Did he have brothers and sisters?—suddenly felt almost unbearably frustrating. For the first time in her life she felt rootless. Not entirely, but enough to cause distress.
Nicola leaned her head against the back of the chair and sighed. Still, as much as she craved a sense of rootedness, she had no desire to search for the anonymous sperm donor. First, the search was likely to be fruitless. Second, what if she did manage to find him? She could never approach him; if he had wanted to claim his child, he would have been a “known donor.” No, a sense of her real place in the world would have to be found elsewhere. If it could be found anywhere.
One thing was for sure. A sense of security and purpose could have nothing to do with the reemergence of her mother in Yorktide.
Nicola knew that for a fact.
Chapter 8
Julie was heating frozen dinners. It was not the healthiest choice she might have made for her family, but she found that she didn’t much care
if she served them heavily salted processed food loaded with fats and cholesterol. Only weeks earlier she would have been washing fresh greens and slicing lean meat.
But that was in another lifetime.
As she waited for the microwave to bring the meals to life, Julie’s thoughts drifted to the strange situation in which her mother currently found herself. One thing was clear. Bonnie didn’t deserve Carol’s high-handed treatment, especially after all that she had done for the family, starting with the death of Julie’s grandfather.
Ronald Ascher had passed out behind the wheel of his car; later, the doctors told the family that he had died of cardiac arrest. His death came as a terrible shock. Ronald and Shirley had had plans to spend a night in Portland, a rare treat. Ronald had been in the middle of several house projects, including the reconstruction of part of Ferndean’s front porch. And he had recently joined the newly formed Men’s Charitable Association at church.
Carol had paid for the wake, funeral, and burial. Bonnie had handled the details and carried the bulk of her mother’s emotional burden. Carol arrived in Yorktide two days before the services and left two days afterward. Duty done.
Not long after Ronald’s passing, Shirley fell gravely ill. It was a virulent cancer. Carol sent money but left the day-to-day care and decision making to her sister. For the last month of Julie’s grandmother’s life, Bonnie lived with her mother at Ferndean, while Ken stayed at the cottage with Julie. Bonnie Ascher had never complained, not once.
Years later, Bonnie had taken in her sister’s daughter. Again, she had never complained.
The timer on the microwave went off and Julie removed the ready-made meals. If anyone deserved Ferndean House, she thought, it was Bonnie Ascher Elgort.
“What’s for dinner? I’m starved.”
It was Sophie. She was wearing a pair of jeans that left little to the imagination. Ordinarily, Julie would have said something on the order of, How can you breathe in those things? but now she said nothing.
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