Nantucket Blue

Seventeen





“SHE LISTENS TO THE JESUS STATION so loudly that you might find yourself converted by the end of the day,” Liz said. We were standing at the window, watching Bernadette walk around the inn to the kitchen door. Bernadette was the chambermaid who worked when Liz or I had the day off. She wore a little radio fastened around her waist. It had old-fashioned headphones that covered her ears entirely, lobes included. Today was Liz’s day off, and my first time working without her. I already missed her.

I didn’t know where Bernadette lived, but she arrived at the inn via an old van with tinted windows. It dropped her off, then rattled away. “She thinks we’re lazy, and she’s not afraid to tell us.”

“I’m not lazy,” I said. I had straight A’s, excluding math but including physics.

“Well, she thinks so. Oh, and there’s one more thing.” Liz poured herself coffee in one of the to-go cups we gave to guests who were headed to the ferry. “She doesn’t take a lunch break and she’ll yell at you if you do. So eat up while you can.”

“She can’t yell at us for taking a lunch break,” I said. “That’s like, illegal, I think. Does Gavin know about that?”

“He loves her.” She laughed. “It’s a love that springs from fear, but he says Bernadette is the only one who gets this place truly clean.”

“So why doesn’t she work here full-time if he loves her so much?” I asked.

“She refuses to work anywhere more than twice a week. Considers herself freelance. That way she maintains her autonomy.” She patted my hand. “Just remember, it’s better to work straight through to the end or eat something quick when she’s on her cigarette break.”

“No lunch break for us, but she takes a cigarette break?” I said with a full mouth of muffin.

“Look on the bright side. You’ll be done early. Ta-ta,” Liz said, and flounced out the door, twirling her bikini around her finger. I took another slug of coffee as Bernadette walked through the door, took me in, sighed disappointedly, and headed for the laundry room. We had a big day ahead; almost all the rooms were turnovers. I stuck the rest of the scone in the pocket of my apron.

Bernadette emerged from the laundry room with an armload of clean rags. “Put down your coffee. It’s time to work, girl.”

I took one last gulp and chucked the rest down the sink.

Okay, fine, I’m lazy, I thought, three hours later, shaking with hunger, covered in a fine mélange of sweat, filth, and Lysol, and on the verge of tears. Bernadette cleaned so hard it was like she saw the devil’s face in the toilet bowl and his a*shole in the shower drains. She could snap sheets onto beds with one jerk of her long arms—her quick, cracked hands folding hospital corners too fast for me to understand how she did it.

She appeared to be ignoring me, but at the same time I felt like I was being watched by the FBI. I’d leave a room, thinking I was done, and she’d go back in and check over my work. Inevitably, she’d come out of what I thought was a perfectly clean room shaking her head and sucking air through her teeth. I’d missed some scum in the caulking around the tub, grime in the corner of bathroom floors, perhaps a bit of dust along the baseboard.

“You girls are so lazy,” she said, checking under a bed I’d just made. “Look under there.” I got on my hands and knees to peer under the dust ruffle. A man-eating dust bunny stared back at me. The worst part was that I had actually swept under there. “Go on, get it.”

“With what?” I asked. I had stopped trying to be nice. “Broom won’t work at this angle.”

“With the hands the Good Lord gave you.”

As I crept on my elbows like an alligator in a swamp, my head brushing the bottom of the box spring, I wondered what the hell I was doing on Nantucket. This job sucked. My best friend and the guy I liked both hated me. I reached for the dust ball, and feeling my own soft arm against my cheek, lay my head on it for a moment. This small, protected part of me still smelled sweet, still felt pretty. I held my breath to keep from crying. I missed Jules, who I wasn’t going to be able to tell this story to. Without a best friend to tell stories to, it almost didn’t matter if they even happened.

“Get your head out of the clouds,” Bernadette said to me, grabbed my ankle, and yanked on it. My elbows burned on the wooden floor. I pursed my lips and twisted my head to keep from literally mopping the floor with my lips. I pushed myself all the way out.

“I’m taking a cigarette break. Here.” I handed her the dust monster. I stormed down the stairs, not making eye contact with a sunburned couple, back early from the beach, their eyes full of concern as I stomped past them.

I sat in the shade of the bike shed, on a stone that faced away from the backyard to the hedges, wanting to quit so badly. I shut my eyes. I could do it. But if I did, I’d just be back at home, back with Mom and her white wine, her phone that didn’t ring, her furrowed brow, and eight-thirty bedtimes. I’d be back to Dad’s new life, to his new house, where the floors were made of eggshells, and Alexi’s temper bombs ticked in every corner. In his new family I had to be polite all the time, like he was someone else’s dad, which he was now.

It was better to stay here. It was better to try to make things work. I just needed to turn things around. I remembered Jenna Garbetti, the shy, big-boobed senior from a few years ago who had turned around her bad reputation by disappearing from the social scene, getting a new look, and focusing on her studies. If there was ever a time to use the Jenna Garbetti method, it was now.

Lie low, look good, and learn, I said to myself. I was already lying low, I thought. I lifted the twig in the air, pretending to smoke it like a cigarette in case Bernadette was watching. I couldn’t lie much lower than this. I just needed to figure out how to achieve the other two. I stood up and moved around the shed so that I could stand in the sun. I saw George coming around the corner on his crutches, a bag from Something Natural in his hand. I dropped the twig.

“Just the person I was looking for,” he said. “Your sandwich.”

“Mmm, lunch,” I said, and took the bag. “I really needed this today.”

“Well, good. There’s a cookie in there, too.” He smiled in a way that made me feel like my old confident self again. “I don’t know how you feel about chocolate chip. Bought it on spec.”

“Yum. Um, hey listen, so I was thinking”—this took some courage—“that I could be your intern. I have straight A’s, except in math, and English is my best subject.”

He smiled. “Don’t you already have a job?”

“I get off at three o’clock. You said last night that you’re not even functional until one.”

“That’s true. But I can’t exactly pay you,” he said, his forehead crinkling.

“I just want my name somewhere in the book. Like the thank-you section?”

“That wouldn’t be a problem at all.”

“We could try it out and see if it works.” I shrugged.

“This is called marketing,” he said. “You’ve just sold me.” We shook hands.

“I have to go; my cigarette break is almost over.”

“You smoke?” he asked.

“No, but don’t tell.” George looked confused. “Long story.”

“Got it. We’ll talk later today, then? Iron out the details?”

I nodded. Lie low, look good, and learn. I was two-thirds of the way there.

After I finished with Bernadette, who wouldn’t even look at me, I went back to Needle and Thread. I peeked in the window of the tiny shop to make sure that Jules wasn’t there, and then I bought the dress. It was a whole paycheck, but if I was going to make the Jenna Garbetti method work, I had to go all the way. I carried the bag back to the inn, peeking into the tissue paper a few times to make sure it hadn’t disappeared on me. It was twilight, the crickets were chirping, and the air smelled like flowers. Thank you, Jenna Garbetti, I thought. I hoped she’d grown her hair long again, that she was in love with a guy who loved her back, and that her life at Yale was nothing less than beautiful.