Nantucket Blue

Seven





I CONSIDERED MY OPTIONS as I left the Lucases’.

Option one: catch the ten o’clock ferry. I didn’t want to go back home. If I did, Mom would pretend like we were having a great girls’ weekend all summer even though we were both miserable; she because she missed Dad, and I because I wanted to be with other kids. She promised we would go on trips to Newport and Block Island but would always come down with a headache when it came time to get in the car. She would get that look in her eye like I was betraying her every time I went to Dad’s house. It was a soft, pleading look that made me want to wrap my arms around her and comfort her and, at the same time, sprint away from her as fast as I could. I nixed the thought before I’d even reached the end of the driveway. I couldn’t give up yet.

Option two: go to Jules’s house. “It’s right in town,” she’d told me. “A five-minute walk to the Hub.” The Hub, Jules told me, was a little store where she bought all her magazines. “They also sell postcards, little things, Tic Tacs, gum, Nantucket key chains, crap like that. Oh, and also, there’s no CVS on Nantucket, no Target, no Costco, nothing even close.”

She went on to tell me that no one locked their doors at night, people left their keys dangling in the ignitions of their Jeeps, and everyone bought their bread from a bakery and their vegetables from a farm, not the supermarket. She’d made Nantucket sound like a foreign land whose customs I might have difficulty comprehending. It bugged me. It was only one state away. My mother had spent a summer here. I’d been to Cape Cod a bunch of times. And there was a farm stand in Tiverton that Mom, Dad, and I used to go to in the summer for blueberries, tomatoes, and Silver Queen corn. I wasn’t a total ignoramus. Still, I’d packed two big boxes of tampons just in case they were scarce out here, or really expensive, like in Russia.

I had her address memorized, 4 Darling Street, and could picture the house perfectly. The Claytons’ Christmas card every year was of the family standing in front of the blue door with the scallop-shell knocker. A gold “4” hung above them, as if counting the perfect family: mom, dad, sister, brother. In last year’s card, Nina is looking up and laughing. What would the picture be like this year? Would they still stand in front of the door? I felt another kick of sadness, right in the stomach. I was realizing that loss has a kind of violence to it.

When I got closer to town I took out my map and, straining my eyes in the darkness, found the Claytons’ address. Insects thrummed in the nearby yards as I traced my finger over the route.

I passed back through town and crossed the busy, cobblestoned Main Street. Jeez, was there a beautiful-people factory out here? A breeding ground for J. Crew models? The older ones walked in close teams of two and four, the younger ones in looser packs of six or eight. The uneven sidewalk was illuminated by glowing, old-fashioned streetlamps. The shop windows were decorated with sea-motif jewelry. Gold starfish earrings lay in pools of green silk, and diamond-crusted anchors hung on velvet necks.

The windows of the interior-design stores were so warm and inviting I wanted to crawl inside and curl up in one of their nautical tableaus, bury my toes in the knotty rugs, and fall backward into the plump pillows. How funny would that be, I thought, if Jules walked by in the morning and I was sleeping in the bed of a shop window?

I turned onto Fair Street, about to head toward Jules’s, when I heard my mother’s teacher voice in my head telling me that Jules said I couldn’t stay with her, and I needed to respect that. I couldn’t just drop in unless I had a place to stay for certain. A church bell rang, and I counted the low gongs. It was ten o’clock. I paused, dropped my duffel, and looked at the map. I was four blocks shy of Darling Street, standing in front of an inn. It was white with dark red shutters and a front porch, and had a carved, gold-lettered sign.

Option three: the Cranberry Inn.

The door was unlocked. The lobby, with the bookcases, worn oriental rugs, and clusters of sofas and armchairs around a fireplace, looked like a living room. A man with a ponytail and goatee sat behind an antique desk, reading a paperback with one of those dark, manly-man covers. A pair of drugstore glasses sat on the end of his nose. He was sitting cross-legged in an armchair in what looked like pajama bottoms or maybe karate pants. The string of a tea bag hung over his mug. He sipped his tea and turned the page quickly, his eyes darting to the top of the next page.

“Excuse me, are there any rooms available at the inn?” I asked. Oh god, I was actually saying a line from our fifth-grade Christmas pageant when I played Mary!

The man jerked his head up, eyes wide, startled for a second, then laughed a little.

“I didn’t even hear you come in,” he said as if he knew me. He held up the book. “People leave these mysteries behind, and I can’t put them down. They get me every time.” He shook his head, disappointed with himself, and waved me over. “Come on in. I’m Gavin.” He glanced through the open door behind me. “Are you with your parents?”

I shook my head.

“A solo traveler,” he said. “Nothing like traveling alone to get to know yourself. Sit down. Have a cookie.” He gestured to a table with a pitcher of water and a plate of chocolate chip cookies. I took one. He tilted his head and consulted his reservation book. “We have one room. It’s the Admiral’s Suite.”

The kitchen door swung open, and a girl walked through with a tray of fresh glasses. She stacked them next to the pitcher of water.

“Oh, great,” I said, covering my mouth as I swallowed. I was hungrier than I’d realized. “I’ll take it.”

“It’s three ninety-nine.” He sighed and added, “Plus tax.”

“Oh,” I said. “I can’t do that. I’m not exactly on vacation, I’m looking for a job.” I needed my three hundred dollars to last at least two or three nights. I sank a little lower in the chair. I was tired for the first time since I’d woken up at five a.m., wired with anticipation.

“Give her Rebecca’s room,” the girl said in a thick accent. Was she Irish? “Can’t charge more than a hundred for that, can you?” Was she his daughter? She was a little chubby, with pink cheeks and a sunburned nose. She pushed a black curl back behind her ear and gestured to me. “Poor thing looks knackered.”

“Rebecca won’t mind?” I asked, wondering who Rebecca was.

“She’s halfway to England by now,” Gavin said.

“I got my cousin a job on Nantucket, and she quit after a week ’cause she missed her lug of a boyfriend.” I wasn’t sure if this was funny because of her accent, or even if it was meant to be a joke, but I laughed. “And he’s a right wanker.”

“I’m looking for a job,” I said, sitting up and tapping the table with my palms. “And I need one that comes with housing.”

“Well, this works out perfectly, then, doesn’t it?” the girl said, a hand on her sturdy hip. “You get a job, Gavin doesn’t have to go on the great chambermaid search, and I don’t have to share a bathroom with a freak of nature. You’re not a freak of nature, are you?”

“Nope.” I shook my head. Chambermaid? It sounded like a job from another century, like a charwoman or a scullery maid. Would I be churning butter, cleaning chimneys, beating rugs with a broom? Who cared? I’d have a job and a place to stay for free on Nantucket.

“We don’t even know her name,” he said to the girl, then put a hand to his chest and turned to me. “Excuse us, what’s your name?”

“Cricket,” I said. “Cricket Thompson.”

“Amazing,” Gavin said. “I was noticing, really noticing the crickets earlier. I thought to myself, Ah, the song of the cricket, the song of summer.”

“See, it’s a sign,” Liz said. “I’m Liz, by the way. Not Liza, not Lizzy, and”—she shot Gavin a look—“definitely not Lizard.”

“Nice to meet you, Liz.”

“What do you say, Gavin?” she asked.

“I’m interviewing someone tomorrow,” he said. “But I don’t see why I couldn’t interview Cricket as well. Come back in the afternoon, say around three?”

“Okay,” I said, and shook his hand. “Sounds great.”

“Wait, who are you interviewing?” Liz asked.

“Svetlana,” he said.

“Svetlana…the cow?” Liz asked with a look of horror. She sounded dead serious, so I tried not to laugh.

“She has good references,” Gavin said.

“She flirted with Shane in front of my face at The Chicken Box,” Liz said.

“It’s not your decision, Liz,” Gavin said, now sounding officially annoyed. “See you tomorrow, Cricket?”

“Yes,” I said, and smiled. I felt too awkward to ask about Rebecca’s room again. “I’ll see you then.”

I gave him my cell phone number, picked up my duffel bag, and walked out the front door. As soon as I hit Main Street I sat on a bench in front of one of the beautiful shops, wondering where I was going to spend the night now. My phone rang. I prayed it was Jules and that she’d invite me over right away. But it was my mom.

A part of me didn’t want to pick up. I’d have to tell her that the job didn’t work out and I was considering sleeping on a park bench. It would show that she had been right and Nantucket was a bad idea. It would be evidence that I wasn’t the independent girl I worked so hard to be. But the other part of me, the tired part of me, with a blister forming on my left foot, a growling stomach, and no idea where I was going to sleep tonight, wanted to talk to her.

“Mom?”

“Honey? What happened?” She had always been able to tell by the way I said even one word if something was wrong. If Mom had a superpower, it was her hearing. When it came to me, her ears were as keen as a wolf’s. It was no use lying to her.

“Well, the babysitting job didn’t work out,” I said.

“Oh, I’m sorry,” she said. “You must be really disappointed.”

“Yeah,” I said.

“But do you remember when Andrew pooped in the minivan and you had to clean it up? Or when he insisted you play Transformers…for a week?”

“Yes. That minivan was disgusting.”

“So, you hate babysitting, remember?”

“I guess I do.”

“So, this is a good thing. That family’s letting you spend the night there, at least?”

“Not exactly,” I said.

Her voice dropped an octave. “What do you mean? Where are you?”

“Before you freak out, here’s the good news. I have a job interview at an inn tomorrow. And I have a fifty percent chance of getting it. Maybe even like sixty percent.”

“To be what?” she asked.

“A chambermaid.”

“A maid? No, no, no. And where are you staying tonight? It’s late!”

“I don’t know,” I said.

“Well, where are you right now?”

“I’m in town,” I said, taking in the cobblestones, the misty evening air, the books nestled in the display of the bookstore across the street, the elegant well-dressed couples holding hands, “and it’s perfect.”

“Here’s what I’m going to do,” she said as if she hadn’t even heard me. “You’re going to sit tight. I‘m going to call around, find a place for you to stay, and pay for a room with my credit card. I wonder if the Jared Coffin House is still there.”

“Thanks, Mom.” I felt cool relief wash through me. With a good night’s sleep and at least another day out here, I knew I could make something work.

“Then tomorrow morning, first thing, you’ll get on a ferry back to Hyannis. I’ll pick you up, and you’ll spend the summer with me. Just us girls.”

Now I had wolf ears. I could hear her smile. Her relief laced through my disappointment with delicate, painful stitches. Just as I was about to protest, I got another call. It was a Nantucket number.

“Mom, hold on one sec,” I said, and switched lines. “Hello?”

“Cricket, it’s Liz. Where are you, you daft girl? You fled.”

“I’m in town,” I said. This was good news. I could feel it.

“Well, come on back! I convinced Gavin to give you a try tomorrow. I told him if you were a disaster, he could hire Svetlana and I wouldn’t say a word about it.”

“That’s great,” I said, smiling. “That’s so great. Thank you!”

“So, don’t be a disaster!”

“I won’t,” I said. “I promise. See you in a sec.”

I switched back to Mom. “Mom, I just got the chambermaiding job!”

“What? Just now?”

“Yes! I can stay on Nantucket!”

“As a maid?”

“Yeah, but so what? It’s better than babysitting, right? And this place is really cute. It’s called the Cranberry Inn.” I picked up my duffel bag for the zillionth time that day and headed back toward Fair Street. “If you saw this place, I swear you’d love it. It’s cozy and old-fashioned and they make cookies every afternoon. Google it.” I waited for her to find the Web site. “You could even come and visit.”

“It looks like a really nice place,” she said. I had to give her credit. She was trying. “Okay, now, if you change your mind, I’m right here—”

“I’ll call you when I get settled—okay, Mom?”

“All right,” she said, and hung up.

I turned up Fair Street, picturing Mom turning in for the night with a mystery novel, a glass of tepid tap water by her bed, and the picture of my father she still kept in the drawer of her bedside table. I knew she had nothing to do tonight or tomorrow night or the night after that. As Liz opened the door for me and led me to a tiny room with rose wallpaper, a window with peeling paint, a twin bed, a sink, a dresser, and a slanted ceiling, I tried to tell myself that it wasn’t my fault my mother was alone.

“We start tomorrow at six a.m. sharp,” Liz said.

“Got it,” I said, and dropped my duffel bag on the floor of my new room. I’d wait until tomorrow to ask what exactly being a chambermaid involved and how much I was going to be paid. Now that I had it, the job seemed like a small deal compared to the real purpose of my Nantucket adventure: to be there for Jules, and maybe, just maybe, fall in love with Jay Logan. I splashed some cold water on my face, slipped out the front door, which Liz promised was always unlocked, and walked to Darling Street. It was 10:43. Hopefully, Jules was awake.