By age twelve, she was making shorts and blouses for herself and her sisters. And by fifteen, she was being asked to help classmates with prom and graduation dresses. Now, at eighteen, she had as many as five or six jobs at a time, making dresses, shorts, pants, and blouses for friends and family on the island, in addition to outfitting herself, Kyrstin, and all of her sister’s bridesmaids for the July wedding.
And one day? Well, one day she wanted to make it up north to the Parsons School in New York City or RISD in Rhode Island. She wanted to go to college for fashion design and learn from the best. She wanted to start her own line of clothes, inspired by the greens and blues of the water and sky on Corey. She wanted her own house that didn’t smell like crabs, with carpets that weren’t perpetually covered in a gritty dust of dried salt and sand. She wanted a different life than Corey Island could ever hope to offer.
That said, college didn’t come cheap. She figured she had three or four years of clothesmaking to go before she’d be able to swing the first-year tuition, even with financial assistance. And working on free jobs, like her sister’s wedding, did nothing to further her cause.
She looked up to find her sisters staring at her.
“So?” asked Isolde. “What’re you goin’ to do about Brodie?”
“I’ll march over to his house, and I’ll stand there in his driveway, and I’ll call him out as a liar for the whole island to hear,” she said, raising her chin.
Isolde gasped. “You will not make a scene, Laire Maiden Cornish.”
“Oh, yes, I . . . I goddamn fucking will!”
Laire’s use of the word fuck made her sister’s eyes wider than a full moon over the Sound. They were not the sort of family who used curse words beyond an occasional damn, ass, or hell.
“Better not kiss Daddy with that mouth!” exclaimed Kyrstin, shaking her head in disapproval.
Isolde shoved the tea at Kyrstin and placed her hand over her belly as she took an angry step toward Laire. “I don’t want my baby hearin’ that kind of filthy talk. I’m goin’ home.”
“Good.” Laire put her hands on her hips. “Don’t let the door hit you in the ass on the way out!”
Isolde had just gotten to the front door as it swung open, and there, taking up the entirety of the doorway with his maple-tree strength and brawn was their father, Howard “Hook” Cornish, the best crabber in the Outer Banks.
“Where y’all off to now, Issy girl?”
Isolde leaned up on tiptoe and kissed her father’s whiskered cheek. “Laire’s in a mood, and Kyrstin drank all your sweet tea. See you tomorrow for services.”
“Amen,” said Hook, calling after her. “Take care, now. Y’all keep my grandbaby safe, hear?”
“I hear!” came Isolde’s muffled reply as she stomped out of the house and started her car.
Hook turned to his remaining daughters, giving Kyrstin an annoyed look. “Y’all drank all my sweet tea, huh?”
“I’ll go make more, Daddy,” said Kyrstin with a sheepish smile, taking her empty glass into the kitchen.
“Yeah,” he drawled to himself, “but it’ll be from powder, I s’pose.” He turned to Laire, scanning her face with his sharp blue eyes. “And you’re in a mood? What for?”
Laire shrugged. “Issy’s the one in a mood.”
He looked out the window as she pulled out of the driveway, kicking up gravel with her tires. “Might be. But she’s big as a house, Laire. Cut her some slack.”
He was right. She was big as a house, with a mother-in-law who was loving but demanding, and no mother of her own to lead her through the terrifying mystery of childbirth.
“I’ll do that,” she said. “You mommucked, Daddy?”
Mommucked was an islander word meaning “dead tired.” It was the sort of word her mother would have reminded her not to use off-island, but here, at home, it was the right word.
“Aye-up. Went through a thousand pounds of bait, and I cracked my back hookin’ a buoy. Long day.” He had taken off his knee-high rubber boots and yellow all-weather coveralls on the porch, but his jeans were filthy and he smelled strongly of fish and the sea. Right yethy.
As though he could read her mind, he chucked her under the chin and grinned. “Best shower before that tea.” He turned toward the hallway that led to the bathroom and two bedrooms, then pivoted back around with a low groan. “Ah. Shoot. Almost forgot. Got a delivery to make over in Buxton.” His lips pursed after a long sigh. “But my tired’s got tired.”
“Buxton?” said Laire, perking up as she pictured the castle-like summer homes of the superwealthy who lived a short ways up the coast.
Buxton, like Frisco, Avon, Rodanthe, and Nags Head, was where millionaires from Raleigh, Charlotte, and even faraway places like New York City, spent their summers. It wasn’t an area that Laire had gotten to see up close very often, but the few times her father had taken her on a delivery, she’d been fascinated by a totally different world so close to home.
“Aye-up.” He put one hand on his hip and rubbed his forehead with the other. “Guess I’ll shower later. Gotta take six crates of blues to a house up there.”
“You’re tired,” said Laire. “I could help. I don’t mind doin’ it for you.”