She learned she was in the home of Thomas Frost Duncan, an award-winning poet and longtime Provincetown resident who was celebrating not just his fifty-fifth birthday but twenty years of surviving with AIDS.
Thomas had short-cropped white hair and piercing blue eyes. He sat folded in an Eames chair and looked much older than fifty-five. As if reading Rachel’s thoughts, he said, “I never thought I’d reach forty.”
Unsure what to say to that, she asked about his poetry.
“I didn’t think your generation was interested in poetry. Just your hundred-and-forty-character Twitter haiku.”
“Such a cranky old man. How do I put up with you?” Bart said, his warm brown eyes crinkled with affection. “Don’t mind him. In fact, you should go back to the pool with the other young people.”
“Sure,” said Rachel. “I’ll go check it out.”
She wandered over to the back patio. It was quiet out there except for a lone guy sitting poolside in a lounge chair. She didn’t want to disturb him. She stood indecisively between the house and the pool until the man sensed her awkward presence and turned around.
“Hey there.” He gave a half smile, then turned back to the water.
Whoa. He had cheekbones you could ski jump off and blue-green eyes the color of the bay. When she was young she had been obsessed with a made-for-TV movie about a girl who turned into a mermaid. The mermaid (and Rachel!) fell in love with a hunky lifeguard, played by a gorgeous Australian actor. This guy looked just like him. All he was missing was the accent.
But this wasn’t a movie, and she shouldn’t be crushing on some dude. That was not why she was there. This was a family trip, and shame on her for even noticing that he was great-looking. Besides, this was a crowd of gay men. She was an idiot.
She sat on a chair near him but not too near.
“Hey. I’m Rachel,” she said.
“Luke,” he said. “How do you know Thomas?”
“Oh—I don’t. I came with my grandmother. She’s good friends with him.”
He nodded with a polite smile. Dimples! What was wrong with her?
“So how do you know Thomas?” she asked.
“He’s my father.”
“Really?” she said, not bothering to hide her surprise.
“Yes,” said Luke. “You know, most people here are on their second lives.”
She shook her head. “I don’t know that much about this place. I just got here yesterday.”
“Oh, well—you’ll see. P-Town is the land of reinvention. Everybody’s got a story.”
I just want your story, she thought. “Do you live here?” she asked.
“Just visiting,” he said. “I teach at the University of Rhode Island.”
Cute and smart. “What do you teach?”
“Urban planning.”
And socially aware. Stop it.
How old was he? Early thirties, she guessed. She started to say something but noticed he was distracted, fixed on something or someone over her shoulder. She turned to see Marin. Marin, looking like a radiant, dark-haired angel in a diaphanous white sundress.
Rachel felt an unfamiliar pang of territorial angst.
For the first time since learning about Marin, Rachel wanted a few more minutes of being an only child.
Chapter Eighteen
Marin stood in front of the row of lounge chairs while Rachel stumbled through introductions to the hot guy, followed by an awkward explanation of their half-sisterhood.
“Interesting,” he said. “And I thought I had a complicated situation with my dad.”
Kelly and Paul appeared.
“We’re going to duck out and get a drink,” said Kelly.
“Correction,” said Paul. “We’re going out to get drunk.”
“You’re leaving?” Marin asked.
“Bart’s friends are in recovery, so this party is dry; Paul and I want to have a celebratory round,” Kelly said. “In case you’d like to join us.”
Marin had two choices: Continue to talk with the hottie—and suffer the dagger eyes of Rachel—or get good and drunk.
“Sounds like a plan,” she said. “Lead the way.”
Rachel’s sigh of relief was shockingly blatant—or maybe Marin had imagined it. Suddenly, she was really annoyed with Rachel. Annoyed with her innocent doe eyes. Annoyed with her for her pathetic, obvious crush on this guy. Annoyed with her for the endless pit of need that had dragged Marin into her life and turned Marin’s own life upside down.
“Care to join us?” Marin said to Luke. He seemed to consider it, then said, “It’s a little early for me. Thanks, though.”
“Suit yourself,” Marin said.
The bar was, as everything here seemed to be, within easy walking distance. A-House was nestled on a side street off Commercial. It was a white clapboard building with an American flag waving atop the porch roof. A hanging wooden sign out front read ATLANTIC HOUSE BAR. It was old-fashioned and non-remarkable-looking, but when Marin glanced up she noticed beautiful stained-glass windows on an upper floor. They didn’t really fit with the rest of the exterior. But this was what Provincetown seemed to be so far: at first glance, you saw one thing; after a closer look, you saw something you wouldn’t necessarily expect.
Inside, it was dark and smelled like decades’ worth of faded cigarette smoke. Behind the bar, Christmas-tree lights. And in the farthest corner of the room, another small, stained-glass window. Mariah Carey played over the sound system: “Vision of Love.”
The bartender looked up wearily, as if it were the end of a late Saturday night instead of eleven in the morning in the middle of the week. He had a sun-weathered face, a buzz cut, and a full sleeve of tattoos. Marin couldn’t tell if he was forty or sixty.
Marin, Kelly, and Paul sat at the bar, front and center. Directly behind the bartender was a carved wooden bust of a merman.
“Hey, Chris. Three kamikaze shots,” said Paul.
A kamikaze? Marin was a wine drinker—that was it. To her left, a giant screen played the Mariah Carey video that went with the song.
“To Thomas’s birthday,” the bartender said, sliding the shots in front of them and downing one himself.
“To Thomas,” Marin said along with Kelly and Paul. She swallowed her shot. Vodka with lime juice? She wasn’t sure. All she knew was that it was strong.
“Fifty-five,” Kelly said. “And I can’t believe I’m past fifty.”
“Yes, you are, sweetheart. But you don’t look a day over thirty-five. You and Julianne Moore. The hottest old redheads in the world.”
“Thanks?” Kelly said, laughing.
“I hate that you didn’t have a big party last year. I say we have a ridiculous, all-night soiree right here for your next birthday. It should have a theme.”
“I’ll drink to that.” Kelly waved the bartender over for another round. “But you better check in with my better half. You know she always has something planned.”
“Don’t I know it, you lucky bitch. You and Amelia, Thomas and Bart—you all make me almost believe in marriage. Though it is a little sickening to be around all that love and devotion.” Paul turned to Marin. “What about you, gorgeous? Do you have a boyfriend? Some hot suit waiting for you back in New York?”
Marin burst into tears.