Sadie arrives in short order, which is good, Franklin thinks, because it doesn’t leave Lydia any time to talk about her. One look at his sister, however, tells Franklin what his mother would have said if she’d had the chance. Sadie has lost at least ten pounds, and she wasn’t a very big person to begin with. Her cheeks are sunken; her face, for lack of a better word, looks cadaverous. She keeps her hair very short, but now it looks as if she’s taken kitchen shears to it in a fit of grief. There are purplish-red circles under her eyes, and she is shaking.
Franklin’s heart sinks. He knows that Sadie has closed the pie shop “until further notice,” but he had hoped she would have taken the hiatus to rest and recoup. He had hoped she would rise above her circumstances and maybe even revel in her newfound independence. Reed betrayed her—yes, he did. He cheated on her with the daughter of one of his patients, a woman whose morals were already held in question by most of the island because of her involvement with Joey Bowen.
Franklin has refrained from sharing his opinion with his sister, which is that he doesn’t think Harper is a bad person. He has always liked her. She has been a fan of his music; she came to see him every time he played and was the first person to buy his ill-fated CD of original songs. Harper has never been anything but sweet and lovely to him, and he had witnessed firsthand the crap she had to put up with as a cocktail waitress at Dahlia’s. Those girls were teased and manhandled and harassed. A chance to quit slinging drinks and do something far easier—if illegal and dangerous—for Joey Bowen must have seemed like an answer of sorts.
Franklin also believes that no affair is ever one partner’s fault; it signifies the collapse of the union. This past winter, Franklin stopped by Reed and Sadie’s house to get a prescription for a Z-Pak; Franklin had a nasty case of bronchitis that was wreaking havoc with his carpentry and singing. It was a Sunday afternoon: Sadie was at the pie shop, and Reed was home alone, drinking an eighteen-year-old Aberlour, watching the Patriots in the playoffs. He invited Franklin to stay.
He held up his glass. “Aberlour has its own medicinal properties, you know.”
After they had each had two glasses—Franklin’s with water, Reed’s straight—Reed muted the television; the Pats were winning in a blowout. Reed said, “Does your sister ever say if she’s happy being married to me?”
The question was as welcome as a bowling ball to the groin. Franklin sucked in a breath and opened his mouth to reassure his brother that yes, his sister was happy. Of course she was happy! Why wouldn’t she be happy? It was islandwide opinion that Dr. Reed Zimmer was a great guy. Reliable, trustworthy, dedicated. A Martha’s Vineyard treasure—a hero, even. But Franklin had, in fact, accidentally overheard Sadie talking to their mother, Lydia, during one of the family dinners Reed hadn’t been able to attend because he’d been called into the hospital. Sadie had been venting to Lydia because Reed had suddenly decided he wanted children.
But I won’t do it, Sadie had said. And I will punish him until he takes the words back.
Franklin had stopped listening at that point. He had sought refuge with his father, who was loath to talk about anything more controversial than local politics.
“I don’t know,” Franklin said to his brother-in-law. He and Reed had never had a heart-to-heart chat before. He didn’t know Reed was capable of it. But of course Reed needed a confidant; everyone did.
“We haven’t slept together in over a year,” Reed said. He had slugged back his Scotch and poured another two fingers. “And I’m talking sex, but I’m also telling you we now keep different bedrooms. She won’t touch me at all, Franklin.”
Franklin had been muted by discomfort. The next-to-last thing he wanted to hear about was his sister’s sex life; the last thing he wanted to hear about was his parents’ sex life. But he put two and two together and deduced that cutting Reed off was Sadie’s way of exacting her punishment. Now, Franklin is not saying Reed was justified in having an affair. But he isn’t sure how Sadie saw that strategy working out to her advantage, other than that it would ensure she wouldn’t have a child. At this point, neither does she have a husband.
They sit down to dinner promptly at six. Franklin’s mother doesn’t believe in a cocktail hour; she claims hors d’oeuvres ruin the appetite. She also has no use for seasonality. It’s mid-July, and she has made a pot roast with potatoes and carrots and onions, snowflake rolls from scratch, and an iceberg salad with bottled blue cheese dressing. Franklin has warned his mother that one day the Martha’s Vineyard farmer’s market police are going to arrest her simply for serving iceberg lettuce. But Lydia feels no shame.
Franklin sweats his way through the meal in more ways than one. All he can do is hope that his mother made pie for dessert—peach or triple berry. He pictures Tabitha rolling Paul Revere’s Ride onto the powder-room walls, a few specks of paint dotting her nose. She had told him, right before he left, that Wyatt, her children’s father, was a professional housepainter and had long ago taught her how to tape off a room. The thunderbolt of jealousy Franklin experienced nearly caused him to pass out.
It was only on the way to his parents’ house that he thought, Children? He has only heard about the daughter, Ainsley.
“So,” Sadie says, contributing to conversation for the first time. “Where are you working these days, Frankie?” The childhood nickname is a playful touch. Maybe she’s not as damaged as she looks. But even so, Franklin can’t own up to the truth. He harbors the naive belief that if he just lets some more time pass, Sadie’s mind-set will improve, and she won’t care when he tells her he’s seeing Tabitha Frost.
And the word seeing doesn’t begin to convey how he feels. He’s gobsmacked. He’s neck-deep in emotion for the woman.
“Cuttyhunk,” he says nonchalantly.
“Really?” she says. Her tone is indecipherable. Is she calling his bluff or merely impressed?
“Really,” he says.
“So you’re using the boat, then?” she asks. “You should take me over there sometime.”
“We can all go!” Lydia says.
“Now, now, honey,” Al says. “Franklin is working.”
“I am working,” Franklin says. “Believe me, there’s nothing I’d rather do than have the three of you join me for a leisurely day on Cuttyhunk, but it isn’t really feasible with the project I’m involved in.”
“Of course not,” Al says.
Sadie stares at him.
Franklin leaves his parents’ house that evening with his secret intact. But how much longer can he hope to keep it that way?
Not much longer, we all suspect. Because who has ever successfully kept a secret on this island?
It’s three days later when Tad Morrissey is backing up in the parking lot of Cottle’s lumberyard in Edgartown and gets T-boned from the right by Roger Door, who had parked in the Cottle’s lot but spent nearly an hour over at Coop’s Bait & Tackle talking about where the stripers are running—and, apparently, nipping from the flask of Bushmills he takes with him everywhere.
Tad recognizes Roger Door but doesn’t properly know him, and the accident has brought out Tad’s infrequently seen Irish temper.