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Susan woke in her childhood bed the next morning just after six-thirty. She blinked at the ceiling, a crack that had grown longer and thicker in the many years since she’d last slept there. The house creaked and drifted with the early-morning spring wind. Today was the first day of June. Somehow, someway, it was the first spring after Susan’s divorce and her first full day on the island.
Downstairs on the breakfast table, sat a basket of freshly-baked croissants, biscuits, and blueberry muffins. A pot of coffee had recently been brewed, the smell of which stirred with the lilacs and baked bread. Wes Sheridan had always been an early-riser. With the Sunrise Cove, there had always been a reason to stay up late or wake up early.
“Dad?” Susan called out. There was no answer. Immediately, fear overwhelmed her. Wasn’t this the common trope with dementia patients? They wandered off, got confused, ended up somewhere lost and alone? She fled toward the door that looked out over the road. Nothing. She rushed outside, her feet falling against the grass, wet with dew, then bounded around the side of the house. Again, she called for her father, her eyes scanning the trees. Had he wandered inside, looking for wood scraps for the bonfire?
But no. When she reached the water-side of the house, she found her father in a familiar spot. He was on the other porch swing, the one that remained attached to the porch itself. He swung with a cup of coffee in his hands as he gazed contemplatively out at the water. He hadn’t heard her frantic attempts to call.
Susan walked up the steps that led onto the porch. Once on the landing, her dad turned his head. His eyes brightened. “There she is. I thought you would never get up.”
Susan chuckled. “You know it’s only six-forty-five, right?”
“Half the day is already over!” He smiled up at his daughter.
“Ha.” Susan collected his coffee cup, returned to the house, refilled his and grabbed herself some. Then, she brought out the basket of croissants, muffins, and biscuits and perched them on the little table in front of the porch swing. She sunk her teeth into the buttery wonder of the fluffy croissant and closed her eyes, savoring the glorious taste. She hadn’t eaten so gluttonously in years. There had been such pressure to look a certain way as a criminal lawyer in Newark—and also, as Richard’s wife. She had trimmed off any extra fluff over the years with endless pilates classes and early-morning jogs.
“How does it feel to be back, then?” Wes tore the top off a biscuit and ate it slowly.
“It’s difficult to describe,” Susan answered. “Like no time has passed. Or like three hundred years have passed.”
“I’ve never understood time,” Wes returned. “Sometimes, I sit out here, and I still think I can hear you girls running around in the woods, playing hide and go seek.”
Susan was breathless for a second. She felt she could hear the voices, too. She considered telling her father there was a possibility her sisters would arrive sometime soon—but without more details, she didn’t want to get his hopes up.
“I hate that I’ve been away for so long,” Susan said. “They always tell you when you’re younger about the regrets you’ll have when you’re older. But you don’t take the advice seriously until it’s too late. I’ve missed this place. I know every single path on this island. I know the way the light hits the water. I know the air and the people and the food and...” She paused and pressed her lips together. “I know it in ways that I don’t even know my own life back in Newark anymore.”
Wes placed the uneaten half of his biscuit back in the basket. He seemed contemplative but unwilling to say what was on his mind. He swallowed a gulp of coffee.
“I just missed you, is all,” Susan stated and patted his free hand.
But her dad didn’t want to hear it anymore. He arched his brow in that same way he always had when he was tired of something, and said, “I have to get over to the Cove soon. Want to come with me?”
“Of course I do,” Susan said as she stole a glance at him. “How has it really been going over there?”
“It’s better than ever,” her dad said. “I hired a different lady to work at the front desk a few years back. Natalie. She’s about thirty-five, I guess, and really whip-smart. Has a few kids of her own. Anyway, she told me yesterday that we’re already booked solid for the entire summer—a real banner year for us.”
“That’s incredible, Dad. When we passed by yesterday, I couldn’t help but...” She paused, unsure if she should press forward.
Her dad flashed his eyes toward her. “What is it?”
“It just looked like it needed a little sprucing up is all. I don’t know if you hire the same people for spring cleaning?”
“I did it all myself the past few years. They changed management and started to rip me off. You know I don’t have much patience for that,” Wes said.
Admittedly, in Susan’s memory, her father had very little patience for anything. Her smile fluttered down and she looked at the water for a bit. It was obvious that her dad didn’t want to talk about any kind of neglect on the inn. The silence stretched between them. Was this really the life she wanted to return to? Full-time?
“I guess it’s about that time,” her father said then. “Ready?”
Susan showered and dressed quickly and met her father back downstairs. He wore the same jean jacket he’d always worn, its gold buttons as bright and shiny as ever. He remained trim and physically healthy. He grabbed the house keys as Susan checked to make sure everything was off in the kitchen. She didn’t want another fire incident.
Outside, Wes and Susan struck off down the once-familiar path that led from their house to the Sunrise Cove Inn. At the beginning, the path was lined with beautiful trees and caught a view of the water every few seconds, a reminder that it was never far from sight. Then, the edge of Oak Bluffs perked up, beautiful little streets with gorgeous houses that looked like gingerbread homes in all different arrays of colors. Between the cafés, ice cream parlors, horse and buggies carting tourists already, despite the earliness of the morning. Everything was already bustling.
As Susan continued to walk alongside her father, she couldn't help but remember all the high-end eateries there were to choose from, along with the ice cream parlors. The vineyard was always cool and casual and being on the ocean was always an inspiration for the island chefs. The one thing about the Vineyard was the people on the island always ate well and never went without.
The Sunrise Cove Inn had a massive porch that wrapped nearly around the entirety of the building, with several porch swings that looked out over the water. The Inn itself sat atop a slight hill. From there, sterling grey rocks that reflected the sunlight piled down toward the beach below. Between the rocks was a little pathway, with a staircase that allowed for easy access to the water. Susan stood on the porch of the Inn and gazed out at the beach while the winds rolled up the waves and cast them across the shore. Again, she could see them: herself, Christine, Lola, holding hands and leaping into the water and shrieking at how cold it was.
Out in the blue, she recognized a little boat with a man she had once known. Stan, wasn’t it? Stan Ellis. He had been a friend of her parents, a fisherman. He looked a bit more haggard, his back in a perfect curve as he yanked a line out from the water to bring up the perfect glitter of a fish. The motion was so timeless, like poetry. Susan held her breath as she stared.
Her father’s feet creaked over the floorboards as he approached behind her.
“Isn’t that Stan Ellis?” she asked without looking over at him.
“Guess it is,” her dad returned. “I haven’t talked to him in a while.”
Susan followed her father through the front door. Just like the exterior, the interior seemed neglected as well. The same couches lined the waiting area, now forlorn-looking and slightly torn. The front desk was clean yet ragged. Standing up with a phone to her ear was the new front desk concierge, Natalie: blonde and smiley. She placed the phone back on its hook and said, “Goodness, you must be Susan. It’s wonderful to finally meet you.”
“And you!” Susan returned.
They shook hands. Natalie looked as though she might bubble over.
“Wes has talked so much about his girls, I feel like I know you already,” Natalie said.
Susan felt a bit struck by the comment. She forced a wider smile. Wes pressed his hand across the top of the front desk and said, “I have a little meeting with some of the staff. Do you mind if I step away for a moment?”
Susan realized he spoke to her. Flustered, she said, “Oh, I don’t mind. No. Go ahead.”
This left Susan with Natalie. Natalie continued to beam at her. This was such a stark difference to anyone Susan normally dealt with in Newark. It was optimistic and pure.
“The Inn seems like it needs a little bit of... help,” Susan said suddenly as her eyes continued to scan the front lobby.
Natalie’s eyes flashed around confusedly. “Oh? Do you think so?”
Susan’s stomach clenched. “It just doesn’t seem the same as it did when I was younger. Maybe it works for the people who come? Dad said, that you’re already booked up for the summer.”
“Yes, we are! We used some internet advertising and got people in from all over the place,” she beamed. “I took a marketing class online and learned a thing or two. Your dad hardly knows how to use a computer, if you can believe it!”
“Oh, I believe it.” Susan’s smile became a bit more natural. Maybe she could use Natalie to get a better picture of the common occurrences at the inn and why it seemed so rough around the edges. “You know about my dad’s diagnosis, don’t you?”
Natalie’s face turned grey. “Yes. He only told me a few months ago. Of course, I noticed things around the inn—things that I had to pick up the slack for. But I was more than willing to do it. And still am. The thing is, I don’t know much about business, beyond what that marketing class taught me. And Wes has been in the hospitality business for as long as he’s been alive.”
“I’m going to pick up some of that slack,” Susan told her.
“Oh! So you’re staying, then?”
“I think so. For the time being until I figure everything out.”
“Then I look forward to being your friend, Susan.” Natalie's head nodded at her. Again, her words were welcoming and sweet.
Susan headed to her father’s office after that to wait for him. Her father’s office was also a relic—something of an expected thing, she supposed—with furniture from the ‘80s, a family portrait from maybe 1992 hanging on the wall (with styles that suited those times), and a massive desktop computer from probably 2002 atop the old desk. To his credit, the office remained clean and orderly. Engraved into the side of the desk remained the words—like always—Wes and Anna Sheridan. This had been the desk they had worked at together for as long as Susan could remember. This had been their office.
The office had its own little porch that overlooked the ocean and a fishing pier. Susan stood out and closed her eyes, feeling the fresh blast of the salty ocean wind whip across her cheeks and blow around her long chocolate locks around her face. When she opened her eyes again, she spotted Stan a bit further out. It seemed crazy to her that all the people on this island were doing the same things, performing the same tasks, even working on the same computer, for decades at a time.
“There she is!’ Her father’s voice boomed out from the doorway. A bit of color had returned to his cheeks. He looked vibrant and happy, the way he always had when he’d taken charge of something.
“Just catching as much as I can of this beautiful view,” Susan said. “I can’t believe I haven’t seen it in so many years.”
Again, her father seemed unwilling to dip into any kind of nostalgia. He nodded, maintaining his smile, and said, “I have a few more meetings during the morning. Do you want to meet back at the bistro at noon for lunch? The chef we’ve had for the past eight or nine months is to die for. I think you might have known him in high school.”
This piqued Susan’s curiosity. How many other people had stayed on at the island from her past? She agreed to meet her dad in an hour and decided to wander through town to check out the old sights until then.