One of my only concessions to my dotage is showering inside, not outside. No one needs to see an old woman in a towel walking around. No one wants to peek innocently out a third-floor window and get a glimpse of my gray head under a shower. No. Inside it is, in my own bathroom, in the shower or tub or whatever I choose. Started it the year I turned sixty and probably should have begun sooner. Bathing behind a closed door was sometimes the only time I was ever alone in the big house. I confess I used to look forward to my chores, because it gave me full rein while they were all off gallivanting. A big home calls out to guests, whether you intend it to or not. Of course, that’s what my father always envisioned, and I carry that forward. Room for guests, always. Still, I secretly longed for it empty. Maybe it’s not that secret anymore. Caroline always looks like she knows what everyone is thinking, even me.
The cottage is built better, solid, winterized. Can’t even hear when the wind blows offshore. But even in the large bathroom, still, I can hear them outside the door: Tom, John—a deep voice he has, it carries more than the others—the squeals of Sydney with her little friend. Things going on without Tripp, things that are the same. Smaller now, in this smaller space. Fitting, perhaps, I think. Fitting.
In my bedroom—mine, not ours; I must practice that—a small vanity tucked up under an eave. I comb my hair, swipe on a bit of lipstick, a few modest passes of shadow, eyelashes curled. Concessions to the inevitable.
An old white dress, a new blue wrap, legs tan as a lizard, as they always are, but I don’t look too worse for wear, I think, as I descend the stairs.
“Where are you going?” Caroline asked. They were all in the small kitchen. John slicing cucumbers, carrots. Neighbors’ casseroles warming in the oven. I smelled curry, garlic, things Tripp had never liked. Moving on, all of us, already.
“To the party,” I said.
“What…party?”
“The block party.”
They looked at each other. Or I should say Caroline looked at Tom, and Tom looked at his feet, then John looked at Caroline. A round-robin, could have been like a tennis match. Ping, pong.
“What block party?”
“The progressive block party.”
“You didn’t mention this, Mom. I—”
“Well, you weren’t invited. It’s the homeowner’s association, you see, and—”
“Mom,” Tom started to say, “don’t you think that maybe—”
“Maybe what, Tom?”
“That you should skip the party?”
“But we go every year!”
Surely my children remembered this!
“Mom, this year, maybe—”
“Because that man tore down half my house? I should hang my head in shame in front of the homeowner’s association, because my home is damaged? I assure you, they’ll side with me. I’ll get full support. Maybe find a good lawyer to help.”
“No, Mom, because of Dad.” Caroline said Dad in such a way, so hard and long, that it almost sounded like dead. Did she intend that?
“Your father RSVP’d yes to that party, Caroline. He would want me to honor that.”
Again, with the looks. As if I wouldn’t notice. As if I wasn’t standing right there.
“I think, under the circumstances, you’d be forgiven for being a no-show, don’t you? I mean, you’re grieving.”
The kitchen, so small, much smaller than ours. The living room, tiny. The heat of their bodies, the oven, the smell of their foreign foods.
“Your father would not want me to grieve. Not for one second. If you need me,” I said, “I’ll be at the Grinstaffs’.”
I threw that name out before I thought of it, and I confess, I regretted it a bit when I saw her face.
Here’s how it had always worked: hors d’oeuvres at the first house, buffet dinner at the second, dessert at the third. It was always houses between Jetties and Brant Point. Members rotated hosting duties over the years. Tripp and I had only hosted twice. People rode bikes with lights; neighbors walked in formation. How many times he and I had walked, arm in arm, the smell of warm rolls and bubbling chowder in the air as we made our way up the street.
But this year, walking alone, I saw a long line of cars. When I got closer, I saw that they had an attendant. Valet parking, with tipping, at a party! And who needed to drive when they lived around the corner?
I walked up the circular driveway, crunching my way across the shells, shaking my head at the man who opened the door in a waiter’s uniform. How many more employees would I encounter before I met the host and hostess?
I took a glass of champagne off a tray, wishing I’d called Beryl or Joan so we could arrive together. Everywhere I looked, there were young women dressed in high-heeled espadrilles. High heels at the beach! Who were these people? A few polite conversations led me to the belief that the Grinstaffs had invited a great many people beyond the local homeowners. There were people there from Madaket, ’Sconset, Wauwinet. Another tradition, out the window. I grabbed a shrimp skewer from a tray and nibbled it, thinking of Tripp. How he had loved shrimp. This one was chewy, overcooked.
Finally, a blond woman Caroline’s age came up and introduced herself as Teddy Grinstaff. When I told her my name, she took a step back.
“From across the street?”
“Yes, of course.”
“I’m sorry. I didn’t expect you.”
“Well, you invited me.”
“Yes, but—”
“Of course, it appears you invited the entire island.”
Her face clouded. “We try to be inclusive.”
“Is Kit here?”
“Who?”
“Your…mother-in-law?”
“Oh, Katherine died last year.”
I blinked. No one had told me. There’d been no obituary in the Nantucket paper.
“What a shame,” I said. “So you buried her nickname with her, did you?”
“Will you excuse me?” she said, her eyes fixed on something overhead.
I found Beryl, at last, on the porch. She wasn’t surprised to see me, not in the slightest. She said it was good that I was getting out. That I was carrying on. Life is for the living. I would accept all drinks, all skewers, and all condolences.
“They redecorated but haven’t changed much at all, have they?” Beryl said as we looked inside from the deck. Behind the glass, the same long living room, the same placement of a game table and a telescope. Plusher sofas, carpet, sconces, yes, but the basics remained. “But the food is awful.”
“Well,” I said, “she may have won her divorce case, but that dreadful woman spent all her money on waiters.”
“Yes,” she agreed. “As if people don’t have the strength to pick up their own hors d’oeuvres. And I heard they catered s’mores on the Fourth.”
“Did they hire whittlers to carve out sticks for the marshmallows?”
We shared a laugh, skipped the food, and walked down to the next house on Brant Point, to the Marshalls’, who had a sensible vat of fish stew bubbling, and where Karen Marshall was wearing an apron and wielding her own ladle, and who told me she was glad, so glad that I was there, that Tripp would have wanted me to come.
Of course he would.
But part of me wanted to tell her, tell someone, the awful truth. That Tripp also wanted me to kiteboard and jump out of a plane and ride a glittering, flashing skateboard from wherever we were to the next place. He was filled with want; for a man who appeared content, he simply wanted, far too much.