Shannon was the first to arrive. She’d driven down in a crappy car that she’d purchased for herself with her own money. She’d made a deal with her father that he would only pay her rent and nothing more. “After that, it’s over,” Shannon had told him. “I want to stand on my own.”
Isabelle and Felicity weren’t like that, Arietta knew. They were happy to let their father pay for anything, as was their right, she supposed.
Arietta flung herself out the front door and hugged her eldest daughter tighter than she’d planned for. Shannon squeezed back, as though she’d needed a hug just as much. They stood in the driveway, listening to the waves lap on the nearby shore.
“You look good, sweetheart,” Arietta said, pulling back to look at her daughter, who, in fact, did not look good. She looked worn out and skinny. “Come on. Your sisters will be here in about two hours. Let’s eat some snacks and catch up.”
Arietta led Shannon to the veranda that stretched along the white beach, where she’d already set out a cheese board and some fresh bread and a bottle of red wine. It was a chillier day, in the upper sixties and overcast, so they wrapped blankets around their shoulders as they sipped their wine.
“Mom, are you all right?” Shannon asked. Her eyes were narrow and focused.
“I’m okay, honey.” Arietta tried to smile, but it didn’t feel natural.
“It’s just that on the phone the other night, you didn’t sound like yourself,” Shannon stated.
Arietta laughed. “I guess I won’t sound like myself for a while.”
“Yeah. That makes sense.” Shannon sipped her wine. “I’m glad you invited us to the island. We, um, we have to be there for each other. Especially now.”
“I agree.” Arietta knew it would be stupid to tell her daughters about the blackmail letter. She didn’t want them to go to the police and make a big fuss. She didn’t want to worry them.
“I guess I should tell you something.” Shannon sighed. “Cole and I broke up.”
Arietta’s shoulders dropped. Shannon and Cole had been an item since they were nineteen years old, and Arietta had assumed they were going to get married. She’d assumed that Shannon’s love life and therefore emotional life was taken care of.
“Oh, honey. I’m sorry. When did it happen?”
“A few weeks ago,” Shannon said. “It’s for the best, probably. He met someone else.”
Arietta’s eyes widened. She couldn’t stop herself from saying, “Met someone else? People meet other people all the time. But they don’t let themselves…” She trailed off, suddenly horrified. Shannon didn’t need to hear this from her.
“He didn’t love me anymore, I guess,” Shannon said simply. “It doesn’t really matter. Not in the grand scheme of things.”
“It matters, honey,” Arietta said. “But you’ll meet someone else. You’ll meet someone who knows how to treat you. How to respect you.”
Shannon couldn’t look at Arietta, not then. Arietta reached for a piece of cheese and placed it on her tongue, closing her eyes against the ripeness, the bitterness, the salt.
She wondered,had she and Fred had a good marriage? Had their marriage been a good model for their daughters?
This wasn’t something she felt comfortable asking, so she kept quiet.
When Felicity and Isabelle came, things livened up a little bit. Her happy, more frivolous daughters had brought bouquets and bottles of wine and an entire chocolate-cherry cheesecake, which they broke into right away.
“My favorite,” Arietta said, her mouth full of melting chocolate.
“We know!” Isabella sang, smiling.
After the cake, the three sisters went to the guest room to visit their father. Arietta stood in the doorway, watching and listening as Isabelle and Felicity told their father stories of their previous few weeks. Isabella set up flowers on the windowsill, and Felicity combed her father’s hair. All the while, Shannon sat in silence at the foot of Fred’s bed, watching him.
Arietta knew that Shannon knew just as much about the brain as she did, if not more. She was a scientist, after all. Shannon saw no reason to speak to Fred, not even for her own emotional health.
“Oh, Isabelle, tell Daddy about your new boyfriend,” Felicity said, her voice wavering.
Isabella blushed, then turned her eyes to Arietta in the doorway. “It’s sort of new. I mean, he isn’t really my boyfriend yet.”
“Tell the truth, Izzy,” Felicity teased her. “He asked you to be his girlfriend, and you said…”
“I said I’d think about it,” Isabelle said, laughing.