Chapter 11
Lindsey sat in the back seat of Jake’s car, her hands wrapped tightly around her knees as they headed for downtown Nantucket. Taylor was in the passenger seat, sniffing, her eyes stirring with emotions that Lindsey couldn’t fathom.
Jake, who truly didn’t know Taylor Charron, was a calm and capable driver. He parked near the door, then turned to smile at Taylor and ask, “We’re going to get some food to take to the beach. What kind of stuff do you like?”
Taylor continued to look at Jake with confusion and gratefulness. “I like everything,” she said finally, shrugging, her voice so small.
Lindsey followed Jake into the bustling coffee shop, glancing behind her to watch as Taylor hid in the back seat of the car and covered her face.
At the big glass counter, Jake bent to assess the breakfast pastries, the ham-and-turkey-and-cheese sandwiches, and the mini quiches.
Lindsey’s heart swelled. All morning, they’d explored the island, and he’d pointed out birds and wildlife that she’d never appreciated before.
Now, he was helping one of the women of the Harbor House. Was there any end to his goodness?
Into three large paper bags, they collected what they’d purchased: pain au chocolat, baguette with cheeses, three kinds of cheeses, and a bottle of chilled white wine, which Jake wanted them to share on the beach.
“I want to celebrate the morning,” Jake explained as they headed back to the car.
“We saw three species I didn’t imagine we’d find, especially not the first morning out. I wonder if you’re my good luck charm?”
“Ha. I don’t know about that.” Lindsey reached for the door handle, then stopped. “You really don’t know who that woman is, do you?”
Jake raised his eyebrows. “Should I? I mean, is there something I should know?”
Lindsey smiled, realizing that she was in the company of someone incredibly “offline.” He hadn’t grown up watching television. He lived in a magical world of his own creation, a world of birds and nature and travel. She smiled inwardly.
Back in the car, Jake handed the bags back to Lindsey, who peered inside, her eyes enormous.
Was she hungry? Lindsey couldn’t tell. She buckled her seat belt and reminded herself that she had to treat Taylor Charron like everyone else.
Taylor was in trouble. Her emotional state was ragged at best. But how could she help her? What could she possibly say?
But Jake wasn’t held back by any uncertainty. As he drove them to the beach, he asked, “How is it at the Harbor House?”
“Oh, it’s nice,” Taylor murmured. “Winona is a sweetheart.”
“I can’t imagine what it’s like to stay with so many people at once,” Jake said. “Do you get on each other’s nerves?”
“Not yet,” Taylor said, although this wasn’t entirely true. Lindsey knew. Taylor chuckled gently.
When they reached the beach, Jake tugged a blanket from the trunk and spread it across the sand, so that Lindsey, Taylor, and Jake could sit in a line and watch the water as they ate.
Long before Taylor took her first bite, Jake pulled out his phone and began showing her photographs of the birds Lindsey and Jake had discovered that morning.
Lindsey smiled foolishly, watching Taylor’s expressions, which alternated between incredulity and joy.
Eventually, Jake spotted another bird down the beach, one he wanted to get closer to, and he left Lindsey and Taylor alone with their snacks and their glasses of wine. Sunlight warmed their cheeks. Lindsey tore at her piece of baguette and cheese, wondering what to say.
But it was Taylor who spoke first. “Thanks for getting me out of my funk, or whatever that was.”
Lindsey looked at this woman, this star. “Are you all right?”
Taylor raised her shoulders. “I got a text from my dad. Apparently, my mother passed away. It’s a total shock. I haven’t seen either of them in many years, and I didn’t know she was sick. But it was also the way he texted it. It felt so sterile. Like we hardly ever knew each other.”
Lindsey remembered when she’d learned about her own mother’s death, how it had rattled her. “Oh, I’m so sorry, Taylor,” she breathed. “That’s awful.”
“I don’t know. I don’t know what to make of it.
I came to Nantucket to, like, heal? But all I’ve done since I got here is hide myself away.
And now…” She shook her head. “There’s the funeral to deal with.
There will be interviews, I guess. Probably my agent will want me to ‘use’ this opportunity to generate pity and find a new gig. But I don’t think I have the energy.”
“That’s heinous,” Lindsey whispered.
“That’s Hollywood,” Taylor said.
Taylor took a bite of pain au chocolat and chewed slowly. Lindsey found herself praying that Taylor would eat more, that she’d fill out her aching bones. Down the beach, Jake continued to bird-watch, his eyes alert, his motions slow so as not to scare the birds off.
“Your boyfriend is someone special,” Taylor said suddenly.
Lindsey let out a sharp laugh. “I met him last night,” she explained when Taylor gave her a look.
“Wow. It seems like you’ve known each other for years,” Taylor said. “There’s trust there.”
“I don’t know about that.”
Taylor set her food to the side and stretched out on the blanket, so that her blond hair spilled out behind her, and she looked angelic. “Going to that funeral means facing many, many people I haven’t seen in a long time,” she said. “It means acknowledging the mess I’ve let myself turn into.”
“You’re not a mess,” Lindsey told her.
Taylor looked at her, her hands splayed across her forehead.
“Trust me, I’ve seen messes,” Lindsey said. “I’ve been a mess. You’re not a mess.”
Of course, she said this to make Taylor feel better. But in some ways, it felt true.
“It’s impossible to let anyone into what’s really going on,” Taylor said softly. “It’s impossible to explain yourself fully. Isn’t it?”
Lindsey nodded, searching her heart for a way through this.
“I hope you know we’re here to listen to that. To try our best to understand it,” Lindsey said, thinking of her sister, of her mother’s vision for the Harbor House.
Jake returned a moment later, exuberant from his bird-watching excursion and eager to show off his photographs.
Lindsey watched as Jake flicked through them, angling the phone toward Taylor Charron, a woman he’d never seen before, despite her appearance in hundreds of magazines, thousands of articles, five sitcoms, and twelve movies. He lived in another world.
Lindsey thought that maybe she’d like to know more of that world, if he was willing to share it.
Back in the car, Lindsey buckled herself in and offered a smile back at Taylor, whose hair was windswept.
Her cheeks were pink, as though that was the first real sun she’d gotten in a while.
As though she’d opened herself up to the elements for the first time.
Lindsey imagined that for most of the year, Taylor had been hidden away in her house.
Maybe this—friendship, laughter, beaches, nice food—was what Taylor Charron needed to recover. Maybe this was the next step.
Just then, an alert rang out on Lindsey’s phone. It was something from a gossip news site, and it read: TAYLOR CHARRON SPOTTED SOBBING ON NANTUCKET BEACH.
Lindsey’s stomach dropped. Jake was driving, talking to Taylor about something Nantucket-related, and Taylor seemed none the wiser. Obviously, Taylor didn’t get alerts about herself like that. She had to protect herself.
Careful not to let Taylor see, Lindsey opened the notification and saw a photograph of Taylor on the bench from earlier, sobbing, red-faced, her shoulders flung forward.
She looked terrible, skeletal, at the end of her rope.
She looked nothing like the woman who was smiling behind her now, asking Jake questions about his life, about birds, about nature.
Who could have taken the photograph? Lindsey’s heart thudded. She thought back to what Jake had said about Nantucket, how empty it was this time of year. But someone had come along. Someone had decided to sell Taylor out. What was worse was they’d probably gotten a lot of money for it.
Taylor laughed at something Jake said, and Lindsey hurried to hide the photograph away. Maybe Taylor would never have to know about it.
Back at the Harbor House, Taylor shook first Jake’s hand, then Lindsey’s, and thanked them for saving her. “I don’t know what I would have done without you. I thought I was going insane,” Taylor explained. She then raised her hand, waving at Winona, who waited for her on the porch.
Winona’s expression was difficult to read. She waved back, her face marred with panic. Lindsey knew, then, that Winona had seen the photograph of Taylor on the beach. Winona hurried toward Taylor, linked her arm through hers, and muttered, “It’s going to be all right.”
Lindsey and Jake hung back, watching as they scuttled up the stairs and back into the Harbor House. Jake put his hands on his hips, miffed.
“What was that about?” Jake asked.
Lindsey pulled her phone from her pocket and showed him the photograph.
Immediately, Jake’s face transformed. He looked furious. “Who would do this?” he demanded. “This is an invasion of privacy. This is cruel.”
Lindsey nodded sadly, her eyes on the Harbor House. All she wanted in the world was to hurry back inside and scoop Taylor into a hug. “We couldn’t protect her,” she whispered.
Jake sighed and rubbed his forehead. There was nothing else to say.
“I’ll drive you back.”
Lindsey slipped back into the passenger seat.
His car smelled of Taylor’s expensive perfume, plus the crisp and cheesy dough from their snacks earlier.
She thought to ask him whether today had been a date, but then felt too fatigued to ask.
They drove back to the Historic District in silence, where he parked in front of her apartment.
“You were kind to her earlier,” Lindsey said gently.
“I was a person to her,” Jake said. “Just another person.”
Lindsey fought the urge to throw her arms around Jake. She fought the urge to tell him, “I know what it’s like to lose someone, and I’m scared that already, I don’t want to lose you.”
Rather than freak him out, she thanked him for today. “It was really fun,” she said. “I never thought I’d take to birding like that.”
Jake offered her a meek smile. “Do you really mean that?”
Lindsey thought for a moment. “I’ll never be a professional birder. But being out there in the world, hearing why you love what you love, touched me. It’s something I could imagine doing again.” She pressed her lips together and drew her eyes to his.
“It would be my pleasure to do it again,” Jake told her. He said it as though he’d never thought himself half as lucky.
Lindsey smiled, then headed out of his car and hurried into her apartment, where she promptly fell face-first onto the bed and let out an excited scream.
Of course, the night wasn’t meant only for her euphoric feelings for Jake. Candice called half an hour later, groaning. “I’m assuming you saw the photo?”
“Yeah. I did.” Lindsey was curled up in her favorite chair, sipping tea and watching storm clouds brew over the water. “Does Taylor know yet?”
“Yes. It gets worse,” Candice said. “Apparently, Casey was the one to take the pictures. She sold them and left the Harbor House immediately.”
Lindsey was on her feet, her jaw slack. “You’re kidding.”
“We figured it out during the group session,” Candice explained.
“Taylor was there, withdrawn after the publication of the photograph but still eager to talk. We waited and waited for Casey to appear. I thought maybe she was too embarrassed by her behavior last night. But when we went to her room, we found that she’d packed up and left early.
Gwen called to check on her, and that’s when Casey confessed about the photograph. ”
Lindsey sat back down again, her heart pounding. “I can’t believe it. I can’t believe she’d take advantage of Taylor like that.”
“It sounded like she thought she was owed that. Especially from someone like Taylor,” Candice said. “But I hate it. We promised these women we would protect them.”
“We didn’t know we would have to protect them from each other,” Lindsey offered.
Candice was quiet. Lindsey could picture her, sitting in a lamplight at their mother’s desk. Reeling. Wondering.
“It’s going to be okay, Sis,” Lindsey told her. “Everyone’s safe.”
“We’ll see,” Candice offered. “Gwen won’t be able to sleep tonight. And I can feel Mom’s disappointment in us. The Harbor House was supposed to stand for something different.”
“It does,” Lindsey assured her. “It will.”