Chapter Thirty-Nine
Talia takes in Kelly’s childhood home, a stately brick Colonial with hunter-green shutters and arched, paned windows.
The house is set back from the road beyond low cobblestone walls on an exquisitely landscaped property.
Vibrant flower gardens border the plush lawn.
Pachysandra rambles beneath towering shade trees, and ivy scales their massive trunks.
“This is like stepping back in time,” Talia says as Kelly parks by the front door.
“Isn’t it? Do you want to come in and see my mom? She pretty much looks exactly the same, too, and I know she’d love to see you and meet Caleb if she’s in a good place this morning. But her moods change from day to day. Sometimes from minute to minute.”
“That’s okay. We’ll wait here. I’d love to see her, too, but if this is a bad day, I wouldn’t want to stress her out or confuse her.”
“My concern is the opposite.” Kelly nods toward Caleb, contentedly absorbed in the coloring books she bought him at CVS, along with three packages of colored markers.
Talia warned her that it wasn’t a good idea to hand a six-year-old ink pens in the white leather seat of a nice car, but Kelly shrugged it off.
“My mom can be so sweet on her good days,” Kelly tells her. “But on her bad days? Look out. She can be really angry. I know it’s part of the disease, but when she lashes out, I have to steer clear.”
“I’m so sorry, Kelly. I hate that you’re going through this.”
“I just hate that she is.” Leaving the car running, she sighs and grabs the drugstore prescription bag from the console. “Okay, I’ll be right back. Then, the beach! I promise!”
Talia watches her hurry toward the house. On the doorstep, she pauses for a moment, hand on the knob. Then she straightens her shoulders, holds her head high, and steps inside.
Poor Kelly. She rarely talks about her mother’s illness, but it’s obviously taking a toll.
Growing up, Talia occasionally related to her as a fellow only child, but more often, she was envious.
Kelly had two parents and plenty of money.
But in adulthood, she lost her doting father as unexpectedly as Talia lost Natalie, and all the money in the world can’t halt Beverly Barrow’s agonizing march into oblivion.
Hoping this is one of her good days, for Kelly’s sake, Talia notices the security camera mounted above the door.
On the night Gordy Klatte died, Beverly had told Kelly that Caroline had come to the house looking for her. They’d attributed it to her delusions before discovering that the camera had captured the visitor.
The footage was grainy, but the woman certainly looked like Caroline. She was left-handed, as Caroline was, wearing Caroline’s charm bracelet.
At first, they believed it was Caroline, still alive. Caroline, back in town . . . to kill Gordy Klatte?
Yeah, that hadn’t seemed likely at the time. The Caroline they knew and loved was incapable of violence.
Later, they realized that it was Mary Beth, posing as Caroline. Wearing Caroline’s bracelet. They’d always looked alike, and left-handedness is genetic, so . . .
Of course it was Mary Beth.
The Caroline they knew and loved was long dead.
Grief washes over Talia as if she’s just heard the news. There are too many memories in Mulberry Bay. It’s time to make some new ones. Happy ones.
Maybe Ben is back from his run and getting ready for the beach. Maybe Hayley is up and in a better mood. Maybe they can have a fun day together—or at least, a fun morning, before the rain begins.
She takes out her phone to check her messages.
There’s no word from Ben. That’s not surprising. He seemed eager to take a long run, something he rarely has time to do at home.
There’s nothing from Hayley either. She had yet to emerge from her room when they left the house.
“I was sure she got her period,” she told Ben. “PMS would explain the mood swings. Especially the way she’s been treating me.”
“Teenage girls are always hard on their mothers,” he said mildly, lacing up his running shoes as she threw things into her tote bag for the beach.
“She’s not even a teenager yet.”
“Then we’d better brace ourselves for a decade-long Hayl-storm.”
Talia must have had her share of blowups with Natalie at this age—but right now, she only recalls the good times.
It was just the two of them, and they were so much closer in age than Talia and Hayley are. So much closer, period. Is it possible that they didn’t experience the same friction?
If only she could pick up the phone and ask her mother how to navigate this.
It’s unfair that she was taken so soon; unfair, too, that Kelly’s father is gone and her mother might as well be. And Caroline . . . Caroline should be here.
On the radio, still tuned to the eighties station, Mike and the Mechanics are singing “The Living Years.” Talia reaches beneath her sunglasses and presses index fingers to the inside corners of her eyes to stop the tears.
Okay, this is ridiculous. She flips to the next station.
Ah, that’s better. She’s in the nineties now, with the Backstreet Boys.
She returns her attention to her phone.
There is one new message. It’s from Chloe’s mom, Camille.
I know you’re away, but when you have a minute, can you give me a call?
With Chloe away at camp all summer, Talia has welcomed some distance from her mom. Now, she supposes, Camille will want to pick up where they left off in June, with Camille constantly inviting her to have lunch or coffee or wine, and Talia trying to make convincing excuses.
It’s not that Talia dislikes the woman, but they’re circumstantial friends, basically in each other’s lives because the girls are inseparable. Camille is the kind of person who asks a lot of personal questions and tends to overshare, especially now that she’s going through a difficult divorce.
She ignores the text, opens a Google search on her phone, types in Britney Spears + Oops I Did It Again + which year album released, and hits enter.
2000.
So the DJ on Pop 2K had the year correct.
Then Midge must have been wrong that it was the CD in Caroline’s pink Walkman.
It’s an understandable error. Midge was never a Britney fan like the rest of them.
The Barrows’ front door opens, and Kelly steps out. Her mother is in the doorway.
Once a vibrant, athletic, attractive blonde, Beverly is gray and frail now, wearing baggy sweatpants and, on a hot summer day, a cardigan that sags on her skinny frame.
Talia sees Kelly hug her with a tenderness she rarely exhibits.
As she starts to step away, her mother grasps her wrist, appearing confused.
Kelly seems to reassure her. Then Mrs. Verga appears behind Beverly with a protective hand on her arm and shepherds her into the house as if to extract her from an unwelcome visitor, closing the door without a word to Kelly.
From behind, Talia sees her friend’s shoulders slump. After a moment, she turns around, her face drawn and weary. Then she seems to remember Talia and Caleb in the car, pastes on a smile, and hurries toward them.
“Who’s ready for a fun day at the beach?”