“Why don’t you and Liam bring Gemma here for a visit instead?” Celeste had suggested with a trans-Atlantic call to Paulina a few weeks earlier. The three of them were still busy bouncing around Europe. Paulina and Liam’s habits hadn’t changed much in the years since becoming parents, and Paulina insisted she was going to settle in one place “soon.” Constance was pushing them to plant themselves in the city so Gemma could have a proper education, but so far Paulina hadn’t committed.

“Oh, please come to the party! I can’t deal with Elodie’s dirty looks without you as a buffer. You’re honestly the only one I really want to see. And bring Heron—Gemma is begging us for a pet, so at least that might satisfy her for a weekend.” At the time, Celeste and Jack had a rescue dog named after her favorite Cape Cod bird.

Celeste agreed to go for the weekend—without the dog. She was staying at her parents’ on Park Avenue and Constance didn’t like animals because they smelled.

She mollified herself during the long drive with the fact that at such a huge party, the tension between her sisters would be swallowed up by the crowd. Celeste should have known it wouldn’t be that simple.

It wasn’t enough for her parents to have a wedding-sized party for their eight-year-old granddaughter. They also hosted a dinner the night before, family only, at the apartment. When Celeste arrived, she found that Paulina and Liam were also staying there for the weekend. She’d had enough of the acrimony between her sisters during the last visit, but her adorable niece was some consolation; Gemma was a sweet, shy child who looked a lot like Paulina, with the same flaxen hair and bright blue-green eyes. But even at that age she was clearly her own little person. She talked about her love of animals and how she wanted to be a veterinarian or an artist when she grew up.

Gemma showed Elodie a drawing she’d made, and Elodie sneered that she’d better learn to color properly if she planned on becoming an artist.

“Ease up,” Celeste had whispered, pulling her aside. “Whatever happened in the past isn’t her fault. She never did anything to you.”

“Her existence is doing something to me,” Elodie said. “Something you’d understand if you ever took a second to consider my feelings.”

It was hopeless. Years and years since the nuclear photos of Paulina, Liam, and Celeste on the beach, and Elodie was no closer to getting over it. She still hated Paulina, she resented the child, and she blamed Celeste for not taking her “side.” Celeste would have to just ride out the weekend, and the next time Paulina wanted to see her, it was going to have to be in Provincetown.

She had no idea that there wouldn’t be a next time.