All these things she’d thought she’d forgotten. But it turned out they were still inside her somewhere. She didn’t like the idea of all these memories just lying in wait, dormant. Ready to surge up and engulf her with no warning.

“What ever happened to Clara Collins?” she asked, though she had no idea why. She had just been thinking about how she didn’t want to muck about in Moonflower Bay memories.

But she had always had a soft spot for Clara.

Maya raised her eyebrows. “Why do you ask?”

“No reason.”

“No reason, my ass!”

“I was just thinking about how she used to like this fountain.” Which was true. Long after Eve had gotten over her fear of the fountain, she and Sawyer had visited with Clara in tow.

“Well, she’s about to start her last year of high school. She’s a great kid. Super smart, but also one of those annoyingly well-rounded people. I cast her in a lot of my plays.”

Eve was genuinely happy to hear it. Her newfound Sawyer-directed rage did not extend to Clara.

When they arrived at the beach, she asked, “Can we walk out on the pier?”

“Sure.” When they reached the railing at the end, Maya leaned over it. “The funeral was nice.”

Eve didn’t answer, just got out the urn.

“Though I have to say, I’m not sure if—Holy crap! What is that?”

“Lucille.”

“What?”

“She wanted to be scattered in the lake, but she didn’t say how. Like, should I take her out on a boat? Should it have been part of the service?” Eve’s voice cracked—it felt like something inside her was cracking, too—but she soldiered on. “Should I invite her friends?”

“Aww.” Maya slung an arm around Eve’s shoulder. “What do you think?”

“I think if she cared about details, she would have specified. She just said to cremate her and spread her ashes in the lake. I can imagine her adding, ‘And don’t make a big deal about it.’”

“Well, what are you waiting for, then?”

“I’m going to stay for a year and renovate the inn,” she whispered, realizing she wasn’t answering Maya’s question at all. She had no idea why she was whispering, except that saying it out loud felt like trying to talk through a mouthful of rocks.

Maya ran with the abrupt change of subject. “Wow.”

“I have no idea what I’m doing,” Eve said. “How does a person with no money renovate an inn?”

“That’s what YouTube is for. And we’ll help you.”

“Who’s ‘we’?”