(It made sense to Anthony, even now.)

“Anthony? Maybe I’ll come and visit you sometime soon.”

“Here?”

“Yes. There’s something I’d love to talk to you about.”

“Ah . . .” Anthony looked around the cottage. It was a two-bedroom, but, still, he couldn’t imagine his mother in the other bedroom. “Maybe not quite yet, Mom. I think I need to get my head on straight first. Alone.”

He was glad he couldn’t see his mother’s face; he didn’t want to know if he’d hurt her.

“Well, we’ll talk about it. It would be good for us to spend some time together. I’ll speak with you soon, okay? Hang in there.”

“Hanging in,” he said.

When they disconnected he texted Cassie. Can I talk to Max? If I call, will you answer?

Immediately the little bubbles popped up to tell him Cassie was writing back.

Not here. At camp.

But he’s alive though?

Of course he’s alive. Why wouldn’t he be alive?

On the screen, Travis was asking Leonard about the program he’d started to bring creative writing programs to state prisons across the country. Writers Unbarred, it was called. Give me a break, thought Anthony. He hadn’t known about the program.

“I just think everyone should have a voice,” said Leonard, shrugging. “Right? Maybe we’ve made mistakes, slipped off the path, but that doesn’t mean we shouldn’t all have a voice.”

“There he is,” said Travis, as the transitional music began to play, indicating the end of the segment. No questions about him, then, about Anthony. That must have been part of the agreement beforehand. “Leonard Puckett,” said Travis. “A great man, and a good man.”

“Bullshit,” Anthony told the television. “Bullshit, Travis. You can’t be both of those. Good or great. You have to pick one.” Anthony threw the remote at the television, but gently, more softball pitch than major league curveball, because he knew he couldn’t afford to replace the television or the remote.

He looked at the decanter with the beautiful golden liquid. He wanted it so badly, so very, very badly—he wanted the scorch, the burn, the slow warm ease of forgetting. But he couldn’t; he wouldn’t. Drinking, after all, was one of the things that had gotten him into this mess in the first place.

Chapter 11

JOY

ON THE TWENTY-FIFTH of June each year Joy drove her former neighbor, Helen Simmons, to the Island Cemetery to place a wreath of flowers on the grave of her husband Jack to mark the day of his death. Jack Simmons had died in 1997 at the age of sixty-four. This year Mrs. Simmons was eighty-four; she had been Joy’s first friend when Joy and Maggie moved to the island all those years ago, before they moved to their current cottage.

“When are you going to get married, Joy?” Mrs. Simmons asked about thirty seconds after she got into the car, accompanied, as always, by a great cloud of perfume. She always wore a summer dress to the cemetery, along with thick-soled orthopedic shoes (“Bunions!”) and pantyhose. Mrs. Simmons didn’t believe that a woman should show bare skin on the lower part of the body unless she was at home. Joy always put on a sundress out of respect but she drew the line at pantyhose. She had worked for two hours in the shop that morning in order to free herself up, and she had Maggie in there helping Olivia. Maggie could practically run the shop on her own.