Michael stuffed his hands into his pockets and felt for his “worry stone,” a milky white quartz pebble Connie had given him all those years ago. “Rub it whenever you need to calm down,” she’d said. He was surprised he hadn’t rubbed it down into fine grains of sand over the years—hell, he felt like he could rub it to sand at that very moment. “I don’t even know what you’re trying to get me to say. That was a long time ago.”

Poppy was growing impatient with his evasiveness, he could tell. Why couldn’t he just be honest? Instead he bit his lip, rubbed the stone, looked down at his feet as they kicked at the sandy ground.

She let out an exasperated sigh. “So, Carol says you want the house?”

Oh, God. The house. He’d almost forgotten that this was what all this was about. “You and Ann were going to sell it anyway.”

“Ann was going to. She railroaded me. We never even talked about it. But now that I’m back, I’m having second thoughts. She keeps telling me I can’t afford it, it’s so much work, it’s just a house, blah blah blah.”

“It’s not just a house, and I’m a legitimate heir.” A breeze picked up, a warm breeze from the south, carrying with it the surprising smell of summer.

“But why?”

“Why what?”

“Why do you want it? Even if you’re entitled, you could get some of the money from the sale.”

“I don’t give a damn about the money, you know that. I’ve always loved that house. It’s the only place where my life ever felt like it made any sense.” This felt like such an enormous confession that Michael couldn’t just stand there and let his words settle in the air around them. He started to walk because he had to move, had to escape his own weakness, had to resist everything Poppy wanted to say to him. He walked with a brisk pace through the empty parking lot until he got to the open shelter, perched on the edge of the bluff overlooking the Atlantic, where it had to be moved because of erosion. The whole damn Cape was getting chewed up on all sides the same way he was. The wind was so strong closer to the water that bits of sand blew into his face, and when he licked his lip, it tasted like salt. Poppy stood next to him, her hair tossing wildly in the cool ocean breeze. She tugged his sleeve again.

“Maybe we can think of something, the two of us. There must be some way for us to keep it.”

“But you said Ann is hot to sell, and you know she doesn’t want me to have it.”