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Back The Summer Cottage
Chapters (75)
  1. Cover
  2. Back Cover Text
  3. Praise
  4. Booklist
  5. About the Author
  6. Dedication
  7. Quote
  8. Prologue
  9. Part One
  10. ONE
  11. TWO
  12. THREE
  13. Part Two
  14. FOUR
  15. FIVE
  16. SIX
  17. Part Three
  18. SEVEN
  19. EIGHT
  20. NINE
  21. TEN
  22. Part Four
  23. ELEVEN
  24. TWELVE
  25. THIRTEEN
  26. Part Five
  27. FOURTEEN
  28. FIFTEEN
  29. SIXTEEN
  30. SEVENTEEN
  31. Part Six
  32. EIGHTEEN
  33. NINETEEN
  34. TWENTY
  35. TWENTY-ONE
  36. Part Seven
  37. TWENTY-TWO
  38. TWENTY-THREE
  39. TWENTY-FOUR
  40. TWENTY-FIVE
  41. Part Eight
  42. TWENTY-SIX
  43. TWENTY-SEVEN
  44. TWENTY-EIGHT
  45. TWENTY-NINE
  46. Part Nine
  47. THIRTY
  48. THIRTY-ONE
  49. THIRTY-TWO
  50. THIRTY-THREE
  51. THIRTY-FOUR
  52. Part Ten
  53. THIRTY-FIVE
  54. THIRTY-SIX
  55. THIRTY-SEVEN
  56. THIRTY-EIGHT
  57. Part Eleven
  58. THIRTY-NINE
  59. FORTY
  60. FORTY-ONE
  61. Part Twelve
  62. FORTY-TWO
  63. FORTY-THREE
  64. FORTY-FOUR
  65. Part Thirteen
  66. FORTY-FIVE
  67. FORTY-SIX
  68. FORTY-SEVEN
  69. EPILOGUE
  70. ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
  71. AUTHOR NOTE
  72. Reader’s Guide
  73. Questions for Discussion
  74. The Heirloom Garden
  75. Abby

I shake my head, pour another cup of coffee and hurry upstairs, toward the turret, the place I used to dream big as a girl.

My heart races—partly because of the climb and the caffeine, and partly because I haven’t been up here in years—and as I reach the narrow, circular staircase that leads to the turret, I hold my cup above my head and bend over into a comma to reach the top.

Sunlight overwhelms me as I step into the round space, encircled by windows, making me feel as I have climbed to the top of one of the beautiful Michigan lighthouses that dot the coastline. It’s even colder than I imagined up here, and I can see my breath in front of me. I take a seat on the cushioned bench my dad made to fit the space, sip my coffee and look out at the lake. It looks like it’s frozen for miles. There are large boulders of ice on the snow-covered shore, and waves frozen in midair, big enough for people to walk into, creating mini-glaciers or...

I stop and actually laugh out loud at the ironic analogy I was about to make.

Don’t say it, I think, but it’s too late. Ice castles.

I narrow my eyes and focus my gaze, and I can pinpoint the line in the distance where the lake is no longer frozen. I move my eyes slowly toward the shore, and I can see the ice undulate, the lake ripple below it, life trapped underneath, just waiting for the spring thaw.

I shut my eyes and can see myself up here as a little girl, dressed as Wonder Woman, standing atop this bench, thinking all it took was a golden lasso and a firm belief in my own abilities to fly as high and as far as I wanted, to change the world. I remember thinking I could soar over the lake, just like one of the gulls that float on the current forever before diving headfirst into the water with a big splash to retrieve a fish.

Splish!

I open my eyes at the watery sound and look into my cup, the coffee moving in small waves as if I’d just skipped a rock across its surface.

Wait! I think to myself. Did I do that?

I shut my eyes again and picture myself as Wonder Woman soaring like a gull and then diving...

Splash!

I open my eyes, and my coffee is, indeed, moving. I feel like—who was that psychic my grandparents said they always used to watch on The Tonight Show?—Uri Geller! I shut my eyes again, bow my head and concentrate.

Splat!

This time, water hits the back of my head instead of my coffee, and I can feel a big, cold drop rolling down my back. I look up.

“Oh, shit,” I say, as another drop falls into my open mouth.