Page 49 of A Nantucket Wedding

“How are you going to do that?” Poppy snapped, hands on her hips.

“They could share,” Alison suggested. “They could take turns.”

“NO! It’smywhale!” Hunter yelled, and with one final tug, he wrenched the long black rubber mass from Luke’s hands.

Luke tried to get hold of it again. Hunter raised his arms and slammed Luke in the face with the whale.

“Ow!” Luke screamed, falling to the ground.

“Oh, my God,” Felicity cried. “Luke’s bleeding!” She knelt over her son. “Sweetie, let Mommy look at your forehead.”

“No way can he be bleeding,” Poppy said officiously. “That thing is only a piece of rubber.”

“But it has two hard plastic tubes for blowing in the air,” Patrick told her quietly. “I think one of the tubes made the wound.”

Poppy shot daggers at her husband. “It’s hardly awound.”

Jane took a moment to check out her husband’s reaction to the quarrel. Scott had backed away from the group and stood watching with amazement, as if he’d never seen children fight before.

Alison took charge. “Felicity, take Luke and wash his cut. We’ve got ointment and Band-Aids in the downstairs bathroom. Patrick, would you please take the whale and fold it up again and return it to its home under the porch?”

“But it’smine,” Hunter protested, bursting into tears.

“Hunter should apologize to Luke for hitting him,” Jane said.

“He didn’t mean to,” Poppy argued. “He pulled it away and it was simply physics that caused the object to fly back. Hunter wasn’taimingat Luke.”

“No one gets the whale right now,” Alison pronounced sternly. “It’s time the children went down to the beach for a swim.”

Poppy glared at Alison.

Alison glared right back at her future daughter-in-law. “We should have one last swim. In a few hours we have to shower and pack and catch planes back to the real world.”

Patrick agreed. “She’s right. Come on, Daphne, Hunter. I’ll race you to the water.”

Poppy stood frowning.

Hunter dropped the whale and ran off, whooping. Luke gave the whale a long, covetous look. He saw his mother’s face, and his grandmother’s face, and his little shoulders sagged and he stayed away from the whale.

Felicity was proud of her son. “Come on,” she said, taking his hand. “We’ll look at your cut and then I’ll swim with you. You, too, Alice.”

Jane started to head for the water. She stopped, turning to her husband. “Aren’t you coming in? For one last swim?”

“No, thanks,” Scott said. “I’m going to shower and start packing.”

“I’ll go down with you, Jane,” Alison said. “I could use a nice cooling dip right now.”

—

As they flew back to New York, Jane and Scott didn’t talk. Scott wore his earphones whenever he flew, with his phone set to the latest news or a podcast. He wore his earphones in the taxi to their apartment, too.

That was fine with Jane. She knew Scott’s habits well. She had plenty of habits of her own and was uncomfortable breaking them. So she unpacked both their suitcases, started a load of laundry, and set her laptop on the kitchen table so she could check her email. She ordered in Thai from their favorite place and put together a small salad. She opened a bottle of pinot grigio. They would eat at six o’clock tonight, because Scott always watched60 Minutes,which came on at seven.

When the food delivery arrived, Scott said, “Smells wonderful.”

So that was promising. Scott was in a good mood and eatingwould make him feel more relaxed. She kept his wineglass topped up.

As they ate, they idly discussed the latest news. When they were finished, she took a deep breath, said a little prayer, and approached thechildrentopic with her husband.

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