I go in for mine. Behind me, Jonah lets out a snort of disbelief as I extract two large rolling suitcases, a smaller carry-on, and a bulging laptop bag. “That can’t all be yours,” he says. When I don’t reply, he adds, “Did you pack your entire closet?”
Not even close, but he doesn’t have to know that. Or that the smaller suitcase is nothing but shoes. “We’re going to be here for two months,” I say.
Jonah narrows his eyes as he takes in my suitcases. They’re Tumi with pearlized aluminum casing, and I suppose if you didn’t know my mother bought them secondhand on eBay, they might look a little ostentatious. Especially in the middle of this shorts-and-T-shirt crowd. Gull Cove Island visitors have money—lots of it—but they don’t flaunt it. That’s part of the alleged charm of this place. “Guess Aunt Allison is doing all right,” Jonah says.
“Oh please,” I snap. “You were going to go to some fancy-ass science camp all summer, so don’t judge me for bringing wardrobe options.”
“Except I couldn’t afford it,” Jonah says. Something almost like anger flashes across his face before he composes his features into their usual expression of half-boredom, half-disdain. “And now I get to be here instead.”
I pause before the reflexive response lucky us crosses my lips. I don’t know a lot about my cousins’ financial situations. I know Aubrey’s mom is a nurse and her dad has spent the past ten years trying to write another book, so they’re probably comfortable but not rolling in it. Jonah’s parents’ situation is murkier. Uncle Anders is a financial consultant, supposedly, but the kind who works for himself instead of an actual company. A couple of weeks ago, when I was trying to find any information I could about Jonah’s family online, I stumbled across a short article in the Providence Journal about Uncle Anders in which a disgruntled former client called him “the Bernie Madoff of Rhode Island.”
I didn’t know who that was, so I had to look him up. Apparently Bernie Madoff was a financial adviser who went to jail after cheating thousands of investors in a giant Ponzi scheme. I’d felt a shocked little thrill then—our family had always been strange, but never criminal—until I kept reading. Ultimately, even though a couple of former clients reported him for fraud, all that could be proved was that Uncle Anders gave bad financial advice. It wasn’t a big enough story to make the New York papers, so my mother hadn’t seen it. She didn’t seem especially shocked when I told her. “Nobody with an ounce of common sense would ask Anders to help manage their money,” she’d said.
“Why?” I asked. “I thought he was supposed to be brilliant.”
“He is. But there’s only one person whose interests Anders has ever looked out for, and that’s Anders himself.”
“What about Aunt Victoria? Or Jonah?” I’d asked.
Mom’s lips had thinned. “I’m talking about business, not family.” But from the look on her face, she didn’t think much of those relationships, either. Which might have something to do with the bitter expression Jonah’s wearing right now.
Aubrey gazes around at the teeming crowd surrounding us. “No Gran,” she says sadly, like she honestly expected Mildred to be waiting for us. “Should we just grab a cab?”
“I guess. I don’t see any, though.” I squint against the emerging sun and pull my sunglasses from the top of my head, settling the large tortoiseshell frames across my nose.
“Allison.” It takes the name being repeated a few times—plus Jonah’s furrowed brow—before I look for the source. An old man, white-haired and frail, stands beside me, with his watery brown eyes fastened on my face. “Allison,” he repeats in a low, wavering voice. “You came back. Why did you come back?”
“I…” I glance between the man and my cousins, at a loss for words. People have told me I look like my mother—“surprisingly like her,” they sometimes add with a sideways glance at my dad—but I’ve never been mistaken for her before. Is it the dress? The sunglasses? Or is this guy just senile?
“Does Mildred know?” the man says, sounding agitated. “She wouldn’t like this, Allison. She wouldn’t like it at all.”
The back of my neck prickles. “I’m not Allison,” I say, pulling off my sunglasses. The old man startles and takes a step back, the heel of his shoe catching on a cobblestone. He nearly stumbles, but Aubrey darts forward lightning-quick and catches hold of his arm.
“You okay there?” she asks. He doesn’t reply, still looking at me as though he’s seen a ghost, and she adds, “It sounds like you know our grandmother? Mildred Story? This is Milly, Allison’s daughter, and I’m Aubrey. Adam Story is my father.” She gestures toward Jonah with her free hand. “And this is Jonah, he—”
“Adam,” the man says faintly. “Adam is here?”
“Oh no,” Aubrey says, smiling brightly. “Just me. I’m his daughter.”
The man looks forlorn and lost, one hand fumbling at the empty pocket of his cardigan like he just realized he left something important behind. “Adam had seeds of greatness, didn’t he? But he wasted them. Foolish boy. Could’ve changed it all with a word.”
Aubrey’s smile slips. “Could have changed what?”
“Granddad!” A harried voice floats our way, and I turn to see a girl around our age striding toward us. She’s short and muscular, with brown skin, freckles, and a cloud of dark hair. Both of her wrists are piled high with braided leather bracelets. “I told you to wait in front of Sweetfern! Parking was impossible because of all the damn tourists—” She pauses as she takes in the three of us surrounded by suitcases, with Aubrey still propping up her grandfather. “I mean new arrivals. Is he all right?” she asks, a note of anxiety creeping into her voice.
The man blinks slowly a few times, like he’s trying to bring her into focus. “Fine, Hazel. Just fine,” he murmurs. “A little tired, is all.”
Hazel takes hold of her grandfather’s arm, and Aubrey steps back. “I think we startled him,” she says apologetically, even though it was the other way around. “He seems to know our grandmother.”
“Really?” Hazel asks. “Who’s your grandmother?”
“Um, Mildred Story?” Aubrey says it like she’s not sure the name will register, but the girl’s eyes immediately widen. Her face, which had been tense and preoccupied, breaks into a wide smile.
“No way! You guys are Storys? What are you doing here?”
“Working at our grandmother’s resort for the summer,” Aubrey says.