That Summer by Jennifer Weiner (free e reader txt) 📗

Carmody?” Diana nodded, and Daisy, recognizing the name of the caretaker of Vernon’s place in Truro, felt her head begin to throb. This was bad, she realized. This was very, very bad. As awful as it would have been to learn that Hal was cheating on her, she knew that the truth, when she finally heard it, was going to be much, much worse.

“Michael was at your house—or your father-in-law’s house, I guess. And I saw a picture of you and Hal.”

Daisy winced. She could guess which picture Diana had seen, a shot of her and Hal on their wedding day. She’d always loved the picture. Hal looked so handsome in his crisp tuxedo with his dark curls, and she’d felt beautiful, and serene, and so hopeful, a beloved princess with her whole life ahead of her and the biggest hurdle—who will I marry? Will anyone love me enough to want to be with me forever?—already cleared.

“I thought I’d made my peace with it.” Diana’s voice was soft, her tone almost musing. “So much time had passed. I’m not the girl I was that summer. But then I saw that picture, and I found out that Hal had been there, on the Cape, every summer, for all those years.” Diana sighed, and lifted her chin, looking Daisy in the eyes. “I found out about you. And that he had a daughter. And that the boy—the one who was watching—”

Daisy shook her head. She felt as breathless as if she’d been punched, all the air forced out of her lungs. “No,” she said, an instant before Diana said, “was your brother.”

“No,” Daisy said again, but her voice was barely a whisper. “No, I don’t—I can’t believe that. He would never—Danny’s the kindest person I know!”

“Maybe.” Diana’s voice was grave. “Maybe he’s a good guy now. But, that summer, he saw what was happening, and he didn’t stop it.”

“Oh, God.” Daisy shook her head, back and forth, again and again, and finally managed to open her eyes. “Why are you here?” she whispered. “What do you want?”

“I used to know.” Diana’s voice was troubled. “I can tell you why I found you, and why I came, and what I wanted, and what I planned on doing.” She steepled her fingers on the table. “Except. Well.” A smile flashed across her face before vanishing as quickly as it had appeared. “I wasn’t expecting to like you so much. Or Beatrice.”

Daisy’s chair made a terrible screech as she shoved it back. The mommies at the next table stopped talking and looked their way. She wasn’t sure if Diana would get up, too, if she’d grab her by the arm or the shoulder, if she’d demand that Daisy sit back down or at least hand over her cell phone. But Diana didn’t say a word. She sat, composed and still, her face calm, her eyes watchful.

Somehow, Daisy got herself to the back of the restaurant, and found the ladies’ room. She made sure the bathroom door was locked, and then she slumped back against the cool, tiled wall. She thought of the man who’d carried Beatrice on his shoulders when she was small. Who’d taught Beatrice how to ice-skate by gliding along behind her, gripping her under her armpits, holding her up as she wobbled around the rink. She thought about her Danny, who used to give her five dollars, sometimes, when he came home from school, and walk her to the 7-Eleven on Bloomfield Avenue and let her buy whatever she wanted, Danny, whose home felt like a sanctuary, Danny who’d done nothing but good with his life.

She couldn’t imagine her brother watching a girl get raped. She couldn’t imagine Hal being a rapist. Yes, he had a temper; yes, he could get angry. But not rape. Not that.

Except, even as she tried to convince herself that it had never happened, at least not the way Diana said, her mind replayed a snippet of what Vernon had told Beatrice on Saturday night. Your dad was a wild one. But “wild” didn’t mean he’d raped a girl. Wild could have just meant drunk, or pulling pranks, vandalism and troublemaking. If Hal had been at a party, if he had known a girl—a girl exactly their daughter’s age—was being hurt, he would have stopped it, he would have stepped in and stopped it, and made sure the transgressors were punished.

But was that the truth, or only what Daisy wanted to be true?

Daisy gave her head a shake, and drew herself upright. At the sink, she splashed cold water on her cheeks and let it run over her wrists. She took a few deep breaths, and then unlocked the door. The table that she and Diana had occupied was empty. There were just two egg creams, a ten-dollar bill, and a note, scribbled on a paper napkin. I’m sorry, it read. Diana herself was gone.

Part

Five

The Downward Path

29 Daisy

When Diana Suzanne Rosen met Henry Albert Shoemaker, the summer before her senior year at Rutgers, she’d just completed three months of rigorous dieting. She wanted to be as confident as possible by the time the university spat her out into the world, and “confident,” of course, meant “thin.” So in May she’d signed herself up for Weight Watchers—again—and began tracking points, cutting out breads, desserts, and almost everything else she loved.

She’d moved back home for the summer, back to the apartment in West Orange. She slept on the pullout couch, while her mother took the bedroom. She’d wanted to be in New York City, sharing a summer sublet with roommates, with an internship, maybe at one of the food magazines, but she needed to earn money for her books and clothes and other incidentals. Instead, she lived at home, rent-free, and waitressed at a place called the Fox and the Hen, where she tried to avoid the older waiters, especially the one who liked