What I Thought Was True Read Free

neither. Mrs. Ellington always seemed timeless to me, like
    a character from one of those old books Grandpa brings home
    from yard sales, with her crisp New England accent, straight
    back, strong opinions. I remember her snapping back to some
    summer person who asked “What’s wrong with him?” about
    Em: “Not as much as is wrong with you .” When Nic and I used to go along with Mom on jobs, back when we were little, Mrs.
    E. gave us frosted sugar cookies and homemade lemonade, and
    let us sway in the hammock on her porch while Mom marched
    around the house with her vacuum cleaner and mop.
    But . . . it would be an island job. A working-for-the-
    summer-people job. And I’ve promised myself I won’t do that.
    Rubbing her eyes with thumb and forefinger, Mom polishes
    off her soda and plunks the can down with a tinny clink. More
    tendrils of hair snake out of her ponytail, clinging in little coils to her damp, flushed cheeks.
    “What would the hours be, again?” I ask.
    “That’s the best part! Nine to four. You’d get her breakfast,
    fix lunch—she naps in the afternoon, so you’d have time free.
    Her son wants someone to start on Monday. It’s three times
    what your dad can pay. For a lot less work. A good deal, Gwen.”
    She lays out this trump card cautiously, sliding the “ you
    need to do this ” carefully underneath the “ you want to do this .”
    Whatever Nic and I can pull in during the summer helps
    during the Seashell dead zone, the long, slow months when
    most of the houses close up for the season—when Mom has
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    fewer regulars, Dad shuts down Castle’s and does odd jobs
    until spring, and Em’s bills keep coming.
    “What about her own family?” I ask.
    Mom hitches a shoulder, up, down, casual. “According to
    Henry, they won’t be there. He does something on Wall Street,
    is super-busy. The boys are grown now—Henry says they don’t
    want to spend their whole summer on a sleepy island with
    their grandma the way they did when they were younger.”
    I make a face. I may have my own thoughts about how small
    and quiet Seashell can be, but I live here. I’m allowed. “Not
    even to help their own grandmother?”
    “Who knows what goes on in families, hon. Other people’s
    stories.”
    Are their own.
    I know this by heart.
    Emory bounces back into the room with Mom’s fuzzy slip-
    pers—a matted furry green one and a red, both for the left
    foot. Reaching out for Mom’s leg, he pulls off the remaining
    sneaker, rubs her instep.
    “Thanks, bunny rabbit,” Mom says as he carefully positions
    one slipper, repeating the routine on the other foot. “What do
    you say, Gwen?” Mom leans into me, nudging my knee with
    hers.
    “I’d have afternoons and nights free—every night?” I ask, as
    though this is some key point. As if I have a hoppin’ social life
    and a devoted boyfriend.
    “Every night,” Mom assures me, kindly not asking “What’s
    it matter, Gwen?”
    Every night free. Guaranteed. Working for Dad, I usually
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    wind up covering the shifts no one else wants—Fridays and
    Saturdays till closing. With all that time open, I can have a real summer, do the beach bonfires and the cookouts. Hang out
    with Vivie and Nic, swim down at the creek as the sun sets, the
    most beautiful time there. No school, no tutoring to do, no
    waking up at 4:30 to time for the swim team, none of those
    boys . . . Running into them yesterday at Castle’s was . . . yuck.
    Out at Mrs. E.’s, the farthest house on Seashell, I’d never have to see them.
    I can practically smell my freedom—salty breezes, green
    sun-warm sea-grass, hot fresh breezes blowing over the wet
    rocks, waves splashing, white foam against the dark curl of
    water.
    “I’ll do it.”
    It’s an island job. But only for one summer. For one fam-
    ily. It’s not what Mom did, starting to clean