“Did she ever talk about Mom with you?” Fliss frowned. “She said something.”
“What?”
“It was weird.” Fliss watched as Charlie chased across the sand in front of her. At this time of day he was allowed off the leash, and he weaved in great loops, as if he was tracking something. “She said it was hard seeing your daughter in love with the wrong man.”
“What’s weird about that? Dad was the wrong man for Mom. She was too gentle for him. Too compliant. She spent her whole life twisting herself into pretzel-like shapes trying to please him. And I empathize. He had the same effect on me. Every time he yelled, I couldn’t force a word out. Do you remember?”
“Trying not to.” She remembered her sister crouched under the table with her eyes squeezed shut and her hands over her ears. She remembered her father growing more and more angry when Harriet couldn’t speak smoothly. Vicious circle, she thought, with the emphasis on vicious.
And she remembered Daniel intervening. Standing firm between his father and his sisters, as he always had, and incurring his father’s wrath because of it. And when he’d left home to go to college, she’d taken on that role.
Would they be as close as siblings if it hadn’t been for their childhood?
If they’d grown up in a happy family, would they have flown the nest and spread out? Or would they still be living close to one another, looking out for each other?
“Well, Mom was no different. We all tried to keep a low profile. Apart from you, of course. You goaded him.”
Fliss lay back on the sand, watching as the sky darkened. “I still think there was something else. Grams looked at me in a funny way. Like I was missing something.”
“You’re imagining it.”
“I don’t think so. I’m not the one who digs around for emotional stuff. That’s you. I try to pretend it isn’t happening.”
“It’s unusual to hear you admit that.”
“Yeah, well, nothing that’s happening around here is usual. And Grams was definitely hiding something. And now, of course, I need to know what it is. Because that’s human nature. Did Mom ever talk to you about her and Dad?”
“Not really. Only that she got married quickly.”
“Because she was pregnant with Daniel. But we already knew that. Mom told me about it once when she was lecturing me on contraception. She told me that you never want to get married unless both of you feel the same way.”
And she’d ignored that advice, of course. The way she ignored all advice.
As a teenager she’d done the opposite of everything anyone had suggested.
“Poor Mom. Still, she’s happy now. Did you see the photos she posted of Antarctica?”
“Yes.” Fliss brushed the sand from her legs. Maybe Harriet was right. Maybe she was imagining things. And if there was something in her mother’s past, that was her business.
People had a right to secrets. They had a right to keep their thoughts and feelings inside if that was what they wanted.
It was exactly what she did.
“So when are you going to tell Seth the truth about who you are?”
“I don’t know. Maybe I won’t need to. You had lunch with him, by the way, at the beach café.”
“I like that place. What did I eat?”
“You had the Thai salad.”
“Did I enjoy it?”
Fliss grinned. “It wasn’t bad. A lot of people came up to me and said how pleased they were to see you. You’re loved, dear sister.”
“I hope you didn’t do anything to ruin my reputation. What were you wearing?”
“Nothing. I dined naked.”