How to Keep a Secret

Jenna

Envy: the desire to have for oneself

something possessed by another.

On her quest to make a romantic dinner, Jenna stopped at the store on her way home and bought food. While she was there, she paused by the magazines and glanced at the covers.

“How to Get a Bikini Body.”

“Beat Those Cravings.”

Judging from the covers, she wasn’t the only one with a problem.

She glanced over her shoulder to check no one was looking and dropped two magazines into her basket.

“Jenna? Jenna! I thought it was you.”

Jenna turned the magazines over. “Hi, Sylvia.”

She’d been at school with Sylvia, but their lives had diverged. Jenna had gone off to college and Sylvia had stayed on island and proceeded to pop out children as if she was on a personal mission to increase the number of year-rounders. Personally Jenna was relieved when the summer people left. The roads were clearer, the beaches were empty and you didn’t have to stand in line for ages at the bakery.

She put field greens, tomatoes and bell peppers into her basket. “How are the children?” Why had she asked that question? The Dentons had six kids. She could potentially be here for hours.

She only half listened as Sylvia talked about the stress of ferrying the children to and from piano lessons, swimming lessons, art class and football.

I’d like that type of stress, Jenna thought.

Sylvia was still talking. “And poor Kaley was in hospital with her asthma again. Your mom was so kind. Visited every day. She’s great with the kids. And she loves babies. Isn’t it about time you and Greg started a family?” The way Sylvia said it suggested that producing babies was something Jenna might have forgotten to do in the day-to-day pressure of living their lives.

Jenna fingered an overripe tomato, wondering whether the pleasure of pulping it against Sylvia’s perfect white shirt would outweigh the inevitable fallout.

Probably not.

She dropped the tomato into her basket and made a vague comment about being busy.

“I must get home.” She grabbed a bottle of wine. She probably shouldn’t be drinking, but she wasn’t pregnant, so why not? Greg wanted her to relax, didn’t he? She’d rather drink wine than go to yoga, and after her earlier encounter with her mother she needed it.

“My Alice loves those stories you read to them, Adventures with My Sister. Could you tell me the author? Is it a series? I’m going to buy those books for her birthday. Her favorite is the story about them freeing the lobsters.”

“They’re not published,” Jenna said. “I make them up. I used to tell stories to my niece when she was little and somehow I carried on doing it with my class.”

“No way! Really? Well you should be writing books, not teaching. Where do you get all those wonderful ideas? You must have quite the imagination.”

“Thank you.”

That and a colorful childhood to draw on for inspiration.

“If you wrote those stories down, the whole class would buy them, that’s for sure.”

Write the stories down.

Why hadn’t she ever thought of that?

Author: a person who composes a book, article or other written work.

“By the way—” Sylvia’s tone was casual “—I was driving through Edgartown half an hour ago and I happened to see a pickup truck parked outside your mother’s house. Guess who was driving it? Scott Rhodes.” She lowered her voice, as if the mere mention of that name might be enough to get her arrested. “He looked as bad and dangerous as ever. I swear the man never smiles. What is his problem? I didn’t know he knew your mom.”

She hadn’t known that either. Thoughts of a new life as an author flew from her head.