“Everyone else sees Superwoman,” JP said. “I see someone who will do anything to avoid having sex with me.”
One rainy day when there had been no customers, JP taught Amy to waltz, a skill left over from his finishing-school days, he told her. Amy had always been a good dancer. She took to it naturally and she could tell JP was impressed.
“Vivi has no rhythm,” he said. “And no interest in touching me.”
A couple of days before Amy was due to leave Nantucket—her job search had turned up nothing, so she was heading back to Alabama to enroll in cosmetology school at her mother’s urging—JP insisted they pop a bottle of Cristal. This was a lavish gesture, but all summer Amy had watched JP spend money in careless ways （ordering this rare vintage, that crystal decanter, none of which ever sold）， so what was one more bottle of bubbly? Amy had never tasted Cristal.
One bottle led to another and then to half of a third. Amy stood in the doorway that opened onto Nantucket Harbor. The sun was low in the sky; it looked like honey dripping off a spoon. There were fewer boats in slips, and the murmur across the way at Cru was subdued. Summer was ending. The view was heartbreakingly beautiful—seagulls standing on the wooden bollards, a glimpse of Brant Point Light in the distance.
“How can I go back to Alabama?” she said.
Suddenly, JP was beside her. When Amy turned, JP cupped her face and kissed her, softly, deeply, expertly. The kiss seemed to contain an entire summer of flirting, discovery, barely sublimated sexual energy. Amy thought of the kiss as a sweet goodbye to a relationship that could never be. She wanted to thank him; in many ways, JP had been her finishing school.
When they finally pulled apart, JP said, his voice husky, “I want you to stay here. With me.”
It wasn’t just lip service, and apparently it wasn’t the Cristal talking either. JP was serious. He wanted Amy to stay on Nantucket; he wanted to be with her. The very next day, JP told Vivi that he had fallen for Amy Van Pelt, his employee.
It sometimes felt to Amy like JP was determined to change his life with a snap of his fingers. Vivi moved out; the wine store went belly-up; Amy commuted to cosmetology school on the Cape and rented a modest year-round apartment out by Nantucket Memorial Airport. When she graduated, she got a bottom-rung job at RJ Miller, sweeping up and washing hair. She also became the Hester Prynne of Nantucket; everyone knew she was the one who had broken up the Quinboro marriage. （It wasn’t like that! Amy wanted to shout, but no one would have listened.） Because she was young and naive, Amy had hoped that, with time, she and Vivi could become friends, or if not friends, then friendly, or if not friendly, then civil. Amy had tried reading one of Vivi’s books, The Angle of Light—JP kept first editions of all Vivi’s books in chronological order on a shelf in the den—but she couldn’t get into it. She wasn’t much of a reader, and she made the mistake of telling Willa, then a freshman in college, that the book hadn’t held her interest. Willa went home and told Vivi.
At some point, Amy began to suspect that JP hadn’t meant to leave Vivi at all, that he had simply wanted her attention, because everywhere Amy looked, Vivi was present. Why did JP keep her books on such a prominent shelf? Why did he reach for the Book Review first when they spent Sunday mornings reading the New York Times? Why did he bring Vivi’s name up in conversation whenever possible? Three years ago, when Amy moved in with JP （he’d made the offer only when Amy lost her year-round housing）， Amy found two of Vivi’s coats hanging in the closet. One was a pink wool belted driving coat, and the other was a flared white raincoat with three silver buckles that was lined with pale blue jacquard silk. Amy loved both coats so much that, if she’d had no pride, she might have worn them herself. She went through the pockets and found the stub of a movie ticket （Eat, Pray, Love） in one and a strawberry hard candy in another. Amy wondered if Vivi and JP had gone to see Eat, Pray, Love together or if Vivi had gone with her best friend, Savannah. Amy wondered where Vivi had picked up the hard candy as she unwrapped it and popped it in her mouth （she couldn’t resist a strawberry hard candy, with its soft middle, or any candy, no matter how old and forlorn）。 Amy had asked JP about the coats and he said, “Yeah, sorry, she must have left them behind. Vivi has always been careless with her things.” Amy gave the coats to Willa to take over to Vivi’s house, but Willa brought them back, saying, “Mom doesn’t want them.”
“Well, what am I supposed to do with them?” Amy said. “They’re her coats.”