Contrast this with Mom’s, where I was summoned Monday nights for dinner and where I spent every other weekend. “You can always change your mind and move here,” Mom said at least twice per visit. She had painted “my” room purple—a lilac-hydrangea shade that I loved against my will. My bed was giant and covered in a fluffy white comforter with embroidered accent pillows. Where were those pillows the first eight years of my life, huh? Why couldn’t I have had pretty pillows in Wellfleet?
Beatrice, who told me to call her Maman, seemed to expect that I, like Hannah, would be bowled over by her fabulosity. I was not. She was beautiful. Stunning, really . . . her father Ethiopian, her mother Norwegian. Her French accent made her sound elegant （to be fair, anything sounded elegant compared to what we spoke here in Massachusetts）。 She had modeled in her early years and then gotten a design degree. She and my mother made quite a striking pair, Mom tall, blond and blue-eyed like her Danish ancestors, Beatrice with her shaved head, glowing brown skin and green eyes. It was like living with Tyra Banks. You couldn’t take your eyes off her.
“Lillie,” she told me the first weekend I stayed with them. My name sounded like Lee-Lee from her lips. “You must find a signature lip color. It defines a woman’s power and beauty, yes?”
“I’m eight,” I said.
“It is never too early to start,” she said. “Come! You may sit with me and try mine.”
“No, thanks.”
I didn’t want to like anything about Mom and Hannah’s new life. They had left me. My mother hadn’t even put up a fuss, really, and didn’t seem to miss me. She would simply sit back in her kitchen chair in the glaringly bright sunlight and point out the sparkling view, the flowers and the French food. Like Satan, she tried to steal my soul.
Between the party atmosphere, the wine, the food, the good looks, the superb conversation on things about which I knew nothing, I was lost. On the weekends I was forced to spend with them, I passed the time by throwing sticks or rocks into the bay, wooing seagulls with potato chips, hoping they’d crap on Beatrice’s vintage Peugeot convertible, and waiting till I could go home.
Hannah drank up everything Beatrice had to teach—how to dress, how to style her hair, how to care for her skin, eat less, walk more. By the time Hannah was sixteen, she could make boeuf à la mode and a fresh salad, could converse in French and Spanish, and I was a slumping teenager with oily skin and hairy arms, jealous and disgusted at the same time.
So that’s how it was—Mom with her steely edges and razor-sharp insults, always telling me in one way or another that all this could be mine, too. It wasn’t that she wanted me to live with her, not really. She just wanted to win another daughter so she could best my father.
But Hannah . . . Hannah had just tried to save herself. And she had.
Maybe, after all these years, it was time I started cutting Hannah some slack. She’d done what she had to do . . . and so had I.
I sighed and looked down at my notes.
Ceremony: Four o’clock, Saturday, October 14.
Thanks, sis.
CHAPTER 13
Melissa
Clear blue skies, seventy degrees and a wedding waiting to happen. The photographer snapped a few more pictures and muttered instructions to his assistants.
“Okay, Melissa,” he said to her. “Chin down, eyes on me, gorgeous, gorgeous, you’re so pretty, that’s it!”
She smiled. She was so pretty. It was true. She dropped her gaze to her bouquet, knowing her fresh eyelash extensions would show beautifully.
“Now, over by the window, eyes straight ahead, yes, yes, you’re sure you haven’t modeled, my God, you make my job easy.”
Oh, everything was perfect. Hannah had done an incredible job, Melissa had to hand it to her. Just looking out over the yard made her heart soar.
There were endless strands of bulbs across the vast green lawn （smelling like skunk no more, thank goodness!）。 Hannah was outside, talking to the crew of a half dozen people as they uplit a few trees and put out the three hundred luminarias that would be lit at dusk. The infinity pool was filled with small, floating glass bowls, each one holding a bobbing candle atop an orchid blossom. The centerpieces were cream and white roses, white hydrangeas, gardenias and orchids, all spilling out of beautiful Waterford Lismore Rose bowls. Above each table hung a stunning, huge flower arrangement with tiny fairy lights hidden within.
To the left of the vast yard, the ceremony area was set with chairs, the driftwood arch stunning under its cloak of flowers. Each row of seats had a bountiful floral arrangement, and it was utterly magical. The wedding favors were boxed and wrapped and set out by the exit—each guest would receive a one-of-a-kind Judith Stiles vase （she was a local potter, quite talented and the mother of a movie star, which would help Melissa’s influencer status hugely, she hoped）。 In addition, guests would get a sampling of Chequessett Chocolate truffles, a bag of specially roasted coffee from Beanstock, a bottle of locally made Dry Line gin and a set of gorgeous, heavy Waterford candlesticks.