That, when he was eight, his parents sent him to boarding school.
When he was eleven, three other boys beat him up so badly that he had to go to the hospital. His parents didn’t visit. Just made a concerned phone cal to the school principal. He wasn’t lying. I know a liar when I see one.
“Your mom?”
He shrugged. He had this smal , slightly embarrassed smile on his face, and I thought maybe he regretted saying anything. “She is who she is. She’s not a bad person. She’s just . . . being a mother doesn’t come natural y to her. I’m pretty sure she had us because it satisfied a condition in the prenup.”
I asked him why he’d told me. He laughed and shook his head. “I don’t know. Maybe because you pissed me off.”
We went back to the house and he made sandwiches and we sat at the counter and talked about books （he likes Iain M. Banks, I like Terry Brooks, we both love Pratchett）。 I tried to find out more about Mike, without being too obvious. But I didn’t get much, other than the impression that maybe Mike’s family isn’t as uber-rich as the Spencers （they don’t have a yacht of their own, boohoo） and Tom hinted that Mike’s parents are going through a rocky patch, which was one of the reasons Mike wanted to get away from Virginia for a while. Tom said that their fathers are good friends but that he and Mike weren’t, particularly, before this trip. They hang out in col ege together, as part of a larger group of friends. It was Mike’s idea to come, to take the new boat up the coast and spend a week or two in Maine before heading back.
Mostly I was just happy that Mike wasn’t there and I didn’t have to see him or worry about anything bad happening to Tom, who genuinely seems to be a decent person, even if he is a bit sheltered.
When I got back to the hotel, I found out that I’d missed some drama. Marta’s sister cal ed while I was out and delivered the news that Marta’s precious boyfriend had cheated on her. Instead of cal ing the asshole and dumping him over the phone, Marta handed in her notice, forfeiting her end-of-season bonus, and packed her stuff, determined to run home and win him back. Why God, why??
Didn’t she read any Judy Blume when she was younger?? Forever is never real y forever. I did try to talk to her, but she just looked at me in a pitying you’l never know love kind of way that made me want to slap her, so I let her go. Now I have the room to myself, and while it’s lonelier than ever, I can’t pretend I’m sorry. It’s so nice to have silence.
Tom invited me back and I think I’m going to go. No more fake cleaning shifts though. That’s just weird. We’ve agreed that I’m not going to take any more jobs at the Spencer house, and if I come over it’l just be as friends. I’m hoping Rosa’l give me work at one of the other houses, so that I won’t miss out. And I’m looking forward to seeing Tom again. He’s interesting, he’s kind, and he’s funny. I like him, but . . . I don’t know. Can you ever be friends with someone when they’re rich and you’re broke? I guess, maybe, we’l find out.
Hannah
FOUR
TUESDAY, AUGUST 27, 2019
By Tuesday morning Hannah had a plan. Rachel had given her a starting point, with her little jibe about Hazel El ison failing to secure a job offer after her summer internship. On Monday night Hannah trawled through selected social media. She found that Sean had his social media accounts locked down on ful y private settings, but Camila’s were public and she posted a few times a week. Hazel was even more prolific. Between social media and the student newspaper, Hannah got al of the information she needed. Sean and Camila were both in their final year at UVA Law, and both had already accepted job offers from major law firms. Hazel was in her third year too, and had had a summer internship at McKnight Babbage in New York, but at the end of the summer there’d been no offer for her.
And there lay an opportunity.
By eight A.M. on Wednesday morning Hannah was ready. She made a cal to Hazel El ison, first routing her number through a website so that a 212 area code would come up on Hazel’s phone, rather than Hannah’s own cel number.
“Hel o?” Hazel sounded distracted, a little confused.
Hannah tried to tighten her voice, make it a little nasal sounding.
“Am I speaking with Hazel El ison?”
“Yes. Yes, that’s me.”
“I’m cal ing from Gabriel Ryan’s office at McKnight Babbage,”
Hannah said. According to Hazel’s social media posts, she had worked on Ryan’s team during her internship.