Kacy rolls onto her side. “And our senior banquet.”
“Stop it!” Coco says. She raises her beer. “Well, here’s to the summer ahead.”
Lamont laughs. “Let’s hope we survive it.” He stands. “I’m going to cast a few lines.”
“Oh!” Coco says. “Would you teach me?”
“Of course,” he says. “Come on.”
Kacy watches as Lamont takes his fishing rod out of the rack, and he and Coco walk to the water’s edge. Kacy can no longer hear what they’re saying but she can tell plenty from body language. Lamont shows Coco the reel, flips back the bail, and holds the line with his finger. Then he executes a gorgeous cast and starts reeling. Coco watches him with an expression of awe.
Kacy misses Isla. They’d gone to the beach together only once, at Half Moon Bay, on a weekend when Rondo was away at a conference. It had been overcast and chilly but they’d rolled up the bottoms of their jeans and strolled along the water holding hands until their feet were numb. They were, Kacy thinks now, like lovers in a movie. Then they ventured into the little town and ate sunchoke soup at the Moonside; they kissed across the table, marveling at being out in the world together, two tourists in a place where nobody knew them.
It’s Coco’s turn to try casting. She flips the bail and holds the line, but when she goes to cast, the line jerks and gets wrapped around the rod. Kacy tries not to laugh. She’s a pretty skilled surf caster herself—her father and brother saw to that—and for a second, she considers showing Coco how it’s done. But she won’t be that person. She will be the person who watches as Lamont steps behind Coco, wraps his arms around her, and shows her how to bring her arm back, then fluidly arc it forward, almost as if she’s skipping a stone across the water. This works: Coco’s line sails out over the waves with a satisfying whiz. Kacy sighs. The sun makes it look as though both Coco and Lamont have been dipped in gold.
10. Field and Oar
The Field and Oar Club allows members to bring two guests at a time, but for lunch on Monday, Phoebe Wheeler brings three. Will anyone challenge her? She breezes past the reception desk with a wave, and the young person Sam (they/their, though the old guard at the club pretend not to understand nonbinary) says, “Good afternoon, Mrs. Wheeler. Here for lunch?”
“You know it, Sam,” Phoebe says. Sam won’t question her guests; Phoebe helped Sam get their job here.
It’s only noon but the patio at the club is popping. It’s the first glorious week of summer, when every day feels like Friday. Diane is playing the piano—“Building a Mystery” by Sarah McLachlan—and nearly all the wrought-iron tables under umbrellas are occupied. There’s a table of women in tennis whites; one of boarding-school bros in polo shirts and loafers with no socks; one with a mother and daughter poring over a seating chart. Beyond the brick patio, guests can see a manicured green lawn, the giant iron anchor sculpture that children have climbed on for decades, the flagpole flying not only the American flag but the Field and Oar’s burgee, and the brilliant blue water of Nantucket Harbor.
As Phoebe approaches the hostess stand, she sees Busy Ambrose sliding her lightship basket up her arm and rising from her table. Busy is the Field and Oar’s commodore, and she’s a stickler for the rules; if she sees that Phoebe has brought three guests, she’ll make a comment. Phoebe believes she should be allowed to bring as many guests as she wants. She not only sits on the membership committee but chairs the scholarship committee, which means reading dozens of student essays on the topics of character and integrity, a thankless job. But Phoebe would like to avoid trouble, especially since it’s early in the season and one of today’s missions is to introduce Leslee Richardson to the club and the club to Leslee Richardson.
“Let’s take a quick tour,” Phoebe says to avoid a run-in with Busy. She leads the three women through the formal dining room and up the stairs. Leslee is right on Phoebe’s heels, wearing a sundress printed with yellow poppies. Behind her is Andrea, in white capris and a lavender tunic, and bringing up the rear is Delilah, who is decked out in what Phoebe thinks of as one of her “Field and Oar–aspirational” outfits—a kelly-green shirtdress with a stiff upturned collar and a bubble hem. Phoebe wishes Delilah wouldn’t try so hard; her own natural style would have been better. Delilah has paired the dress with matching green Jack Rogers sandals and a wicker purse with faux-tortoiseshell handles.
Phoebe acknowledges then that the reason she feels uncomfortable isn’t that she has too many guests. It’s that Delilah, who is Phoebe’s best friend in the universe, has been trying to get into the Field and Oar for years with no success. Phoebe, although she is on the membership committee and is in the room when the vote is taken, has no idea why. Other couples just have more support, and the Drakes are perennially passed over. Each time, Phoebe expresses her ardent endorsement of Jeffrey and Delilah, but she always gets the feeling that the other committee members are just waiting for her to finish.
Phoebe invited Andrea and Delilah along today so they could meet Leslee, but she knows that Delilah is watching like a proverbial hawk to make sure the Richardsons don’t leapfrog over her and Jeffrey to Field and Oar membership. Would that ever happen? Phoebe wonders. She dearly hopes not, but she admits that it might—Leslee Richardson presents well. On an island where you see the same faces year after year, she’s a breath of fresh air. She’s attractive, stylish, and a social butterfly; she’s already talking about a housewarming party and the first sunset sail on her new yacht.
“This is the Governor’s Room,” Phoebe says, showing off the classic lounge where she hosted her son’s thirteenth birthday party. They move out to the deck, which has an unimpeded view of the tennis courts; a group of kids are heading out for a sailing lesson. “And this is the jewel in our crown.” Phoebe opens a door with a brass porthole window. “The Burgee Bar.”
Delilah loves everything about the Field and Oar. It’s an old-school club where understatement is key. The decor is outdated, but there’s history in the faded chintz, the scuffs in the woodwork, the thick white paint. The walls boast plaques naming the winners of every regatta and tennis tournament since time immemorial. It’s easy for Delilah to imagine women coming for lunch in dirndl skirts, pearls, and white gloves sixty years ago. The club seems determined to keep the twenty-first century at bay; cell phones are forbidden, and therefore you won’t see the Field and Oar appearing on TikTok or Instagram or even Facebook. It can only be experienced in person.
Delilah’s favorite part of the Field and Oar is the Burgee Bar. Burgees from clubs across the country flutter from the ceiling. The bar is made from oak salvaged from the original club floor; the leather stools are comfortably worn; and they famously serve Bugles as a bar snack. Nothing about the Burgee is fancy or sleek, but it exudes the rarefied feel of members-only.
“This place could use a makeover,” Leslee says. “It’s a bit… tired.”
Delilah gives Phoebe a pointed look—Leslee Richardson doesn’t get it—which Phoebe ignores. “Shall we go down to lunch?” she says.
They’re seated at the best table—the one closest to the water that receives a welcome breeze—and Delilah feels like everyone in the place is whispering about her. Delilah and Jeffrey have been languishing on the wait list of this club for years. They can’t seem to get in, even with Phoebe on the membership committee. Jeffrey doesn’t give a rat’s ass, and that’s probably half the problem. He’s not good at schmoozing; his idea of cocktail-party chat is talking about aphids and organic fertilizer.
But there’s a part of Delilah that worries she’s the problem. For years, she was the hostess at the Scarlet Begonia on Water Street, a place known for its spinach-artichoke dip and its wild after-hours scene. Delilah hasn’t worked at the Begonia in over a decade, but she wonders if any of the members here saw her drinking bourbon at the bar at two in the morning, hair frizzed out, blouse undone one button too far, when she had two little children at home. There was one fateful night when Delilah left the Begonia and mistook another Jeep Wagoneer for her own. The keys were in the console, right where Delilah left hers, and she drove it all the way home; it was only in the morning when Jeffrey woke up and went out to the driveway that she learned of her mistake. They returned the Wagoneer to town without anyone knowing, but Delilah found out later that the other Jeep belonged to Talbot Sweeney, a longtime member of the Field and Oar.
Their server appears wearing a name tag that says MEAGHAN and, below that, her hometown: ANNANDALE, VA. Phoebe orders a bottle of Sancerre and Leslee says, “Thank god you’re not a chardonnay drinker.” Delilah clears her throat; her go-to wine by the glass is the Chalk Hill chardonnay; is there something wrong with that? Meaghan leaves to fetch the wine, and Andrea, who is seated to Delilah’s left, goes straight into interview mode.
“So, Leslee, what made you want to come to Nantucket? Do you have friends here, did you come as a child, did you read a novel with Nantucket as the setting?”
Multiple choice, Delilah thinks. B would be the best answer, although Delilah’s own answer would have been D, none of the above. Delilah had run away from home, gone as far east as she could, and ended up here. (Maybe some of the Field and Oar members have heard this story and disapprove?)
“My only friend here so far is Phoebe,” Leslee says. She reaches over to squeeze Phoebe’s hand. Delilah cranes her neck; where is Meaghan with their wine? “Bull and I have spent time in Palm Beach, in Aspen, and, most recently, in the Virgin Islands. We tried the BVIs first. We stayed at Oil Nut Bay—”
“Addison and I love Oil Nut Bay!” Phoebe says and Delilah nudges Andrea’s knee under the table. Addison and Phoebe’s extravagant vacations are a topic.
“Then we spent a few weeks in St. John. We’ve never really done summer on the East Coast—we’ve always gone to Europe.”
Please, Delilah thinks, say something more obnoxious. What are they doing with this woman?
“But this past year we decided we wanted to give up our wandering ways and put down roots. Buy a house, make it a home. Lucky for us, Triple Eight Pocomo was on the market.”
“So lucky,” Phoebe says and again Delilah bumps Andrea’s leg. Is it so lucky that in a few years, the Richardsons are going to be living in a pineapple under the sea?
Meaghan arrives with the wine. Hallelujah, Delilah thinks.
They raise their glasses and Phoebe says, “Welcome, Leslee!”
Delilah smiles but says nothing. Leslee hasn’t done anything wrong but Delilah (stubbornly? childishly?) doesn’t want to welcome her. She doesn’t like the way Phoebe is fawning all over her, and is it not obvious that this woman is glomming on to Phoebe because she wants something? She’s a social climber, and the three of them are the rungs.
“What made you decide on that particular house?” Andrea asks. Ha! Delilah thinks. Andrea is tough with the questions today; Ed should put her in the interrogation room.
“The view, obviously. And the history. When we googled it, we saw it had been featured on the cover of Architectural Digest.”
It was Town and Country, actually, Delilah thinks, but why split hairs?
“But the thing that really sold me was the upstairs party room. You’ve heard about it? It was designed by Jennifer Quinn, the last Nantucket project she did before she started Real-Life Rehab and became a celebrity.”
“I have,” Phoebe says. “There was an article in the Wall Street Journal a few years ago about Nantucket homes with bars in them, and Triple Eight was featured.”
