Whatever the reason, Coco doesn’t want to see either of the Richardsons. She will pretend she’s asleep.
Her phone pings with a text. She reads it and then lies back in bed, blowing air at the ceiling. Ignore it, she thinks. But she can’t.
She opens the front door. “Hey,” she says.
“Hey,” Lamont says. He leans against the doorframe like one of the Abercrombie models from Coco’s youth. He’s wearing his crisp white captain’s shirt; Coco’s eyes are drawn to his neck and the pulse visible beneath his smooth brown skin.
“You do realize that showing up here in the middle of the night comes dangerously close to breaking the rule?” she says.
“Yes.” His eyes narrow at her. Has she ever been looked at so intensely? “My attraction to you is more powerful than my fear of breaking the rule.”
“Is it?” she asks. Her nipples harden beneath the white tank she wears to bed. She moves one inch closer to him but does not touch him. She wants him to be the one to cross the line.
“It is.” His voice is husky. He traces a finger along her exposed clavicle, dipping into the hollow at her neck. His touch is featherlight, more a tease than a touch, and it’s working. Coco feels a pulsing between her legs. She wants to undo his brass anchor belt buckle, but she stands perfectly still.
“I don’t want you to treat Leslee like the only woman in the world,” she says. “I want you to treat me that way.”
“Why do you think I’m here?” Finally, he bends down. His lips hover over hers for a second, then he kisses her and she pulls him inside.
22. The Summer Day
Falling in love, Sharon thinks, is even better in her fifties than it was in her twenties. Sharon and Romeo are adults. They don’t have to worry about first-time home ownership or raising kids or establishing careers. They have learned how to be present and enjoy a moment.
Romeo loves making romantic gestures. He appears at Sharon’s house with bouquets from the wildflower truck on Main Street; he brings Sharon a bunch of fresh mint from his garden and teaches her how to make mojitos. He picks Sharon up in his truck and they drive out to 40th Pole to watch the sunset with a bottle of wine, two sandwiches from Walters, and an ’80s playlist. Once it’s dark, they make out in the front seat like a couple of teenagers.
Sharon’s twins, Sterling and Colby, are surprisingly supportive of their mother’s new relationship. Sterling helps Sharon pick her outfits; Colby does her makeup.
“You look hot, Mom,” they say. “You’re a queen.”
Of all the kids, Robert is the most enamored with Romeo. Robert and Romeo watch MrBeast videos together, laughing their heads off, and Romeo plays Fortnite with Robert. (How does he know how to do this? Sharon wonders. It seems as esoteric to her as playing the bagpipes.) Romeo even gives Robert a driving lesson on the sandy roads that crisscross the moors behind Sharon’s house.
As July unfolds, Sharon and Romeo spend more and more time together—soon it’s every night except Fridays. Sharon reserves Fridays for her children, and Romeo catches up with his buddies at the Anglers’ Club. Taking one night apart feels healthy and normal—they’re each maintaining their own lives!—and it also makes them crazy to see each other. One Saturday, they go to the movies at the Dreamland and have dinner at the Boarding House bar. After dinner they stroll on Main Street, stopping to listen to a guitar player, then an a cappella group; they peek in the window of Stephanie’s, where Sharon sees a pair of shoes she likes, and they linger outside Fisher Real Estate and gawk at the picturesque estates in Shawkemo and Quaise. Do they imagine buying a home together? Sharon admits that it has crossed her mind. She’ll get the house on North Pasture Lane in the divorce but she has agreed to let Walker use the house for two weeks of the summer (when she made this concession, she’d imagined herself on one of the Mediterranean cruises Heather has since advised her to avoid). Romeo owns a cute saltbox on Hooper Farm Road that has a nice lawn he keeps mowed; there’s a basement apartment he rents out to servers from the Lobster Trap. Maybe next summer when Walker is in residence, Sharon will move in with Romeo.
She pulls him away from the real estate listings; she’s getting ahead of herself.
They pass the Gaslight, where there’s already a line forming; they can hear the strains of live music spilling out the open windows.
“Should we go in for a nightcap?” Romeo asks. “Maybe dance a little?”
Sharon has never been to the Gaslight, mostly because she’s worried she’ll feel like everyone’s mother. “Let’s save it for another night. I’m kind of tired.”
Will Romeo think she’s an old fuddy-duddy or that she lacks spontaneity? No. He pulls her close. “The sooner I can crawl into bed with you,” he says, “the better.”
On Wednesdays, Romeo gets off work at noon, and one day—is it already the seventeenth of July?—Sharon invites him to meet her at the Field and Oar Club for lunch. He hesitates, then says, “I won’t be dressed for it,” but Sharon tells him to bring a change of clothes to work; the club is just around the corner, he can walk.
“I want to show you off,” she says.
“If you want to get lunch on the water,” he says, “let’s go to the Brant Point Grill.”
“Don’t be silly,” she says. “The club is much nicer.” What she means is that the club is private and exclusive—and it’s only after Romeo sets foot in the foyer that she realizes he might be intimidated by this. When they take their table for two on the patio, Sharon feels like all conversations pause for one brief second. Maybe that’s because Diane, the piano player, is between songs. Sharon pretends not to notice, though she supposes Romeo’s presence is a big deal—this is the first time Sharon has brought a date to the club.
Diane, maybe as a wink, launches into “Changes” by David Bowie.
“Let’s order a drink,” Sharon says.
Once they sip on a couple of mind erasers—a Field and Oar specialty—Romeo visibly relaxes. He’s dressed perfectly, in a forest-green polo and khaki shorts and the driving moccasins he calls his “fancy shoes.” He’s much more appealing than the other men at the club, all of whom seem a bit effete in their pink oxfords and needlepoint belts, their tidy tennis whites, their painfully close shaves. Sharon could stare at Romeo all day; his profile belongs on a coin. His hair curls up at the collar of his shirt, and there’s just a touch of gray around his ears. When he puts on his reading glasses to peruse the menu, Sharon nearly dissolves into a puddle.
Romeo orders the steak sandwich with onion rings and Sharon the Cobb salad. While they’re at it, they order another round of mind erasers. The first one has made Sharon feel like she’s a soap bubble floating across the club’s impeccable lawn toward the harbor.
This bubble, however, threatens to pop when Busy Ambrose approaches the table.
“Sharon!” Busy says. “I see you’ve brought… a guest.”
Well, yes, Sharon thinks. That’s the only reason Busy would come over. If Sharon is alone or with the kids, Busy ignores her.
“Busy, you remember Romeo,” Sharon says. “It’s his first time to the club.”
“I imagine it would be,” Busy says. “He’s a very lucky man, finding someone like you, Sharon. Very lucky indeed.”
Does Busy not realize Romeo is sitting right there? Any slight is intentional; Busy knows better.
“I’m the one who’s lucky!” Sharon says.
Busy waves a dismissive hand. “The summer I turned seventeen, I had a steamy romance with one of the short-order cooks who worked at the snack bar here. My parents were distraught about it, of course, but they needn’t have worried. It was over the second we said goodbye at the ferry on Labor Day.” She turns to Romeo. “You work at the ferry, don’t you?”
Romeo leans back in his chair and graces Busy with his gorgeous smile. “I do, thank you for remembering.”
Busy’s expression is one of bland amusement, as though a child has spoken. “Sharon,” she says, “we have our membership committee meeting on August fourteenth. I’ll send a reminder to your email.”
