nudging the slip that caused Teddy to momentarily lose his equilibrium and grab on to the rail for support?
It’s not her, he told himself, shutting his eyes once more against the blinding sunlight. It’s not. Because it couldn’t be. The girl on the pier below was in her twenties, and Jacy would be in her midsixties now, on the cusp of old age. Before such irrefutable logic he reminded himself that his brain would have little choice but to genuflect, yet he was afraid to open his eyes. When he finally did, the world was still intensely bright but less painfully so, and he now saw that the girl in question wasn’t really with Lincoln, just standing next to him. And of course he didn’t have his arm around her. That had been a trick of light and shadow. Nor, once he really looked at her, did she resemble Jacy at all. No, it was the island that had conjured her up. That, plus the girl’s physical proximity to his old friend, and bingo! His too-susceptible mind had been tricked into believing the impossible.
And tomorrow, to this volatile mix, add Mickey. Was it possible that the three of them here on the Vineyard again after so many years might just blend a magic potion powerful enough to summon her? If so, he thought, feeling panic rise in his throat, he should just stay on the boat. Return to Woods Hole. He could be back in gray Syracuse by early evening.
But it was too late. Lincoln had seen him, too, and was waving. There was nothing to do but wave back.
The girl who wasn’t Jacy was also waving, and for a moment she seemed to be waving at him, but, no, it was the boy at Teddy’s elbow, whose presence he felt before turning to verify it, before the kid called “Hey, babe!” and began prancing down the gangplank toward this girl who was clearly the love of his young life. He would lose her, of course, because that’s how these things worked. What you can’t afford to lose is precisely what the world robs you of. How it knew what you needed the most, just so it could deny you that very thing, was a question for philosophers. Answer it and you’d have the kind of book Tom Ford would’ve considered worth writing: urgent and new and absolutely necessary. To write it, though, you’d have to be on fire.
* * *
—
“JEEZ,” TEDDY SAID, studying the photo of Lincoln’s family, the sun less intense on the deck of a tavern overlooking Oak Bluffs Harbor, with their cold pints of beer sweating on the wide railing. Teddy couldn’t remember the last time he’d had a beer. Their server had recommended a local IPA, and the first taste was so bitter he thought he should send it back. Now, the pint half gone, he’d revised his opinion. Somehow the bitterness had become almost pleasant. In his experience, bitterness had a tendency to do that.
The photo in question was on Lincoln’s iPad, which allowed Teddy to expand each face with his thumb and forefinger. Three girls, three boys, all medium height, slender, the girls strikingly beautiful, the boys all grinning, sandy-haired Robert Redfords. Their grandkids radiating health. “It’s like you and Anita have made it your personal mission to eradicate ugliness from the species.”
“Blame her, then,” Lincoln said, though he was clearly proud of his handsome brood. And it was true. The girls, especially, did take after their mother, who’d been a Minerva beauty herself. Yet Lincoln’s genes were also on display with the boys, their relaxed postures reeking of athleticism, probably tennis. They weren’t tall enough for basketball or brutish enough for football. Maybe baseball. And, knowing Lincoln, golf.
“Where’s Wolfgang Amadeus?” Teddy wondered, returning the iPad. He’d met Lincoln’s father only a handful of times, but he’d certainly made an impression and not just because of his name. “I’m surprised he allows family photos that he’s not part of.”
“We generally don’t show ’em to him for fear he’ll photo-shop himself in,” Lincoln said. “He’s lost some ground since Mom died, but he’s still Dub-Yay. Couple years ago we flew him up to Vegas for Clara’s wedding, and he stood up to give a speech at the rehearsal dinner. Nobody’d asked him to. He just assumed that people would want to hear what he had to say, even if most of them were strangers. Cody had to practically tackle him to get