“Date number three, I’m proposing,” JP says. He looks at Mattie. “Know any good jewelers?”
“What have you done with my friend?” Mattie asks Vivi.
JP keeps swinging by the dry cleaner’s with treats—one day it’s a sandwich from Something Natural, the next day it’s a bouquet from the truck that sells wildflowers on Main Street. He picks her up and drives her out to Madaket to see the sunset. They go to the movies at the Dreamland Theater. On her days off, he takes her to far-flung beaches—Smith’s Point, Quidnet, Coatue.
“I think I’m in love with JP,” Vivi tells Savannah. They’re sitting by Savannah’s pool with margaritas made by Mr. Hamilton.
“Lord help us,” Savannah says. “Listen, I like JP. He’s essentially a good guy and I’ve been impressed with him this summer because he’s treated you beautifully. But he’s soft, Vivi. He gets everything handed to him by his mother. He’s never held a real job and has no plan for the future, no ambition, no drive.”
“I’m not you,” Vivi says. “I don’t need those things.” She doesn’t tell Savannah that she and JP have already talked about spending the winter on Nantucket together. They might get a rental—JP says he’s keeping an ear to the ground—or Vivi might stay where she is and JP might stay in his mother’s house. The house isn’t winterized so it’ll be months of fires in the hearth and space heaters, but it sounds heavenly to Vivi, the two of them bundled up in a big old house that overlooks the harbor.
Vivi doesn’t share this vision with Savannah, but if she had, Savannah would have pointed out that Vivi hadn’t yet cleared the biggest hurdle to the relationship—she hadn’t met Lucinda.
JP invites Vivi to be his date for the Anchor Ball, held on the Saturday of Labor Day weekend at the Field and Oar Club. Vivi doesn’t have anything to wear, so Savannah lends her a pale pink sleeveless dress with a full skirt that makes Vivi feel like Audrey Hepburn. She borrows Savannah’s pearl necklace and earrings.
“Are you sure you don’t want to wear these yourself?” Vivi asks.
“I’m not going to the Anchor,” Savannah says. “You could not pay me enough money.”
“Why not?” Vivi says. She would feel more comfortable if Savannah was there. According to JP, nearly the entire club shows up for the Anchor. It’s a bastion of old-fashioned elegance. There’s a cocktail hour on the lawn where everyone gets pleasantly buzzed, then a sit-down dinner, then dancing all night to an orchestra. It sounds divine to Vivi—except for the part where she’ll finally meet Lucinda.
Lucinda won’t like her. Vivi comes from nowhere and no one. The Hamiltons and the Quinboros move in the same social circles, and the Hamiltons find Vivi pleasant and amusing, but their accepting Vivi as Savannah’s best friend is different from Lucinda accepting Vivi as JP’s girlfriend.
Or maybe it’s exactly the same, Vivi thinks. Maybe she can charm Lucinda with her intelligence, wit, self-sufficiency. She’s plucky! She’s a go-getter! Already she has been promoted to assistant manager at the dry cleaner’s and she’s in charge of training all the new staff. Besides this, she has a degree from Duke! She won the creative-writing award!
Vivi thinks back on all the hours she spent in the front seat of Brett Caspian’s Skylark driving around Parma, listening to the same songs over and over again. “Stone in Love,” “Jungleland,” “Fly Like an Eagle.” What a waste of time! She should have been reading Steinbeck or learning French or taking a ballroom-dancing class. She should have been improving herself, preparing for her eventual attendance at the Anchor Ball on Nantucket as the date of JP Quinboro.
Vivi and JP are ushered forward to shake hands with the commodore and rising commodore of the club before they officially enter the ball. Vivi tucks her cute pink velvet clutch (also Savannah’s) under her arm in a way she hopes seems elegant and Holly Golightly–like and offers her hand to the commodore. His name is Walter Rosen. His wife, Penny, is Lucinda’s best friend.
“Vivian Howe. Pleasure to meet you.”
Walter winks at Vivi and squeezes her hand warmly. “We’ve heard a hundred wonderful things about you,” he says. “Someone has finally captured the heart of our JP. Welcome, Vivi. My wife will be extremely jealous that I met you first.”
The rising commodore’s name is Chas Bonham. He’s only about ten years older than Vivi and JP, and though he’s more reserved than Walter, he’s very