But…Mallory doesn’t love him.

January passes. February passes.

Mallory doesn’t understand what’s wrong with her. Scott checks all the boxes.

She tries to break it down. She loves the way he smells. He has no annoying habits. He doesn’t overstay his welcome; he respects her time with Link, her time by herself. His taste in music is good; there’s a lot of overlap with hers, although his favorite band is the Red Hot Chili Peppers, a group Mallory can take or leave.

Her not-loving him has nothing to do with the Chili Peppers.

There’s no issue with the sex. The sex is amazing.

March passes.

Shall we use a golf metaphor? Why not, since at the end of March there’s a string of days when it’s nice enough for Scott to play and he asks Mallory and Link to meet him afterward so he and Link can continue to practice Link’s putting. Mallory’s feelings for Scott are the ball that glides toward the hole but stops just short, resting on the lip of the cup, eliciting a shout of disbelief and frustration. Drop in already! she thinks.

Mallory begins to fear that this isn’t something that “just needs more time.” What did Kitty say? Love is love—or not-love is not-love, as the case may be—and, really, there’s no explaining it.

But that feels like a cop-out. Mallory can explain it just fine.

Scott doesn’t read fiction, but Mallory once noticed him standing in front of the shelf that held the novels Jake sent her each Christmas. She’s not sure what she would have done if he’d picked one of the books up. Would she have asked him to put it down, like she did with Fifi? Tucked inside the newest book, The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time, is the envelope where Mallory keeps all of her fortunes from their weekends. What would she say if Scott saw them? Sand dollars that she and Jake found at Great Point are lined up in front of the books, and Scott did pick one of those up and Mallory felt anxious and sick during the seconds it took him to replace it.

Her Cat Stevens CDs and World Party’s Bang! are hidden in her underwear drawer. She can’t risk Scott playing them. Back in January, Scott asked if she wanted to drive up to Great Point, since she had the sticker, and she said no, she’d rather not.

Mallory loves Jake. Her heart is not transferrable. It has belonged to Jake since the first time he answered the phone in Coop’s room, since the afternoon he stepped off the ferry and onto the dock, since the moment he slid an omelet onto her plate.

What can she do about this? Anything? Is she simply being stubborn? Has she been, effectively, brainwashed? No; Mallory anticipated that she would someday meet a man who would eclipse Jake. She has even welcomed this, because although loving Jake is the sweetest kind of agony, it’s agony nonetheless.

The end of April brings the Daffodil Festival. This is the first big weekend of the year, the official start of the season on Nantucket. There’s a classic-car parade out to Sconset where everyone gathers to tailgate. Scott enters the Blazer in the parade and says he’ll decorate the car if Mallory will handle the theme and the picnic. Mallory and Apple come up with The Official Preppy Handbook as the theme—“Look, Muffy, a book for us”—and Mallory pulls out the Baltimore Junior League cookbook that Kitty gave her several Christmases ago to find recipes for their preppy picnic.

Mallory can’t believe how great the Blazer looks when Scott is finished with it. It has a blanket of daffodils on the hood and a cute daffodil wreath on the grille. It’s a sunny day, though chilly, but they decide to drive out to Sconset with the top down. Scott and Hugo sit up front in their navy blazers and pink oxford shirts and Mallory and Apple and Link and Roxanne sit in the back. Apple is wearing a white turtleneck and a navy cardigan, and Mallory has on a yellow Fair Isle sweater and the Bean Blucher moccasins she’s owned since high school. Link is in a polo shirt with the collar popped. They wave at the spectators on the side of Milestone Road, and Roxanne barks; she has on a collar printed with navy whales.

They get to Sconset and set up their picnic: gin and tonics, tea sandwiches, boiled asparagus spears, deviled eggs, tiny weenies in barbecue sauce. The judges come by and spend a long time admiring the fine detail on the sandwiches; they take note of the outfits, Apple’s grosgrain watchband, Scott’s tortoiseshell Jack Kennedy sunglasses. Mallory catches a glimpse of herself in the side-view mirror. In her sweater and pearl earrings, she looks alarmingly like Kitty. A photographer from the Inquirer and Mirror snaps a picture of Mallory and Scott in front of the Blazer. Scott tells the reporter the story about how he sold Mallory the Blazer back in the summer of 1993 and how they met ten years later and are now dating.

They win first prize for their tailgate and an honorable mention for the Blazer.

Mallory and Scott’s picture is on the front page of the newspaper the following Thursday, and if Mallory hears it once, she hears it a thousand times: You guys are so perfect together. You are the perfect couple.

To which Mallory responds, “The perfect couple? There’s no such thing.”

May arrives. When Fray takes Link for the weekend, Scott tells Mallory that he’s planned a getaway to Boston—a suite at the Four Seasons, luxury box at Fenway, dinner reservations at No. 9 Park. They’ve been talking about going to Boston all winter, but something always came up. Now that it’s happening, Scott sounds…nervous.

“The Japanese cherry blossoms are going to be at their peak in the Boston Public Garden,” he says. “We have to ride the Swan Boats; in fact, I may hire one so that we have it all to ourselves.”

Mallory knows she has waited too long. He’s going to propose. She imagines him pulling out a velvet box, opening it as the Swan Boat glides under the cotton-candy-pink blossoms of the Japanese cherry tree, presenting a ring in a way that he’s sure will fulfill her dreams. Mallory wants to shrink to the size of a mouse and scurry under the green tweed sofa. She wants to bury herself in the sand.

“Scott,” she says. “We need to talk.”

Summer #12: 2004

What are we talking about in 2004? The Boston Red Sox; quinoa; Pat Tillman; Fallujah; Condoleezza Rice; Indian Ocean tsunami; Ronald Reagan; “I’d like to phone a friend”; Julia Child; Janet Jackson’s wardrobe malfunction; Michael Bluth, Gob, George, Lucille, Maeby, Lindsay, and George Michael; Ken Jennings; Mean Girls; Momofuku; “It started out with a kiss, how did it end up like this?”

It’s the last day of school, and Mallory and Apple head out to celebrate. They decide to go for broke and have a late lunch on the luscious green lawn of the White Elephant Hotel. It’s the epitome of waterfront elegance, which is exactly what they both need after a hundred and eighty days of lockers slamming, fluorescent lights buzzing, and Cheetos flying through the air of the cafeteria.

The hostess at the White Elephant, Donna, has three boys who all went through the school system, naughty boys—Apple knew them well—so Donna seats Mallory and Apple at the edge of the patio with the best views across the harbor. There’s a guitar player named Tony Maroney singing “Fire and Rain.” Mallory flashes back to Jake in college. She wonders if he ever picks up his guitar anymore.