“You think?” Hope said.

“Well,” Allegra said. “Not as cute as us.”

MADELINE

At ten o’clock in the morning, there was a knock on her apartment door. Madeline had just written the first page of her new novel, The Before, on her legal pad. Angie liked the new title and was encouraged by the premise of a prequel to Islandia. She wasn’t quite as frantic as she had been about the popped bubble of B/G. If anything, she seemed almost exhilarated by having something to hold over Redd Dreyfus’s head. “I’ve been indebted to him for so long,” Angie said, “it was time for the tables to turn.”

“Do you mind me asking?” Madeline said. “What happened between you two?”

“I’ll tell you sometime,” Angie had said.

Madeline didn’t want to stand to open the door. The whole point of taking the apartment was to avoid random interruptions. But the knocking was insistent.

Who? Madeline thought.

If it was Rachel McMann “stopping by” to invite Madeline out for coffee, Madeline would lose her temper.

It might be Trevor. He was off today, working around the house and yard. He had threatened to come by and kidnap Madeline for a summertime adventure—a drive up to Great Point, lunch on the deck at Cru, a harbor sail on the Endeavor. “Chim-chiminey, chim-chiminey, chim-chim-cheroo!” Madeline would have a hard time turning her handsome husband down.

It might be Brick, with Hannah Dromanian. Brick and Hannah had started hanging out together in the aftermath of Allegra’s deception. Madeline was worried Brick would fall right into another all-consuming relationship, but it did seem like the two were primarily friends. Hannah was one of those kids whom Madeline thought of as a natural-born achiever. She wanted to succeed, go places, see things, do things, and Madeline thought she might be a good influence on Brick.

Madeline was relieved to know it would not be Eddie Pancik at the door.

The knocking continued. Madeline’s Mini Cooper was in the bricked spot. Whoever this was knew she was here, probably knew she was writing, and didn’t care.

Grace?

The thought occurred to Madeline only as she pulled open the door. Madeline called Grace every day and had invited her ten or twenty times to come into town and see the apartment. But Grace said she felt safer at home. She didn’t want to come into town and bump into anyone—and Madeline couldn’t blame her.

Madeline would have expected that, with all Grace had been through, she would have looked haggard or wrung out, much as she used to after a three-day migraine. But Grace looked radiant. She was wearing white shorts and a blue gingham halter top; she was the picture of summertime. Her eyes were shining, her skin glowed, her smile was warm and peaceful.

Peaceful? Madeline thought. How was that possible?

“Hi?” Madeline said.

“You did it,” Grace said.

“Did what?” Madeline said.

“You wrote this book about me and Benton!” Grace said. “It’s all in there—the mint tea, the pistachio macarons, the Rolling Stones singing ‘Loving Cup.’”

“I know, Grace. I’m so sorry,” Madeline said. “I told you, I’m not going to publish it…”

Grace started shaking and crying, and Madeline thought, She’s going to sue me anyway. Defamation of character. Libel. But then Grace took a step forward and wrapped her arms around Madeline.

“That was the ending I wanted,” Grace said.

“Living in the Virgin Islands?” Madeline said. “Bird-watching?”

“Happiness,” Grace said. “Peace.”

EDDIE

He thought about feeling sorry for himself. He thought about falling into despair. He thought about crying. He thought about listing all the things he would miss about being free.

But what Eddie ended up thinking about on the drive to MCI-Plymouth, a drive that couldn’t last long enough, as far as he was concerned, was the day the twins were born.

Allegra had popped out easily, as if from an ATM spitting out money. Here you go, everything you asked for!

Hope, however, had her umbilical cord wrapped around her neck, and before Eddie could process the arrival of his first baby, Grace was being raced to the emergency room for a cesarean section. Eddie left Allegra with the nurses and followed, pulling on scrubs as he was directed, hurrying to keep up.

He couldn’t watch the surgery—he didn’t have the stomach for that, his head was down between his knees so he didn’t faint—but he did remember seeing Hope’s tiny light-blue body, covered in blood, and he remembered his terror, his naked screaming fear.

She’s dead, he thought.

Grace called out in a voice he could barely stand to summon, She’s dead, Eddie, she’s dead!

She had a grip on his fingers—she was going to break them all cleanly in half—and he didn’t care.

He wouldn’t, he realized, care about his own self, his own person, ever again.

It turned out the baby wasn’t dead. Somehow the doctors, the nurses, the wizards and angels, got Hope breathing—but she couldn’t stay on Nantucket. She had to be MedFlighted to Boston, and Eddie was going with her. Eddie was in charge. Eddie was her father.

There was a lot of procedure that happened very quickly. Paramedics in blue jumpsuits, who struck Eddie as ridiculously calm and competent, strapped Hope onto a tiny stretcher. They applied heart monitors the size of dimes and an oxygen mask the size of an egg. Eddie went into the back of the helicopter with a human being small enough to nestle comfortably inside his Panama hat.