My mom explained that she was going to get herself cleaned up so she could take better care of me and the new baby when he or she came. She said she was turning over a new leaf, and I could tell that she meant it. When my mom lied, her voice wobbled, but that day her voice was clear and strong.

She did get clean. She stopped taking drives with her creepy friend Shelly. She started eating three meals a day, and the fullness came back into her pretty face. One weekend I helped her paint the baby’s room a pale cornflower blue because she was certain it was a boy. My dad was clean then, too, and every night the three of us would cook dinner together and eat it in front of Jeopardy! and Wheel of Fortune. Afterward I’d do the dishes while Mom lay on the couch and Dad rubbed her feet. Mom said she felt lucky to have such a wonderful family.

When Gus was born in February, a new kind of love bloomed inside my heart. I loved holding him and staring at his perfect, tiny features—I couldn’t believe he was my very own brother.

But Mom was different after Gus was born. She stayed in bed most of the day, and she barely smiled. She breastfed him for about six weeks before she started drinking again and switched him to formula. When I reminded her that she’d committed to staying clean, she looked at me with lost blue eyes and smiled absently.

“I know you’ll understand someday, darlin’. It’s all just a little too much.”

I held a vague awareness of “good parenting,” enough to know that my own parents did not fall into that category. I knew what a stable home looked like from TV shows like Leave It to Beaver, and—though they were few and far between—I knew a couple girls from school whose mothers packed them carefully curated lunches every day and could afford to take them shopping at the mall in Plattsburgh. I was shrewd enough to know that kind of parenting didn’t have to be rare, that Langs Valley was at one end of a wide spectrum. I’d developed a broad enough scope to understand that I hadn’t been born “lucky.”

We pulled into Libby’s driveway, and Gus shrieked with delight when he saw the Big Bird balloon tied to the mailbox. I helped him out of the car and we walked inside, crunching through the fresh snow in our boots. Libby had outdone herself. Balloons were all over the kitchen and living room, along with streamers and Sesame Street–themed party hats. A huge cake from a fancy bakery in Plattsburgh was covered in blue icing to look like Cookie Monster, with five cherry-red candles. The best part was the real-life Elmo sitting with the kids in the living room, and my eyes welled up as I watched Gus run over and wrap his arms around the giant red Muppet. I had never seen Gus look so excited.

“Lib!” I threw my arms around her neck. “This is too much. Where in the world did you find Elmo?”

“It’s Peter!” she whispered. “He found the costume in Plattsburgh. Isn’t it hilarious?”

I watched the kids swarming Elmo from all directions and couldn’t help but laugh at the thought of Peter—quiet, mysterious Peter—underneath the red furry suit. Maybe I’d been wrong about him. Maybe he was a better guy than I’d given him credit for.

A few were playmates of Gus’s from the neighborhood, but most were pals of Nate’s from his private preschool in Plattsburgh. I didn’t mind; I liked seeing Gus interact with other boys his age.

“I’ve never seen him so happy, Libby. Thank you.”

“It’s the least I can do, Heath.” Libby smiled, diamond studs glinting subtly from either ear. “You know how much I love that little guy. And how much I love his big sister.” In jeans and a white button-down shirt she radiated classy, easy beauty, her perfect baby girl propped on one hip, and I was overwhelmed by the feeling that so often struck me in her presence. It had become more of a mission than a feeling; with a heightened sense of urgency each passing day, I wanted to be exactly like Libby Fontaine.

Chapter Thirteen

Skye

APRIL 2019

I wake up to another email from Max LaPointe.

Fiancé is an older man, huh? Hope he knows what he’s getting himself into, Starling.

My stomach seesaws—Max must have seen my Instagram. The one I recently posted of Burke and me, the selfie from the morning we got engaged. But how? Max and I unfollowed each other on social media years ago. Possibly Max hates me almost as much as I hate him. Instinctively I reach across the bed for Burke, before I remember he’s already gone.

Burke leaves for work around eight. Like me, he’s a freelancer who works from home. Unlike me, it’s not for mental-health reasons, but nonetheless, we can’t get anything done when we’re both trying to focus in the apartment, so he’s been going to a WeWork in Chelsea.

I reread Max’s email. I hate the entitled way he’s called me Starling—his old, flirtatious name for me. I put my phone down and make myself a cup of coffee before sitting down at my desk. I’m about halfway through the first round of edits for my author Jan Jenkins’s new book, the next in her hit YA series about same-sex romances in middle school. Jan and I have been working together for almost five years, since before she was published. When she found me, she was disheveled and discouraged—newly divorced with two kids in college and a completed manuscript about a seventh-grade girl named Louise struggling with her sexuality. Unable to land an agent, Jan had decided to self-publish, and with my editorial guidance, her first book in the Loving Louise series made the USA Today bestseller list. After that she got multiple offers from major imprints, but in the interest of loyalty and maximizing profit margins, she opted to stick with self-publishing, and me. Now that Jan is on a book-a-year schedule, she keeps me busy, but I typically have a handful of smaller projects I’m working on at any given time. Still, Jan is unquestionably my biggest success story—having her as my author is what’s propelled and sustained my freelance career. And it’s work that would’ve made my mother, a book-publishing veteran, proud.

I’m just about to dive back into Jan’s manuscript when the thought hits me, irrational but unstoppable. Unless I touch every wooden object in the room right now, Burke is going to leave me.

Dr. Salam has taught me not to resist my compulsions the way I used to, and instead to “let them pass through.”

I sigh, place my coffee down, and then I’m off. There’s too much wood in this apartment, I think for the billionth time as I knock on the black-walnut desk and mahogany side tables and footstool and each of the wide-plank floorboards. Wall-to-wall carpet is a nightmare, but I can’t live like this.

I can’t live like this. How many times have I thought this? I think of my first day in Dr. Salam’s office, and the tiny seed of hope she planted in the midst of my fraught, panicked mind.

“Your compulsions exist because they serve a purpose for you, Skye.” Her voice was deliberate and clear. “They help you feel a sense of control in a world that is wildly uncontrollable. But I trust that, someday, they’ll no longer serve that purpose, and when that happens, you’ll cease to feel them at all.”

Someday, but not today.

I’m just finishing my knocks when my phone starts vibrating. Dad Cell.

“Hey, Dad.” I wouldn’t say my father and I are close, but I never screen his calls.

“Hey, sweetheart. You sound like you’re out of breath. How’s it going?”

“Fine,” I lie, plopping back down into my swivel desk chair. “Just doing some work.”

“Still working on the new book from Jan Jenkins?”

“Yup.”

“When does that come out again?”

“We’re aiming for November, and she’s already working on the next one.”

“Oh, wow. That’s great, honey. Your mom is beaming down on you. Well, I don’t mean to interrupt, but I wanted to let you know that we’re all set for Brant Point Grill for the rehearsal dinner on the twentieth.”

“Huh?” I swallow a sip of coffee, now lukewarm. “How did that happen? I thought they were booked until 2020?”

“Pops gave them a call.” Ah. So my grandfather threw money at the problem.

“Look, that’s sweet of Pops, but I told you Burke and I are more than fine with another venue—something more low-key—especially since it’s such a quick turnaround. We could even do it at the house.”

“Your grandmother feels strongly that the location for the rehearsal dinner should be different from the wedding venue.”

“Of course she does.” I sigh. My grandmother can barely remember Burke’s name, but when it comes to the planning of her granddaughter’s wedding, she’s more lucid than she’s been in years.

“Just go with it, Skye. You know it’s not worth going against Gammy in these situations.”

“I just feel bad. Clearly another wedding had reserved Brant Point that night, a couple who probably planned their wedding two years ago. I hate how Pops pays people off like he’s the Nantucket Mafia. I know he’s coming from a ‘place of love’ or whatever, but it makes me feel like a brat. And it’s not important, anyway. I don’t understand why he and Gammy have to hijack the wedding planning.”