“Aunt Julia says that you three are working tirelessly to prove that it was Marcia Conrad,” Danny said. “And if you look at the dates, it adds up. Marcia began her film career directly after she left the Vineyard. Not only that, she directed her own film! Where did she get the capital to finance that?”
“Danny, I don’t think we know anything about this Marcia person. Certainly not enough to pin this against her.”
“But Alana showed me these emails,” Danny continued. “Yes, the text reads a lot like Grandpa’s writing. But then again, how do you explain the same exact prose in Marcia’s book many years later?”
“I’m sure that happens more than we think,” Ella interjected. “Sometimes, I would think that I had written the most incredibly inventive new song, only for someone to say, ‘Oh, that’s already been done.’”
Danny furrowed his brow, annoyed. Ella bit her tongue. Obviously, if her son wanted to believe in Bernard’s innocence, she had to let him. Besides, it seemed his passion behind it had given him a purpose on Nantucket Island.
“But you’re right,” Ella heard herself say. “There are many questions surrounding what happened with my father and my family all those years ago. If you find any answers, I hope you’ll tell your aunts. Or me, I guess.”
Danny’s eyes brightened slightly. “It’s like a detective mystery.”
“Something like that.”
Ella padded around the kitchen to make her son some eggs and toast. Throughout, Danny chatted evenly about a podcast he’d just listened to about the state of the music industry. Hint: it didn’t look good for future indie projects.
As Danny sliced through his eggs and ate, Ella said softly, “I can’t believe this is your last ‘first day’ of school before you run off to college.”
What she wanted to say was this:I’m so glad you made it to your last ‘first day’ of school and didn’t die in that hospital bed.But she held that in.
Danny rolled his eyes in that classic teenager way. “Yeah, yeah. You’re legally supposed to say that because you’re my mom.”
The walk to Nantucket High School was about a mile. Ella knew the route well. Danny insisted that he didn’t want his mother to walk him to school on his first day. Alana, who appeared on the staircase landing with sleep in her eyes, agreed.
“He’s seventeen. He has to make an appearance,” she scolded Ella.
Ella remembered just how into her appearance Alana had been back in high school, but she kept that to herself. That was a story from another time. Besides, “appearances” were very much important in high school. Ella wasn’t so out of touch to remember that.
“I love you!” Ella called from the porch with her hands wrapped around the railing.
Danny waved a sturdy hand back. As he grew smaller and smaller on his walk down the road, he became more and more like his father back in those days— the man who’d changed her life forever. Laura forced her eyes away and realized that Alana remained on the porch with her, bleary-eyed from sleep. Alana placed a hand on Ella’s shoulder and said, “I think today calls for a celebration. Don’t you?”
Ella groaned. “I don’t know if there’s anything to celebrate.”
“Come on. You just got your youngest off for his last ‘first day.’ If that’s not cause for celebration, I don’t know what is.”
Alana announced the plan to Julia, who said she needed an hour longer to edit a manuscript and then she could join. One after another, the Copperfield Sisters showered, changed into cute, autumnal outfits, and met in the foyer. They’d asked their mother to join, but Greta had shooed them out, saying, “Enjoy yourselves, you three. You can’t always have this old bird around.”
The Copperfield Sisters had protested, but eventually, Greta had convinced them. Within minutes, they were headed toward the little brunch place in downtown Nantucket, the adorably-named Black-Eyed Susan’s. It was the ultimate in comfort food, with Huevos Rancheros, Cheese Grits, Scrambles with heaps of toppings, Sourdough French Toast, and the world’s best coffee (or so everyone said). On that Tuesday morning in early September, several parents of school children sat laughing and gossiping, grateful to have gotten their children off to school on time. Several eyes turned toward Alana, Julia, and Ella, and a few hands even waved. This, Ella knew, was a rarity. But with Julia and Alana’s goodwill in the community, it seemed that Nantucket Island had begun to forgive the Copperfield Family. For better or for worse.
Although the place was bustling, the waitress seated them in a booth near the window. There, Alana and Julia sat next to the window while Ella remained standing to adjust her long-sleeved top. This was the first time since her “official” move back to Nantucket that she’d been out in public like this. Should she be embarrassed? She wasn’t sure.
“Why don’t you get the scramble, and I’ll get the French Toast, and we can share?” Julia negotiated her breakfast with the urgency of a lawyer.
As Ella turned to sit down, a pair of piercing eyes caught hers. The gaze came from the far corner. After a split-second, a woman in her forties leaped into the air, waved her arms wildly, and then screeched, “Ella Copperfield!”
As the woman breezed across the brunch spot to greet Ella, Ella’s heart pounded with fear.Who was this crazy person? Had anyone ever been so excited to see her?
But before she could fathom who in the world this was, the stranger’s arms were around her. Ella laughed with surprise and then coughed because the woman had taken the air out of her.
“Gosh, I’d heard rumors that you were back. I just wasn’t sure.” The woman stepped back and flashed a smile Ella would have recognized anywhere.
“Oh my gosh. Stephanie?” Ella’s smile nearly cracked her face open. It was her drummer from her very first band, the one who’d snuck off the island all those years ago to play in Greenwich Village. She rushed forward and hugged her ex-best-friend again, overwhelmed.
Stephanie cackled knowingly. When Ella stepped back again, Stephanie was blurry from Ella’s tears. Ella tried to take in the full image of this woman, whom she hadn’t seen even once since Ella had moved to New York to be with Will and start their band. Stephanie was just as gorgeous, with a little bit of comfortable fluff around the waist that suggested she had children. On her fourth finger, two rings glinted— an engagement band and a wedding band. Clearly, she’d been wealthy in happiness.
“Sit with us!” Alana called over Ella.