Silas had asked if he could take Eleanor out to dinner or come to her house for a drink but she had told him that for this last night she wanted to be alone, and he’d understood. When she moved into her new house, there would be plenty of days and nights to share a drink or a meal with Silas.
And truly, it was done. Legal papers had been signed. Eleanor’s name had been mentioned twice in the local newspaper’s report of real estate transactions. It was the end of an era, but as her ebullient son said, it was the beginning of a new era. Eleanor was, just a little bit, frightened. The walls of this house were as familiar to her as her own skin. And wasn’t she some kind of a traitor, to leave these walls, this house, knowing that very shortly, crews with diggers and growling tanklike machines with shovels would arrive to knock this house down into crushed and useless pieces?
When was the time in a person’s life that she could relieve herself of all responsibility? How did people feel when they moved into assisted living? Were they glad for the freedom from obligation? Probably. Still, Eleanor was sure that when the time came for her to move into assisted living, she would need her doctor to put her on some pretty heavy tranquilizers.
But now. She was here now and the September wind off the ocean carried a shiver of fall. Her hands were cold. The deck furniture was cold. Who was taking the deck furniture, Alicia or Cliff or Ari? No matter, they were the ones who knew when to come and what to take.
Eleanor went into the house, firmly closing the sliding door. It was cold in the house, too, of course. She had a custom of not turning the furnace on until October 1. Ridiculous, really, ridiculous, all the little rules she had made for herself in this house. She could forget the rules. She could remember the house in all the photos taken over the decades. Soon the house would be gone.
But the ocean would always remain.
Twenty-Eight
It was November, a month Eleanor always liked. The cranberry festival was over, cold winds swept the beaches, and the ocean reflected the gray of the cloudy sky. It was dark at four o’clock. It was a time of rest, Eleanor thought, for the island and for families, before the great celebrations of Christmas and New Year’s Eve. She could settle down with Shadow and a thick saga of a book. She could join her friends for a relaxed dinner out. She could dig out her wool sweaters, her flannel sheets and pajamas, her winter hat and gloves.
Today was going to be a different sort of day, and Eleanor was slightly nervous. Not about her family. She had spoken with her family last night and knew that all was well.
Ari and Beck were renting an apartment while they looked for houses. Ari was taking two courses at Boston University—she was going there, taking the MBTA Green Line right to the campus and climbing the stairs to her class. She told Eleanor she’d never felt more fit.
Alicia and Phillip were in the process of selling their Wellesley home, which was listed for more money than they’d imagined, and searching for what Alicia called a “pied-à-terre” in Boston. During the early fall weekends, they had been driving up into Vermont and New Hampshire, looking at homes in the mountains and staying at luxurious hotels with gorgeous walking paths. They’d even started trail riding with a group. When Eleanor spoke with them, they both seemed very happy.
Cliff and Judith bought a handsome home in the posh suburb of Belmont. They’d hired a decorator to furnish the house, from the living room drapes to the omelet pan in the kitchen. Eleanor thought this was slightly odd, because she considered her home as her nest. She couldn’t imagine snuggling down on a sofa without first feeling the fabric and the give of the cushion. Of course, she’d said nothing. She didn’t want to be considered a bothersome old lady.
Well, she might be old, but she was also extremely cool.
All by herself, she had created an organization, the Eleanor Sunderlund Beach Camp Foundation. During September and October, she’d met with Cal, Cleo, and Poppy, and together they’d met with the bank president and their lawyers to officially create the foundation as a nonprofit, with salaries and benefits for the director and her staff. They’d purchased the building on Amelia Drive that housed the current office, and they’d turned the upstairs of the building into two apartments where Cleo and Poppy could live in the summer.
Cleo would be the official director of the foundation. Eleanor was the president of the board. And she’d been able to invite exactly whom she liked to sit on the board. Silas, of course. When Muffy Andover learned that Eleanor gave three million dollars to Beach Camp, she’d immediately given three million five hundred thousand, so Eleanor asked her to be on the board and she accepted. Donnie Hamilton joined, and so did Beck Hathaway’s sister Michelle and a young schoolteacher, Lois Brady. Eleanor was glad to have some young people on the board. If foundations survived on wisdom, wealth, and work, the two young women could do a lot of the heavy lifting. Finally, Martha had joined the board, mostly so that she and Eleanor could gossip about everyone afterward.
This was their first official meeting, held in a conference room at the bank because construction workers were adding bathrooms and kitchens to the headquarters on Amelia Drive. It would take only five minutes to
