The only one who had no summer plans was Eileen, and she couldn’t afford to go anywhere now, since she was out of a job. She had enough money put aside to keep her afloat for two months, and she figured she’d have a job by then. Francesca suggested she go home to San Diego to see her family, but she didn’t want to. And after her stories about her father, Francesca didn’t insist. She felt sorry for her, she had nowhere to go. But every day was a vacation for Eileen now that she wasn’t working. She had started to send her résumé around to various special ed schools, but no one had offered her anything so far. Her references from her previous job were not good, from taking too much time off work, thanks to Brad. It wasn’t helping her find a new one. Brad had not only injured her, he had cost her her livelihood. She still hadn’t heard from him, and Francesca was relieved. Maybe he was gone for good. Chris knew better and doubted it.

“An abuser never loses sight of his prey. He’ll be back.”

“Maybe he’s found someone else to beat up,” Francesca said cynically.

“He’ll be back anyway,” Chris said. He was barely speaking to Eileen now. Her addiction reminded him too much of his wife, and he had suffered too much from it, to want another addict in his life, even as a friend. As far as he was concerned, their pathology was all the same, and he thought that Eileen’s addiction to abuse was pathological, which made it so hard for her to give up. And with no job, she spent most of her time now in bed, crying and missing Brad, and not looking for a job as she should. Francesca could see that she was spiraling down and had no way to stop it.

Charles-Edouard was the first of the group to leave, when he went back to France, and it created a real void. It had been a lot more exciting when the flamboyant Frenchman was around, and Marya admitted she missed him too, but she was meeting him in Provence in a few weeks, to work with him on the book.

“Maybe he’ll leave his wife this summer,” Francesca said hopefully, and Marya just laughed. She wasn’t expecting him to and said she wouldn’t know what to do with him if he did.

“There’s no room in my life for a man,” she said to Francesca practically. “I like my life the way it is. I’m comfortable like this. Besides, I’m too old to find a man, and I don’t want one.” Francesca couldn’t help thinking again how different she was from her mother. Thalia’s only hope was that she was going to meet a man in St. Tropez or Porto Cervo. She was meeting friends everywhere, and planned to be away for two months, as she did every year. She was even meeting friends in Venice for an enormous party. Her summer was always much more glamorous than her daughter’s, or anyone else’s that Francesca knew.

Chris and Ian left for Martha’s Vineyard for the Fourth of July weekend. Chris’s family were planning picnics and barbecues, and family football games, and Ian would be spending the summer with his cousins, far from the agonies he’d been through with his mother. It was going to be good for him, and for Chris. And there were always lots of parties at the Vineyard and all of his old friends. It was a life that Chris assiduously avoided all year, but always gave in to in the summer. His parents would be there, although he wasn’t close to them, and they wanted to see Ian. Ian was going to visit his mother’s family too, in Newport, on the way home. Chris hated it there, it was too social, but he had promised to take Ian to see them for a long weekend. It was all he was willing to do. They were still staunchly defending their daughter, blamed Chris for leaving her, and had denial about her problems, although that was harder to do now, with manslaughter charges pending. She was still in jail, and despite all of her father’s manipulations, the judge had refused to set bail. She was detoxing in jail.

Marya left for France on the tenth of July, so she could spend Bastille Day there. She was stopping in Paris for a few days before Provence, to visit her cooking buddies, some of whom ran the best restaurants in Paris. She had trained there in her youth, and still had friends she loved there. And then she was planning to wend her way to Provence and get to work with Charles-Edouard.

The house was deathly quiet after the others had left. Francesca used the time to get some repairs done, and unwind. She closed early every day-the gallery was dead in the summer. They never sold anything in July, and she closed for most of August. She used the time to clean out her files, and go through slides of new artists. And it was tomblike when she went back to the house. She made the mistake of going out with one of her artists out of pure boredom. They got blind drunk together, and he wound up crying over the girlfriend he’d just broken up with. And all the evening did was depress Francesca. He called her to apologize the next day. The evening had been a total bust and reminded her not to go out with her artists. It was always a bad idea.

Eileen was seeming a little more cheerful, although she didn’t have a job. She was still mourning Brad, which Francesca refused to discuss with her. She didn’t want to feed her sickness. They had a few quiet dinners, before Francesca left. They always seemed to connect at a deep level, and Eileen’s innate innocence and sweetness always tore at her heart. She was so trusting and loving and open. She seemed to have none of the defenses she needed to protect herself in the world. Francesca wished she would harden herself a little and be less vulnerable, but that just wasn’t Eileen. Francesca was feeling guilty about leaving her alone for three weeks, and even offered to take her to Maine with her, but Eileen insisted she’d be fine. She was making friends on the Internet again, which made Francesca uneasy, but she didn’t feel it was her place to say so. The Internet was the epicenter of Eileen’s life and how she made all her friends. Meeting men was just part of that. She was part of a generation that was linked to their computers by an umbilical cord. She was either online or sending texts, something Francesca rarely did. She’d rather pick up the phone and call people, and hear their voice. But Eileen’s generation communicated by e-mails and texts. For most it worked, as did the Internet. For Eileen, it seemed to make her a magnet to the wrong guys.

Francesca took her out to dinner on her last night in New York. They went to the Waverly Inn, and it was fun. There were still plenty of people in New York. And Eileen’s mood seemed lighter and brighter than it had for a while. Francesca commented to her that their house felt like a boarding school where everyone went home for the summer. It reminded her that only Eileen had nowhere to go. The others all had family, friends, or other homes. Eileen said she was planning to go to the beach when she wasn’t job hunting and she’d be fine. She was looking forward to some time alone. And Francesca felt a tug at her heart again when she left her the next day. Eileen looked like a little kid as she stood on the top step and waved with a big smile as the cab drove away to take Francesca to the airport to fly to Bangor to meet her friends. Eileen was wearing pigtails and shorts, and after Francesca left, Eileen walked back inside. Her cell phone was ringing, and she answered it. It was Brad.

Chapter 13

THE SUMMER FLEW by for all of them. Marya covered the most ground. She drove from Paris to Provence, then down to St. Paul de Vence, and spent a weekend with friends in Antibes. She flew from Nice to Spain to visit her friend Ferran Adria, at elBulli in Roses with all his innovative creations. He had invented “molecular” cooking, where he broke the food down and reconstituted it. He had closed the restaurant for a while, and was planning to open again after doing more research. Marya was always fascinated by his ideas and creative genius. And from there she went to Florence, Bologna, Venice, Padua, down to Rome, and back to Paris again for a few days, before she flew to Boston, and then home to Vermont. Marya had friends everywhere, and everyone welcomed her visits. She had a fabulous time, and was happy to be in Vermont again, in her own bed, and cooking in her own kitchen, although she felt her husband’s absence more there. He’d been gone for a year. She still missed him, but she was busy and had a full life.

She and Charles-Edouard had traveled extensively in Provence, and discovered new recipes for their book. They were ready to submit the outline to the publisher, and were planning to write it in September. She added two new chapters while she was in Vermont, and then left for New Hampshire. It was already chilly at night, and fall was in the air. Some of the leaves were already turning as she drove through the countryside. She stayed longer than she intended with her friends in North Conway, and then she slowly drove back home. She’d had a good time all summer, and was starting to think about going back to New York after Labor Day, as she drove up to her house, and was startled to see Charles-Edouard standing on her porch. He looked impatient and relieved as she got out of her car.

“What are you doing here?” she asked him in amazement. His hair looked longer and wilder than ever, and his eyes were the same blue as the Vermont sky. “I thought you were in St. Tropez.” He had a house in Ramatuelle, which was just behind it, and had planned to spend August there. She hadn’t heard from him since Provence, and didn’t expect to. They had agreed to call each other when she got back to New York. And she had no idea what he was doing in Vermont.

He started talking the moment she stepped onto the porch. “She left me for one of my sous-chefs. Can you believe that? Just walked out, packed everything.”

“Who did?” She was sure he was talking about the chef who ran his restaurant in Paris. They’d had a stormy relationship for years, and she threatened to quit every three weeks.