Island Girls (15 page)

Tightening the quilt around her sarong-style, she slid out of the Jeep and padded barefoot around to the back porch and up the steps into the house.

No one was there. Then the front door slammed, and before she could do more than smell the enticing aroma of coffee, Liam walked into the room. He was carrying a stack of newspapers.

“Meg.” He smiled when he saw her. “Where did you go?”

He was perfection itself. “Liam,” she began.

Dropping the newspapers on the kitchen table, Liam came toward her and took her in his arms.

Meg shrank away, thinking of her morning breath, her frizzed-out uncombed hair, her foolish loss of control last night. Now that he had achieved his goal, he would perhaps believe he cared about her for a month, or maybe the summer, and then this fall, when the newly hired instructors arrived at the college, he’d meet someone his own age, or even younger, someone svelte and blossoming, and he’d drop Meg like the fat spinster she was.

“Meg?” He looked puzzled.

She had to be the mature one. She
was
the mature one.

“Liam,” she said coolly. “We need to talk.”

“Meg, come on, talk?” Exasperated, he put his hands on his hips.

“Liam, last night was a mistake.”

“You certainly didn’t act as if it was.”

“Liam, please.” It was hard to be dignified wrapped in a patchwork
quilt. “I want to be clear about this. It can’t happen again. It won’t happen again.” She was verging on tears. She was trying not to tremble. But she knew the pain waiting for her somewhere in the future would devastate her past imagining. She could not let that happen. How could she do this? She had said before, when he’d asked her out, that she was too old for him, but he’d brushed that fact aside as if it were totally irrelevant. She had to do it differently this time. She had to be firm. It was very possible that she was in love with him, and that was like being hooked on drugs. It would only lead to disaster.

She
had
learned something in her life. “Liam,” she said in a chilly voice, “last night was special, but the truth is, you’re too young for me.”

Liam flinched. She had hurt him. She had meant to.

“Meg,” he pleaded. “Don’t do this.”

“Hi, guys!” Adorable pert little Zoey came in the back door, shimmering with youth and good cheer. Her white dress and heels set off the tan she’d acquired yesterday, and the day’s humidity didn’t lift one strand of her sleek dark hair out of place.

Meg managed to say, “Hi, Zoey.”

Liam just stared. Well, any man would stare.

“Hi, Meg. Liam, I’m catching the fast ferry now. My car’s in a lot in Hyannis. If you ride up with me, I can drop you in Sudbury on my way to Concord.” When he didn’t answer right away, Zoey cocked her comely head like a parrot. “We talked about this yesterday, remember? How it would save you from going through Boston?”

Liam nodded. “Right. Sure. I’ll just get my luggage.” He left the room.

Meg cleared her throat, but something still choked it as she asked, “Would you like me to drive you to the boat?”

“Oh, nonsense.” Zoey flapped her hand. “We can walk.”

Meg forced a smile. “In those high heels?”

Zoey seemed puzzled. “But I always wear heels. Well, of course except on the beach.” She tossed her dark hair back. “Listen, where’s Arden? I want to thank her for everything.”

“I don’t think anyone else is here just now,” Meg said.

“Well, thank her for me, will you? Jenny, too? It’s been just
super
.” To Meg’s surprise, Zoey zipped across the room and kissed her on her cheek. “I hope we meet again, Meg. Listen, when your book is published, we’ll find a way to do a spot on you on our little television show.”

So Arden’s
Simplify This
had become “our little television show”? Meg felt dizzy.

Liam returned to the kitchen, wearing a backpack and carrying a small case. “I’m ready.” His look at Meg was bland, a pretense of friendliness. “Meg, thanks for a great weekend.”

“You’re welcome.” Meg could stab herself, she sounded so stilted.

“Bye!” Zoey twinkled her fingers at Meg and went out the door.

Liam followed.

“Have you ever stayed at the White Elephant?” Zoey asked Liam as they went down the porch steps. “It’s totally cool, rather posh, and the breakfasts are incredible.” Her voice trailed off as they went around the house toward the street.

Meg stood in the kitchen in the quilt, trying to breathe. In a moment, when she knew they were really gone, she’d allow the tears to come.

Arden and Jenny arrived back at the Lily Street house to find Meg sitting at the kitchen table, crying.

“Where have you been all morning?” Arden demanded.

“Why are you crying?” Jenny inquired in a gentler voice.

Meg sniffed. “I hate Zoey.”

Arden nodded. “Join the club.”

Jenny said, “Why are you wearing a quilt?”

Meg’s shoulders shook as she sobbed. “I’m an idiot!”

“Have you had breakfast?” Jenny asked. She poured a cup of coffee, stirred in a lot of milk and sugar, and set it before Meg.

“Drink.”

“Thanks.” Meg stifled her sobs, sat up straight, and took a sip. “This is delicious.” She shot a suspicious glare Jenny’s way. “Are you trying to make me even fatter?”

“Right,” Jenny answered. “You found me out. I have a secret plan to make you big as a blimp.” She stuck bread into the toaster and put butter and jam and a knife on the table.

“Meg, you’re not fat.” Arden poured herself a cup of coffee and sat down next to her. “I don’t understand how an educated and beautiful woman like you could have such a poor body self—image. Haven’t you seen the shows and read about women and body dysmorphia?”

Meg took another sip of coffee and regarded rail-thin Arden skeptically. The caffeine steadied her. She took a deep breath, then in the tones of a woman being led to the gallows, admitted, “I slept with Liam.”

“Shut up!” Arden cried. “When? Where? How was it?”

Jenny said, “Wait. He went off with Zoey this morning.”

Meg responded to Jenny first. “Yes, he just walked with Zoey to the boat. She’s going to drive him back to Sudbury.” She turned to Arden. “Last night. My room. Heaven, if you want the truth.”

The toast popped. Jenny flipped it onto a plate and set it in front of Meg, then slid into a chair. “It was heaven?”

Arden echoed, “He went off with Zoey?”

Jenny said, “I have
so
been there.” She cast a jaded look at Arden. To Meg, she said, “I think you need to settle down. This morning Liam was looking all over for you. Yesterday he asked me to talk with you about him. Clearly he cares for you, Meg. I think you’re getting things all twisted around.”

Arden added, “Plus, you said last night was heaven.”

Meg sighed. “How many times can I say it? Liam is
twenty-six years old
. I’m thirty-one. He is not going to want to settle for an older, plumper female. It goes against a male’s Darwinian nature. It’s in their genes or their testosterone, whatever.”

“I still think you should give him a chance,” Jenny softly urged.

“Of course you would think that,” Meg said quietly. “Your mother didn’t go through what my mother went through when Dad left her.”

Arden nodded. “Or mine. I can see Meg’s point. Liam
is
young.
Twenty-six
. Better to end it now when it’s relatively easy, when it won’t hurt so much. At least she won’t be publicly embarrassed. I mean, think about it, Jenny. What if Meg hooks up with Liam at the college, and then he dumps her for some grad student? Meg will still have to work
with him
, maybe even
for him
. He’s got the PhD and the ambition. He could end up dean of her department. It could get messy and ugly for Meg.”

“I disagree.” Jenny folded her arms on the table and scrutinized Meg. “If Liam likes Meg the way she looks now, he’ll never leave her.”

Meg bridled.
“What?”

Arden snickered. “I know what you mean, Jenny.” She turned to Meg. “We’re not talking about your weight. We’re talking about that prim and proper Victorian virgin look you’ve acquired. Do you possess one shirt that doesn’t button up to the top of your neck? And the slacks you wear, those baggy walk-in-the-woods khakis! Really, Meg, they’re terrible.”

“They’re sensible,” Meg shot back. “I can wear them with anything.”

“Yeah, we’ve noticed,” Jenny jested.

Meg drew herself up. “I teach at a college level. That means I have to teach a lot of adults, some even older than I am. I need to look authoritative, like I know what I’m doing. I absolutely cannot look—” She paused, trying to clarify. “I can’t look sexy, and I can’t look as if I’m trying to look sexy.”

Arden nodded, grinning. “Yes, I do see your problem. With a hot bod like yours, Meg, you must find it difficult not to look sexy.”

“But that doesn’t mean you have to look drab, Meg!” Jenny jumped up from the table and walked around Meg, eyeing her up and down.

Meg clutched the quilt more tightly around her.

“What do you usually wear to teach in?” Arden asked.

“I have a kind of uniform, really. So that I don’t have to think about clothes and can concentrate on my work. I need the dean, among others, to understand that I’m a serious scholar and teacher—”

Impatiently, Arden interrupted. “Fine. We get that. So what’s the uniform?”

“Either khaki trousers or skirt, a plaid shirt, and a corduroy jacket. Comfortable low-heeled shoes.”

Arden and Jenny exchanged glances of horror.

Meg continued, “I have about ten shirts, and several jackets and slacks, so I can just snag what I’m going to wear each day and not worry too much about it.”

Jenny touched Meg’s glowing hair. “And what do you do with this?”

“I braid it and coil it at the back of my head.”

“Very Louisa May Alcott,” Arden said.

“Well, … yes,” Meg agreed. “But I don’t want it flying around while I’m teaching. It wouldn’t be professional.”

Arden stood up. “Meg, Jenny and I are going to do you over from head to toe.”

“Brilliant!” Jenny cried. “Like
What Not to Wear
.”

“What are you talking about?” Meg asked.

“Ever watch TV?” Arden asked.

“Not that much, actually. Maybe MSNBC or PBS … and I like
Simplify This
. That’s the one show I watch regularly.”

“You do?” Arden put her hands to her chest. “I didn’t know that. Oh, Meg, that makes me so happy.”

Jenny yanked at Meg’s quilt. “Up. Dress. We’re going shopping.”

——

As the three women walked into town, Arden said, “See, Meg, this is just what I mean. Jenny and I are wearing sundresses. You might as well be wearing a short-sleeved paper bag.”

Meg stopped dead on the sidewalk. After checking to see that no one was around, she told them in a loud whisper, “I have big boobs, all right? It would be inappropriate for me to make them a distraction when I’m teaching.”

“But you’re not teaching now,” Jenny reminded her. “You’re on an island. It’s summer. And you have a waist as well as a bosom. Yet you wear shapeless tents that camouflage your figure.”

“They camouflage my fat.”

“Meg, didn’t your mother ever show you how to dress?” Jenny asked sympathetically.

“She had two boys to raise, remember? She didn’t have time to think about clothes, and neither did I.”

“It’s beginning to make sense,” Arden said. “My mom has to look chic because she’s a real estate agent who deals in high-end properties. So I learned a lot from just observing her. Jenny’s mother, Justine, is drop-dead dazzling, and so is Jenny, so Jenny can wear her computer nerd gear with a pair of exotic earrings and look fabulous.”

Meg cut in, “Don’t forget, Jenny’s slender.”

“Don’t forget,” Jenny shot back, “you’ve got an hourglass figure that can make men blush.”

Meg herself blushed at the compliment. “I never thought of it that way.”

Jenny headed right to Zero Main, her favorite store. “When I have to go into New York for a business meeting, I come here and ask Noel to put me together.”

When Meg saw Noel, she started to walk back out the door. “Jenny,” she whispered, “that woman is tiny. She won’t have anything here in my size.”

“Give her a chance,” Jenny said, locking on to Meg’s arm.

While other saleswomen helped other customers, Noel joined the three sisters in a dressing room. Jenny explained the problem.

Noel quickly eyed Meg up and down. “You’ve got a movie-star figure.”

Meg quipped, “Yeah, for 1930.”

Noel said, “You have a tiny waist.” She tapped her fingernail on her lip. “I’ll be right back.”

Jenny went out to help Noel carry the trial garments into the dressing room. Arden played handmaiden, zipping up dresses, returning them to hangers, handing Meg something new. Sleeveless Eileen Fishers worked the best, with short, bright jackets or shrugs and a scarf or costume jewelry around the neck. They pried Meg out of her Birkenstocks and into seductive sandals, some with actual heels.

“Bombshell,” Arden announced.

“Try these embroidered tunics,” Noel suggested. “They’re all the rage. You’ve got great legs. Wear them with these pants.”

Meg was breathless. She whispered to Arden, “This will cost so much money.”

Arden said, “At the end of the summer, you’re coming into a fat inheritance when we sell the house. Besides, you probably haven’t bought any new clothes for a decade, right?”

Meg wanted to disagree but couldn’t.

“Next,” Jenny announced, “hair. Time for a cut and style.”

“No!” Meg cried. “It’s my one physical feature I’m proud of. It’s such an unusual color.”

“True, but when you braid and coil it behind your neck, you look like Heidi of the Alps. Come on.”

“I’m hungry,” Meg whimpered.

“Me, too,” Arden confessed. “Let’s get these bags home, grab a piece of fruit, and drive out to The Hair Concern.”

“They won’t have a free appointment,” Meg said.

But they did. Tricia cut several inches of Meg’s hair and showed her how to let it fall freely around her face. The change was alluring, even saucy, so she showed Meg how to roll it and tuck it to give it interest when she pulled it back with a refined clip at her neck.