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“I can only imagine how difficult that was for you,” Liz began, groping her way. “But you need to put all that happened in
the past behind you. Not for Dad’s sake, but for Mom’s now, and for yours. You can get past this, Nancy. If you want to, if
you honestly try.”

Nancy swiped at her damp cheeks. “How would you know? You’ve never had a terrible thing happen to you, not ever. You’re the
fair-haired girl everyone loves. You crook your little finger and everything you want drops in your lap.”

Not by a long shot, little sister. Liz felt her temper, sneaking up to the surface for some time now, boil over. “Stop it!
Stop thinking you’re the only one who’s known pain or indifference or hard times. I just buried my husband four months ago.
Did you think that was easy?”

Nancy sniffled noisily. “At least you had a husband, one who loved you, and you have his daughter. I… I have nothing.”

Liz had had enough. If she stayed any longer, she’d blurt out some ugly truths that might satisfy Nancy but would only leave
Liz with regrets. “You have nothing because you accept this way of life. You can have more. You can change the pattern. The
answer to your problem isn’t in a bottle or a different man every few months. It’s inside you. Stop feeling sorry for yourself
and fix your life. No one else can do it for you.” She marched to the door, then swung back. “Are you going to show up or
not? What do you want me to tell Mom?”

Nancy wouldn’t meet her eyes. “I don’t know.”

Without another word, Liz left.

Liz hefted her Louis Vuitton hanging bag into the trunk of her white BMW, then turned to see Sara walking toward her, carrying
a large cardboard box. “What’s in there?” she asked her daughter. “I thought all your stuff was in those two bags we loaded
first.”

“Some CDs and books. If we’re going to stay in La Jolla for a week or so, I’ll go crazy without my music and something to
read.” Sara peered into the trunk, looking for space.

Frowning, Liz bent to the trunk, trying to rearrange their bags to make room. “You’re not going to be a prisoner there, Sara.
Your friends can come get you for the day or whatever. I’m not sure Grandma will appreciate your music with Grandpa so ill.”

“It’s a big house, Mom. I’m not going to play it in his bedroom.”

Sighing, Liz stepped back. “We’ll have to put the box on the backseat. There’s no way it’ll fit in here.” She lowered the
trunk lid and walked around to open the back door, wondering
if she were making a mistake by closing up the Pacific Beach house and going to stay with her folks. But when her mother had
suggested it, looking hesitant and uncertain, Liz hadn’t been able to refuse her. She knew how worried Katherine was and what
a toll her father’s illness was taking on her.

“There, no problem,” Sara said as she set the box on the backseat. “May I drive?”

Sara was less than two months away from turning sixteen in July and had only recently received her learner’s permit, allowing
her to drive when accompanied by a licensed driver. It was the Memorial Day weekend, and school had let out only yesterday.
Next year at this time she would have been graduated in the class of 1993. But for now the whole glorious summer stretched
out before her, and she was keyed up and raring to go.

Liz smiled at her daughter. Sara was lovely, tall and slender, with fine features and wonderful naturally curly blond hair
that hung down past her shoulders. She was nearly grown, Liz realized, and her breath caught in her throat at the thought.
Of course, she still hovered in that middle ground between childhood and womanhood. Sometimes, like today, she looked so young
in shorts and a sloppy shirt. Other times she appeared older, as she had the night of her junior prom when she wore a floor-length
white dress and heels.

In another year she’d be going away to college. She’d already looked into Stanford, intent on preparing for a career in journalism.
Behind her sunglasses, Liz felt her eyes grow moist as she impulsively hugged Sara to her. Her little girl, her baby, was
growing up, and there was nothing she could do about it. “Yes, you may drive.”

Sara’s blue eyes sparkled. “Thanks, Mom.” She climbed behind the wheel with a smile of anticipation.

Liz went back to make sure the front door was locked, then got in beside Sara and watched her rearrange the mirrors, adjust
the seat, and change the radio station. A teenage
ritual, she’d learned since Sara had begun driving. Her usually undemanding daughter had turned into a pest, wanting constantly
to drive the two blocks to the mailbox or to the drugstore for a magazine. Though it was a short ride to the Townsend home,
perhaps Sara would be appeased for a while. “Take the coastal road, honey. There’s less traffic.”

“But I need the practice in traffic, Mom,” Sara insisted, turning out of their circular drive.

“Not today, please, Sara.” Liz fastened her seat belt, wishing this stay weren’t necessary, that her father would somehow
recover and her mother would smile again.

She was fairly certain that wouldn’t happen. Joseph Townsend was in a deep coma. He’d been showering when the stroke had hit,
and he’d fallen, breaking his left hip. The doctors had decided not to put him through the trauma of surgery unless he miraculously
regained consciousness.

So he lay in his bed, pale, shrinking before their eyes, this once strong and vibrant man who was only sixty-eight. The doctors
gave little hope that he’d come out of the coma, though occasionally his eyes opened. But he only stared blankly for moments
and closed them again.

Katherine had hired nurses, but she maintained a constant vigil as well, seldom leaving his side. It was more for her mother
that Liz was putting her life on hold, to spell her. There was precious little she could do for her father anymore. The sorrow
of that made her heart heavy, for despite what Nancy had revealed to her, she loved him. Maybe she loved him even more knowing
he was a flawed human being, as she herself was. He’d always been so formidable. Now she felt she could relate to him better.

Now, it was too late to tell him so.

Sara turned onto the coastal road and glanced at her mother, brooding quietly. Now or never, she decided, “Mom, can we talk
about the trip again, please?”

Liz felt like laying her head back and closing her eyes but
stifled the urge. “We have talked about it, Sara. You’re very young, and Ireland is so far away.”

Sara’s closest friend, Justine Parker, was going with her father, Wayne Parker, a photojournalist for the Associated Press,
on a vacation to Ireland. A widower, Wayne had come over one evening and asked Liz if Sara could go along, promising to take
good care of the girls. Wayne planned to gather information for a book he was planning to write about the civil war that kept
Ireland divided. Liz had known Wayne for years, since he and Justine lived only two blocks away. She trusted him when he said
he wouldn’t take the girls anywhere dangerous. Still, she had misgivings, many of them.

“I’ll be sixteen by the time we’d go in August,” Sara went on, keeping her voice calm and reasonable. She’d learned that that
was the only way to talk with her mother. “I’ve heard you say that traveling by plane is safer than by car. Mr. Parker says
he’ll give you a copy of our complete itinerary, where we’ll be staying each night, what tours we’ll be taking. Everything.
Mom, this is a chance of a lifetime. I… I just
have
to go.”

Remembering what it was like to be fifteen, nearly sixteen, with the world beckoning and the need to explore so insistent,
Liz’s heart went out to her daughter. Perhaps if Richard were alive, she’d feel better about making this decision with him.
She’d scarcely gotten over that loss, and now her father was gravely ill, her mother falling apart, her sister not coming
around. Liz felt the weight of it all crushing her down.

“It’s not just the plane trip. You’re very young to be away from home for two long weeks to a place so far away.”

“Mr. Parker said it would be like touring anywhere in the States. And I can phone as often as you like.”

Small comfort that was. “I can’t give you an answer right now. I told you I’d think about it, and believe me, I am. But give
me some time.”

Impatient, Sara stepped on the gas, wanting to pass a slow-moving van. But she thought better of it and slowed down. Her mother
would think her more mature if she drove like a little old lady. Not that
she
was, little or old. Her mom was terrific looking still, neater than any of her friends’ mothers. Sara could even understand
why Liz worried about her so much, being an only child and her dad gone and all. Still, Sara had to make her see that if she
didn’t go on this trip, she’d simply die.

Maybe she’d talk with her grandmother and try to recruit her as an ally. Then, together, they could persuade her mother to
give in. For now, Sara decided to change the subject. “Do you think Grandpa’s going to come out of the coma and be all right?”
She’d never been as close to him as to her grandmother, but she loved him all the same.

Liz leaned back against the headrest wearily. “I seriously doubt it; but we mustn’t give up hope, especially for Grandma’s
sake.”

“What should I do when we get there? I mean, to help her?” The thought of sitting beside his bed for hours, as she had with
her father during his long illness, depressed Sara terribly.

Liz reached for Sara’s hand and squeezed it, guessing her daughter’s concern. “Just be yourself, sweetheart. There are nurses
to attend to Grandpa. We’re going mostly to give Grandma moral support.”

Sara relaxed visibly. “I could read to him. Remember how he used to love to listen to me read to him?” She’d only just thought
of that, something special she’d shared with her grandfather.

“That would be nice. I understand that people in comas can hear.” Remembering the night she’d spent trying to reach Adam,
she felt certain they did. “So we mustn’t say anything depressing when we’re in his room. Perhaps if he knows we’re pulling
for him, he’ll come back to us.” She had her doubts, but she felt compelled to put up a good front.

They were passing Seal Rock on the left. “Our turn’s the next right,” Liz pointed out. Although Sara’d been to the Townsend
house a thousand times, she’d never driven the route.

“I know, Mom,” Sara said, putting on her right blinker. Why did parents always think teenagers didn’t know anything? she wondered.

Twilight was a lonely time, Liz thought as she walked out onto the Townsends’ covered terrace. Since Richard’s death she’d
become painfully aware of neighboring husbands coming home in the early evening, wives welcoming them at the door, children
going in to dinner. Her evenings, often as not, stretched out before her, too long, too quiet.

She watched a summer squall move out to sea, the gloomy sky casting early shadows on the beach. The dreary evening suited
her mood. She’d been at the La Jolla house only three days, yet it seemed much longer. Her mother, though, was obviously relieved
to have someone to share the burden of watching over Joseph, which made it worthwhile to Liz. Sara had managed by the sheer
exuberance of youth to lighten their days and even elicit a few smiles from her grandmother.

It was just that a death watch—which is how Liz had come to view their vigil after numerous discussions with her father’s
doctors—was exhausting, both mentally and physically. Nancy hadn’t seen fit to show up or even call, and Liz didn’t know whether
to be grateful or angry. The three of them here for Joseph were enough, she supposed. Three generations of women watching
over the patriarch. She wondered often if he were aware of their presence in that twilight place he’d gone to where they could
no longer reach him.

Standing at the waist-high brick ledge, Liz noticed someone walking on the beach some distance below the sloping lawn and
rocky breakfront—a lone figure strolling along, head bent as if searching for something. He was barefoot, his pant legs rolled
up, his hands in his pockets. His stride was
slow, dejected, somehow sad. He was too far away for her to make out his face in the dusky gloom, yet there was something
familiar about the man.

“Here you are,” Katherine said, stepping out onto the terrace and looking up at the gray clouds. “It seems the storm is passing
us by.”

“Yes,” Liz answered without turning around. She squinted, studying the stroller.

Joining her at the ledge, Katherine peered into the gloom and noticed who was attracting her daughter’s attention. “I rather
thought he’d find his way down here somehow,” she said. “You must have told him you were staying with us.”

Perplexed, Liz turned. “Who do you mean?”

Katherine seemed equally surprised at her daughter’s question. “Adam McKenzie. He purchased the Reid house recently. I thought
you knew.”

“No.” She swung her eyes back to the man who’d bent over to pick up a piece of driftwood. “He came to see me after Richard
died, sometime in January, to offer his condolences. He was looking for a house on the beach, and I told him the Reid house
was up for sale, but I didn’t know he’d actually bought it. He used to caddy for Mr. Reid as a teenager and always loved the
place.”

“Is this to be their permanent home, then?”

“I don’t know. Adam said that his wife doesn’t like the sea, but he does. I imagine Diane’s happier in Washington, in the
thick of things.” She hadn’t seen or heard from Adam since that January visit, but, as always, she’d thought of him often.

Liz saw him gaze up toward the rocky cliff and beyond, then turn and slowly start back the way he’d come. He walked as if
the weight of the world were on his shoulders. “He looks so sad,” she said, hardly aware she’d spoken the words aloud.

Katherine studied her daughter’s profile thoughtfully. “It’s
difficult loving a powerful man, isn’t it? Especially one you can’t have.”

Somehow she’d always known that one day they’d be having this conversation, Liz thought. Leaning against the ledge, she crossed
her ankles and looked at her mother. “How long have you known?”