10. Night Changes I
Caroline paces in front of Nantucket Memorial Airport. Her mother is late.
What the actual F? Caroline rose with the pigeons and got her ass to JFK with all of Isaac’s bulky filming equipment, and now she’s rotting on the curb while everyone else on her flight gets a Lyft or a taxi. Caroline texts her
mother: I’m here. Where r u?
There’s no response.
One cab—Roger’s—idles unclaimed. Caroline could hop in and be in Squam in ten minutes, but she refuses to do that on principle. Her mother was so set on having Caroline come, she should be here. She should have been here early. Hollis is probably too busy peeling cucumbers for the spa water or folding the ends of the toilet paper into nifty points to come pick up her own child.
The next thought comes to her unbidden: Her father would have been here on time. He would have been in the Bronco with the top down, wearing his Hootie and the Blowfish T-shirt, and he’d have a latte and a morning bun from Wicked Island Bakery for her, and Henrietta would be lounging across the back seat. He’d jump out of the car, give Caroline a bear hug, and help her with her bags. Then they’d drive to Nobadeer Beach, where Caroline could enjoy her coffee and pull apart the flaky layers of the cinnamon roll as they watched the surfers.
Caroline’s eyes sting with tears. She hadn’t anticipated how coming to Nantucket would make her experience the loss of her father all over again.
Because Caroline’s mother has a long, complex history with the island, which she seems to want to both embrace and deny, Caroline and Matthew had to create their own Nantucket traditions. Matthew liked to spend the Fourth of July on Coatue, where they would grill clams on the hibachi and watch the fireworks set off across the harbor at Jetties Beach. On weekend mornings, he and Caroline would strap their paddleboards to the top of the Bronco and drive to Sesachacha Pond. They’d dip their oars into the still
water while the rising sun turned the surface of the pond into a pink mirror.
On Caroline’s twenty-first birthday, Matthew took her on a surprise daytime trip to the Chicken Box. They stopped to pick up a pepperoni pizza from Sophie T’s and arrived at the Chicken Box at noon, and Caroline ordered her first legal beer. Matthew had arranged for the lead singer of the band that night (Caroline would be going back later with her friends) to come out and sing “Happy Birthday.” The bartender and the locals applauded; the lead singer gave Caroline a hug and took a selfie with her.
Now tears fall as Caroline checks her phone. Still nothing from her mother.
She hears the boarding announcement for the JetBlue flight back to JFK.
Should she just get on the plane and return to the city? It would serve Hollis right. And I’ll never speak to her again, Caroline thinks. I’ll orphan myself.
Back at the Chelsea loft, Isaac and Sofia will now be reunited. They might even be making love on the soft, Egyptian-cottoned acreage that Caroline has so recently occupied. Caroline asked Isaac about his and Sofia’s sex life: Was it real? When did they find time? Isaac admitted that they made love in the late night/early morning when Sofia got home from the clubs. She poured herself into bed like syrup, he said, making her sound exotic and luscious in a way Caroline knows she will never be.
Why me? Caroline had asked Isaac another time, and he said, When you cried, you showed yourself to me. You’re pure, unspoiled, you still feel things.
I found that irresistible.
Caroline does nothing but feel things—an echoing angst, longing, jealousy. And, at the moment, exhaustion and irritation. Where is her mother?
She types a text to Isaac: I miss you. Will he find this irresistible, she wonders, or simply pathetic? Pathetic, she’s pretty sure, but she can’t help
herself; she presses Send.
Then she hears a voice say, “Caroline?”
Caroline turns. A dude holding the hand of a small child is walking out of Crosswinds, the airport restaurant. Caroline blinks. It’s Dylan McKenzie.
Because Caroline is a budding filmmaker, she mentally zooms out and watches this scene unfold even as she’s living it. (Isaac is always reminding her to observe rather than just see.) But one thing that a camera can’t capture is a person’s interior thoughts.
Caroline’s at this moment are something along the lines of Whaaaaaa? Is
this happening? Is Dylan McKenzie really walking up to her?
Dylan McKenzie sounds like a character from Beverly Hills 90210, and Dylan looks like one too—thick dark hair that’s weekend-mussed, defined cheekbones, and soulful brown eyes. Caroline thinks he might have gotten hotter since she last saw him—and how is that possible?
Caroline first meets Dylan at a bonfire at Clark’s Cove when she’s sixteen and Dylan is eighteen. She knows who he is, naturally, because he’s hot and popular—a lacrosse star at Nantucket High School who’ll be going to Syracuse on a full ride. He marches right up to Caroline, beer in hand, and Caroline thinks he’s going to tell her she’s too young for the party or that summer kids aren’t allowed.
But instead he says, “You’re Caroline, right? Your mom and my mom were friends growing up.”
Caroline nods eagerly, relieved she isn’t being asked to leave, though she isn’t sure what he’s talking about. “Your mom is…”
“Tatum,” Dylan says. “Tatum McKenzie.”
“Yes!” Caroline says. Hollis has mentioned that someone called Tatum— it’s a memorable name—was her best friend, her “partner in crime,” though Caroline highly doubts there was any actual crime, her mother is so square.
Caroline never paid close attention to the Tatum stories, because what does her mother’s ancient history have to do with her own life? Nothing—until this moment. Caroline has never met Tatum; if pressed, Caroline might say she’d assumed the mythical Tatum had moved away or even died.
“They were best friends,” Caroline says. “Partners in crime.”
Dylan grabs two Twisted Teas and leads Caroline to a spot in the sand where they sit down side by side. He asks where she goes to school (Wellesley High), where she lives on the island (Squam), if she plays any sports (soccer, but she sucks; she perseveres only because it looks good on college applications). Dylan enlists a sophomore to fetch them each another drink, then he notices Caroline shivering and asks if she wants to move closer to the fire or wear his Whalers hoodie. Obviously, she takes the hoodie.
Caroline’s friend Cygnet watches with wide eyes from the other side of the bonfire; Caroline can feel her phone blowing up in her pocket but she doesn’t want to text with Cygnet while she’s sitting next to Dylan McKenzie wearing
his sweatshirt.
At some point, Dylan’s leg taps against Caroline’s leg and then their bare feet commingle in the cold sand and she thinks, Dylan McKenzie is into me.
How is this possible? Caroline is nowhere near the prettiest girl in Wellesley; she’s not even in the top ten (there are a lot of pretty girls in Wellesley). But that summer, Caroline has undergone something of a metamorphosis. Her hair has lightened to a sandy blond, she’s grown a couple of inches and developed a waist, and her skin has finally cleared up. When Dylan puts his arm around her shoulders, she thinks, This is happening. It kind of makes sense: Dylan lives on an island, he’s probably sick of all the girls he goes to high school with, and Caroline is someone new.
But then there’s a disruption. Someone kicks sand in Caroline’s face and knocks her drink over. Dylan leaps to his feet and grabs the arm of a girl who looks like a young Kate Moss.
This girl glowers at Caroline and says, “Take that sweatshirt off and get the hell out of here before I cut you, you bitch.”
“Aubrey,” Dylan says. “Chill.”
Caroline is so flustered, so intimidated, and so anxious to shed the sweatshirt that she pulls it off too quickly and takes her T-shirt along for the ride, flashing the entire party her pink Victoria’s Secret bra. There are whistles and whoops; Caroline’s face burns hotter than the fire. She and Cygnet beat a hasty and ignominious retreat while Aubrey shouts threats at their backs.
In the middle of the night, Caroline plays that scene in her mind the way it should have ended: With Caroline casually, carefully doffing the sweatshirt, balling it up, handing it to Aubrey, and saying, Sorry about that, psycho.
The next day, when Caroline tells her mother she met Dylan McKenzie (she doesn’t get into the details), Hollis sighs. “I should have figured the two of you would meet at some point. You know, for a long time, his mom, Tatum, was my best friend in the world.”
“Okay, so, like, what happened?” Caroline asks.
Her mother shakes her head. “I moved away,” she says. “And Tatum stayed.”
The following summer, Caroline sees Dylan and Aubrey at Cisco Beach. By
this point, Caroline has done some digging on Aubrey Collins and learned that Dylan and Aubrey have been together—if social media is to be trusted— for a long time. (There’s one Instagram post of five red roses for five years of dating.) When Dylan notices Caroline, he waves (in her seventeenth summer, Caroline has fully blossomed, boobs, booty, and all), and at the same moment, Aubrey flips Caroline off, which answers the question of whether she should go over to say hello.
For a few years, Caroline doesn’t see Dylan either in person or online. His Instagram account vanishes. Caroline goes so far as to follow the Syracuse lacrosse team’s account, but she spies him only once, as a freshman on the bench. He doesn’t appear to be on Snapchat—or if he is, Aubrey has made him block Caroline, which is amusing to think about. Hold grudges much? It was a high-school party!
Caroline next bumps into Dylan as she waits to pick up her family’s order from LoLa Burger. Caroline is deep into her phone when she feels a tap on her shoulder, and there stands Dylan in all his super-hot glory. Dylan asks where Caroline is working for the summer and she says that she just finished a six-week film course in Rome and has to be back in the city by mid-August, so there wasn’t really time to commit to a job.
“Do you babysit?” he asks.
“Ha-ha-ha!” Caroline says. “No.”
“Too bad,” he says. “I could use someone. I have a two-and-a-half-year- old named Orion.”
“You do?” Dylan is a couple years older than Caroline, but even so, she thinks of him as her age, and people her age don’t have children of their own.
She wonders if Aubrey is the mother, then tries to imagine what Aubrey would look like pregnant (the phrase swallowed a watermelon comes to mind).
Before Caroline can ask, her order is called. The bag smells seductively of hot, crispy truffle fries. Caroline smiles at Dylan, thinking, He got beautiful, bitchy Aubrey pregnant and now he’s a father at twenty, what a waste!
“Good seeing you!” she says. “Bye!”
Lights, camera, action! Caroline thinks. There’s no more time for backstory;
Dylan is upon her.
“Hey there!” she says. She looks at Orion, who, as if scripted, is doing a weird-little-kid thing—sucking on a piece of fatty bacon. “This must be your son. He looks just like you.” (Caroline is stretching the truth; the kid has a pudgy, mottled face and fair, flyaway hair.) Dylan is staring at Caroline as intently as he would be if she were directing this scene—Inhale her with your eyes!—and Caroline dearly wishes she’d blown her hair out that morning rather than defaulting to messy bun.
“This is the O-Man,” Dylan says. “O-Man, say hi to Caroline.”
O-Man raises his arms to be picked up, the bacon drooping from his mouth like a cartoon tongue.
“Do you need a ride?” Dylan asks Caroline. He surveys her suitcase and the lumpy bag of equipment. “I take it you’re here for the big weekend?”
“I’ve been hired to film it,” Caroline says, then considers how ridiculous this sounds. It isn’t Coachella. “My mom wants me to take some footage for her website.”
Dylan grins. He’s still staring at her, and O-Man is still sucking on the bacon, and Caroline is still missing Isaac, although she has to admit, this is a nice distraction.
“Let me give you a ride home,” Dylan says. “I just have to wait for… Orion’s mom. She has him this weekend. She’s going to meet us here aaaaaaany second.”
“Oh, that’s okay,” Caroline says, checking her phone. Still nothing from her mother. “My mom is picking me up.” Caroline sees a blue Jeep coming in hot. Behind the wheel is a woman with long straight hair wearing a baseball cap backward (a cute look, one Caroline can’t quite pull off), and surprise, surprise—it’s Aubrey!
The only thing better than Caroline recognizing Aubrey is Aubrey recognizing Caroline. She gets an incredulous expression on her face—really, it’s meme-worthy. She screeches to a halt, flings open her door, and storms around the front of the car. She snatches Orion up off the ground while at the same time ripping the bacon from his mouth, which she then whips into the street.
Orion starts to cry. “My bacon!” His voice is sweet and clear, and in that moment Caroline both loves him and feels sorry for him.
“I cannot believe this!” Aubrey says. She gives Caroline the most
withering of looks—Caroline suddenly feels like she needs a shower—then turns to Dylan. “How long has this been going on?”
Dylan seems pretty relaxed, maybe even a little amused. “About five minutes. We just bumped into Caroline on our way out of the diner. Orion was showing her his bacon.”
Aubrey buckles Orion into a car seat that seems a little janky in its positioning in the front seat of the Jeep (there is no back seat), and Caroline is tempted to speak up. Maybe she is maternal after all?
Aubrey looks at Dylan. “Have your mother come at five on Sunday. I
have plans.”
“Plans with…” Dylan says.
“Plans with none of your business!” Aubrey says.
Caroline can’t believe she’s stuck in the middle of their domestic spat.
Dylan pauses. “My mother is busy all weekend,” he says. “I’ll come get him.”
Aubrey slams the car door shut so hard, the entire Jeep shudders. Orion cries louder, craning his neck around to see the fate of his bacon, which has just been snatched up by a seagull. “Whatever, have fun with your little girlfriend, you pathetic piece of—” She starts the car and drives away,
flipping them both off as she goes.
“Wow,” Caroline says.
“Looks like someone made her jealous!” Dylan says, clearly delighted. He grabs Caroline’s suitcase and hoists up her equipment bag. “Come on, I’m parked over here.”
Caroline follows Dylan to a truck so big it qualifies as “monster.” He opens the passenger door and offers Caroline a hand as she climbs up into the seat (this requires her standing on the running board). The truck is so high off the ground that Caroline feels like she’s viewing the parking lot from the second story of a building. She revels in the novelty of a man with a truck.
Isaac doesn’t even have a driver’s license.
Dylan climbs in, aims the air-conditioning vents toward her, and changes the radio station from Kidz Bop to the Coffee House, which is playing an
acoustic version of “Night Changes.”
Whoa.
“To Squam?” Dylan says.
It takes Caroline a second to equilibrate. She’s in a truck next to Dylan
McKenzie listening to One Direction. For a second, she’s sixteen again.
“Yes,” she says. Then: “I can’t believe you remember where I live.”
“It’s all my mother has been talking about for days,” Dylan says. “Staying at your mother’s house in Squam. She’s been trying to downplay it but I think she’s really excited about this weekend.”
Caroline finds she’s happy to hear this, for Hollis’s sake. Dylan turns the song up, and spontaneously, they both sing along, Everything that you’ve ever dreamed of disappearin’ when you wake up… It’s such a meet-cute, Caroline can hardly stand it!
She sends her mother a text: Nvm. I found a ride.
