The Lobster Kings by Alexi Zentner

Author:Alexi Zentner [Zentner, Alexi]
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 978-0-307-36297-1
Publisher: Knopf Canada
Published: 2014-05-06T04:00:00+00:00

Despite my fling with Otto, the summer seemed to drag forever. It felt like all I did was wait: for Carly and Stephanie to move to Loosewood Island, for the fishing season to start again. Finally, the day before the season started, in mid-August, we moved Carly and Stephanie onto the island. I’d volunteered to give them my house and move into one of Daddy’s smaller rentals—it made the most sense, but it was also a peace offering—but it meant I was going to have to move in with Daddy through mid-September, when the rental house opened up. Moving me was easy, since the rental was furnished, but Stephanie and Carly were a different matter.

Daddy, Tucker, and I drove down to Portland to help them pack up and drive the rental truck, and it turned out that they had a lot more stuff than you would have expected in a one-bedroom apartment.

“I’ve heard of people with baggage,” I muttered, “but this is ridiculous.”

Carly didn’t smile. “Some people have more baggage than others, Cordelia.”

I didn’t bother responding. My baggage didn’t need to be carried down three flights of stairs.

Even with Daddy, Tucker, and I leaving Loosewood Island before dawn—which is early, in August—we weren’t back to the docks on the mainland and loading up the Queen Jane and the Kings’ Ransom until late afternoon. By the time we hit the island and were down to the last dozen or so boxes, I was beat. I skipped over a large box and then another one that had BOOKS written on it, and grabbed a small box marked for the bedroom. Carrying it into what used to be my bedroom, I wasn’t paying a lot of attention, and I didn’t see that Trudy had spread herself out across the doorway.

I didn’t fall that hard—it was more of an awkward stumble—but I landed partially on the box and the side split open. I got up on my knees and started stuffing the contents back in, a few shirts, a bathrobe, a scarf, and then I saw the necklace. It had been tucked inside a delicate wooden box, and when I’d fallen, the lid of the box must have slid open. There were only a few pearls of the necklace showing. I reached out to touch it, but then I hesitated.

I stood up and carried the box into the bathroom, putting it down on the counter, and then reached in and touched my fingers to the pearls. They were cool. I pinched them and then gently, very gently, pulled them out of the wooden box that they had been wrapped inside, and held them in the light. The necklace pooled in my hands. There was no question to me: this was Momma’s necklace.

I looked in the mirror while I put the strand of pearls around my neck. I could feel my fingers fumbling—I thought of how nice it would be to have Momma still alive, to have her fasten it for me—and then it was on.

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