“I think you’ve rendered him speechless,” Daria said to Chloe with a laugh.
“I just…hadn’t expected that.” He laughed himself. That explained Chloe’s reserve in greeting him. “So, do nuns get the summer off? Is that why you’re here?”
“I’m working at St. Esther’s, the Catholic church in Nag’s Head, for the summer,” Chloe said. “I’ve been doing that the past few summers, running a day camp for kids.”
“Well, I’m almost afraid to ask what you’re doing, Daria,” he said.
“I’m a carpenter,” she said.
Rory laughed. “I should have guessed,” he said. “For real?”
“For real,” she said. “I probably have sawdust in my hair right now.”
“I was wondering what that was,” he said. “I thought maybe it was a new Outer Banks trend.”
“It’s just a Daria Cato trend.” Shelly grinned.
“I was working on a bookshelf for a cottage in Duck when Chloe told me you were here. There’s always a lot of building going on in the Outer Banks.”
“Are you living here year-round?” he asked. Despite the fact that Shelly’s letter bore the Kill Devil Hills return address, it was hard for him to imagine anyone living here year-round. For him, the Outer Banks had always meant summer and the beach.
“Uh-huh,” Daria said. “Shelly and I have lived here for the past ten years.”
“Wow.” He wondered what it would be like to live smack on the beach during the winter.
“Daria’s also an EMT,” Shelly said. There was pride in her voice.
“An EMT?” he asked. “Emergency medical technician?”
“Well, I was,” Daria said. “I’m taking some time off.”
“A lifesaver.” Rory studied her with admiration. “You started that avocation early, didn’t you?” He looked at Shelly. “She was only ten years old when she saved your life.”
“Eleven,” Daria corrected.
“I know,” said Shelly. “People around here call her Supergirl.”
“I remember!” he said, flashing back to the newspaper articles that followed Shelly’s discovery on the beach. “They still call you that after all this time?”
“’Fraid so,” Daria said. “I’ll be sixty and they’ll still call me Supergirl.”
“It’s because she’s kept on saving people,” Shelly said. “She’s the local hero.”
“I’ll never forget that day.” He wondered if he should tell them now that Shelly’s letter had prompted his visit to Kill Devil Hills this summer, but he had more catching up to do first. He set his empty glass on the coffee table. “Is there anybody else left on the cul-de-sac from the old days?” he asked. “I noticed Cindy Trump’s cottage is gone.”
“There was a bad storm more than a decade ago,” Daria said. “The ocean swallowed their cottage in one gulp. It did a lot of damage to the Sea Shanty, too, but your cottage was spared.”
“The Wheelers are still around,” Chloe said. “Do you remember them? They live next door.”
“Still?” He remembered a quiet older couple who often strolled on the beach in the evening, hand in hand. “They’re still living?”
“They’re only in their seventies,” Daria said. “Their cottage is filled with their grandchildren all summer long.”
“Did he know Linda and her dogs?” Shelly asked.
“Yeah, you knew Linda, right?” Daria asked.
He narrowed his eyes in concentration, picturing a mousy young girl lying on the beach with her nose in a book. “I think so,” he said.
“She lives in that same cottage with her partner, Jackie,” Chloe said. “They raise golden retrievers. Linda is a lesbian.”
Chloe revealed that fact as easily as if she’d said that Linda was a teacher or a swim coach. Rory had had little experience with nuns, but he’d assumed that Chloe had become moralistic and judgmental. He hoped her matter-of-fact description of Linda meant that she had not.
“Well, you never can tell how people are going to turn out, can you,” Rory said. “What about your cousin? Ellen? What’s she doing?”
“She’s married,” Chloe said. “She comes down every few weeks or so with her husband and kids.”
“Not this summer,” Daria said. “I mean, Ellen and Ted will be here, I guess, but not her daughters. They’re traveling in Europe as part of a high-school exchange program,” she explained to Rory. “Ellen’s a medical technician. She does mammograms all day.” Daria and Chloe laughed at that. “I don’t know if you remember what she was like, but that job suits her perfectly.”
Rory smiled. “She had a bit of a…sadistic streak, if I recall,” he said.
“You’ve got it,” Chloe said.
“What about the twins who lived next door to me?” Rory asked. “Jill and…her brother. I can’t remember his name.”
“Jill and Brian Fletcher,” Daria said. “Jill is still around.”
“The bonfire lady,” Shelly said.
“Yes.” Daria looked at Rory. “Remember the annual bonfire we had on the beach near the end of each summer?”
He had forgotten, but the memory slipped back easily. The huge, roaring fire. Great food. The sound of the ocean. Willing girls and the sheltering darkness. He nodded.
“Well, Jill has kept that tradition going,” Daria said. “She has to get special permission each year, because bonfires are no longer allowed on the beach. She has to make the fire closer to the water, but she’s fanatical about it. She’s got a couple of teenagers, and her husband comes down on the weekends. I don’t know what happened to Brian, her brother.” Daria looked at Chloe, who shrugged.
“Haven’t seen him in years,” Chloe said.
Rory was pleased to hear that some of the old residents were still around, although he was disappointed that Cindy Trump was not one of them. He’d always thought that Cindy somehow held the key to the mystery of the foundling.
He looked at Shelly. She was a striking young woman, with large, light brown eyes, that long blond hair, a willowy body and perfect tan. Sitting there on the floor of the living room, she was all legs and arms and gossamer hair. She’d been wearing the same ingenuous smile since his arrival, and he realized that she had a childlike way of speaking, a simplicity about her. He’d lived with Polly long enough to recognize it, and he wondered if Shelly’s rude introduction to the world had left her with some brain damage.
“How about you, Shelly?” he asked. “What are you up to?”
“I