Read Online Summer's End by Kathleen Gilles Seidel - Free Book Online Page B

hadn’t even thought about Amy having friends until she saw the altar flowers—dozens and dozens—no, there were probably hundreds of them—of tulips of such a very dark purple that they seemed black. Their pale green stems arched under the weight of the dark blossoms and fell in graceful curves over the white marble urns.
    Amy’s friends had had them shipped directly from a grower in Holland. They were the most extraordinary flowers anyone had ever seen; they were unique, assertive, even majestic. Mother would have loved them.
    Â 
    And now, a year and a half after Mother’s funeral, Dad was bringing another woman home.
    Phoebe had understood why he had decided to take a leave of absence for the spring semester. “It’s been a year,” he had said. “I’m still living exactly as I was whenyour mother was alive. I need to get away for a while, force myself to develop some new routines.”
    Who would have thought that the new routines would include another woman?
    Dad said that Phoebe and Giles would like her, this Gwen person, that she was organized and feminine.
    â€œFeminine?” Phoebe demanded of Giles. “Since when did Dad ever care about that?” Her mother had not been remotely feminine, and to Phoebe the word smelled of frivolity and girlishness.
    She called her brother to tell him that Gwen was coming to Iowa.
    â€œWe could have anticipated this,” Ian said heavily. “We should have expected that women of a certain age would be all over him. It should not be a surprise.”
    Phoebe shifted the phone to her other ear. What crap that was. Ian had been just as surprised as she. But he liked to think he could anticipate everything. If you could anticipate something, you could control it, and Ian liked that.
    Getting along with Ian and Joyce had been difficult this year. Phoebe wanted to badger him, startle him. This is serious, Ian. Giles said they might get married .
    Married…another woman in Mother’s house, taking Mother’s place in the duplicate bridge club, using Mother’s heavy silver trays, coming up to the lake in Mother’s place.
    It didn’t bear thinking of.
    Â 
    Hal’s house was rented for the semester. Phoebe urged him to bring Gwen to stay in Iowa City.
    â€œThank you for offering,” he said. “But you know how crazy things get.” The weekend of the senior musicmajors’ recitals was crammed with department receptions and parties hosted by parents who wanted to meet favorite professors. “We probably need to stay in town. Everyone’s offered to put us up, but I think we’ll just stay in the Holiday Inn. Can you meet us there?”
    The Holiday Inn in Lipton was a Holidome. The rooms ran around a central indoor courtyard that had a swimming pool, a ping-pong table, and little redwood terraces separated by planters. Phoebe called her father’s room, but no one answered. “They are probably waiting for us in the bar.”
    â€œThe bar here is pretty dark,” Giles said. “Your father is likely to be at one of the tables by the pool.”
    Phoebe turned, and the moment she did, she saw her father walking toward them, smiling, his hands outstretched.
    He led them toward the pool. At a glass-topped table sat a woman who stood as they approached. She had smooth blonde hair cut to her chin. She was slender without seeming fragile.
    â€œPhoebe.” Her voice was low and melodic. Her handshake was firm, her eyes were direct. She wasn’t shy.
    She was wearing lemon-colored silk, a pleated skirt with a scoop-necked shell under a crepe blazer. The silk and the crepe were exactly the same color, and there was not a single suitcase wrinkle in the silk. She had pearl earrings and a pearl bracelet. Her nails were polished a very pale rose. There was no telling how old she was.
    Phoebe couldn’t imagine her at the lake.
    They all sat down. Gwen’s spine barely