The Castaways

DELILAH

Every night when Delilah tucked Barney into bed, he asked about Greg’s guitar.

“Can I have it, Mom? Please?”

“I’m working on it,” Delilah said, though this was not exactly true. Delilah hadn’t spoken to Andrea in over a week. She avoided her at drop-off and pick-up from camp, though more than half the time Kacy biked in with the kids.

“I want it really bad,” Barney said.

“I know, honey,” Delilah said, kissing his forehead. Barney was six and a half, with the sensibilities of an evolved forty-year-old man. He did not ask for things gratuitously. He only became emotionally invested in things that were meaningful. Delilah had offered Barney a brand-new guitar, but that wasn’t what he was after. He wanted Greg’s guitar, the well-worn, honey-toned instrument they all loved and recognized. It was the only guitar he had ever heard played.

An idea formed in Delilah’s mind. She would steal Greg’s guitar out of the Kapenash house and give it to Barney. Steal Greg’s guitar out of the police chief’s house! This was, she realized, the only way she was going to get her hands on it.

When?

Anytime! It would be easy! Ed and Andrea left their house unlocked, and in the summertime wide open! Delilah would slip in in the middle of the night, take the guitar, and slip out. The last time Delilah had been to the house, the guitar had been collecting dust in the mudroom. It would be so easy and yet so subversive! One naughty step that Delilah could take to make Barney, and herself, feel better.

And so, on the fifth of July, Delilah set her alarm for 2 A.M. She slid out of bed, tiptoed out of her house, got in the car, and drove to the Kapenash house. She parked down the street and strolled through the balmy night. The sky was clear and there were a million stars, and the stars made Delilah think of heaven. Was there a heaven, and were Greg and Tess in it?

Delilah crunched up the Chief’s shell driveway. She had thought she might feel afraid. What if the Chief mistook her for a burglar and appeared with his gun? But she was as calm as a nun. If the Chief or Andrea woke up, Delilah would declare herself, and as odd as it would seem, she would tell them she was there for Greg’s guitar.

As predicted, the door to the mudroom was wide open. Delilah pulled back the screen door and stepped inside. The house hummed with sleeping people. Delilah had picked the fifth of July because the Fourth was the Chief’s most arduous day of the year-thirty thousand people descended on Jetties Beach, the traffic alone was a migraine-and he would be exhausted.

For the first time since moving to Nantucket, Delilah had skipped the Fourth of July celebration; she was too downtrodden to deal with the frivolity or the crowds. And so she’d taken the boys to Addison and Phoebe’s house. Phoebe was out at some big, splashy party, but Addison was home. He escorted Delilah and the boys to the widow’s walk, where he drunkenly belted out “The Star-Spangled Banner” once the fireworks started. Delilah found the occasion depressing, and the boys seemed antsy and unimpressed. Andrea was supposed to come with the twins, but she didn’t show up, and when Delilah called, Kacy answered and said that Andrea was “under the weather.”

Right, Delilah thought as she shifted feet, praying for the fire-works to end so she could get home to bed. They were all under the weather.

There in the corner of the Kapenashes’ mudroom was the guitar case. Delilah reached for it, giddy. The whole operation would take less than thirty seconds. But when Delilah grabbed the case, it swung open and banged against the trunk that held the Kapenash family’s winter boots. Delilah looked: the guitar case was empty. It was a casket without a body.

No! Arrgh! It would have been too easy. Delilah propped the guitar case back in the corner and waited a few seconds to see if the banging noise had woken anyone. The house was silent. Where was the guitar? Delilah tiptoed into the living room, through the kitchen, down the hall. She opened the door to the coat closet. Was the guitar in here? No. Just the Christmas decorations and the hideous fur that Andrea had inherited from her mother. (Okay, they all knew each other too well.) Delilah stood for a second outside the Chief and Andrea’s bedroom. She could hear the Chief snoring. She realized that if the guitar were anywhere it was probably in Eric’s room, but even Delilah had no intention of entering the bedroom of a fifteen-year-old boy. Ha! If Andrea caught Delilah in there, she would have her arrested.

As Delilah turned to leave, she heard a feathery noise. The Kapenashes had a cat named Arthur who was breaking all kinds of feline longevity records. Was it Arthur?

Delilah peeked up the stairs and caught her breath.

Jesus!

Chloe was floating down the stairs in a white nightie. A ghost, an angel. Her eyes were open, her face placid, even as she saw Delilah.

“Oh, honey,” Delilah whispered.

Chloe held out her arms and Delilah reached for her. Chloe was petite, like Tess; she was a featherweight compared to Delilah’s boys.

Chloe said, “Where’s my mom?”

Delilah’s heart was a berry, crushed underfoot. She hugged Chloe. This poor child. No mother, no father, no Fourth of July fireworks. Delilah carried her back upstairs to the guest room, where Finn lay, growling like a Tonka truck in his sleep. Delilah laid Chloe down in bed and smoothed her dark hair and stroked her cheek, the perfect pink little girl cheek, dotted with light freckles. She kissed Chloe’s temple. Delilah had never wanted a little girl; she had been too afraid that the girl would turn out to be like her. But Delilah wanted this little girl, and her brother, too.

She cast her eyes around the room for the guitar-the twins’ room was another place it would likely be-but she didn’t see it. She stood up and gazed at the twins. Tonight she had come for the guitar. But the next time she would come for them.