The Vineyard by Barbara Delinsky

roads, but I remember neitherthat nor our actual arrival at Asquonset. Brad said the place was dismal, and I’m sure it was. We were used to luxury. Asquonset was anything but.
    â€œI cannot imagine that,” Olivia chided.
    â€œYou’re being polite.”
    â€œNo. Really. It’s such a beautiful place.”
    â€œNow.”
    â€œEven the land. I imagine it would be beautiful without a single building on it.”
    Natalie smiled. “Good girl. I’ve chosen the right person. Your heart’s in the right place. We just have to fine-tune your view of reality. I may not remember my very first view of this place, but I certainly do remember the ones after that. ‘Beautiful’ was not an adjective that I would have used to describe Asquonset back then.”
    The Burkes had moved into a smaller cottage on the property, leaving the stone farmhouse for us, and my father had done his best. Those pieces of furniture that we hadn’t sold had been shipped ahead and were in place in the living room, kitchen, and bedrooms. Jeremiah’s wife, Brida, had scrubbed the house and made it shine as much as a farmhouse built in the 1870s could shine, but it was as different as night and day from the home we had left in New York. As was the custom in the country, the ceilings were low so that the fire could more easily heat the damp, cold air, and we did have indoor plumbing. We were lucky in that. But the place was small, closed in, and dark, totally alone on its windy hill.
    It was a metaphor for our life.
    Natalie stopped talking. Her eyes were faraway as she moved her hand ever so lightly over the photograph.
    â€œWho
is
this boy?” Olivia asked.
    The older woman looked up with a start. It was a minute before she found herself and smiled. “This boy?” She raised the picture. “This boy is my very first distinct memory.”
    It was late afternoon on the day of our arrival in Asquonset. I was outside in fields that had yielded their crop of potatoes six weeks before. I’m not sure how I got there. I doubt my parentswould have wanted me out in the rain. I suppose that they were unpacking at the house and didn’t see me leave.
    I must have been desperate to escape. Between their personal gloom and those low ceilings, I imagine that I felt choked.
    The fields were bare, plowed clear of everything but rain and earth. I walked as far and as fast as I could, but I was frightened enough of the place to keep the farmhouse in sight. It was small and distant. But it was there.
    I’ll never forget it. I wore a little hat, just as I would have if I’d been in New York. It was made of felt and had a tiny turned-up rim and straps that went under the chin. It was no match for the rain. With each step my hair grew wetter, until it hung in sodden strands around my face. I was wearing T-strap shoes that had been white that morning. They had been scuffed during the trip from New York, but out there in the field, they were quickly covered with mud. I bent to wipe them clean. When I straightened, the hem of my coat had mud on it, too.
    The coat and my dress were pale blue. They were the best of my old clothes that still fit. Horrified, I tried to brush the mud off, but the smear spread. The more I brushed, the worse it got. My stomach began to hurt. The sense of loss went far beyond my clothes.
    Then I saw Carl.
    She was lost in the snapshot, which she held now as though it were gold.
    It took Olivia a minute to make the connection.
“This
is Carl?”
    â€œIt is,” Natalie said with a contented sigh.
    â€œHe was
Jeremiah’s
son?”
    â€œWhy the surprise?”
    Why the surprise?
The scenario Olivia had dreamed up was suddenly all wrong. “I just—just assumed that Carl was a newer acquaintance. I thought he was from somewhere else.”
    â€œWell, he was, if you count his being born in Ireland. But he was a toddler when his parents brought him here.