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“I didn’t have the opportunity.”
While cooking frozen peas in the microwave, she grated some parmesan cheese. “No college?”
His cup clicked as it gently came to rest on its saucer. “No high school, either.”
“Are you serious?” she asked, putting down the grater. “But...isn’t that illegal? I mean...kids in America—at least in most states—have to attend school until they turn eighteen. Or did you drop out and get your GED?”
“I didn’t drop out. I made it mostly through middle school, but it was at that point my uncle got sick and couldn’t fish, and if we wanted to eat, someone had to put food on the table.”
“You had to work?”
“It wasn’t quite work. For the most part, it was absolute freedom, and I enjoyed it.”
“But...what about when your uncle got better? He didn’t make you go back to school?”
“He never fully recovered. I send him money to this day, or he wouldn’t make it. Besides, once you start that kind of life, it’s almost impossible to go back. I’d missed so much and was so big. Can you imagine being set back three years when you already look three years older than your age?”
“It seems like someone should’ve made that happen. The police, if no one else.”
“There wasn’t much oversight where I grew up.”
“In the swamp.”
“In the swamp,” he repeated.
“So you left your uncle’s house looking for more opportunity. But I’m still not clear on what made you choose to come to an island off Cape Cod.”
“I didn’t choose Mariners right away. I rambled around a bit, eventually came up here to see what it was like and...” he shrugged “...never left.”
“I see.” She strained the pasta and set it aside before mixing some of the water she’d boiled it in with the cheese and peas—all of which she added to the pancetta in the frying pan. “Has it been everything you’d hoped?”
“More or less.”
“You don’t get island fever in the wintertime?” she asked as she stirred everything together. “Remy told me there’re only about fifteen thousand residents year-round, which is a far cry from the number of people who come during the summer. And the nor’easters can be terrible.”
“As far as I’m concerned, the fewer people I have to contend with the better. And the nor’easters aren’t any worse than the hurricanes in Louisiana.”
She could see where crowds of tourists might be a bit much for a person who’d grown up in a backwater village in the swamps of Louisiana. But surely it had to get lonely spending a long cold winter in a cabin in such an isolated situation. “I’m not sure I’m cut out for island life. It’s too...unpredictable.”
“It’s not for everyone.”
“But it suits you?”
“For now.”
She piled some pasta in a bowl, poured the sauce she’d made on top, and added a spoon and fork before sliding it in front of him. “I hope you’re hungry.”
“Smells good,” he said but waited for her to sit down with her own bowl and glass of wine before taking his first bite.
“How long have you worked for the Windsors?” she asked as they ate.
“Almost two years.”
“How well do you know Remy?”
He paused with his fork halfway to his mouth. “Not that well. I’ve seen him around and spoken to him a few times; I’ve mostly heard what his mother has to say about him. She comes to the island more often than any other member of the family. I get the impression she needs to be alone sometimes.”
Ismay swallowed what was in her mouth. “What does Annabelle say about Remy?”
