Page 21 of Sunset on the Solstice

“I stayed for hours. I could tell that Shelby was more relaxed, not only within herself but with the baby. She laughed a few times, which felt rare. I wanted more than anything to get her into the car and drive out of there, but when I suggested that she consider taking a break from Jared, she froze up and said she couldn’t.”

“Did she have a reason?” Victor asked.

“She said he’s her husband,” Rebecca said. “She loved him. I don’t know. Dad, it doesn’t make any sense to me.”

“I know. I know.” Victor shook his head. “I’ve seen many women like Shelby in my years of therapy. Women who fall in love in a way that eliminates their sense of self.”

Rebecca wanted to insist that Shelby was different from those other women. She wanted to tell her father that he had it all wrong, that it couldn’t be like that. But of course, it was.

“Jared came back while I was still at their place,” Rebecca said. “Shelby immediately panicked. She told me to go out the back way and walk around the house, if only so I didn’t have to talk to him. I told her that was ridiculous. I stood to greet him, and he got very stony-faced with me. He asked me what I was doing there. He reminded me that he’d told me to leave last night. I told him that I was here for the benefit of my daughter and grandson. He reached for his phone and immediately called the cops, telling them that I’d broken in and was threatening not to leave.”

Victor’s jaw hung open. Rebecca could still see the scene, playing out in her mind’s eye. She could still feel the screams coming out of her throat. “I told him that he couldn’t do this to Shelby. I told him that I’d send child protective services after him. All the while, Shelby was sobbing, telling me to go, that it was all going to be okay. She asked me to leave them alone. Suddenly, the cops were there. I didn’t want them to touch me, so I threw up my hands and walked out. I told them that Shelby was my daughter, and I was worried about her. But it was clear that Jared had already gotten them on his side. He’s some bigwig in that area now. His job is important, and people respect him. Out there, I’m just a woman from out East. They don’t trust me.”

Victor put his hands over his face and rubbed his beard. “It’s worse than I thought,” he muttered. When he let his hands drop, he asked Rebecca, “Why haven’t you told me this before?”

Rebecca shrugged. “I’m embarrassed. I hate that this happened. I hate that I raised a daughter who fell for this kind of man.”

“We should be beyond embarrassment in this family,” Victor said sternly. “We’ve been through too much.”

Rebecca felt a knot in her stomach loosen.

“We can’t give up on this, Rebecca,” Victor said. “We can’t let that monster take Shelby and her baby from us forever.”

Rebecca’s voice broke. “I don’t know how to fix it. I was so helpless when I went out there last time.”

Victor gestured toward Chad and Jenny, who were laughing together at a nearby table. He gestured in another direction, where Bethany and her husband Rod were slow dancing beneath the purple sky. “There are so many of us,” he said finally. “Can’t we, with all our love and hope and goodness, overpower some idiotic and mean-spirited Harvard graduate? Can’t we show him just how much of a little nothing he is?”

11

Cambridge, Massachusetts: Autumn 2026

During that first week, Shelby hardly left the hospital. Sick with regret and anxious to be there if and when Jared woke up, she showered at the hospital, ate all her meals from the hospital cafeteria, and told all her Columbia professors that she had a really awful flu and she’d be back as soon as she could. She felt the lies, piling up around her, and she didn’t care. All she cared about was Jared. When she slept, which was not often, she dreamed about the beautiful months they’d spent together on Nantucket. She remembered swimming and laughter. She remembered sun-drenched beach days. She prayed that they would have them again someday.

By the beginning of week two, Jared’s parents had become accustomed to Shelby's refusal to go. Sometimes when they went for food, they brought Shelby back something: a burrito, a sandwich, sometimes entire bowls of fancy pasta. The food they bought was much better than anything Shelby could buy at the hospital, and she often went outside and wolfed it down on the bench near the parking lot.

Midway through week two, Shelby called two of her professors to confess that she was struggling with the course load due to her “sickness.” One of them was understanding, but the other, Professor Margaret Thames, told her that she needed a note from a doctor. “It’s campus policy,” she explained flatly. And then she said, “There are rumors about where you actually are, Shelby. If you’re lying to me about this, I need you to fess up. We can handle anything, you and me. I genuinely believe in you and your abilities, and I understand you’re at a difficult age. Please communicate.”

Shelby was stricken. “I, um,” she began, searching her mind for a better excuse.

“Come back to New York and meet me in my office next week,” Professor Thames urged her. “We can work something out. Together. All right?”

Shelby told her she would.

When Shelby told Jim and Monica that she had to head back to the city for a day or two, they seemed confused. It was as though they’d decided that Shelby was a part of the hospital furniture or the wallpaper. Shelby squeezed Jared’s hand, tears in her eyes, as she told him, “I love you. I’ll be back as soon as I can.”

Monica followed Shelby out to the waiting room. “Wait, Shelby,” Monica said. Her blond hair wasn’t as shiny as it usually was, and Shelby wondered if her son’s coma was finally getting to her. “Shelby, you don’t have to come back. I mean, I’m sure you have things to take care of.”

Shelby searched Monica’s face for signs that this was a trick. “I didn’t want to break up,” she stammered, thinking of that impossible day in August when Jared had still been conscious. “I wanted to do long distance, but Jared refused.”

Monica closed her eyes. “Jared is… particular. I mean, he has a vision for how things are supposed to go, and if things deviate from that plan, he struggles.”

“He’s brilliant,” Shelby told her. “I know it’s a struggle for him to be so brilliant.”

But his mother gave Shelby a look that meant, That isn’t what I’m trying to say to you.

Shelby couldn’t talk to Monica a moment longer. She turned on her heel and hurried through the rain, all the way to the bus station, where she took a smoggy and ominous bus to Manhattan. There, she took the subway back to the apartment she shared with Molly. She found Molly and Molly’s new boyfriend on the sofa, tangled up and eating pizza. When Molly saw her, she sprang up and asked, “Is Jared alive?”

“Yes, he’s alive, Molly,” Shelby said, rolling her eyes. She hurried into the bathroom to shower, wondering what Molly was telling her boyfriend about her. She decided she didn’t care.