Free Summerland: A Novel by Elin Hilderbrand

were gathering for pictures. Hobby was wearing a tux jacket and a bow tie with a pair of madras Bermuda shorts and flip-flops. He was dazzling. Clairewore a white lace sheath and hot-pink satin heels to match the plaid of Hobby’s shorts.
    Rasha and Zoe had stood shoulder to shoulder, beaming at their children, taking pictures with their iPhones. Hobby had brought Claire a bouquet of white roses and calla lilies instead of a corsage.
    “They look like they’re getting married,” Zoe had said.
    “Don’t they?” Rasha asked. She had smiled wistfully. Because what mother wouldn’t want her daughter to marry Hobby Alistair?
    Rasha’s first report from the hospital was that Zoe seemed to be disappearing. She was thin, pale, and trembling. Her dark hair, always so stylishly cut and tipped with reddish highlights, was matted; she didn’t smell that great. She wore gray sweatpants and a gray Nantucket Whalers T-shirt that belonged to Hobby.
    Rasha learned that there had been no change in Hobby’s condition.
    But at that moment Rasha decided there would be one change, at least: Zoe was going to eat something. Rasha knew that the woman was a chef, that she appreciated good food, and that after a week of sustaining herself on nothing but crackers from the vending machine, she must be hungry. Rasha walked up Cambridge Street to Whole Foods and got one container of chilled summer squash soup and another of Asian chicken salad. She got freshly made hummus and Burrata cheese and bruschetta topping and a whole grain baguette and a pint of fresh raspberries and some bars of dark chocolate. She returned to the hospital with these riches, but by that point both Zoe and Claire were in the room with Hobby. Touching him, talking to him. Rasha herself was able to peek into the room and see Hobby, his left side bandaged like a mummy, his majestic form in repose as if he were a fallen king.
    Zoe smoothed the hair off of her son’s face.
    Rasha had heard people say less-than-generous things about Zoe Alistair, but at that moment she saw nothing in her but strength and grace.
    Day 8: We began to wonder about a funeral for Penny. Her body was at the Lewis Funeral Home on Union Street. Zoe had decided on a burial instead of cremation. But when?
    Zoe ate half of the summer squash soup and ten raspberries. This was her first meal since the accident, and it was significant enough news to make the email chain.
    Day 9: At ten o’clock at night, phones rang across the island. Annabel Wright, the cheerleading captain, whose family lived out in Sconset, had gotten permission to ring the bells of the Sconset Chapel.
    Hobby Alistair had opened his eyes! He had regained consciousness!

ZOE
    Y ou would have to be a mother to understand. But how many mothers really could? There were some, Zoe knew this. There were mothers in the world who had sick children, sometimes more than one. There were mothers in the world with sons or daughters in Afghanistan or other war zones, sometimes more than one child. One killed in action, one still fighting.
    That was Zoe.
    Penny was dead, but Zoe had done some mental yoga and put that information aside for now so that she could focus on Hobby. Ever since the day the twins were born, this had been her modus operandi. Set one down, pick the other one up and nurse her. Giveone a bath, put the other one on the soft bathroom rug and let him cry. Help one with her homework, let the other one sit and complain. Watch one play basketball, ask the other to sit in the stands and cheer. Zoe was one woman facing two sets of needs. Splitting her attention had never worked. The kids knew this: either they had her or they didn’t.
    For nine days she had given Hobby all of herself. A gatekeeper wielding a long, sharp machete lived in her mind: no other thoughts but of Hobby.
    Zoe talked to the doctors. She talked, tersely, to Al Castle: “No change,” she said. “No change.” “Penny will be buried, not cremated.” “No