As soon as Eddie hangs up the phone, he Googles the names. Roger and Marcia Christy of East Boston pop up right away in a sidebar of the Boston Herald. The couple won $132 million from a lottery ticket that they bought from Lanzilli Groceria in Orient Heights near Constitution Beach.
They’re for real! Eddie thinks. A hundred thirty-two million. If they took the payout, they probably ended up with eighty million, and after paying 40 percent in taxes, they’re left with forty-eight million. So a ten-to-fifteen-million-dollar investment in real estate seems reasonable. The Christys are coming to Nantucket next Friday for the weekend, and Eddie will set up at least six houses for them to look at. He will take them to lunch someplace charming but modest—either the Nantucket Pharmacy lunch counter or Something Natural. He will chauffeur them around in Barbie’s new Escalade, since Eddie and Grace are sharing a sixteen-year-old Jeep Cherokee that has a weird, persistent smell of old popcorn.
Eddie rubs his hands together. If he can sell the Powerball Christys a house, he will officially be back.
He tells Allegra he’s taking lunch—normally, he works right through it—but he’s too excited to eat, so instead he decides to go for a walk. It’s a crisp, beautiful fall day on Nantucket. The trees on Main Street are ablaze with color, but the first frost has yet to arrive, so all the chrysanthemums and dahlias in the window boxes are still blooming. If the Christys could see Nantucket right now, today, they would buy in a heartbeat. This is the most charming island in the world, in Eddie’s opinion—a whole different planet from East Boston. The homes in town are not just aesthetically pleasing; they’re old, they have architectural integrity, they contain stories—stories of the whaling heyday, captains and crews, men lost at sea, men returned safely to loved ones, stories of Quakers and Unitarians, Native Americans and Cape Verdeans, stories of love, betrayal, death, achievement, failure, hope, faith, family. Eddie tears up a little, thinking about how lucky he is to live in so authentic and singular a place. Most people think real estate is a business about property and therefore money, but Eddie would argue that real estate is a business about people.
And about money.
His tears are partially those of relief. If he can split the difference and sell the Christys a house for twelve-five, he’ll get a $375,000 commission, a third of which will go to the office, still leaving him with a quarter of a million dollars.
Breathing room. He might even be in a position to start house hunting himself.
He considers walking home to Lily Street to tell Grace the news, but he’s torn. On the one hand, he has vowed to be more open and emotionally available to Grace, to share what’s going on in his “interior life,” and right now what he’s feeling is cautiously optimistic. But on the other hand, Eddie is superstitious. He feels that as soon as he discloses the prospect of good news, it will evaporate. The Christys will cancel their trip on Friday, saying they have decided to buy on Martha’s Vineyard instead. Or they will have done further exploring on the Internet and decide to go with a different real estate company, most likely Addison Wheeler or, the worst-case scenario, Rachel McMann. There are a million things that can go wrong, Eddie knows. He decides to wait and tell Grace after he spends the day with the Christys.
On his right Eddie passes Winter Street, and he stops. The Winter Street Inn is there at the end of the block, and Eddie wonders if he should stop by to see the Quinns and ask if there is anything he can bring to the party next week. Would it seem rude, popping by unannounced? Grace told Eddie that she was surprised the Quinns were throwing a party because she had heard that Kelley Quinn was quite sick. Prostate cancer or brain cancer, she couldn’t recall which. Eddie chided Grace for repeating rumors. The gossip on this island was toxic. Hadn’t they learned that much?
Eddie strolls down Winter Street, deciding that he will pop in to say hello, not least of all because he’s feeling a bit peckish, and the inn is famous for serving homemade snacks like warm cheddar tartlets and sweet-and-spicy pecans throughout the day.
Eddie steps up to the front door and uses the knocker.
A long moment passes with no answer, long enough for Eddie to think that nobody is home. But is that likely? At an inn? But then the door swings open and Mitzi is standing before him, her cheeks rosy, her hair mussed. She smiles, but he can tell she doesn’t quite recognize him. Can he blame her? He hasn’t seen her in a number of years. The last Christmas Eve party Eddie attended here at the inn, Mitzi was mysteriously absent, and there were rumors about that, to be sure, something about Mitzi having an affair with Santa Claus, too weird and fantastical to believe.
“Hi, Mitzi,” Eddie says. “It’s Eddie, Eddie Pancik.”
She still looks uncertain, and so Eddie resorts to use of his loathsome nickname. “Fast Eddie.”
He watches this click into place. Her face lights up with recognition, if not with actual joy. “Eddie!” she says. “I’m so sorry! You must think me dreadfully rude. It’s just… well, I wasn’t expecting anyone, least of all you. You’re home, then? Back on Nantucket? For good?” She seems to be scrambling for the proper way to ask if Eddie has been released from jail. He has found the best way to deal with people is to be straightforward.
“Back home,” he says. “I served my time. I’m a new man.”
“Well, that’s good to hear,” Mitzi says. “Not that there was anything wrong with you before. Listen, if anyone knows about losing one’s way for a while, it’s me—as I’m sure you’ve heard.”
Eddie isn’t sure what to say. Maybe the rumors about Mitzi running away with the inn’s Santa Claus are true, then. And yet, here she is, answering the door, looking as pretty and fresh as ever. Still with the long skirts and the dangly earrings, like she just returned from a Peter, Paul and Mary concert.
“Grace and I got your invitation,” Eddie says. “Unfortunately, Grace has volunteer duties she can’t escape from, but I will be attending your party with my daughter Allegra.”
“How lovely!” Mitzi says. She holds the door open a little wider. “Please, come in for a minute, won’t you?”
“Well, I don’t see why not,” Eddie says, motivated by the possibility of a few warm cheddar tartlets. “Although I really just stopped by to give you my RSVP in person and to see if I can bring anything.”
“Now, remind me, Eddie,” Mitzi says as she leads Eddie through the inn’s living and dining rooms to the spacious, airy country kitchen. Eddie scans the counter for tartlets or nuts or muffins, but all he sees is an open bag of kale chips. He feels like maybe he’s made a mistake in dropping by. If he remembers correctly, Mitzi is a talker. He might be held hostage for the remainder of the afternoon. “I lose track of other people’s children so quickly. Are the twins still in high school?”
“They graduated in 2016,” Eddie says. “So right now Hope is a sophomore at Bucknell. And Allegra is living at home with Grace and me. Turns out, college wasn’t for her. She’s working with me at Bayberry Properties right now, trying to figure out her next step.”
“College isn’t for everyone, Eddie,” Mitzi says. “And there’s no reason to be ashamed. Until recently Kelley and I had three out of our four adult children living at home. Now, thankfully, Kevin has a place of his own, and Ava has moved to New York. So we only have Bart. He’s also trying to figure out his next step. He’s been trying for ten months.”
“He’s a war hero,” Eddie says.
“This is true,” Mitzi says. “But he still has his entire life ahead of him. All he does is… sit in his room.” She looks at Eddie and her eyes fill with tears. “I don’t know what to do. He won’t see a therapist. I’m throwing this party mostly to get him out of the house, to get him out among the living again.”
Eddie nods and arranges his face to appear sympathetic, although he feels uneasy. As his wife, Grace, will gladly tell you: Eddie is unqualified to be anyone’s therapist. “How’s Kelley doing?” he asks, hoping to change the subject.
At this, the tears fall. “He’s dying,” Mitzi says. “His doctor says two, maybe three, months at the most. He has an inoperable tumor on the brain that is rapidly encroaching on his basic functions. He lost sight in his left eye. He has tumors on three of his vertebrae. And you know what? He’s as cheerful as I’ve ever seen him. He doesn’t seem to mind that he disappears a little more each day. He doesn’t seem to care that he’s leaving us behind. I mean, what am I going to do?” Mitzi tilts her head toward the ceiling, tears streaming down her face, and Eddie feels genuinely awful. Poor Mitzi! Her son has some form of PTSD, most likely, and her husband is dying. By comparison, Eddie’s problems seem very small indeed. He has to answer the phones—so what? His house is only seven hundred square feet—boohoo! At least Grace and the girls are healthy. All the hardships Eddie is enduring right now he has brought upon himself. He needs to remember that.