“And some other things,” I add, sitting up and looking at the Liars in the morning light. “Things are coming back as you’re filling me in.”
“We are telling you all the stuff that happened before we set the fire,” says Johnny, still loud.
“Yes,” says Mirren.
“We set a fire,” I say, in wonder. “We didn’t sob and bleed; we did something instead. Made a change.”
“Kind of,” says Mirren.
“Are you kidding? We burned that fucking palace to the ground.”
71
After the aunties and Granddad quarreled, I was crying.
Gat was crying, too.
He was going to leave the island and I’d never see him again. He would never see me.
Gat, my Gat.
I had never cried with anyone before. At the same time.
He cried like a man, not like a boy. Not like he was frustrated or hadn’t gotten his way, but like life was bitter. Like his wounds couldn’t be healed.
I wanted to heal them for him.
We ran down to the tiny beach alone. I clung to him and we sat together in the sand, and for once he had nothing to say. No analysis, no questions.
Finally I said something about
what if
what if
we took it into our own hands?
And Gat said,
How?
And I said something about
what if
what if
they could stop fighting?
We have something to save.
And Gat said,
Yes. You and me and Mirren and Johnny, yes, we do.
But of course we can always see each other, the four of us.
Next year we can drive.
There is always the phone.
But here, I said. This.
Yes, here, he said. This.
You and me.
I said something about
what if
what if
we could somehow stop being
the Beautiful Sinclair Family and just be a family?
What if we could stop being
different colors, different backgrounds, and just be in love?
What if we could force everyone to change?
Force them.
You want to play God, Gat said.
I want to take action, I said. There is always the phone, he said.
Bu what about here? I said. This.
Yes, here, he said. This.
Gat was my love, my first and only. How could I let him go?
He was a person who couldn’t fake a smile but smiled often. He wrapped my wrists in white gauze and believed wounds needed attention. He wrote on his hands and asked me my thoughts. His mind was restless, relentless. He didn’t believe in God anymore and yet he still wished that God would help him.
And now, he was mine I said we should not let our love be threatened.
We should not let the family fall apart.
We should not accept an evil we can change.
We would stand up against it, would we not?
Yes. We should.
We would be heroes, even.
Gat and I talked to Mirren and Johnny.
Convinced them to take action.
We told each other
over and over: do what you are afraid to do.
We told each other.
Over and over, we said it.
We told each other
we were right.
72
The plan was simple. We would find the spare jugs of gas, the ones kept in the shed for the motorboats. There were newspapers and cardboard in the mudroom: we’d build piles of recycling and soak those in gasoline. We’d soak the wood floors as well. Stand back. Light a paper towel roll and throw it. Easy.
We would light every floor, every room, if possible, to make sure Clairmont burned completely. Gat in the basement, me on the ground floor, Johnny on the second and Mirren on top.
“The fire department arrived really late,” says Mirren.
“Two fire departments,” says Johnny. “Woods Hole and Martha’s Vineyard.”
“We were counting on that,” I say, realizing.
“We planned to call for help,” says Johnny. “Of course someone had to call or it would look like arson. We were going to say we were all down at Cuddledown, watching a movie, and you know how the trees surround it. You can’t see the other houses unless you go on the roof. So it made sense that no one would have called.”
“Those fire departments are mainly volunteers,” says Gat. “No one had a clue. Old wood house. Tinderbox.”
“If the aunts and Granddad suspected us, and I think maybe they did, they’d never prosecute,” adds Johnny. “It was easy to bank on that.”
Of course they wouldn’t prosecute.
No one here is a criminal.
No one is an addict.
No one is a failure.
I feel a thrill at what we have done. What I have done.
My full name is Cadence Sinclair Eastman, and contrary to the expectations of the beautiful family in which I was raised, I am an arsonist.
A visionary, a heroine, a rebel.
The kind of person who changes history.
A criminal.
But if I am a criminal, am I, then, an addict? Am I, then, a failure?
My mind is playing with twists of meaning as it always does. Here with the Liars, I can see the truth at last. “We made it happen,” I say.
“Depends on what you think it is,” says Mirren.
“We saved the family. They started over.”
“Aunt Carrie’s wandering the island at night,” says Mirren. “My mother’s scrubbing clean sinks till her hands are raw. Penny watches you sleep and writes down what you eat. They drink a fuckload. They’re getting drunk until the tears roll down their faces.”
“When are you even at New Clairmont to see that?” I say.
“I get up there now and then,” Mirren says. “You think we solved everything, Cady, but I think it was—”
“We’re here,” I persist. “Without that fire, we wouldn’t be here. That’s what I’m saying.”
“Okay.”
“Granddad held so much power,” I say. “And now he doesn’t. We changed an evil we saw in the world.”
I understand so much that wasn’t clear before. My tea is warm, the Liars are beautiful, Cuddledown is beautiful. It doesn’t matter if there are stains on the wall. It doesn’t matter if I have headaches or Mirren is sick. It doesn’t matter if Will has nightmares and Gat hates himself. We have committed the perfect crime.
“Granddad only lacks power because he’s demented,” says Mirren. “He would still torture everybody if he could.”
“I don’t I agree with you,” says Gat. “New Clairmont seems like a punishment to me.”
“What?” she asks.
“A self-punishment. He built himself a home that isn’t a home. It’s deliberately uncomfortable.”
“Why would he do that?” I ask.
“Why did you give away all your belongings?” Gat asks.
He is staring at me. They are all staring at me.
“To be charitable,” I answer. “To do some good in the world.”
There is a strange silence.
“I hate clutter,” I say.
No one laughs. I don’t know how this conversation came to be all about me.
None of the Liars speaks for a long time. Then Johnny says, “Don’t push it, Gat,” and Gat says, “I’m glad you remember the fire, Cadence,” and I say, “Yah, well, some of it,” and Mirren says she doesn’t feel well and goes back to bed.
The boys and I lie on the kitchen floor and stare at the ceiling for a while longer, until I realize, with some embarrassment, that they have both fallen asleep.
73
I find my mother on the Windemere porch with the goldens. She is crocheting a scarf of pale blue wool.
“You’re always at Cuddledown,” Mummy complains. “It’s not good to be down there all the time. Carrie went yesterday, looking for a something, and she said it was filthy. What have you been doing?”
“Nothing. Sorry about the mess.”
“If it’s really dirty we can’t ask Ginny to clean it. You know that, right? It’s not fair to her. And Bess will have a fit if she sees it.”
I don’t want anyone coming into Cuddledown. I want it just for us. “Don’t worry.” I sit down and pat Bosh on his sweet yellow head. “Listen, Mummy?”
“Yes?”
“Why did you tell the family not to talk to me about the fire?”
She puts down her yarn and looks at me for a long time. “You remember the fire?”
“Last night, it came rushing back. I don’t remember all of it, but yeah. I remember it happened. I remember you all argued. And everyone left the island. I remember I was here with Gat, Mirren, and Johnny.”
“Do you remember anything else?”
“What the sky looked like. With the flames. The smell of the smoke.”
If Mummy thinks I am in any way at fault, she will never, ever, ask me. I know she won’t.