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firm mattress, Cindy leafed through the file. One paper invited her to a bonfire talk and sing-along that night, and another laid out her schedule with all the activities she’d chosen. Archery, hiking, art class—she hadn’t painted since she was a girl!—tennis, so she could play with Kevin and not embarrass herself . . . and one mandatory 34 Isabel
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    class she hadn’t signed up for. Baking. Ugh. The only thing she knew how to bake was burned lumps of cement and raw lumps of goo, but Betsy said campers could only change the classes they picked themselves, so Cindy was stuck with that, and with group therapy and the special trip to one of the islands in the bay the last day, which sounded fine.
    As for the rest, she couldn’t wait to get started. Her mom had gone to a camp in Maine when she was a girl, and this seemed so much like her stories. Except Mom’s camp didn’t have massages and other fancy spa stuff. Cindy could get all that pampering back home. When things weren’t going well, she liked to keep moving.
    She put the file aside, clenched her fists and beat a light rhythm on her thighs. Tum-da-da-tum. Tum-da-da-tum.
    The cabin would hold four women. Maybe the others would be here soon. She jumped up and strode through the small common area, comfortably furnished with navy and olive couches lightened with floral throw pillows, and a wooden lobster trap covered by a clear acrylic top for a coffee table. An attractive arrangement of shells had been glued to one wall, and on the opposite wall a pretty cloth showing different types of local wildflowers hung between windows that faced the sea.
    Out the door, across the screened-in front porch whose sturdy wooden chairs looked perfect for reading in, she followed the path past the largest building, the lodge, also shingled with dark green shutters, where she’d registered and was told that meetings and some activities would be held, up through spare clumps of birches and firs toward the parking lot, where she thought some of the others might be arriving.
    She was in luck! a car had just pulled in, a silver MerAs Good As It Got
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    cedes with Massachusetts plates. She stood by the edge of the grassy lot until the car stopped, then moved toward it, brimming with excitement. Maybe she’d make a new friend.
    Maybe this woman would be one of the other three in her cabin.
    A dark head showed above the car’s roof, then the shoulders of a sage-colored suit jacket that looked like linen. Cindy kept walking, conscious of her denim wraparound skirt, her simple cotton shirt, and her pink sneakers with ruffled white ankle socks, which she wore in somewhat joking defiance of fashion rules.
    The woman turned. She was beautiful, with the kind of dewy skin that didn’t show age, a nose that didn’t dare bump asymmetrically, and a strong chin that wouldn’t tolerate any sagging under it. Right now she was breathing the beautiful clear sea air as if it were a delicious gift.
    “Hi there.” Cindy drew closer, hand outstretched, drinking in the style and beauty of the new arrival the same way the new arrival was drinking in the pure air. But then this kind of woman wouldn’t be thrilled to meet someone like Cindy. “I’m Cindy.”
    They shook, the woman’s lackluster grip taking Cindy by surprise. She looked forceful enough to complete a triatha-lon, then come back to start her real workout.
    “I’m Ann.”
    “Ann Redding?” Cindy clapped her hands together. “You’re in my cabin!”
    The woman’s eyes flicked briefly over Cindy’s outfit, resting for an extra beat on the ruffled ankle socks. “Really?”
    “Oh, don’t worry. Not everyone here will be as dowdy as I am. And besides, you know what they say . . . socks don’t 36 Isabel
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    make the woman.” She smiled widely, expecting the startled look on Ann’s face. Women like Ann expected women like Cindy not to know how they came across. Cindy liked to surprise them with direct acknowledgment.