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plate of pasta al olio for me. Most of the talk at the table was about the wedding and last-minute changes or plans for the big day, so I didn’t have to say anything at all, which was good because I felt like I looked out of place enough without having to open my mouth and prove it. While everyone else bore the colors of a rainbow sherbet spread onto individual dresses and jackets and ties, I wore a dark plum-colored dress—the least hoochie one available at Forever 21—because my mom had convinced me that “jewel tones” were “right for my coloring.” I looked like a bruise on the shin of the party (and I had literal bruises and scrapes on my arms and legs from yesterday’s tumble off the deck). At least Michael’s mom had on black, as usual, with a sweeping sheer zebra print scarf draped around her shoulders, but she can get away with such eccentricity because she’s an artist and has bohemian cred I don’t. Plus, she would look chic in a pair of overalls and hip waders. Even the white streak on the side of her face looks impossibly glamorous. Michael obviously got his dark hair and eyes from her; from what I could tell, everyone on the Endicott side of his family seemed to be the result of some Nazi genetic experiment in producing healthy-looking, blue-eyed blonds for the Fatherland.
    After dinner, someone from the Boston Symphony came in to play the piano as even more guests arrived and milled about or clustered, sipping cocktails and chatting. I stuck next to Michael and smiled and nodded at anything anyone said, especially when Catalina arrived and everyone seemed thrilled to see her, like she was the Duchess of Cambridge bringing in the heir to the throne. She gave Michael another kiss on the cheek and whispered something that made him blush a little.
    “Georgia, I can’t bel ieve this is the first time you’ve ever been to the Cape!” she scolded, as if I had just found a pile of dog droppings on the lawn and brought it in to show everyone. “That’s just wrong .”
    “My family’s only been in Massachusetts for two years,” I said, hating myself for explaining my negligence. “I guess we just didn’t get around to it yet.”
    “Well, I couldn’t live without it,” she declared and smiled at Michael in a way that seemed intended to rekindle a thousand golden memories of their time together on these honeyed shores. Meanwhile, I found myself wishing that I could set her hair on fire with the power of my mind. At the moment, pyrokinesis seemed like a talent worth cultivating.
    As she whispered something else to Michael, I heard his uncle Don behind me telling his dad about a phone consultation he’d had with Brad Pitt concerning the restorations he’d done in New Orleans after the hurricane.
    “Oh, you do green building projects?” I asked him, grateful to have a polite reason to ignore Catalina and thanking God that I had read about Brad Pitt’s housing projects in one of my Dad’s Atlantic magazines. Or maybe it was my mom’s People . “That’s so great!”
    He beamed at my enthusiasm and started to tell me at great length about a building he was designing in Sao Paolo. Michael’s dad winked at me before walking away because he could tell I was getting a little bored and overwhelmed, even though I was trying really hard to smile the whole time. And then Forrest Ritter appeared, tugging at my elbow, and telling Michael’s uncle, “I must steal this lovely young lady from you for a moment, Don.”
    Don grudgingly waved me away and I found myself being propelled from the room through the crowd by the famous writer’s hand on my elbow. As we left, I saw Michael watching me with a concerned look and hoped that he would wrap up whatever he was saying to Catalina really soon and, remembering the last contact I had had with his idol, swoop in like his secret hero, Spiderman, to save me.
    Forrest Ritter stopped when we got to a little bar tucked into a hallway between the kitchen and the