Page 9 of Waves of Time
After dinner, Marc ordered raspberry cheesecake for their dessert, which was creamy, decadent, and far too much, and Hilary made her way out of the restaurant feeling overstuffed but happy. Outside, the three of them strolled the streets of the city, chatting about this and that and people-watching. So many years ago, San Francisco had been the heart of hippie culture, a world unto itself, but it had changed tremendously over the years and became something different. Still, if Hilary looked around for that lost culture, she could find it in odd corners— in decorations on people’s windows and cars, in the way a few locals dressed.
“You must feel like San Francisco is your home by now,” Hilary suggested to Marc as they neared their hotel. “You’ve lived here twenty-one years at this point.”
“I don’t know. I still feel like an east coast guy in my soul,” Marc said.
“But you’ve spent almost half your life on the west coast,” Hilary pointed out.
Marc looked strangely regretful. “Strange how quickly it all went, isn’t it? I blinked, and I’m a middle-aged man.”
“You must do well in the dating scene,” Hilary tried. “You’re a CFO in a beautiful city. You take people to places like the Lazy Bear.”
Marc shrugged, his eyes moving away. He clearly did not want to talk about his current dating life with his ex.
At the hotel, Hilary first hugged Aria, then Marc and shooed them out again. “I’ll get some shut-eye. You two, have fun. Promise?”
“We will,” Aria promised. “I promise I won’t be too late.”
“I trust you,” Hilary said, then turned a mischievous eye to Marc to add, “but I’m not sure I trust you.”
Marc laughed. “Aria will keep me in line. Don’t worry about that.”
ChapterFour
Aria couldn’t believe it. There she was, at a swanky cocktail club in San Francisco with her father, the confident and successful Marc Halton. As a child, she’d thought of him synonymously with celebrities— as though anything he did was above reproach. Aria had ordered a margarita with mezcal, and her father had ordered an Old Fashioned as they talked about the changing city and what Marc liked and disliked about modern San Francisco. Aria had no idea how to keep up with this conversation, as she’d only ever lived in Nantucket or at Tufts University. And the Tufts situation hadn’t exactly panned out well.
“It sounds great,” Aria heard herself say of San Francisco.
“There’s no reason you can’t spend a year or two here,” Marc suggested, leaning forward. “It’s a fantastic city for young people. And there are several universities here.”
Aria’s cheeks burned with embarrassment. She sipped her margarita and, when it was clear that Marc wasn’t going to say anything, added, “I mean, I’m really enjoying my work with Mom.”
“But it’s not full-time, is it?” Marc asked. “You still have to work at that silly restaurant?”
Aria wavered on her chair, mortified. “I make really good money in the summer. And Mom says that after I work as her apprentice for a little while, Sotheby’s is interested in hiring me as an interior designer.”
“Really? Wow.” Marc seemed vaguely impressed, but he then added, “I just think a college education is very important, honey. You learn so much more about yourself and about the world around you than you do from the safety of Nantucket.”
Aria bristled, but she still wanted to find a way to agree with her father. After all, she rarely saw him, and she definitely didn’t want to start an argument.
“I love Nantucket,” she said. “I don’t want to live anywhere else.”
Marc waved his hand. “You say that now. But you don’t really know anything else.” He paused, then added, “I love Nantucket, too. I lived there for a little while.”
Aria tilted her head, incredulous. “You did? When?”
Marc hesitated. “After college,” he said hurriedly, as though he didn’t want to add fuel to the fire.
Aria’s thoughts tumbled over themselves. If that was true, then that meant that Marc had moved to Nantucket to be with Hilary— probably around the time Hilary had been pregnant.
“How long were you in Nantucket?”
Marc waved his hand, scanning the crowd around them as though looking for a distraction. Before Aria could think of another way to demand answers about her parents’ past together, however, a beautiful twenty-something woman with long black hair approached the table, smiling brightly in recognition. Aria’s heart hummed with shock.Was this proof that her father always dated younger women?Aria had heard Hilary say this to a girlfriend off-handily— something like, “I’m way too old for Marc these days.” The thought had stung.
But instead of addressing Marc when she reached the table, the young woman cried out, “Aria Coleman? Is that really you?”
Aria’s jaw dropped. “Callie? What are you doing here!” Aria leaped up and hugged Callie, a girl who’d lived in her dorm her freshman and sophomore years at Tufts, whom she’d lost track of after she’d dropped out. She’d been too ashamed of her failure to keep in contact with many people.
“I live here!” Callie exclaimed as their hug broke. “I moved out here this summer after graduation. What are you doing here, missy?”