Summer Beach Reads 5-Book Bundle: Beachcombers, Heat Wave, Moon Shell Beach, Summer House, Summer Breeze by Nancy Thayer Page B

bored in simple clothes. Deep in her heart she longed to wear flashy, fabulous, look-at-me clothing and jewelry. Perhaps, with both her sisters back, Lily could keep a little more of her paycheck for clothing and give a bit less of it to her father for food and utilities. She’d never really sat down with her father to talk about it. She’d always just offered money, and he’d taken it. But of course, if she didn’t live at home, she’d have to pay rent and buy her own groceries; she knew that. She didn’t really know whether she was helping her father or costing him money. He paid the insurance on the Old Clunker … 
    The houselights dimmed. The stage lights came up. Lily turned her attention to the play.
    Friday morning, Lily took a glass of iced tea and headed up the steep stairs at the back of the house to the attic.
    “Hey, kid!” Abbie stuck her head up into the attic heat. “What are you doing up here?”
    “Oh, I’m kind of messing around with some old clothes,” Lily told her. “I need more things to wear to all my events, and I think there are some of Mom’s clothes up here.”
    Abbie came up the stairs and stood in the middle of the attic with her hands on her hips. “Good God. There’s tons of
everything
up here. What a mess.” Her eye fell on a batik cotton bedspread in swirls of turquoise and blue. “Oh, my gosh. Mom threw that over the old chaise in their bedroom to hide all the rips and stains from poor old Rover. This can definitely go to Take It or Leave It.”
    “Don’t be so hasty,” Lily advised absentmindedly. She was pawing through hanging wardrobes.
    “Well, do you want it? I can’t see it ever fitting in with your décor.”
    “I don’t want it,” Lily answered. “I’m changing my style. No more yellow butterflies and daisy sundresses. I want something black.”
    “That sounds very Goth. I thought that was a teenage phase.”
    “Not Goth, silly. Sophisticated.” Narrowing her eyes at her sister, she snapped, “Stop smirking!
I
can be sophisticated!”
    “Of course you can,” Abbie replied without a touch of condescension in her voice.
    Lily unzipped a quilted wardrobe and reached in. “Ugh. Grandmom’s old fur coat. Why are we saving it?”
    “Because,” Abbie replied, her words muffled as she bent over a box, “this family is psychotically anal. We can’t seem to throw away anything. For example! Our old Scrabble game.”
    “Great. Bring it downstairs. We can play it some rainy night.”
    “No, we
can’t
, because don’t you remember? Some of the letters are missing. We just stuck it up here because what, we thought it would magically reproduce the letters? God, we’re a strange family.”
    “No, Abbie, we thought we’d use those letters for some kind of game, scavenger hunts or spy games or something.”
    “Well, it’s going to the dump!” Abbie added it to the pile of discards.
    Lily knelt down next to a chest full of stuffed animals. “I suppose some of these should go, too. I mean, we can save some for our children—I want to save my dolls for my children—but some of these are just mangy and gross.” She held up an elongated rabbit with a ripped ear and a missing eye. “I don’t even remember this guy, do you?”
    Abbie glanced over. “Nope. Dump it.”
    It was really nice, having Abbie’s company up here in the gloomy attic. Lily loved her father, but she’d been lonely for the companionship her sisters provided. She wouldn’t admit it aloud, but she’d been especially lonely for Abbie. Of course it was because when Lily was seven and their mother died, it had been Abbie who stepped into the maternal role. Lily understood that. She’d talked to counselors and therapists, she’d read books. But she wasn’t
dependent
on Abbie. Abbie had been gone for almost two years, after all. And Lily was making her own way in life. It was just that with Abbie around, Lily felt … well, less lonely.
    “Abbie?” Emma’s voice came from the