He knows he shouldn’t be surprised that his brother came back down to St. John and, apparently, plans to make it his permanent home, sponging off Irene, but he is. He tells Cash as much, though instead of using the word sponging, he calls it “taking full advantage of Mom’s generosity.” It’s marginally kinder; after all, Floyd is listening.

“I’m not taking advantage any more than you are,” Cash says with what Baker can only assume is a phony smile. “And I found a job.”

“So soon?” Baker says. “Where?”

“First mate on Treasure Island,” Cash says.

First mate on Treasure Island? It takes Baker a second, but he puts it together. Treasure Island is the boat that Ayers works on.

“You have got to be”—he swallows the swearword because of Floyd—“kidding me.”

“Not kidding,” Cash says.

Not kidding; of course not kidding. Somehow Cash weaseled his way onto that boat and into near-daily interaction with Ayers.

“I didn’t realize you liked the water,” Baker says. “I thought you were more of a mountain guy.” He says this with relative equanimity. What he’s thinking is this: You hate water unless it’s frozen! You’re ten thousand feet out of your comfort zone! The only reason you’re here is to try and steal my girl! “How did you find out about the job, anyway?”

“Ayers texted me,” Cash says. He rubs Winnie under the chin. “Winnie and I just went for a hike and a swim with Ayers and Maia on the Johnny Horn Trail. It was beautiful, but man, was it hot. I was dreaming about this pool the whole way back.” Cash pries off his hiking boots and strips down to his swim trunks. Baker tries to look at his brother objectively. Cash is in good shape; he has six-pack abs and really strong legs from all the skiing, but he’s not quite six feet tall, so Baker has always discounted him as a possible rival. But now, Baker has all kinds of troubling thoughts. Maybe Ayers is into the short, stocky, and (admittedly) super-cut look as opposed to the tall, broad-shouldered, and (admittedly) dad-bod look. (Baker flexes his arm behind him to see if he still has triceps. Maybe; it’s hard to tell.) Cash went hiking and swimming with Ayers and Maia—he’s been the recipient of Ayers’s smile. It’s Baker’s fantasy.

He’s jealous.

His first instinct is to be a jerk about it. But honestly, he doesn’t want to do battle with Cash over Ayers. He doesn’t want to do battle with Cash over anything. He finds he’s actually psyched—and relieved—that Cash is here. Baker talked a big game about moving down here but he doesn’t know a soul except for Ayers and, sort of, Huck, and he has nothing in the way of a support system. He can continue to day-trade and he can accept Anna’s offer of financial help, but he needs to see if life here is sustainable—school for Floyd, some kind of job for himself that’s part-time with flexible hours that will get him out of the house and into the community. He could even volunteer.

“How’s Maia doing?” Baker asks. “Was she…okay seeing you?”

“Surprisingly, yes,” Cash says. “She seems great. I mean, don’t get me wrong, she had a moment or two where she almost broke down—”

“I’m going down the slide,” Floyd announces. “Uncle Cash, are you getting in?”

Cash jumps into the pool and swims over to a spot where he can watch Floyd go down the slide to the lower pool.

“But, I mean, generally, she was okay. She’s a smart kid. She was teaching me about the island’s history and the plants and trees—”

“Maybe I’ll apply for a job with the National Park Service,” Baker says.

Cash gives him an incredulous look and Baker thinks it’s probably justified. Being a park ranger must require years in forestry school or some such.

“And before you ask, Ayers is still with Mick. I saw them together at La Tapa last night.”

“He’ll cheat on her again,” Baker says.

“Agreed,” Cash says. He holds Baker’s gaze for a second and Baker can tell they’re thinking the same thing: Once Mick cheats on her again, it’ll be brother against brother.

Or maybe not, Baker thinks. Maybe Cash will realize that he and Ayers should just remain friends. Maybe Cash will fall for one of the young, single women who climb aboard Treasure Island.

“What’s up with Anna?” Cash asks.

“She and Louisa have accepted positions at the Cleveland Clinic,” Baker says. “They’re moving to Shaker Heights. Floyd will go there holidays and summers. That’s why we decided to move down here. There’s nothing tethering us to Houston anymore.”

“Great minds think alike,” Cash says. “I was going to head to Breck to ski but it’s too late in the season for me to get a decent job. Then Ayers told me about Treasure Island. I start my lifesaving classes on Monday.”

Baker is surprised that Cash is so organized; it sounds like he’s thought something through for once. Objectively, Baker has to admit that Cash would be great as a first mate on a tour boat. When Baker and Anna visited Cash in Breckenridge, they had a chance to see him in action as a group ski instructor and they had both been impressed. Cash was friendly, engaging, funny, kind, and patient—his patience had been astonishing, in fact.

“What would Dad think,” Baker asks, “if he could see us together right now?”

Cash raises his eyebrows. “The more relevant question is, what would Mom think? I talked to her yesterday and she didn’t tell me you were coming down. Does she even know?”

Baker eases himself into the pool and swims over to Cash. He peers down at Floyd, splashing in the lower pool. “She doesn’t.”

“Why didn’t you tell her?”

“I’m not sure,” Baker says. “Probably because I didn’t want her to stop me.”

“Legally, it’s her house,” Cash says. “I’m not trying to be a jerk but my advice is to call her and tell her you’re here.”

Baker knows Cash is right. “I will,” he says. “I’ll call her tonight after Floyd is asleep.”

Before Cash can respond, Baker hears the strains of “Blitzkrieg Bop,” by the Ramones—and Cash pushes himself up out of the pool. He pulls his cell phone out of his hiking shorts, looks at the screen, and says, “Well, guess what, it’s Mom.”

“Good,” Baker says. “Tell her I’m here. She’ll like it better coming from you anyway.”

Cash says, “Hello, Mother Alarm Clock, what’s up? Good, yeah…I saw Maia today. Ayers and I took her on a hike, or she took us on a hike, actually…yeah, I start Monday, they said I’ll be good to go in a week. Hey, listen, I have some news…oh, all right. No, you go first.”

There’s a pause during which Baker can hear the tinny sound of Irene’s voice over the phone and Baker grows hot and uncomfortable. He just wants Cash to spit it out already! Baker checks on Floyd, who is splashing around, happy as can be, like a model only child. Baker will check out preschools for Floyd.

When Baker phoned Anna and told her that he and Floyd were considering moving down to St. John on a somewhat permanent basis, Anna had accepted the news the way she accepted everything he said: with indifference.

“It’s nice there,” Anna said. “I’ll have to see what Louisa thinks—”

“It doesn’t matter what Louisa thinks,” Baker said. “She doesn’t get to weigh in on my decisions.”

“But Floyd…” Anna says. He recognized her distracted tone of voice; she was probably writing in someone’s chart while she was talking to him.

“Louisa isn’t Floyd’s mother,” Baker said. “You are. Now, assuming I find a suitable school for our child, do you have any objections to Floyd and me spending some time in St. John? The vacation schedule will be the same. Nothing changes except he won’t be in Houston. Do you object?”

“No,” Anna said. “I guess not…”

“Wonderful, thank you,” Baker said, and he hung up before she could change her mind.

Baker is yanked back into the present moment when he hears Cash say, “A week from Monday?”

A week from Monday what? Baker wonders.

“Well, you’re in for a nice surprise,” Cash says. “Because guess who else is here—Baker and Floyd!”

Pause. Baker hears his mother’s voice, maybe a little more high-pitched than before.

“Yep, I guess Anna took a job in Cleveland and so Baker and Floyd are…yep, they’re here now. Yes, Mom, I think that’s the plan.” Cash locks eyes with Baker and starts nodding. “Yes, it will be so nice, all of us together.”

All of us together? Does this mean what Baker thinks it means?

“Just text to let us know what ferry you’ll be on,” Cash says. “And one of us will be there to pick you up. A week from Monday.”

That night, they grill steaks and asparagus and Baker makes his potato packets in foil and he and Cash and Floyd devour everything and Baker remembers that it’s nice cooking for people who actually appreciate it. Floyd goes inside to watch Despicable Me 3 for the ten thousandth time and Baker and Cash stare out at the scattering of lights across the water.

“So Mom is coming a week from Monday,” Baker says. He’s not sure how he feels about this. “There are obviously pluses and minuses to this situation.”

“Agreed,” Cash says. “On the plus side, we have been through a family crisis. If Mom stayed in Iowa, I would worry about her.”

“I can’t believe she quit her job,” Baker says.

“She wants a change, she says.”

“But working on Huck’s fishing boat? Mom? She’s a fifty-seven-year-old woman. She must have been kidding about that.”

“Don’t you remember the way she used to wake us up at dawn on Clark Lake to go out on Pop’s flat-bottom boat to fish for bass? Mom took us, not Dad. Mom baited our hooks. Mom taught us how to cast.”

“Yeah, I do,” Baker says. He hasn’t thought of it in eons but suddenly he has a vivid picture of being out on Clark Lake before the sun was even fully up, Irene yanking on the starter of the outboard motor, then Irene driving the boat to the spot where the smallmouth bass were biting. Irene had indeed taught both Baker and Cash to cast. She had shown them how to reel in a fish after they felt a tug on the line. She had deftly worked the hook from the fish’s mouth, using one gloved hand to hold the fish and one hand to maneuver her Gerber tool. Irene could snap fishing line with her teeth. She could fillet a bass or a perch so expertly that there were no bones to worry about when it came off the charcoal grill that evening at dinner. Baker had forgotten that his mother liked to fish, but even now that he remembers, he wonders if this is really what she wants to do for a living. Maybe she needs a break, a respite, a time to recharge and reset.

Maybe that’s what they all need.

“On the minus side,” Cash says, “we’ll be grown men living with our mother.”

“Sexy,” Baker says.

“But the house is big,” Cash says.

“The house is big,” Baker says. And it’ll be nice to have an extra person to watch Floyd. He won’t mention that, however, lest Cash call him a self-involved bastard.

Later that night, Baker wants to go out. The dishes are done and Baker has read to Floyd and tucked him in. Baker also showed him how their bedrooms connect; the house feels more familiar this time around.

Baker finds Cash collapsed in a heap in front of a basketball game. He considers slipping out the door—he needs to go to town; he needs to see Ayers—but he can’t just leave with Floyd asleep upstairs. “Hey, Cash?”

“Yeah.” Cash doesn’t move his eyes from the TV.

“I’m going out for a little while, man,” Baker says. “Or I’d like to. If you could just…keep one ear open in case Floyd wakes up?”

“Yeah, of course,” Cash says.

Baker lets his breath go.

“Are you going into town to see Ayers?” Cash asks.

Baker considers lying, but what can he say? That he’s going to the grocery store? Out for a nightcap? Cash will know better.

“Yeah,” Baker admits.

“She asked about you today on the hike,” Cash says.

Baker’s heart feels like a speeding car without brakes. “She did?”

“She said you didn’t call her after you left.” Cash pauses. “Were you really that stupid?”

Yes, Baker thinks, he was. There had been dozens of times when Baker thought to reach out, but, honestly, he hadn’t seen the point. He had been stuck in Houston…until Anna announced she was leaving. “I was that stupid,” Baker says.

“My guess is she has a thing for you,” Cash says. “Don’t mess it up.”

Cash’s tone indicates that he fully believes Baker will mess it up. It’s true that Baker’s track record with women hasn’t been great. He chose to marry a woman who didn’t love him, who may or may not have liked men at all. But Ayers is different. It’s as though Baker had been on a quest without even realizing it—until he found exactly what he was looking for.

He’s not going to mess it up.

Baker wonders why Cash is being so cool about Ayers. He seems relaxed and at ease in a way that is very un-Cash-like. Maybe it’s some kind of trap. Or maybe the island is working its magic.

“Thanks, man,” Baker says. “I mean it, Cash. Thank you.”

“Good luck,” Cash says.

Good luck. Baker turns up the radio in the Jeep; the excellent station out of San Juan—104.3 the Buzz—is playing the Red Hot Chili Peppers. Baker sings along, woefully off-key, but who cares; he’s got the windows open and the sweet night air is rushing in. Baker hasn’t felt this sense of freedom, this sense of possibility, since he was in high school. He’s nervous. He has butterflies.

He drives into town at ten thirty and things are still lively; it’s Saturday night. He worries that to see Ayers, he’ll have to go to La Tapa for a drink—he really wanted to be sober and clearheaded tonight—but then he spots her leaving the restaurant, wearing cutoff jean shorts and a T-shirt and a pair of Chucks, a suede bag hitched over her shoulder.

She reaches up and releases her hair from its bun. She is so strong and composed and self-possessed. Baker is dazzled. He has been dazzled by women before, of course—when he watched Anna pull a splinter out of Floyd’s foot with one quick, precise movement; when his old girlfriend Trinity knotted a cherry stem with her tongue (Baker still doesn’t understand how people do that)—but Ayers is different. She’s flawless.

Baker drives up alongside her and rolls the window down. He thinks about trying to be funny—Hey, little girl, want some candy?—but there’s no way he’ll be able to pull it off.

“Ayers,” he says. “Hi.”

She stops, ducks her head to peer into the car. They lock eyes.

“Baker,” she says. She holds his gaze and the two of them knit together somehow. He can’t speak so he nods his head toward the passenger seat. She runs around the front of the car, opens the door, climbs in, and fastens her seat belt.

“Wow,” she says. “I can’t believe I’m doing this.”

“Where to?” he asks.

“Hawksnest Beach,” she says. “I’ll show you the way.”