"People thronged to her. She adored that."

"Listen," Paige said, and read, U'Life is so busy here sometimes that I fool myself into thinking that there's a deeper meaning in it, but the fact is that everyone has his own life and it's separate from mine.

They see me, they talk to me, they even tell me how wonderful I am, then they go home to their own lives and don't think of me at all. I'm incidental in the overall scheme of things. I come and go in people's lives, just as people come and go in mine. Relationships go only so far, then stop, always short of the deep connect. I wonder what's wrong."" Angie was stunned. "Mara wrote that?"

"When?" Peter asked.

"I couldn't find an exact date," Paige answered. "It's one of a whole bunch of letters. None of them were ever mailed, but they're all addressed to a Lizzie Parks. Do either of you know that name?"

"Not me," said Angie.

"A bunch of letters?" Peter asked. "Have you read them all?"

"Not all. They're pretty heavy. I can only take them in small doses.

She truly saw herself as a failure." I "What did the other letters say?" he asked.

"Most of the ones I've read have to do with her family. She would have had us believe that she didn't care about them, but the opposite was true. Calling it an obsession might be taking it too far, but she thought about them a lot."

Peter left the door, took the letter from her, and stared at it front and back. "Why didn't you tell us about these before?"

"Because I felt guilty reading them, they seemed so private, and now I'm betraying her by reading them aloud."

"Then why did you?"

It had been unpremeditated, an impulsive thing, but Paige didn't regret it. "We're all pretty uptight. I thought maybe sharing them would help. It's easy to feel sorry for ourselves, picking up the remains of Mara's life like we are, but the fact is that compared to Mara, we're in good shape. The deep connect what a phrase. She felt so alone, it boggles the mind."

Peter tossed the letter onto the desk. "She was unbalanced. I've been saying that for weeks." He glanced at Angie, then back at Paige. "So, can we interview for a replacement, or should we sit around agonizing over Mara a little longer?"

Put that way, Paige felt foolish. "You're right, I guess. It's silly to wait. We'll need someone else eventually. Eventually might as well be sooner."

When she thought Peter would savor the victory, he was checking his watch. "I'm off for an allergy meeting in Montpelier. You're both covering, right?" Angie sat straighter. "Not right. I had the afternoon off. What allergy meeting?"

"My usual."

"But that's on Mondays."

"This is a supplemental one."

"Ginny didn't have it on the schedule."

"Then Ginny messed up." He went to the door.

"This is why we need a fourth. We're stretched too thin. Can you help Paige, or should I skip the meeting?"

"I can help," Angie said, and he left.

Paige turned to Angie, who was sitting at the side of the room looking peaked, and not only from lack of sleep, Paige knew. Dougie was boarding now, which left her home alone with Ben or, more aptly waiting for Ben, who wasn't doing much more than making brief appearances there. They were tiptoeing around each other, and though Paige had urged Angie to talk to him, argue with him, even beg him to see a counselor, she refused. She had been burned for years of taking charge, so she was lying low, waiting for him to take the initiative.

It was a painful wait. She was dying a little more each day.

Paige, in turn, felt the agony of seeing a friend suffer and wanting to help but not knowing how. "Is working now a problem, Angie?"

Angie let out a breath. "No problem. I didn't have specific plans. I never do lately, it seems. I feel like I need time to think, only when I sit down to do it, I can't."

"Did you talk with Dougie last night?"

"Sure did. He's having a ball, and that's a quote. Don't ask me what it means. He may be doing very little of what he should and a whole lot of what he shouldn't, but one thing's for sure, he's pleased to be free of me."

"Don't you think that's taking it too personally?"

"Maybe." She picked her cuticle. "At any rate, Ben isn't upset. He believes that whatever Dougie does at Mount Court is important for his development."

"You must agree on some level," Paige pointed out, "or you wouldn't have gone along with the decision to let him board."

"I do agree. I guess." She tucked her hand in her lap. ill don't know, Paige. I'm terrified when I think of the harm that could be done to my son's mind, body, ego, if this doesn't work out. But then, some of Ben's arguments have merit. I have been protective. Maybe overly so. I can see that now. I just wish that we could have found an in-between measure.

Boarding is so total." She rubbed her palm against her skirt. "Then again, he's home on weekends, and on those times he's his old affectionate self, so maybe Ben's right. Maybe the problem was me, after all."

Paige could hear it coming. She left the desk. "Angie" "I've failed as a mother."

"No way." Paige perched on the edge of the chair by Angie's. "No way at all, and you have an incredible kid to prove it. Think about it, Angie. We've seen hundreds of kids over the years. Some of them have been troubled in ways that stem directly from their parents. Think of the Welkes, the Foggs, the Legeres they are failures as parents, but you aren't in any way, shape, or form related, even with a gross stretch of the imagination, to any one of them. Dougie isn't troubled.

He isn't suicidal. He doesn't skip school to play body games with girls behind the maintenance building. He doesn't drink on the steps of the war memorial. He doesn't steal hubcaps from tourists passing through town. He's a welladjusted kid who has reached the very normal stage of needing to share more of his life with his peers. It's possible that if Mount Court had been three hours away, he would never have wanted to board, but it was an incredible temptation to himto board and still have his parents close by. The kid has the best of both worlds. He's a smart little guy."

"Not so little," Angie mused. "I have to keep reminding myself of thatand of the fact that he's rooming with one of the top students in his grade, and that his dorm parent is new and very good, and that the Head of School has enough confidence in the system to let his own daughter live in a dorm. Did you know he had a daughter at Mount Court?"

Did she ever, but Paige had thought it a secret. "Who told you?"

"Marian Fowler," one of the few Tucker natives on the Board of Trustees. "I called her right before Dougie moved into the dorm. I knew she'd give me a positive picture of the school, but that was what I wanted. She said that if the new Head trusted the school with his child, I should, too." She paused, cautious now. "I heard something else about the new Head."

Paige arched a brow, understating her curiosity.

"I heard," Angie said, "that he was seen leaving your house early one morning. Do you run with him?"

The front door, rather than the window. Paige had known that would come back to haunt her.

"Uh, not really. But we are friends. He was out running one morning and stopped by to say hello."

"Good friends?"

Paige shrugged as casually as she could. She didn't know what to call the kind of friend Noah was. She wasn't even sure she should be calling him a friend, but the alternatives were either boss or lover, neither of which would do.

"He's a handsome man," Angie invited.

Had Paige denied it, Angie would have been instantly suspicious. So she didn't try. "That was the first thing that struck me. I would have thouqht the girls at Mount Court would have crushes on him right and left." She shook her head. "They can't stand his rules. Neither can I. He can be rigid."

"Reassuringly so, from a parent's standpoint," Angie commented. "It was only after I talked with him that I felt at all at ease about Dougie boarding."