The Marvelous Monroe Girls

Book 1: Harbor Cove

by Shirley Jump

Genres: Siblings; Friendship; Small Town & Rural

Synopsis

A heartwarming story of sisterhood, second chances, and falling in love by New York Times bestselling author Shirley Jump.

Release date: January 11, 2022

Publisher: Grand Central Publishing

Print pages: 336

Sample

ONE

The best memories from Gabby Monroe’s childhood were sprinkled with chocolate chip cookie crumbs. On too many nights to count, a trail of sugary crumbs marched across her pink-and-white comforter and then tumbled down to the white Berber carpet, like an inviting road for a mouse. Whenever Gabby woke up with crumbs on her bed, it meant the three Monroe sisters had stayed up way too late, giggling and whispering and growing as close as peas in a pod.

Grandma dubbed them the Monroe Musketeers, because where one went, the other two often went, too, whether that was on an adventure along the creek that ran behind Grandma’s house or under Gabby’s blankets after lights-out to read a book by flashlight.

Eventually, all three girls had grown up, and their paths diverged, and Gabby’s bed became a neatly made queen in her own little house. There were no whispers at night. No giggles. And most of all, no cookie crumbs.

As each of them graduated high school and moved on and out, a sharp distance began to build between them. Over the last year or so, Gabby could feel Meggy and Emma slipping away even more, like they were a trio of boats adrift in the ocean.

Maybe it was the cost of burying the truth over the years, or maybe the fissure had begun the day Momma died, but whatever had happened between her and her sisters, Gabby knew it was time they came back together. For Grandma’s sake, if nothing else. So she’d done what she always did—concocted a plan that would put the three of them in the same room for a few hours, before Emma took off on another adventure and Meggy got buried in her business, and the ocean between them widened a little more.

Which was why, on a too-warm day in early spring, the three of them were standing in Grandma’s dusty, dim, hot attic, looking for anything historically related to Harbor Cove, as well as for Momma’s wedding dress, in the myriad of boxes stacked along the pitched walls. In the past half hour, they had opened one box and had two arguments.

The happy family reunion she’d planned was already swerving into tense territory, and the promise Gabby had made that day in the cemetery, when she’d stayed behind to whisper a solemn vow over a freshly dug grave, echoed inside her.

I’ll keep us together, Momma. I promise. I’m never going to let you down again.

Once upon a time, the Monroe Musketeers had been a team. Now they were…distant friends.

“I remember Momma giving me this tea set for my birthday,” Emma said as she opened a box and pulled out a tiny white saucer. Her French braid cascaded over one shoulder, so long it brushed against her wrist. Emma was the wild one, a mustang that didn’t want to be contained, ready to flit away on impromptu weekend hiking trips or weeklong yoga retreats at any second. In between, she worked at a boutique hotel as an assistant wedding planner. The fact that she’d had the job at the Harbor Cove Hotel for more than a year now was a miracle in and of itself. “Remember us having tea parties with our stuffed animals, Meggy? And Momma would sew little place mats and napkins for us to use?”

“No, I really don’t. In fact, I remember Momma giving this to me, not you. I swear, the two of you have a totally different family history written in your heads than I do.” Margaret had a smudge of dust on her cheek, and her normally sleek dark hair had become a frizzy mess making a desperate—and futile—attempt to escape her severe ponytail. Anyone who knew Margaret knew that nothing around her was ever out of control. She owned the jewelry store in downtown Harbor Cove, a custom-design shop catering to persnickety customers much like Margaret herself.

Today was the first time all three of them had been in the same place for longer than a few seconds in weeks. Gabby was not going to let Margaret screw this up.

“Can we please not argue about a toy?” Gabby said. “Momma wouldn’t want us to—”

“Momma isn’t here, in case you’ve forgotten.” Her sister’s sharp tone spoke of annoyance and impatience.

“I’ve never forgotten that, Margaret. I just…” She sighed and ran a hand through her hair. She didn’t want to alarm them about Grandma, because it wasn’t like Eleanor Whitmore was sick, exactly. Just…not herself. An argument during their visit would simply make things worse. “I need you guys to work with me, okay?”

“What do you think I’m doing up in this attic? God, I swear it’s a thousand degrees in here.” Margaret fanned herself and made a face. She’d worn what Gabby liked to call her “work armor”—a wrinkle-free navy pantsuit and a pair of sensible tan heels, both of which sent the message that Margaret was undoubtedly heading to work. On a Sunday morning. Again. “What’s so important about finding all this junk anyway?”

“Do you have a single sentimental bone in your body?” Emma asked. “Come on, this is history we’re looking at. Our history.”

“I don’t have time to be sentimental.” Margaret scowled. “Or to rummage through a bunch of stupid boxes just because Gab got on some tear about a trip down memory lane.”

“That’s not it at all, and you know it,” Gabby said as she took the box with the tea set from Emma. “Business has been down all over Harbor Cove for the better part of a year. The business committee thought this tricentennial celebration might be just the thing to ignite a little interest and revenue. I would think you’d want the boost for your own store, Margaret.”

It sure mattered to Gabby’s struggling vintage dress shop. She’d opened it a year ago, proudly naming the shop Ella Penny Boutique, an homage to her name, Gabriella, and her mother’s name, Penny, hoping that would also bring her fledgling foray some good luck. She had thought business would come easily. After all, Harbor Cove was a tourist town, and anything unique or fun seemed to sell insanely well during the warmer months. But as the year wore on, business slowly dropped to a trickle, and Gabby realized she needed to do something to get back on track—or close her doors and figure out what else she could do with her life.

A couple months ago, she’d gone to several other small business owners in town to brainstorm something that could boost everyone’s sales. On a cold January afternoon, they’d come up with the idea of Celebrate History in the Harbor as a way of using the upcoming tricentennial to showcase the vintage clothing, antiques, and jewelry that historic Harbor Cove was known for. Now all Gabby needed was one retro wedding dress—a dress with a story and emotional ties—to bring attention to Ella Penny Boutique.

It wasn’t just her mother’s name on the sign that drove Gabby’s need to make the shop a success. It was more—maybe a need to prove she wasn’t an aimless thirty-year-old who couldn’t figure out what she wanted to be when she grew up. Gabby had done everything in the years since she’d graduated from UMass—waitress, transcriptionist, clerk, administrative assistant. Not a one of those jobs had felt quite right, as if she’d been wearing shoes a tad too big or too small. Then she’d seen an empty storefront downtown and cobbled together enough money to rent the shop and slowly fill it with inventory. Now that idea, too, was falling flat. Gabby couldn’t afford yet another failure. This business boost had to work.

It absolutely had to.

“Yeah, Margaret, quit being a Grinch and just get on board.” Emma looked cool and calm with her light cotton maxi skirt and the clunky silver-and-turquoise bracelet that echoed her blue eyes. Emma’s facial features were the most like their mother’s, all delicate and porcelain and beautiful.

“Fine. But I want that tea set.” Margaret reached for the box in Gabby’s hands, but Gabby was faster and swept it behind her back. Margaret scowled. Then she paused and peeked past Gabby’s shoulder. “Hey, isn’t that Jake outside?”

“You will not distract me with the mention of someone I have known since I was six,” Gabby said. Of course she knew Jake was here. Maybe it was because they’d been friends for as long as she could remember, but every time the boy next door—now a tall and often annoying man—was near, Gabby was aware of him, maybe too aware. It wasn’t that Jake wasn’t handsome or that he didn’t have a nice smile. He was just…Jake. “Besides, you both know as well as I do that nine days out of ten, Jake is over here and not at his own house. So that’s not exactly a news flash.”

“Because he has a crush on you,” Emma said, her voice singsong and teasing.

“Oh. My. God. We are not in middle school, and no, he does not. Besides, it was his cousin who asked me out, not Jake.” After the disastrous end to her short-lived, fiery relationship with Jake’s cousin Brad, Gabby had vowed to swear off any man with the last name Maddox. Just because Jake had always hovered on the edge of Gabby’s life, was a handsomer version of Brad, and had a pulse did not make them a potential couple. “Anyway, back to the—”

“He has grown up quite nicely, don’t you think, Emma? If you ask me, a lot nicer than that cousin of his,” Margaret said. She tried to sidestep Gabby, but once again, Gabby was faster. That’s what Margaret got for skipping pretty much every single one of the weekly yoga classes the girls took at the Harbor Cove gym.

“All boys grow taller, but not all boys grow up, as Grandma says. And Jake is in the latter group. Both the Maddox boys are.” Gabby held the box to her chest. “Now let’s settle this silly argument so we can get back to why we’re up here in the first place. Celebrate History in the Harbor is only three weeks away, and Momma’s dress is perfect because it’s an original Betsy Josephs. They’re doing a whole retrospective on Betsy at the town museum—”

“Which is just a glorified room in the back of the community center,” Margaret cut in. “And Betsy wasn’t exactly Michelangelo. She was a tailor.”

“Who made a dress for a Kennedy.”

Margaret rolled her eyes. “The second cousin of a Kennedy. Not the same thing. Honest to God, that’s a tangential connection at best.”

“Well, it’s a tourist draw, and with the peak season just around the corner, Harbor Cove needs all the tourists we can get.” And so do I. But Gabby didn’t say that because it would worry her sisters and Grandma. The shop would be just fine. Just. Fine.

Gabby opened another box and found a bunch of dusty Halloween decorations. Damn it. “Where is that trunk? Grandma has so many boxes up here.”

“Either way,” Margaret said, taking advantage of Gabby’s distraction to snatch the tea set box away, “this is mine, and I’m taking it home.”

“Have the two of you ever considered that maybe, just maybe, Momma rewrapped it and gave it to Emma?” Gabby said. “As in…regifted it?”

“She would never have done that.” Margaret, the authority on everything, of course.

“Remember when Momma regifted the punch bowl that Mrs. Hartman gave her?” Honestly, how did no one in this family remember a single thing from their childhood? If anything, Gabby remembered too much, and sometimes…well, sometimes that made life a little harder. Hence today’s plan, which, so far, was going sideways at a fast clip. “And she turned that crystal bowl into a planter for Cousin Charlie?”

“Oh yeah.” Emma dropped onto a dusty wooden chair and reached into the box at her feet, one filled with newspaper cutouts and memorabilia from over the years, sifting through it without really looking at anything. “Momma was pretty practical that way.”

Their mother had been more than practical. She’d been…magic. Beautiful and warm, and always taking the girls on adventures or coming up with little games to play on rainy days. Gabby missed her every single day, sometimes as deeply as she had the day Momma died. It hadn’t been easy for any of the girls, especially Margaret, who, as far as Gabby knew, had never had a moment that wasn’t stoic. Emma had only been five, Gabby just eight, but Margaret had been nine, and in a flash, the oldest Monroe girl had become an adult.

If only Gabby had been more responsible that day, taken her promise to Momma more seriously, then their mother never would have been on that dark road at night and never would have ended up—

No. She couldn’t think about that now. If she did, she’d fill up with regrets and start to cry. It would become a whole thing, and she couldn’t afford the time to pause for a breakdown or an explanation.

Gabby loved being in this dusty old attic, full of moments frozen in time. All her best memories, as well as some of her worst ones, were in this Bayberry Lane house. From the long, stormy afternoon of the funeral reception, when Gabby had tried to make herself scarce in the crowded yet empty rooms of Grandma’s house while sad-eyed mourners drifted in and out, giving the girls pitying looks and distant hugs, to the hazy afternoons when their father made a harried visit, his mind somewhere else, his heart permanently shattered. When things were bad, Gabby would sneak away to the attic and burrow beneath a knitted afghan on the faded armchair in the corner while dust motes floated in the air and the soft murmur of voices echoed in the stairwell. She’d read books or play dolls, or later, write in a journal about acne and boys and disappointment.

Grandma was always the one to find Gabby. Never Dad. No, he’d checked out the day his wife had died and never quite checked back in, at least not with his own family. There were things that Gabby knew, things she’d never told a soul, because they would tarnish the memories everyone had and hurt her sisters.

Over the years, the Daddy she had known as a kid became Dad, a less warm, less connected name. He’d left the girls in the wake of his grief, maybe on purpose, maybe not, but still, he’d left and moved on to another family, another life. A life he may have had waiting in the wings all along, a secret that Gabby had told no one, not even Jake. If it hadn’t been for Grandma…

Gabby pushed those thoughts firmly out of her mind. It was far better to focus on the tea sets and rummy games and cookie crumbs. That world was the one she liked, the one that was like sinking into a familiar movie, where she knew the ending and could be guaranteed a happy catharsis.

“Let’s get back to work,” Gabby said, returning to the pile of boxes she’d been moving a moment earlier, and in the process disrupting a cloud of dust. “This attic is so cool, isn’t it? It’s like visiting old friends every time we find something.”

Margaret scoffed. “Did we have the same crappy childhood? Because it wasn’t as romantic as you seem to think, Gab.” Margaret took one of the plastic teacups out of the box and held it up to the light. A pattern of faded pink roses marched around the edge. “Sometimes I wish…” She shook her head, tucked the cup back into the box and, along with it, the fraction of vulnerability that had flickered on her face. “Anyway, let’s get this finished. I need to get to work.”

“You do know it’s Sunday, right?” Gabby said.

“And you do know I don’t need a reminder?” Margaret shot back. “What does Grandma always say? Eyes on your own book, Gabby.”

“Fine. I’m just pointing it out. I thought it would be nice for all of us to—”

“Will you quit living in the past, Pollyanna?” Margaret interrupted.

“I’m not doing that. I’m…trying to help everyone out.” Didn’t her sisters understand that there were days when Gabby couldn’t do enough to make up for that day? For one tiny mistake that had had enormous repercussions?

Stop it. She wasn’t here to think about things she couldn’t change, choices she couldn’t undo. Secrets she couldn’t share. Gabby shoved the biggest box along the back wall to the right, sending a fresh cloud of dust into the air. She coughed, waving it away, and then saw a glimmer of wood and brass.

Finally. “Hey, guys, look! I found the dress!”

“About damned time.” Margaret sighed. “Now can I leave?”

If Margaret left, the entire happy moment that Gabby had pictured in her head wouldn’t happen. When she’d come up with the idea of participating in the fair with Momma’s dress, she’d pictured the three girls laughing and crying and sharing memories of their mother and their childhoods. “Help me pull this out, Margaret.”

“Fine. But I better not get dirty. I have to—”

“Go to work. I know. Can you please, for five minutes, be present with the rest of us?” Gabby gestured toward the other end of the trunk and grasped the brass handle on her end. “This was supposed to be a chance for us to be together and honor Momma and—”

“Oh my God, Gabby. You talk so much, we’re going to be here all day. Come on, let’s just get it over with.” Margaret yanked up her side—surprisingly strong for a woman who worked behind a desk most days—and the two of them lugged the steamer trunk out of the shadows and into the light.

Gabby lifted the brass latch, exposing the inside of the trunk to the dim light in the attic, and gasped. Ten years since she’d looked inside this cedar box, and she’d been expecting the worst. “Oh my…it’s still perfect. I was so worried.” She reached inside and then peeled open a cardboard box with a cellophane window, revealing a frothy creation of organza and satin. As Gabby gently lifted it out, the fabric rustled in the quiet of the attic, a whisper of memories from before the girls were even born. “It’s prettier than I remember.”

When she’d lived at Grandma Eleanor’s, Gabby had snuck up to the attic at least a dozen times to visit Momma’s wedding dress. She’d draw the soft fabric to her face and inhale, swearing she could still catch the scent of Momma’s perfume in the folds. As Gabby got older and taller, she’d slip the dress on over her shorts and T-shirt and then stand in front of the full-length oval mirror and imagine Momma on her wedding day, beautiful and beaming and perfect.

Then Gabby had moved into a little house of her own, and her life got rushed, and the dress sat in the steamer trunk, forgotten and, she’d feared, moth-eaten. But no, the dress had been spared, and although it had yellowed some over the years, it was nearly as perfect as the day Momma had worn it to walk down the aisle of the Harbor Cove Methodist Church. Gabby could just imagine Dad’s eyes, the smile on his face that he seemed to have lost a long time ago, and the way he must have taken his bride into his arms and pledged forever. Whether he meant it or not she had no idea, but Gabby’s version of that day was a fairy tale.

In the distance of her memories, she could remember her father, the way he’d say “I’m so glad to see all my favorite girls” every night when he got home from work. Momma would kiss him and giggle, and the girls would hang on Daddy’s arms as he duck-walked over to the dining room table. Some nights, their father would drape the tablecloth over the edges of the table, making it into a tent, and then read books to them by flashlight. Momma would make shadow animals with her hands before crowding under there with them until the clock ticked past bedtime. In those days, life had been perfect.

“I know that look, Gabby. Don’t go getting all daydreamy and mopey. You have that love-story-fantasy face, and real life isn’t anything like that.” Margaret’s sharp tone interrupted Gabby’s memories. “We found what we came for, and now I can go.”

“For Pete’s sake, Meggy. You haven’t seen Momma’s wedding dress in forever.” She thrust the full-length gown in her sister’s direction. “Here. I swear, you can see her in it when you touch it.”

Just remember her like I do, Gabby thought. And maybe you’ll stop being so distant and we can all go back to being the family we once were.

Margaret didn’t say anything. She fingered the edge of a cap sleeve just long enough for Gabby to hope for a moment of sisterly reminiscing. But instead Margaret stepped back. “What was Momma thinking?”

Gabby pivoted toward the mirror and held the dress up to her chest. Now that she was an adult, the dress was almost a perfect match for Gabby’s frame and height. The only thing Gabby didn’t have—or want—was a groom. Brad still lingered at the edges of her thoughts, more of a needle reminding her of their painful and abrupt breakup. There was no way Gabby wanted to fall in love with anyone and end up brokenhearted or, worse, betrayed. “What are you talking about? Her dress is beautiful. She was stunning on her wedding day.”

Margaret seemed to come out of whatever daze she’d been in. “Of course she was. Sorry. I was just…thinking about something else.”

Where the girls once had exchanged daily phone calls and texts, recently there’d been mostly radio silence on Margaret’s end. For months, her eldest sister had claimed it was work keeping her tied up, but as time wore on, Gabby began to wonder if maybe there was something more going on, especially given that odd, distant look in Margaret’s eyes, and the fact that she and her husband, Mike, had missed more family dinners than they’d attended. “Is everything okay with you, Meggy?”

“Will you quit calling me that?” Margaret scowled. “I’m not five, and I don’t need a nickname. I wish you both would just leave me alone.”

Everything about Margaret’s body language said Don’t ask, so Gabby let it go—again—and went back to digging through the trunk. She swore she saw Margaret exhale a sigh of relief when the subject got dropped. “I wonder if Momma’s veil is still in here, too,” Gabby said. “Last time I was up here, I think I put it back in—”

“You guys…” Emma’s voice trailed off. “Um, there’s something here you should see.”

“Did you find the wedding announcement?” Gabby moved a quilt to the other side of the trunk and tugged out the box with her mother’s glittery white shoes. Kitten heels with rhinestones marching along the edges and toes. Beside the box was a smaller one marked Veil. Awesome. “I thought it might be nice to frame the announcement and hang it in the shop beside the dress.”

“No. I found something…else.” Emma got to her feet. She held out a stack of newspaper clippings. “You all need to see this.”

Gabby set the shoes back in the trunk and then turned to look over Emma’s shoulder, giving the pages a cursory glance. “It’s a bunch of Dear Amelia columns. I know about those. Grandma collects them.”

Emma nodded. “I know that. But if all she collects is the past columns…why does she have the letters, too?”

“What do you mean?”

“See?” Emma flipped past the first pages of newsprint until she came across a stack of letters, some handwritten, some typed, some on white paper and some on blue, some with monogrammed stationery and some just plain copier pages. “Why would Grandma have these?”

“Let me see.” Margaret took a few pages from her sister and began to read. “Maybe she just thought they were good advice or something.”

“But why would she have the original letters?” Emma asked. “The only one who would need—or have—those would be Dear Amelia herself.”

Gabby shrugged. Their grandmother had worked as a typesetter at the local paper for at least three decades. Maybe she’d brought home the wrong folder one day or something. “Do you think Grandma knew the real Dear Amelia?”

“If she did, she totally would have told us.” Emma gave Gabby a clipping. “Wouldn’t she? I think the truth is something else. Read this one and tell me who it reminds you of.”

Gabby’s gaze skipped over the lines on the faded newspaper. She read the town paper most days but usually just focused on the pages for neighborhood news and the occasional garage sale or estate sale where she could pick up some vintage dresses to carry in the shop. She always checked out the creative ads Jake designed, only to get great ideas for her own ads. But she couldn’t remember the last time she’d read the Harbor Cove Gazette from cover to cover, much less the entertainment pages that were scattered with comic strip panels, a daily word jumble, and the Dear Amelia column.

The corners of the decades-old page in her hand were so fragile that they threatened to crumble, but the picture of a generic kindly woman and the familiar script for the Dear Amelia column looked as they always had. “‘The road of life is paved with squirrels who couldn’t make a. . .