Mag­gie sug­gest­ed we arrive at twelve-thir­ty for lunch, but we did­n’t hit New Hamp­shire until eleven, so I need­ed to hur­ry. Dri­ving through the pic­turesque lakes region down Inter­state 93 on a two-lane high­way, we passed towns char­ac­ter­ized by gas sta­tions, sports bars, and road­side pro­duce stands. Many res­i­dents had fire­wood for sale on the hon­or system—a part of small-town life. The GPS indi­cat­ed we were still forty-five min­utes from Osprey Cove, and while I was eager to stretch my legs, I could­n’t ignore the knot of ner­vous­ness in my stom­ach about meet­ing Errol and Cather­ine and their vast net­work of friends.

Tam­my noticed my anx­i­ety, not­ing my nail-bit­ing habit. I shared my unease stem­ming from a news report about a woman who had lost every­thing in a fire, feel­ing as though it was an omen for my day ahead. Tam­my reas­sured me that pre-wed­ding jit­ters were nor­mal, as she too felt out of her ele­ment, nev­er hav­ing attend­ed a sum­mer camp before. I dread­ed say­ing or doing some­thing to embar­rass Mag­gie, espe­cial­ly since I did­n’t want to ruin her spe­cial week­end or our chance for rec­on­cil­i­a­tion.

Our jour­ney con­tin­ued as we crest­ed a hill, reveal­ing the White Moun­tains and a vibrant blue lake team­ing with sail­boats. We entered Hopps Fer­ry, a vil­lage with a fad­ed charm, where Tam­my urgent­ly request­ed to stop for a bath­room break. Final­ly, we reached a road­side restau­rant named Mom and Dad’s. While Tam­my and Abi­gail rushed inside, I felt too anx­ious to engage with strangers, divert­ing my focus to a bul­letin board cov­ered in local fly­ers.

One fly­er caught my eye: it was about a miss­ing woman named Dawn Tag­gart, who had van­ished since Novem­ber 3rd. Brody Tag­gart, claim­ing to be her uncle, approached me as I exam­ined the fly­er. He recount­ed how his niece went miss­ing after seek­ing help from Aidan Gard­ner, rais­ing alarm bells about the Gard­ner fam­i­ly. As Brody pas­sion­ate­ly warned me about the Gard­ners’ alleged dark his­to­ry, the sit­u­a­tion esca­lat­ed with a police offi­cer inter­ven­ing.

After the com­mo­tion set­tled, the restau­rant own­er dis­missed Brody’s claims, sug­gest­ing he was the town’s res­i­dent trou­ble­mak­er. The man spoke high­ly of the Gard­ners’ con­tri­bu­tions to the town, which left me and Tam­my in dis­be­lief but some­what relieved. As the bizarre encounter lin­gered in our minds, Tam­my reas­sured Abi­gail, dis­miss­ing Brody’s chaot­ic out­burst. It became evi­dent that every­one held their own nar­ra­tives about the Gard­ners, mak­ing our fam­i­ly gath­er­ing at Osprey Cove increas­ing­ly com­pli­cat­ed.