Suzanne Nelson was raised just outside of San Francisco. A Stanford grad and varsity runner, she heads to New York City for law school. She is gay, but has come out to no one. In New York she meets Kerry Neally, a New Yorker and fellow student. Who is straight. First in a study group and then as a pair, they find themselves become attached to one another. And have to work out that Kerry thinks she's straight. Eileen is Kerry's mother. She is a widow, and meeting Suzanne helps her leave the shell into which she placed herself after her husband died. And she comes to the attention of two men. One a widower. The other divorced. And love intevenes for her choice. With Suzanne settled into her New York life, she turns her back on her parents, who turned their backs on Suzanne's aunt Mary, a gay woman disowned by her parents and brother decades before. She, too, lives in New York and she and Eileen attempt to get Suzanne's parents to understand their daughter. Kate Nelson comes to New York to reason with her daughter. As eventually does William, her father. The story is about how the members of what becomes a large New York family deal with themselves, each other, and love.

The Neallys

“You need to understand, Kate, that we are all being tested. I understand that. You need to. Suzanne needs to. I am here to help you understand that. Your family”—by which he meant Kate’s parents and brothers and sisters—”are here to help you.” Kate was so entwined with the people in New York that she neglected her family in California, and she should have realized that William would reach out to them. They, as expected, took his side, or most of them did, an observation that troubled her. It had become about “sides” and not about faith. William was playing a game and he wanted to win. He wanted to do what he thought was right by her soul, and Suzanne’s, but in part he did not want to lose. It was part of him she enjoyed when they were allies, but it frightened her now that they weren’t, and especially now that it concerned her daughter.


Chapter 64