Gloucester House

By Eliza Thompson

A funeral. A beach house. A final request.

Hannah Ricci has no idea what to do when her beloved grandfather dies, leaving her his beach house with all the Cape Ann charm and family drama.

With jealous relatives and her mother’s chemo, Hannah struggles to find a balance. They all expect something different. Her grandfather used to be her safe harbor, knowing her bad habit of putting everyone else first, but with him gone, she’s lost at sea.

A hidden letter and a final request pushes her together with Joel Donnelly, her mysterious neighbor and a newcomer to the island! Joel is a walking ball of sunshine, offering warmth and patience that Hannah has never experienced before. He unknots the anxieties in her mind, putting her at ease even as he slowly worms his way into her heart — a place no one has ever managed to go.

Joel transforms a mission to spread her grandfather’s ashes in important places around Gloucester into a courtship — dancing in the gazebo where her grandparents had their first kiss, sharing secrets amongst the flowers, and learning to laugh again on the sea.

But Joel's past and the future he offers Hannah balance on the back of a dark secret. When the truth comes to light, Hannah must decide what matters more — everybody’s expectations or her heart?

• Language: English
• Publisher: Hidden Helm Press
• Release date: Feb 4, 2024
• ISBN: 9798215580042

Book preview

The Gloucester House

Eliza Thompson

The Gloucester House by Eliza Thompson

This is a work of fiction. Names, places, characters, and events are fictitious in every regard. Any similarities to actual events and persons, living or dead, are purely coincidental. Any trademarks, service marks, product names, or named features are only for reference. There is no implied endorsement if any of these terms are used.

The Gloucester House

Copyright © 2024

All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means, without prior permission in writing from the publisher.

Table of Contents

Chapter One

Chapter Two

Chapter Three

Chapter Four

Chapter Five

Chapter Six

Chapter Seven

Chapter Eight

Chapter Nine

Chapter Ten

Chapter Eleven

Epilogue

Chapter One

The sun had no right to shine so brightly. Hot and humid, the ocean’s breeze couldn’t reach this plot. Dark stones glimmered. Reminders stood side by side, lining in perfect rows until they tumbled over. New square and carved stone met the crumbling, weathered curves of the old.

Surrounded by family and strangers, I could barely breathe. My skin itched. The black fabric of my dress weighed down on me, and my feet ached in the flats I borrowed from my mother. How did I forget to pack my black flats? I had my entire life stuffed into luggage and plastic tubs, but I couldn’t figure out where a single pair of stupid shoes were, and my feet were just that much wider than hers, so my feet hurt, and the sun left my skin pink, and everything was so green and happy and alive, and it had no right to be so beautiful when he was dead.

Biting my lip, I held back the sob that threatened to claw its way free. People sniffled. Tears poured down my sister’s face, and my brother’s knuckles were white where his fingers entwined with his wife’s, but this voice in my head just kept telling me that I couldn’t cry. Not here. Not in front of these people that expected me to know who they were because they all knew my grandfather.

The Seaver family were born and bred in Gloucester long before the place had a name. Everybody knew Michael Seaver. They all had these stories about how he made their lives better. He was a good man. Cared for strangers. A good Christian man who welcomed everyone into his home. He and my grandmother raised half of my mother’s friends, and though I only had two aunts and an uncle on that side, my grandfather would have probably counted a number of the other faces in the crowd as his children. Dressed in black, the crowd poured out about the cemetery. Spots of purple and blue stuck out. Not that my grandfather would have minded.

The priest spoke at length, offering prayers as if somebody needed to bribe St. Peter to let my grandfather in. I couldn’t hear a word of it. Just the loud punctuation of his voice pitching before dropping low. A background noise to the gasps for breath around me.

My mother clung to my father. Her black scarf hid her thinning hair, but her gaunt face gave away the chemo if my aunts hadn’t told everybody about the cancer long before. She looked so brittle. Thinner than I’d ever seen her. Tired and gaunt and gray and too close to a grave despite how well the surgery went and that this was her final round. She was solidly on route to recovery, and the ground vanished from beneath her feet.

I’m an orphan, Henry, she’d whispered to my father that morning.

The world knocked us over in threes. My grandmother died almost a year ago, and the next month, my mother was diagnosed with breast cancer. Right when she headed toward the end, my grandfather died. Found in his home having suffered a heart attack. We’d talked just the day before. He told me about how proud he was of his garden this year, and then he asked when I would come up for a visit. I promised I’d come after graduation.

Well, I guess I kept that promise.

My sister, Nicole, buried her face in her husband’s chest. His arms wrapped around her, holding her, but his eyes remained on the casket. Maybe he saw his own father’s death coming down the line. Their daughter shifted at their side, holding her little brother’s hand.

Thomas held his wife’s hand with one hand. The knuckles white from the tension, but Jenny didn’t even flinch. She held their daughter on her hip, and his other hand rested gently on his son’s shoulder. A gentle reassuring hold. The muscles in my brother’s jaw bounced as he fought to keep back the tears that glimmered in his eyes.

Too hot. Everything was too much. Too loud. When they lowered the casket into the ground, I wanted to laugh. It was ridiculous. Some of his ashes were in there, but he wasn’t. My grandmother wanted to be buried in the cemetery side by side, so he did what she wanted, and half of him would be buried beside her, but the other half was in an urn back at his house.

After, as we walked away from the grave, I felt like I was still standing there. Still staring down in baffled confusion. Though the casket easily held the ash inside, it seemed too small. His life should’ve overflowed, but the ground swallowed it whole, and now, we were supposed to get on with the rest of our lives ignoring the gaping hole he left behind.

The service was lovely, a stranger told my mother. How are you doing, Rachel? You look so thin!

I kept walking, catching only pieces of what people said around me.

Is that the man who moved into the Thompson’s old house? my Uncle John asked, gesturing to some guy in a black suit that probably cost more than my entire wardrobe.

Aunt Peggy nodded, leaning toward him conspiratorially as if she wasn’t speaking loud enough for everybody to hear. That’s Joel Donnelly.

One of Barb’s boys?

No! He bought the Thompson’s house and completely tore it down. Some rich businessman from New York!

My mother’s family pushed death into the closet like an itchy sweater. Kept to be polite. Mourning paraded out when people were by, and truly appreciated in the gesture of it, but whenever possible, they suppressed