She would drink the beer and maybe she'd feel a little better. But now she felt so empty and sad inside, and she began to sob softly, letting the tears stream down her cheeks as she walked through patches of long grass that grew along the edge of the beach. Did Bob know how much he was hurting her, and could he comprehend that love meant more than trying to feel a girl's breasts beneath her bathing suit? Did he know that part of a relationship meant helping the other person with their problems and, most of all, showing understanding towards those problems?

She stopped for a moment and looked back towards the bonfire. The loud music was only a soft murmur now, and it seemed to merge with the rush of waves exploding only a few yards away from her down the beach. Bob was probably enjoying himself now with some of the fellows, she thought angrily to herself. He got over these spats they had so easily and, well, she just didn't have his capacity to forget things as quickly. In this respect she was her father's daughter, and funny as it might have seemed, she was proud of it. Yet it had been her father's stubbornness in the face of the one tragic indiscretion her mother had made during their twenty-five years of marriage that had sent him into a rage that had ended in the break-up of their marriage. Ellen didn't know exactly what had happened between her parents, and she had justly believed that it would be foolish for her to pry. But, somehow, she felt Jennifer's recent behavior was a kind of defense the older girl had developed against the true facts of their parents' divorce.

Ellen lowered herself down onto the soft grass and popped open the top of the beer can she held in her hand. She was no psychologist and she couldn't even try to understand all of her sister's present difficulties. She would just sit here and drink her beer, and maybe this would make her feel a bit better.