Beach House Memories (35 page)

Palmer snorted at that. “Does Daddy know?”

Alarms were going off in Lovie’s mind, but she maintained her composure. “Of course your daddy doesn’t know. He’s in Europe.”

“When’s he coming home?”

“I don’t know exactly.”

“Uh-huh.”

“What’s that supposed to mean?”

“Just that Daddy’s been gone for six weeks and you don’t even know when he’s coming home. Do you even care?”

Lovie reached out to place her hand on the table to steady herself.

“Palmer, honey,” she said, gentling her voice, “of course I care. Your daddy was scheduled to come home this Friday night. But he wired to say he missed his flight and he was trying to get another. He didn’t know when he’d be back. That’s why
I
don’t know when he’ll be home. But it will be soon.”

Palmer didn’t respond. He stared at his feet, frowning.

“I’ve made your favorite dinner. Roast lamb. And custard.”

“I’m not eating here. I’m going to Dick’s.”

“You most certainly are not. I’ve set a place for you at the table.”

Palmer’s mouth worked, but rather than speak he rammed his hands into his pockets and mulishly headed for the front door.

“Palmer Middleton Rutledge, you stop right where you are.”

He stopped at the door but did not look back.

“I don’t know what’s going on in your head, but . . .”

Palmer spun on his heel. He still did not look at her, but he ground out, “I’m going to Dick’s.” Then he turned and went out the door.

Lovie ran after him, calling out as he ran down the porch stairs. “You come back here right now or your father will hear about this!”

Palmer turned and shouted back, “Oh, yeah? Good!”

Lovie’s last view was the sight of her son’s bright blond hair as he ran into the darkness.

The house went still. She could hear her heart beating in her chest, or it might have been the mantel clock ticking away the seconds as she stood staring into the night, wildly wondering what darkness in Palmer’s mind had precipitated his outburst.

“Mama?”

Lovie spun around, surprised to find Cara at her side. “Cara!”

“What’s up with him?” Cara asked with wide eyes.

“I’m not sure. I was going to ask you.”

“He’s been acting kind of weird this week. It might have something to with . . .” She abruptly stopped herself.

Lovie put her hand on Cara’s shoulder. “With what?”

“Nothing,” Cara replied cagily.

“Caretta, I’ve had enough secrecy for tonight. Tell me what you know.”

Cara frowned and stuck her chin out stubbornly.

Lovie saw that her daughter was shaken by Palmer’s flare-up and, more, that she knew something. Lovie guided Cara to the sofa and sat down beside her. She took a calming breath. “Cara, something’s bothering Palmer. But I can’t help him if I don’t know what it is. If you know something, please tell me.”

“Mama, I can’t tattle.”

“This wouldn’t be tattling. I promise you, I won’t get mad.”

Cara looked at her hands tucked between her knees. “It’s just some game he’s been playing with the guys.”

“Game? What game? Is he involved in that ding dong ditch game?” The neighborhood was getting upset with the antics of the boys ringing the bells and running off.

“No, ma’am.”

Lovie was sure Cara knew what was bothering Palmer. “Then what game?” she prodded.

“Well,” she began reluctantly, then in a gush, the story poured out. “It all started when we went to Fort Moultrie. The boys planned to walk through the fort. In the dark,” she added, almost breathless at the thought of such a thing. “So they could try and see the ghost of Osceola. They had to go in one by one. Alone. It was Palmer’s job to walk around the fort to make sure there were no devil worshippers or anything before we went in. He was gone a long time, and we all started to get kinda worried that something happened to him. When he got back he was acting all strange, kinda mad, and he said he was going home. The guys thought he saw devil worshippers, and when they asked him, he said he didn’t but he was going home all the same. And he made me go home with him.”

“That’s all?” Lovie asked. “You came home?”

“Yes’m. Except that the boys all called him chicken and stuff like that.”

Lovie sat back against the cushions and thought about the story. It was unlike Palmer to back down from the challenge. Something had spooked him when he walked around Fort Moultrie that night. Lovie felt the blood drain from her face.

“Cara,” she said in an even voice, “did Palmer ever tell you what he saw that frightened him?”

She shook her head. “He wouldn’t. Won’t talk about that night.” She looked at her mother. “Do you think he saw a ghost?”

“Hard to say,” Lovie replied, her mind racing in a different direction from ghosts. “Did you or anyone else see anything? Or anyone?”

“Nope. Not even ol’ Osceola.”

“Cara, what night was it that y’all went to Fort Moultrie?”

Cara lifted her slim shoulders. “I don’t know.”

“Try and remember. Was it Sunday? Monday? Yesterday?”

Cara reached up and scratched her head. “I think it was Monday.”

“You’re sure?”

Cara nodded. “Yeah, because I was at Emmi’s house on Sunday and her mom and dad were watching
The Smothers Brothers
. I remember because I was trying to talk Emmi into going to the fort with me but she wouldn’t.”

“Thank you, Cara. I don’t think there’s anything we need to worry about. Palmer’s probably just upset about the teasing.”

“That’s what I thought,” Cara said, reassured. “There’s no such things as ghosts, are there.” She made it sound like a statement, but Lovie heard the girl’s need for reassurance.

“No, silly,” she said, putting her arm around Cara’s shoulders and giving them a gentle shake. “Now go on and finish setting the table. We’re going to have a wonderful meal.”

“Palmer will be sorry.”

Lovie watched her daughter bolt off toward the kitchen, free of the burden of her secret. Lovie rose and immediately went to her desk and opened the turtle journal. She flipped through the pages, checking the dates. Her fingers stopped on Monday, August 19. She read the entry, then closed her eyes, placed her palms flat against the table, and leaned her weight against them.

She remembered that night well. On the evening of last Monday, she and Russell had walked the beach of Sullivan’s Island to check the few nests there as an addendum to the final report. The moon and stars were particularly bright, they’d commented
on it. There were only four nests, and when they were finished checking them they’d exited the beach and walked to the parking lot to their separate cars. Not seeing anyone, Russell had kissed her good-bye.

Lovie straightened and closed the journal, remembering the expression of her son’s face when he turned to look at her at the bottom of the stairs. His blue eyes were roiling with the fire of resentment and the iciness of anger. She shivered and held the journal to her breast, thinking of the young boy she’d once held close to her heart and of the young man who had just turned his back on her.

She and Russell had parked their cars in the lot at Fort Moultrie.

Eighteen

I
t was Labor Day weekend, the farewell holiday of summer. For Lovie, September loomed with the same dread as the hurricane roiling somewhere out in the Atlantic. This final weekend at the beach house was a time for good-byes.

Stratton was due home from Europe on Monday and expected his family back on Tradd Street to greet him. Her beach house was packed up, ready to close tomorrow. She’d said her good-byes to friends. The turtle project’s farewell party included promises to continue the project the following summer. Most of the volunteers had already left for points north. Tonight was her last night on the island this summer, and her hardest good-bye was the one she had to say to Russell Bennett.

Lovie lay in Russell’s arms on the faithful red-and-black checked blanket that had served them well over the past weeks as they lay together on the dunes. Countless stars put on a dazzling display in the heavens. The beach felt otherworldly, bathed in the harvest moon’s silvery light, revealing the untrammeled sand of low tide. Even the ocean had diminished its roar to serenely roll in and out, murmuring whispers of constancy along the shoreline. The air was still, as though the night were holding its
breath, waiting, watching to see how the final moments of Lovie and Russell’s summer would end.

Their lovemaking had been both tender and desperate. Now, in the aftermath, Lovie felt a calm that was born of resignation and acceptance. She had no more tears left. She didn’t want to think of her life without him. She had a lifetime to endure that reality. Tonight Russell was here, in her arms. That was all she had, and it had to be enough.

This is how I’ll always remember him, she thought. She closed her eyes. She would make a picture of this moment in her mind. She committed the sensation of his hand idly stroking her hair, his musky scent, the sound of his heart beating in his chest, to her mind so that on nights to come, after he was gone, she would have these memories to hold on to.

“It’s getting late,” he said.

Her heart stopped. “No, it’s early yet.”

“We should go.”

She sighed and held him tighter. She heard the rattling of the tall, dry sea grasses stirring in the wind and the scuttling in the sand of a ghost crab. “I promised myself I wouldn’t cry again.”

He took his hand from her hair and played with her fingers on his chest. “My darling, I don’t want you to cry. We knew this day was coming.”

“That doesn’t make it any easier.”

“No.”

“It’s all so heartbreaking and frustrating,” she said against his chest. “I feel helpless, and I don’t like that feeling. I’m just going along with the plot as written, like some character in a tragic story of star-crossed lovers. We’re no better off than Romeo and Juliet.”

He brought her fingers to his lips, kissing them. “I don’t think I like that example. They died, you know. Perhaps Lancelot and Guinevere?”

“You’re trying to make me laugh. It won’t work. Besides, I don’t want to be a nun.”

He pressed his lips to her palm. “Better than burned at the stake.”

“Lancelot rescued her, you know.” She clutched his shirt. “He came back for her.”

His hand tightened around her hair as he pulled her head down so their foreheads touched. His whisper was tortured. “Don’t you know leaving you is the hardest thing I’ll ever have to do?”

“Then don’t.”

He kissed her then, and it sparked a violent passion. All reason and resolve was cast aside as they clung to each other with the final desperation. He kissed her face, her body, telling her he loved her, would love her always. When they made love a second time, Lovie held tight, reluctant to let go, knowing that she would never again find a love so true, so pure.

Russell rose up on his forearms to stare at her face as though memorizing each detail. He lifted his finger to wipe away the tears from her cheek.

“Olivia,” he said in a husky voice, “I love you. I’ve never loved anyone the way I love you and I know I never will again. Come with me.”

“Don’t say that,” Lovie said. “You know I can’t. That you can’t. We both knew that we’d have to end this at the end of the summer.”

“I never promised that. We never said the words.”

“But it was understood,” she said, weakening.

“I’m asking you now. I’m saying the words. Come with me.”

“Russell, how can I?”

“Move with me to Florida. Bring your children. We’ll be a family.”

“But Russell, we never intended to break up our families.
Think of the scandal. Not just for us, but for our families. How can we do that?”

He shook his head in dismay. “Olivia, I know it will be hard. But what else can we do? We can’t continue like this. Neither of us. We have to decide. We either both leave our families and be together, or we say good-bye tonight.”

Lovie clung to him, feeling the finality of the words. She couldn’t let him go. Not tonight. It was too soon.

“Russell,” she said, bringing her hand to his face. His breathing was heavy and he appeared stricken. She moved to sit upright on the blanket. “I have one idea.”

He moved to join her, sitting cross-legged. His unbuttoned shirt hung open, exposing his finely muscled chest to the moonlight. “Tell me.”

She reached out to take his hand. “I know we understood that we’d leave here tonight and never see each other again. We decided to do the right thing and go back to our families. Neither of us wants to see anyone hurt. But I keep asking myself: What if this love we have
is
our destiny? Do we have the right to deny it? And why do we have to? Are we willing to give up everything we possess, even our honor, to be together? To start a new life together?”

“Yes,” he said.

“Wait.” She brought her finger up to his lips. “Don’t answer now. This decision is too big, it carries too much weight not only for us but for those we love to answer quickly.” She paused, gathering her thoughts. “I propose we make a promise. We will wait six months. Time enough for us to return to our lives, to cool our heads, and to think through all the ramifications of our decisions. Carefully and deliberately. There must be no contact until the six months are over. None at all. No pressure of any kind.”