Beach Trip (62 page)

“They’re not all like that. Some of them are nice.”

It gave her a grim measure of satisfaction to know that she had the power to put him someplace he didn’t want to go. Not that she would, of course, at least not anytime soon.

Outside the window, Nashville rose like the city of Oz. Mel rested her cheek against the glass and stared at the wide blue sky, wondering what death must feel like. She had cried herself empty but there were still moments when grief overcame her, rising up when she least expected it. When it became too much to bear, she called Sara.

She had spoken to J.T. several times since Lola’s death, his voice cool and distant while he waited for Sara to pick up the phone. She didn’t know if it was grief or anger that made him sound so detached but she’d dreamed of him afterward. And now this afternoon she would see him again for the first time in nine years.

She hoped he was bald and fat.

Annie rattled on about Agnes Grace, trying to fill the long silences. Mel had been morose and distant since they picked her up at the airport; she seemed to be taking Lola’s death hard. They all were, really. It was a tragic event, the kind of thing they would never really get over.

Mitchell patted Annie reassuringly on the shoulder, and she gave him a bright little smile. He dropped his hand and reached over and took hers, and they drove for awhile like this, hand in hand, like a courting couple.

Something had happened to Annie out there on the island. Some shift in perception, an awareness dawning like a light on the horizon. Something potent and miraculous. She had gone out there the old Anne Louise Stites but she had returned a new woman. She had shed her skin like a snake, and that was why, despite Lola’s death, despite the sadness of the occasion,
she could still feel a deep and overwhelming sense of joy on this bright, sunlit day.

She squeezed his hand and Mitchell looked at her and grinned. He had been very sweet throughout this whole ordeal, flying down to be with her during the inquest, calling and making excuses as to why she couldn’t be at various committee meetings, making sure no one bothered her while she was grieving. She had been a woman on a mission when she got back from North Carolina. She had wasted no time, driving out to the Baptist Home for Children to see Agnes Grace. She’d taken her a bag of seashells, a T-shirt that read
BEACH BUNNY
, and a book on turtles she’d picked up at the Whale Head Island Turtle Conservancy. Agnes Grace seemed happy to see her.

“Girl, where you been?” she asked, eagerly grabbing the gifts Annie had brought. “I thought you’d run off and left me.”

“Now Agnes Grace, you know I told you I was meeting some friends for a week in North Carolina.”

“Yeah. I forgot.” She picked carefully through the shells. “How was it? Being with your friends, I mean.”

“It was good.” Annie smiled sadly and gently stroked the child’s hair off her face. “It was really good.” Agnes Grace had seen enough of death and hardship in her short life and Annie was determined not to burden her with more.

The next day she picked Agnes Grace up and took her to meet Mitchell. He was out by the pool, cleaning laurel leaves out of the water with a strainer, and Agnes Grace went right up to him and said, “Hey, what you doing?” Annie had told Mitchell about the child, of course, she had warned him, but Mitchell and Agnes Grace got on famously. They cleaned out the pool and then took a ride on the motorized Mule to see the farm and check out Alan Jackson’s horses. When they got back, Agnes Grace was all excited.

“Mitchell says he’ll get me a pony,” she said, hopping from foot to foot. “For me to ride anytime I want.”

Annie raised one eyebrow and looked at Mitchell, and he flushed and said, “Well, now honey, we got all that acreage just going to waste. And Agnes Grace can come out and ride and feed it and help muck out the barn.”

“I can milk the goats, too!” Agnes Grace said, still hopping.

Annie said, “Goats?”

Mitchell took his cowboy hat off and wiped his brow with one arm. “Taking care of animals teaches a child responsibility. You know that, honey.”

“That’s right, taking care of animals teaches a child responsibility!” Agnes Grace shouted. Her face was red and streaked with sweat and dirt, and she looked happy, happier than Annie had ever seen her look.

“Well, I know that, but I think we might need to talk to the neighbors before we start buying goats.”

Later that night, Annie lay in bed beside Mitchell and told him what she wanted, what she’d wanted from the very first time she met Agnes Grace, only she didn’t know it then.

“Adoption’s a pretty big decision,” Mitchell said softly. “Even if her mama agrees to it, there’s still the responsibility of raising a child at our age.”

“Goodness, Mitchell, you make us sound like we’re
old.
We’re only in our mid-forties. And forty is the new thirty, in case you didn’t know.”

“Oh, is that right?” He leaned over and tickled her until she made him stop.

“We’ll go slow,” Annie said. “We’ll introduce her to the boys and then we’ll make a family decision, because once we invite her in, she’s family. She’ll be our little girl.”

Mitchell put his hands behind his head and stared at the ceiling. “Well,” he said. “She’s a fine girl.”

“Yes, she is.”

Mitchell grinned, his teeth gleaming in the darkness. “And I can’t wait to see how she shakes things up at that stuck-up private school you sent the boys to.”

Annie giggled, thinking about that.
Q-Tip
was pretty tame compared to what future mothers would probably call her.

Outside her window, the green hills of Tennessee glided past. Annie hummed a little tune under her breath. She could never be a good mother to her lost children, but she could be a good mother to Agnes Grace. That would have to be enough.

“What time’s the service?” Mel asked from the backseat.

“Two-thirty” Annie forced herself to stop thinking about the happy future and concentrate on the mournful present. Poor Lola. Poor Lola and
Lonnie. To have known, and lost, the love of a good man seemed tragic. It wasn’t so much the life Lola had lost as much as it was the life she’d never lived that seemed so unbearably sad to Annie.

The night before the memorial service, Sara, Tom, and Nicky were sprawled on Tom and Sara’s queen-size bed watching the latest Lego movie. Adam was down on the floor, building a Lego fortress.

“Okay, watch this,” Tom said. Sara was lying on her side, spooned up against him. She looked up at him and smiled, putting her hand on his cheek. He hadn’t shaved in days; the semester had ended this week, and his face was rough. She ran her fingers lightly over the stubble and he kissed them and said, “Look,” pointing at the TV screen.

“Where’s Adam?” Nicky said. “I don’t see him.” She was sprawled at the end of the bed on her stomach, her thin legs waving back and forth like windshield wipers. A plate of half-eaten pizza sat on the bed beside her. Caught by their measured movement, Sara stared at Nicky’s legs.
Had they always been that thin?

On the TV screen, a Lego tyrannosaurus, moved by two hands, attacked a city of Legos. “Roar,” someone said in the background. Adam looked up. He stood, then sat on the edge of the bed. “That’s me,” he said, watching the screen. “The sound guy is me.” They watched it until the end and then everyone clapped. Adam smiled and went back to playing with his Legos on the floor. Nicky folded her bird legs under her and rolled off the bed. “I’ll be right back,” she said, picking up the pizza plate.

“Are you going to the kitchen?” Sara tried not to stare at her arms and legs but she couldn’t help herself. They were painfully thin; the child looked like she would blow away in a strong gust of wind.

Nicky put her hand on her hip and rolled her eyes. She sighed dramatically. “What do you want?” she asked.

“A glass of water.”

“I’ll have a beer,” Tom said.

Nicky smiled at him. She didn’t mind getting him a beer nearly as much as she minded getting her mother a glass of water. They heard her tripping down the hall and then her feet pattering down the back stairway to the kitchen.

“Follow her,” Sara said, “and see if she goes into the bathroom.”

“Stop it,” Tom said. He leaned over and tapped Adam on the top of the head. “Hey, buddy, did you put together that space cruiser I got you?”

Adam didn’t look at him but he said, “Yeah, do you want to see it?” He jumped up without waiting for his father to answer, and ran down the hallway to his bedroom to get it. Most teenage boys got excited by video games and iPods, but Adam got excited by a Lego space cruiser. Sara supposed she should be thankful that he got excited about
something.
She had to stop being so negative. She had to retrain herself to see things in a positive light. She thought again of that fleeting moment of perfect detachment that she had experienced on the long-ago road trip to North Carolina. She wanted to feel that way again. She wanted to stop worrying about her child, and the life he would never have. She wanted to build a new life with Tom, a better life than the one they had now, with its constant cycle of disappointment and hope. Surely they deserved better? Surely they were good people who deserved better?

“She’s eating,” Tom said, bringing her attention back to Nicky. “I saw her eat two helpings of the potatoes at dinner.”

“But then she immediately runs to the bathroom. After every meal.”

“So what are you suggesting—bulimia?”

“I don’t know.” Sara closed her eyes. “She’s so thin.”

“You were thin at her age.”

“I know, I know.” She opened her eyes and laid back on the pillows. “But I didn’t grow up with the cult of perfection hanging over my head every minute of the day. We didn’t start reading
Cosmopolitan
until college.”

“Maybe we should just watch her for a few days.”

“I’ve
been
watching her. I’m worried.”

Tom ran his hand wearily over his face. “Can’t we just worry about one child at a time?”

“I wish it were that simple.” She rolled over on her side, facing him. “This isn’t going to just go away.”

“All right.” He smiled faintly at her. He looked bone-tired, worn down by worry and fatigue. “I’ll ask Dr. Eberhardt if he can recommend someone. It’s probably a good idea if she talks to someone anyway, what with our constant focus on Adam. It must be hard for her.”

She sat up on one elbow, fingering the buttons of his shirt, avoiding his gaze. “Are you ever sorry?” she asked.

“About what?”

“Me. The kids.”

He leaned over and kissed her, running his hand lightly over the swell of her hip. “Never,” he said.

Later, they all sat together on the bed, even Adam, and watched the tape one more time. There was a point where two Lego dinosaurs are fighting and then began to kiss and make up. They had seen the tape a dozen times but suddenly, without warning, Adam began laughing. He glanced over his shoulder at them and they were so startled, they began laughing, too. And in that brief moment of shared laughter, looking around at her family huddled together on the bed, Sara experienced a sudden unexpected happiness. A moment of sheer, startling joy. They laughed and played the scene over and laughed again, and looking around at their happy faces, Sara thought,
Maybe that’s all there is, these small moments of unexpected joy. Maybe that’s the best we can hope for.

And for her, on this night at least, that was enough.

She took a long, hot bath and thought about Lola. The fact that she would never see her friend again, would never again witness the world through Lola’s sweet, bright eyes seemed to her unbearably sad. She cried for a while, and when she was finished, she washed her face and lay back in the bath. She wondered if she’d be able to speak to Briggs at the service, to continue the pretense a little longer.

She climbed out of the tub and wrapped herself in a towel. She was glad Mel and Annie would be there tomorrow. She felt like she could get through anything if they were there. Tom came in and stood at the sink, brushing his teeth while she dressed.

“Are you nervous about seeing her again?” she asked, toweling her hair.

He rinsed his mouth and looked at her in the mirror. “Who?”

She smiled. “Mel.”

“Not really. Why?”

“Well, she was your college sweetheart. She was the love of your life.”

He pulled her roughly into his arms and kissed her, toothpaste still on his face. She laughed and he slapped her playfully on the rear end and kissed her again.

“You are the love of my life,” he said.

Mel hadn’t expected the church to be so big, but it was a good thing it was because there were several hundred people in attendance, among them many dignitaries, including the mayor and two state senators. Mel stood on her tiptoes scanning the crowd, looking for Sara and her family. They made their way slowly toward the front pews, Mel in front, followed by
Annie and Mitchell, still holding hands. Mel could see Lola’s mother, Maureen, standing at the end of the aisle. She was greeting people as they came forward to find their seats, still a handsome woman at seventy, looking stoic and bitter, as if contemplating her lost child, her life’s work, so finally and irrevocably beyond her control. Briggs stood beside her, his face rigid, expression fixed. He had aged overnight into an old man, slope-shouldered but fierce, like a crafty old bull waiting for the matador to wave the muleta. He said something to a young man sitting in a pew across the aisle and the young man turned to survey the crowd.
Henry
, Mel guessed. He looked so much like Lola that her heart lurched suddenly in her chest. Henry stared up at one of the stained-glass windows, looking strangely calm and peaceful.

April and Captain Mike were noticeably absent, not that Mel would have expected them at the memorial service. The inquest had been bad enough. Briggs had lost his temper and thrown himself at Captain Mike, who had manfully restrained himself even though you could see how badly he wanted to punch Briggs in the face. It had taken two large sheriff’s deputies to haul Briggs away. He had been cursing Captain Mike the whole time. Briggs had to have someone else to blame for Lola’s death. He couldn’t blame himself.