The Sound of Glass

by Karen White

  Merritt looked down at her skirt and blouse as if expecting to see something different. “I’m not going. I have too much to do here.”

  His face fell, and for a moment Loralee thought he might cry. He was really working for his twenty dollars, and he might even get a tip with this performance. “But I really, really want you to come with us. It won’t be any fun without you. And Mama said she wasn’t feeling good, and if she has to leave we all have to go home early, because it’s not safe for just Dr. Heyward and two kids to be on the boat.”

  He used the puppy-dog eyes that he usually reserved for getting extra dessert, and Loralee admired his ad-libbing. She would definitely have to give him a tip.

  Merritt looked at him as a person would look at a yipping little dog, unsure whether it was just for show or a real threat. “That’s very nice of you to say, but I’m just not comfortable in a boat. . . .”

  Gibbes cleared his throat. “I thought we’d take my jonboat. Stick to the small waterways. Maybe explore the creeks and see if we can spot any turtles.”

  “I love the turtles,” Maris said, jumping up and down. And then, as if she were in on Loralee’s plans, she said, “I’d really be sad if we couldn’t stay long because Mrs. Connors got sick.” Her dimples were even more pronounced when she frowned, which didn’t make any sense at all.

  “But I’m . . . not comfortable on the water,” Merritt said. “And I don’t even know what a jonboat is.”

  Owen piped up. “It’s a flat-bottomed boat that was originally used by the old fur traders, but is still used today for traveling in shallow creeks and marshes.”

  “We call them stump-knockers, too, because that’s what you do with them in the shallow water. They used to be called bateaux, which means boats in French,” Maris added. Owen looked at her with surprise and she gave him a smug smile.

  “And I have a life jacket for everyone—including two children’s jackets—and I’m a really good swimmer. There is absolutely nothing to worry about.” Gibbes sounded like a man offering to feed a rattlesnake, and Loralee sent him her mama look to get him to quit.

  She had once seen a movie about the French Revolution with a scene of a woman being led to get her head chopped off. Merritt looked a little bit like that woman.

  Her face lit up briefly. “I don’t have a bathing suit.”

  “Just shorts and a T-shirt is all you need,” Gibbes said.

  “I don’t have that either.”

  Loralee almost expected Merritt to swipe her hands together like she’d finished a complicated task and was ready for something else.

  “I do,” Loralee almost shouted. “And you can borrow anything you want. I’m pretty sure we’re the same size.”

  Merritt and Gibbes looked at Loralee as if she’d just told a bald-faced lie. They would have to wait and see, because she was confident that Merritt had a body hidden under those drab clothes and it was time to let the world know.

  “Please, Merritt,” Owen whined, using a tone that usually got him sent to his room. “Daddy had a boat, too, and he used to always take me out on the lake to go fishing or just ride around. It was our favorite thing to do. It would be real neat going out on a boat with you. Kind of like Daddy being right there with us.” Owen had never been fishing in his life, but Loralee was prepared to let the lie slide unremarked.

  Loralee winced, hoping Merritt didn’t remember Owen telling Gibbes that he’d never been fishing before. Still, if they’d been alone, Loralee would have hugged her little boy for such a performance. But something in his face told her he wasn’t completely playacting. She wished they’d had more time to mourn Robert, for her to give Owen his chance to grieve instead of taking him away from the only home he’d known. One day he’d understand. She didn’t allow herself to second-guess her belief that one day he would. Because he would just have to.

  Merritt must have seen that in his face, too, because her own face softened just like Owen’s did right before he fell asleep.

  “Unless you don’t mind a ten-year-old girl in pigtails showing you up. Of course, you might prefer staying here to inventory the attic.” Gibbes’s voice was filled with a challenge, baiting her.

  Merritt gave him a hard look before turning to Owen. “If we’re not going anywhere near the ocean, and we stick to the little creeks, we should be okay. I’m sure I have a pair of old pants. . . .”

  Loralee didn’t let her continue. Instead, she grabbed her by the elbow and began leading her to the stairs. “Owen, please take Maris back to the kitchen and finish packing up the basket. Merritt and I will be down in ten minutes.” She glanced at Merritt’s pale, pinched face. “Maybe closer to fifteen,” she added.

  They were halfway up the stairs when Owen called up. “Maybe we’ll see some dolphins.”

  Merritt’s arm stiffened under her fingers, but Loralee just gripped harder, pulling her along. She dragged her into her room and sat her down on the step stool she’d found in the pantry and had placed in front of her dressing table.

  Loralee began rummaging through one of her drawers, tossing possibilities on the bed.

  “Absolutely not,” Merritt said, pointing to the hot-pink strapless two-piece bathing suit. “Don’t you have Bermuda shorts, or capri pants? And something with sleeves in case it gets cool?”

  Loralee looked up at Merritt for a moment to see whether she was serious, then went back to rummaging, finally deciding on something they could both agree on. Handing the shorts and shirt to Merritt, Loralee said, “Take these and put them on. I’m going to dig in my cosmetics case to see if I’ve got something that would work.”

  “I am not wearing makeup to go out on a boat. That’s ridiculous.”

  Loralee sighed, finally letting her exasperation out. “It’s got an SPF of fifty, and I’ll make it look natural so nobody even knows you’re wearing any.”

  “So what would be the point? It’s a waste of time. Don’t you have any zinc oxide?”

  Loralee sighed inwardly, wondering whether David had ever complained that much to Michelangelo while he was being sculpted. “I have a wonderful foundation that’s moisturizer and sunscreen. You’ll need sunscreen to go out on the boat.” She glanced down at Merritt’s pale legs and arms. “Actually, we’ll need to stop by a drugstore to get you some pretty strong SPF for your body. And probably a hat. Have you ever been in the sun before?”

  Merritt crossed her arms and looked so much like her little brother that Loralee almost laughed. “I’m from Maine. My sun exposure was . . . limited.”

  “That’s why your skin looks like porcelain, and I’m trying to keep it that way by using the right products.”

  Merritt stood and crossed the room toward the door.

  “Where are you going?”

  “To my room so I can change.”

  “Don’t be silly,” Loralee said. “It’ll be quicker if you do it here. I promise I won’t look.”

  Merritt seemed to consider it for a moment before heading toward the closet and pulling open the door so she could stand behind it. First a skirt was thrown out from behind the door, and then the hateful beige blouse. “I don’t know what game you and Gibbes are playing by dragging me out on a boat. You both know I’m afraid of water, and I suspect you know why.”

  Loralee straightened, dumping several tubes and bottles on the dressing table. “I would never make anybody do something I thought wasn’t the right thing to do. Besides, you could have said no.”

  It was silent behind the closet door, and Loralee could picture Robert’s stubborn jaw in his daughter’s face jutting out to show how riled up she was. They were so much alike that it shouldn’t have been a surprise to anybody who knew them how they could have remained estranged for so many years. If Loralee had known it then, she would have dared Robert to never see Merritt again and they would most likely have been on the next flight to Maine.

  Merritt came out from behind the door, pulling and tugging at her clothes like they were covered in fleas. “I do
n’t think this fits.”

  The sleeveless top was in a soft sky blue that looked lovely against Merritt’s dark hair. The smooth knit skimmed over her slim body, hugging where it was supposed to. The shorts were the most conservative ones Loralee owned, purchased for Boy Scout events, where the other mothers didn’t seem to appreciate any other clothing choices Loralee had previously worn. They were navy blue and cuffed at the hem, hitting midthigh and showing off Merritt’s long, slender—and appallingly white—legs.

  “It fits you just fine. Now come over here so I can put something on your face so you don’t get sunburned.”

  Merritt crossed her arms. “No. I’ll stop by a drugstore and get a hat and a high-SPF lotion I can put on my face and body. That’s all I need.”

  Loralee didn’t smile with relief at the discovery that the girl with opinions Robert had told her about was still inside Merritt somewhere. Instead she just nodded, then led the way to the door.

  “Won’t I need a sweater out on the water? This shirt doesn’t have any sleeves.”

  Loralee didn’t even pause. “I promise you that you won’t need a sweater. Not until October, most likely.”

  Loralee kept walking, knowing that Merritt would follow her, just as she knew Owen would figure out how a LEGO model was put together no matter how many times he threw it against the floor because it was wrong.

  The children were in the front yard when they came down, and Gibbes was in the foyer with his head bent over his cell phone, typing a message. He glanced up and his eyes got that look Loralee remembered from her flying days, when she brought a scotch and soda to a first-class passenger without being asked. “Oh,” he said.

  Merritt plucked at her blouse. “Loralee says I won’t need a sweater.”

  “No.”

  Merritt didn’t seem to notice that Gibbes was acting like he’d fallen out of the stupid tree, hitting every branch on the way down, and Loralee figured it was probably a good thing. Merritt had enough on her mind right then.

  “I’ll get the picnic basket,” Merritt said, her voice hopeful, like she was looking forward to carrying the basket in front of her as some kind of barrier.

  Gibbes cleared his throat. “It’s already in my truck.” He moved to the door and held it open while Merritt grabbed her pocketbook from the hall table.

  Loralee paused as she stared out into the new day, the river golden in the morning light, glassy and bright like a promise. She hoped Merritt felt that, too: that each morning should always feel like a promise regardless of where you’d been the day before. She remembered the safety training she’d received as a flight attendant, how if they found themselves in water to roll on their backs and lead with their feet so they could see where they were going instead of where they’d been. She’d always thought that was a good way to approach life, too.

  “We need to talk about the attic,” Gibbes said to Merritt.

  She frowned up at him. “Not today. I can only handle one scary thing per day.”

  She said it seriously, but the corner of his mouth turned up. “Me, too.”

  Loralee grabbed her own purse from the hall table and followed Merritt out the door, wishing she could tell her what she’d written in her journal that morning as she was thinking about her coming out on the river that day. You are stronger than you think. She couldn’t, of course. Most people just needed to figure that out on their own.

  She joined everybody out on the porch, pausing a moment to catch her breath, and waiting for the sound of the door closing behind her.

  chapter 13

  MERRITT

  I could have said no. I had once been a young girl who’d grown into a young woman with opinions and a strong will, both of which the years had leached from my bones, an embalming of the spirit. But I still could have said no.

  Maybe it was Owen’s obvious pleas that had made me agree to go along. I knew he’d been prompted by Loralee, or Gibbes, or maybe both, making me curious as to their motive. Or it could have been the memory of my father gently suggesting a family beach vacation, and my mother’s stubborn refusal to revisit a part of her unhappy childhood she wanted left in the shoe box of photos she kept under her bed. A perverse part of me wanted to find out whether our fear was genetic, something I’d inherited along with her dark hair and slender feet. Mostly, I thought, I wanted to prove Cal wrong in his belief that all fears are permanent, that, like bone fractures, they will heal but leave a hairline shadow.

  But I could have said no.

  Gibbes drove his Explorer with Loralee in the front seat and Owen, me, and Maris in the back. I’d insisted on the seating arrangement as soon as I realized that we would have to drive over the river to get to Lady’s Island, where Gibbes lived. I knew only that his house was on the marsh, and he had a dock, and that Lady’s Island had once been the home of large agricultural plantations before the Civil War—although Loralee had called the war something else. She might have said more, but I’d stopped listening, too intent on watching her toddle on incredibly high heels as we walked toward Gibbes’s SUV.

  Where I’d lived inland in Maine, bridges hadn’t really been an issue. I didn’t travel far, and when I did, I would go to great lengths to avoid them. But there in the Lowcountry, the land seemed borrowed from the ocean. With strips of islands separated by creeks and salt marshes, avoiding bridges would be like avoiding snow in Maine in January.

  Before my decision to move to Beaufort, I’d gone to the box of books I’d inherited from my maternal grandmother, who’d moved inland when my mother died to take care of me when my father was flying, and had died when I was in college. She was quiet, not unlike my mother, but always wore an aura of wariness, always overly cautious around strangers, events, and emotions. Which was why I’d been surprised to find that she owned a AAA South Carolina travel guide and road map. In all the years I’d known her, she’d never expressed any interest in knowing what might exist outside the small corner of her New England world. I’d felt ashamed, as if I’d never really bothered to know her. But then, she’d never offered, deflecting my questions with a dismissive flick of her wrist. It wasn’t until after I’d married Cal that I began to realize that we rarely really know everything about those whose lives we share.

  I’d spread open the map of South Carolina across my kitchen table as if seeing the land itself would make my undertaking somehow real. As if by following red and blue highways with my fingers, crossing bridges, and driving alongside vast bodies of water, I was as good as gone. I was my mother’s daughter, after all. By her own admission she wasn’t a great cook, but an adequate one who surprised herself every once in a while with a flash of genius. Her recipe box was filled with minute, step-by-step instructions on how to make even the most basic item. It was her road map in the unfamiliar territory of the kitchen, just as my map would guide me through an even more foreign place.

  I sat in the middle between Maris and Owen, listening to Loralee and Gibbes talking about fishing, something they were apparently both familiar with, having grown up by the coast, and Maris’s constant question bombardment aimed at a desultory Owen. He responded by narrating a litany of random facts that he’d either found interesting and wanted to share, or that were his way of dealing with being so close to Maris. I focused on the bright bows on Maris’s flip-flops, aware of Gibbes’s SUV heading toward the bridge and not wanting to know exactly when we’d get there.

  If I were to live there, I knew I couldn’t avoid driving over bridges forever, but I was glad it was Gibbes behind the wheel instead of me. A therapist had shown me how to use breathing techniques and helpful thoughts to manage the few times I’d had to navigate a small bridge back home. I’d have to remember them, go look for my notes and practice in the quiet of my bedroom. I didn’t imagine I’d ever get used to it no matter how many times I had to cross the rivers and byways of my new home, but I’d manage. I’d simply recall Cal’s voice telling me I couldn’t do it and I would prove him wrong. One thing I knew for sure, h
owever, was that I could never do it during a storm. And never, ever at night.

  “This is the Woods bridge,” Gibbes said, turning slightly toward the back seat. “Also known locally as the Beaufort River Bridge, and the Sea Island Parkway. It’s a swing bridge.”

  “What’s that?” Owen asked, sitting forward so that his seat belt strained across his chest.

  “They have a man in the operations station in the middle of the span to swing the bridge open to allow boats through that are too tall to go beneath it.”

  “Cool,” said Owen, looking intently out the window as we approached. A shiver ran through me as I imagined the bridge swinging open just as we reached it.

  “Please keep your eyes on the road.” I realized I’d said it out loud when Gibbes’s eyes met mine in the rearview mirror. I closed my eyes and tried to disappear into the back of my seat.

  “Did you know that this year August will have five Fridays, five Saturdays, and five Sundays? This happens only once every eight hundred and twenty-three years. The Chinese call it ‘silver pockets full.’ It’s supposed to be good luck or something.” Owen’s voice sounded loud in my ear, but not loud enough to block out the change in sound under our tires as we began a small ascent onto the bridge.

  The bridge rumbled under the tires of the SUV and my hands took hold of the edges of the seats in front of me, as if they would hold me aloft while the brakes squealed and the side rails of the bridge gave way with the force of a vehicle crashing through them. As if they could save me from falling into freezing water that lapped below like the tongue of a hungry animal. Breathe. Breathe. Fill your lungs with air. Everything’s fine.

  “Did you know that when you’re playing rock, paper, and scissors that you have a higher probability of winning if you always go with paper? That’s because most people don’t like making a scissors with their fingers, so they use rock because it’s easier, and paper always covers rock.” Owen was staring out the front window as if talking to no one but himself.