The skin was faded around one of her fingers where her wedding ring used to be, a wedding band that was ten feet below ground in her ex-husband’s casket. She stopped wearing it long before he died. She kept it on when she caught him cheating the first time because he said he was sorry. The second time, though, Ruthie took it off for good and divorced him and took everything he had. Everything. Not like she needed it, she was born into money. But who ever said taking someone’s money was about the money. When he died, she paid the embalmer a handsome sum to insert the ring six inches up her ex-husband’s anus.
Her hand was still scratching, so she put it in her lap.
She was supposed to still be in the hospital. The doctors refused to release her, but Ruthie told them, under no uncertain terms, she was leaving. That’s that. She would send for her entire staff to retrieve her if that’s what it took. The doctors seemed ready to challenge her, but then her driver showed up and everyone seemed to calm down and saw it her way. People always saw it Ruthie’s way, sooner or later.
Her head seemed loosely attached. It swayed with the turns. This far out on Kiawah Island, there were many scenic turns. People paid lots of money for those turns. Ruthie wanted to vomit. She wanted to lean her head out the window and hurl down the waxed side of her car, but that would look rather coarse. When one rides in the back of a luxury automobile, it’s one’s duty to do it with class. So she sat back, adjusted the oxygen tube and took a deep breath.
The live oaks swam out of a mist, their branches reaching out like muscled arms. She blinked and realized the fog wasn’t outside the car but inside her head. She just couldn’t think straight. A fuzzy thought told her to go back to the hospital, but she’d rather be home.
Her driver had not said a word. Her staff had always been instructed to do so. He was a good soldier, but appeared to be wearing a black t-shirt and was without a cap. She would have to have a talk about his uniform. Currents are not casual, certainly not their staff.
The skin on the back of his neck was blacker than the hood of her Bentley. It wasn’t that Ruthie wasn’t accustomed to African-Americans, she just had not employed one so dark. Perhaps he was Kenyan.
Or perhaps this was a dream.
She recalled the disconnected memories of discomfort of the previous days. Of needles piercing her skin. The beeps of machines. The scent of hospital disinfectant still soaked her white hair. Before that, she couldn’t remember much. Only the distinct feeling she wasn’t supposed to be here. Not in the car, just here. In the world.
She was supposed to be dead.
The iron gates were swinging open ahead of the car, the grand letter C splitting open to let them in. Her estate was beyond. She was home.
Her driver had brought her home.
III
“Why aren’t you here?” Condor said into the phone. “You said you’d be here if there were any problems, and guess what? You’re not here.”
Condor paced across the foyer, his shoes clacking on the shined floor. He pulled the drapes aside and looked out the window.
“You’re the one that started this—”
Condor pulled the phone off his ear and winced. His sister’s voice came out like a spike. He held the phone to his chest, could feel it vibrate on his sternum. He pulled aside the drapes again. When the phone felt quiet, he spoke into it without putting it against his head.
“Well, when are you going to be here?” The silence was long enough that Condor finally pressed the phone closer. Carrie was back in control, speaking softly. Condor listened without moving away from the window. He answered, “That’s too long… you said…”
Carrie spoke some more.
Condor suddenly felt that weakness in his knees, like when he did something wrong. Like when he was in trouble. Grandmother Ruthie had been in the hospital for a week and Condor hadn’t come to visit her. He was busy organizing the fundraiser, he told himself. Truth was this: He didn’t expect her to come home.
The doctors only gave her a couple days, said they would keep her comfortable. They didn’t know what was wrong, but she was old and sometimes that’s all the reason you need. But then she came out of it. The doctors couldn’t explain it, called it a miracle recovery. The idiots didn’t even know what was wrong with her, so how would they fix her? Condor knew what was wrong and he knew she shouldn’t have recovered. That was the real miracle.
The gates began to open. The front end of the Bentley eased onto the entry drive. He clutched the drapes. His lips fluttered against the phone but nothing came out.
“Just hurry,” he blurted.
Condor looked in the polished mirror next to the front doors. His skin looked like cream cheese. He wiped his forehead and took a deep breath. His sister’s voice buzzed from the phone.
“I can…” He swallowed. I can’t do this.
He cleared his throat and lifted his chin, like his father taught him. Condor pointed his chin at his reflection and looked down his nose. He puffed his chest out.
“I can do this.”
He hung up before Carrie told him to say it again and stared at the reflection. His nostrils flared. He willed the weakness to leave his knees. Told the reflection, out loud, that he was a Current. That’s that.
He looked out the window as the car circled around the fountain and stopped in front of the doors. No one got out. Condor cupped his hand in front of his mouth and huffed a couple times. He dug a roll of breath mints out of his pocket and chewed three of them like cereal. He gave his breath another test, peeking out the window. The driver’s door cracked open.
Condor threw open the front doors. The trunk was already open. The driver whipped a wheelchair out like it was made of paper and snapped it open before reaching for the back door. Condor assumed it was the driver, but it was no one he knew.
“Grandmother!” Condor met her at the bottom step. “It does my heart good to see you so well. We’ve all been worried sick.”
He bent over and kissed her cheek. It was soft like a spent tissue, smelled damp. Grandmother Ruthie looked straight ahead with her lips tightly clamped. Condor clasped his hands to his chest, felt the cold weakness rush to his knees.
She knows I didn’t visit. She knows.
The driver looked like a boy. His skin dark and smooth. Barely out of high school. He held out his hand. “You must be from the hospital. My name is Condor.”
The idiot driver shook his hand but didn’t even look at him. Condor looked stunned. The driver spun the wheelchair and moved Grandmother Ruthie up the steps. She didn’t jostle in the seat, as if the driver lifted the chair with the 85-pound old woman.
“We need a ramp, Condor,” Grandmother Ruthie said. “See to it. Tastefully.”
And the front doors closed. Condor was on the steps alone.
IV
Carrie Current placed the phone on a small table. She sipped the last of her rejuvenation drink and leaned against the balcony railing. She was still sweating. Her personal trainer worked her to exhaustion, holding various yoga poses while the surf washed around their ankles and pre-dawn temperatures dimpled her bronze skin. Endorphins were still tingling beneath her scalp, but they were losing the battle with the fury burning in her chest.
If she wasn’t looking at one of the most scenic beaches on the planet, she would’ve thrown the phone, the cup, and the table into the trees below. But just that moment, the sun had crested the horizon and lit the ocean with fiery lines. There was nothing between her and the ocean but palms and a pristine beach.
My beach.
This thought calmed her. Having things brought her peace. She didn’t believe in borrowing, that was for librarians. If Carrie liked it, she made it hers. Sharing was not a virtue. This piece of paradise was hers, she reminded herself. She needed that thought right at that moment. Because things had suddenly gotten so fucked.
Her family always had the good grace of a timely death. All of them, except dear old Grandmother. The old hag clung to life like a barnacle.
Death couldn’t scrape her off with a shovel. Carrie’s plan to assist Death wasn’t elaborate, just a trace of toxin slipped into her morning tea that would give the appearance of death by natural causes. But Connie fucked that up, too.
She could still hear her brother’s voice whining. He had the spine of an earthworm. She should’ve spiked his drink first, killed that perverted asshole. She ground her teeth, fighting the urge to fling the phone Frisbee-style.
Carrie refused to call him Condor. It implied strength and aggression. Domination from above. Her shithead father thought he could make his son a man with a powerful name, but it doesn’t work that way. Dogshit is dogshit, no matter what you call it.
Now she’d have to fly all the way back to Charleston to clean up the mess. She’d give it a few days. If she went back now, if she saw Connie’s face too soon, she’d put a knee square in it. And that would do no good. No, she’d cool off before returning. By then, she’d be ready to bend over and kiss Grandmother’s 85 year old lips that felt like two slugs fighting over fake teeth. Carrie swished the last of her drink like mouthwash.
A breeze shook the palms. Carrie closed her eyes and sucked the ocean air through her nostrils. She imagined a beach unbroken by footprints, untainted by tourists. Nothing but smooth sand and rolling surf. A place that was hers.
Her heartbeat slowed.
Another breath and the endorphins oozed down her neck. She counted her breaths until the peaceful feeling was in her toes. Seagulls called distantly. She stayed in the darkness behind her eyelids, resting in the peace of a million dollar cabana on a tropical island.
Bare feet padded up behind her. She felt the touch of callused fingers, still damp from the shower, stroke her bare back. She moaned, slightly. He would stop if she didn’t acknowledge his touch. He knew better.
The hands kneaded her shoulders. She dropped her head while the knuckles traced down her trapezius. Over and over, they worked rhythmically through the tension building in her back. Her sweat lubricated the long, slow strokes until the hands slipped below her waist. Slid her panties down.
And then he took her from behind with the same firmness, slow and rhythmic.
Carrie’s belly filled with another fury, one of desire. She could feel the ridges of his abdomen on her back as he leaned over. He bundled her blonde hair in his hand and pulled it to the side. His breath raised gooseflesh on her neck.
“Don’t kiss me,” she said. “Just fuck.”
She didn’t want to think of slugs.
V
When the car stopped in front of her house, the driver sat quietly. Ruthie wondered what he was doing, but she felt such peace she didn’t want to spoil it. And then her grandson opened the door with that enormous grin. Tension gripped her forehead.
The driver moved swiftly from behind the steering wheel. She took his outstretched hand. Muscles moved beneath his forearm like thick ropes. His eyes were downcast, shadows hiding them beneath his brows. He was younger than she suspected, but it did not matter. He was certainly capable.
She endured a kiss from Condor that smelled of mint and cigarettes. She deplored the latter. What else had he done? Then he stood there, useless. In her foggy memory of the events before she went to the hospital, she recalled him standing there much the same as the paramedics lifted her into the ambulance. I don’t know what’s wrong with her, he was saying. But his voice rose as he said it, which meant he did know.
The best schools in Charleston ruined him, just like his father. They had the best teachers, but nothing undermines a person like a sense of entitlement.
How did it all go wrong?
Ruthie’s father was a model citizen. A man’s man. A wonderful human being that made a fortune as an investor and a human rights lawyer. But he had given birth to a litter of squabbling rats. Ruthie never excluded herself from the bunch. She knew what she was, but she conducted herself with dignity. Perhaps that was not enough to tip the scales of karma in her favor for her own deplorable behavior, but it was all she could do. Her son was proof that the worst in her genetics had been passed down. Her son never stood a chance, with a mother like her and a father that fornicated like a dog, fought like a badger and cheated like a thief. Rats, all of them.
Ruthie was guided up the steps by her driver. It occurred to her there was no ramp, regardless of the fact she was gliding toward the door. Condor was at the bottom step, shading his eyes from the sun. She told him to build a ramp. That would give him something to do.
Ruthie entered the cool interior of her home. She was asleep before her driver had wheeled her to her bed.
VI
Drayton snipped another flower from a rose bush. A thorn pierced his finger, but blood did not arise, the wound simply closing. He replaced the pruners on his belt and tucked the stem into a wicker basket with blackeyed Susans and stalks of sea oats. Later, he would arrange them in a vase near the back doors.
It had been a week since he brought Ms. Ruth home from the hospital. In that time, he had gone from chauffeur to gardener without question. The staff was busy catering to Ms. Ruth to be bothered by the young man manicuring the courtyard, especially since Ms. Ruth valued her garden above all else. If curiosity arose, Drayton simply willed their interest away from him.
Ms. Ruth was wheeled out to the second story veranda every morning of the week with a blanket over her lap. Her trusted chambermaid would be by her side. They would watch Drayton tend to the weeds, to the careful trimming of the roses and shaping of the boxwoods. She would come out again after lunch, this time with her grandson standing a few steps behind her. He stood there like a good boy and stared, too. His curiosity was greatest of all. Like the others, he did nothing with it.
It was the afternoon, the teeth of the summer sun. Sweat did not break upon Drayton brow. His shirt did not moisten in the heat. His skin absorbed the sun’s rays but never warmed. His muscles could be seen writhing beneath his shirt but never tired. His movements were smooth and fluid, like a gardener moving in ballet. The sound of the ocean was his orchestra.
Drayton took the basket to a tool shed beneath a mossy grove of oaks and put the flowers in water. When he returned to the courtyard, Ms. Ruth had gone inside for her afternoon nap. Her grandson remained, staring. Drayton collected the spent flowers in a wheelbarrow.
Ms. Ruth was dying in the hospital when Drayton came upon her. He had not come to the hospital for her. He was there for other reasons. He walked quietly unnoticed throughout the floors, sensing the waning lives all around him. He chose him victims carefully. While he did not care to call them victims, it was apt. Drayton absorbed their life essence as they passed from the physical world. It was not murder anymore than if he pushed a person that was already falling from a cliff. The fall was inevitable, and in the moments before that person hit the rocks, Drayton drew out their life, their savory essence. It filled him. Fed him.
The measure of a man is what he does with power. Drayton was alive when Socrates made that statement. That was a time when Drayton took essence remorselessly, ruthlessly. Drinking it from their salty blood, draining from their necks and down his chin.
That was no longer Drayton’s way.
So he had walked the hospital, sniffing the air like a connoisseur, seeking the distinctive essence that would satisfy his current hunger. If there were none to satisfy his taste, he would leave and come back another time. He was not greedy. He would eventually find something suitable. He always did.
Ms. Ruth was close to death when he passed into her room. The attending doctor was consulting a team of nurses, giving them instructions and advising them to notify next of kin. She wasn’t going to make it through the evening. The doctor left the room without noticing the young man standing at the end of the bed, wearing ordinary clothes and boots. Smooth skin. Black skin. Both quite the opposite of the withered woman in the bed, mouth indignantly hung open.
Drayton cocked his head. Her essence tanged the end of his tongue, hung thickly inside his nostrils.
He only needed to draw it and there would be no more suffering. But Drayton sensed something beyond his need to take. Ms. Ruth had an unresolved life. Drayton couldn’t say what that resolution was; he only felt its urgency. He was not an angel. He had lived as long as humans had existed and still did not know what he was. But he learned the subtleties of life and when a wrong needed to be made right.
Drayton filled Ms. Ruth with life. He blew what little essence he contained back into her waning body. The unidentified toxins that were killing her were neutralized. By morning, Ms. Ruth awoke to inform the hospital staff that she would return home. Drayton was waiting with her car.
He assumed a gardener’s duties when he arrived at the house. Since there currently was not one on staff, he moved easily into the position. He would continue to care for the estate as Ms. Ruth recovered. He knew not what his duty was to her or how to aid her unresolved life. If his countless years of existence had taught him anything, it was to let life unfold.
Drayton took the bucket filled with dead flowers down a sandy path between the dunes. He stopped on the hardpacked sand, where the foamy waves gently glided landward before receding. Drayton emptied them into the water. The dead petals spread out, carried out to deeper water. Drifting in, then out. The undercurrent beneath the surface was strong and unseen.
Drayton returned to the garden.
VII
“Condor.” Grandmother Ruthie raised her hand, fingers curled like hooks.
That was Condor’s signal to come closer. He stepped away from the balcony door and stooped by her side, his ear turned toward her lips. Grandmother Ruthie made no effort to come closer, not even turning her head. She had the transfixed look on her face, staring ahead, eyes fixed on the gardener. Every day like this, come to the balcony and watch him rake, watch him clip goddamn flowers.
The Drayton Chronicles Page 10
