Sand Castles

by Antoinette Stockenberg

  It couldn't have been the owners; they were currently living in Switzerland. So there had to be a staff, or a service. Were the dusters and the waterers included in the rent? Wendy couldn't figure out a graceful way to ask. It all felt so unreal. She could have been perusing the featured home in an upscale shelter magazine. Her! Jim! What would they do with all that room? She felt as overwhelmed as she was enchanted by the rambling six-bedroom, five-bath expanded Cape.

  Jim, on the other hand, was clearly in his element. Poised at a side window where he'd been taking in the view, he said with droll urbanity, "The best part about it is that you can sneeze without having a neighbor say God bless you."

  The realtor, a gray-haired woman with big gold earrings, responded instantly to his tone. With a confidential smile, she said, "Yes, living in Providence, no matter how good the neighborhood, is bound to feel cramped compared to this."

  The house was smack in the middle of Barrington's mile-long gold coast, just northeast of the country club and the Carmelite monastery and tucked among lanes with carefully obvious names like Bay and Water and Beach.

  Oh, yes; Jim was in his element, all right. He came and stood alongside her in silence, letting the view work its magic.

  They had looked at two houses on Providence's east side, both of them sophisticated, historic homes less than a mile from their house but with a must-vacate date etched in stone. In contrast, the house they were standing in had come on the market less than an hour before they had shown up at the realtor's office, and its date of vacancy was open-ended. Barrington was just minutes from Providence: a small price to pay, the realtor told them as she bundled them into her Mercedes, for a private beach.

  "I've seen plenty of beaches in my life; why does this one look so much more spectacular?" Wendy mused.

  It was the realtor who answered her. "Because this view, you would own," she said. "At least for the length of the lease."

  Did Jim agree with that theory? Wendy wasn't sure he'd even heard it. He looked a million miles away—lost, she assumed, in the shimmering blues of the bay.

  Wendy felt guilty for even considering renting the house; they'd done nothing, absolutely nothing, to earn something so special. And yet ...

  "Jim ...?"

  He had to shake himself free of his thoughts before he said almost wearily, "If you insist on living close to the house during construction, this is probably a fairly good place to do it."

  "Oh, but the rent," she blurted. She scarcely brought home in a year what the owners were charging a month.

  He hated it when she sounded as if they were out of their league. It embarrassed him, and the flush in his face told her that this time was no exception.

  He said coolly, "Would you rather just buy a house outright?"

  Because we can do that, you know, said the expression on his face.

  He did look like someone who could. He was beautifully dressed; he carried himself well; he spoke the language of real estate. Wendy looked at him—really, for the first time—the way someone like the realtor would. Suddenly it hit her: Jim had grown into his wealth. She, on the other hand, was still wearing it self-consciously, like an ill-fitting dress.

  In the meantime, the realtor's pleasant smile had become even more fiercely pleasant. She spoke not so much to Wendy as to Jim, in a lower, more confidential voice than she had used up until then.

  "You know, I shouldn't be saying this, but there's some question whether the owner will be returning from Switzerland anytime soon—or at all. In our phone call, he did talk about the possibility of ... well. You can fill in the blank," she said, including Wendy in a glance that also took in the view. "This really is an exceptional property, and it's in fabulous condition. If you like, I can make an inquiry."

  Jim said easily, "That's probably premature. First we ought to see whether my wife approves of it even on a rental basis." He turned to Wendy. "Well, Wen? What to you think? Could you stand to hang your hat here while you oversee the restoration of your family's little homestead?"

  He phrased it so elegantly that for a second she wasn't sure what homestead he was talking about. More to the point, his question didn't seem to leave room for a no.

  "Well ... it really is a beautiful house," she said, trying to get past her reservations and be on the same side that he was.

  "One of the best that you'll find," the realtor assured them.

  "Would all of the furnishings stay?" Wendy asked her, because she couldn't believe that people who owned such exquisite things would let strangers use them.

  Jim said dryly, "Here we are: one couple and a ten-year-old child. Yes, Wendy, I imagine that will call for triple the stipulated damage deposit."

  The realtor laughed pleasantly, and they moved on, but not before Jim shot his wife an angry and embarrassed look.

  The tour ended in the last of the guest rooms, this one in the absolutely charming dormered attic. It featured pretty florals, white wicker, and a hand-painted armoire that made Wendy want to try that much harder to persuade Jim to make another baby, this one a girl. Odd, how something as simple as wallpaper could cause such a pang of longing for a bigger family. Jim had always argued that they didn't have enough room for more kids. Now he argued that they were too distracted to have more kids.

  And meanwhile, her clock was ticking.

  "Great place for Ty's cousins to sleep over," Jim remarked, ducking under an eave to check out the view through one of the deep dormered windows.

  Emmy and Trish! He was right; it was a great place for little girls—anyone's little girls—to sleep over. One offhand remark by her husband, and Wendy felt the floodgates open and a wave of longing rush over her. Suddenly she didn't care if it cost three times the quote, she wanted to rent the house.

  It was perfect. There would be bedrooms for visiting family, and small sitting rooms for quiet moments, and a library, and a den, and twin parlors, and a beach—an actual beach!—from which to launch a boat or go for a swim; and all of the rooms and everything in them would be hers, at least for a few months while she played at being a woman of sophistication and privilege and with lots of kids of her own. It would be like a trip to Disney World, a fantasy flight from dust and debris.

  And after that, she would return, a satisfied Cinderella, to her own sweet, remodeled home to live happily ever after—hopefully with a larger family than she presently had.

  She walked up to the gabled dormer where Jim was still standing and paused for a moment to take in the bright blue sky and the dancing, shimmering waves.

  "Yes," she said softly to him alone. "I definitely think we should take it."

  ****

  In a pocket-sized park on Congdon Street, Zack sat on a bench and watched the sun set over the massive capitol dome in downtown Providence. The capitol was a ridiculously impressive piece of architecture for such a tiny state, testimony to a time when civic-minded men built for the ages and not just for function. The imposing structure radiated high ideals, lofty morals, and above all, an abiding dignity.

  All qualities that Zack presently had in short supply. He was filled with self-loathing just then. There was something about the view—something about the majesty of the sky, settling its blue and gold mantle over the majesty of the capitol—that made him feel small and mean and coldly vengeful.

  What right had he to go charging into innocent lives and upending them? As near as he could tell, Wendy Hodene was a woman of character. All anyone had to do was look at her face: she looked you straight in the eye, she had a warm, ready smile, and she treated everyone with the same courtesy. That was all Zack needed to know about anyone, man or woman, to judge that person's worth. She had worth.

  And her son. Tyler. He seemed to be a likable enough kid, always with his nose in a book. Did he really need to know that his father was a bigamist and that he himself was a bastard? How did you recover from something like that? Some kids weren't very resilient. Look at Zina after their parents died; she had refused to come out
of her shell for a year. Twenty-six years later, she still wasn't all the way right.

  It all came down to this: Zina loved Jimmy Hayward, but Jim Hodene was never going to love her back. The only way out of the impasse was to find Zina someone else to love, and if the someone else happened to be cats and dogs, then so be it. Love was love.

  Ah, but why Wendy, why do this to her? Zack pictured her on her way to work, doing laundry, nagging her kid. This was a real, honest-to-God, flesh-and-bones woman he was sticking it to, not some faceless CEO of a corporation. That made it hard.

  He thought of their little exchange in the basement, and his mouth inched up in a wistful smile. Wendy Hodene ... keeper of the socks.

  He wondered, in his new and melancholy mood, what would be coming next. The initial confrontation with Jim in the basement may have ended abruptly, but that morning Jim had gruffly demanded Zack's phone number, and Zack had obliged. Not long after that, Jim had taken off with Wendy; they hadn't returned by quitting time. In short, Zack was batting zip-nada so far, which had to be a factor in his faltering resolve.

  It occurred to him that Jim might just whisk his family into hiding until Zack became bored and left. If so, Zack had only himself to blame. He had tipped his hand by announcing right up front that he was determined to protect his sister from further hurt. Boy. Some blackmailer he was.

  He sighed. It was a beautiful, heartbreaking sunset. And utterly wasted on him.

  The phone in his pocket rang. In theory it could have been Jim; but Zack was dead certain that it wasn't—so dead certain that he took out the tiny thing, flipped it open without looking at it, and said, "Hi, Zee."

  Startled by his greeting, she said, "Oh-h-h, I'm being a pest, aren't I?"

  "Not at all."

  "You haven't spoken to him, or you would have called," she said with a sigh.

  "Right," he said, lying merrily away. "I was just about to pick up the phone and tell you that. I'm hoping I have news for you tomorrow or shortly after."

  "But ... why are you staying in Providence, if he isn't there? Isn't that a waste of money?"

  "Nah. I found a bed-and-breakfast that suits me." In fact, it was a third-floor rathole in a huge Victorian that had been split into half a dozen apartments, most of them housing students from Brown and the Rhode Island School of Design. The rent went by the week, and an extra bonus was that he could walk to the little park he was at and breathe air that didn't reek of pot and smelly sneakers.

  "Besides, I've managed to nail down a commission," he said, adding another link to the chain of his lies. "A lady on the east side wants me to repair a set of busted Chippendale chairs that she picked up for a song—well, what she calls a song."

  Zina sounded relieved. "Oh, good! I'm glad you're going to be making some money out of this, at least."

  "Hand over fist," Zack said with a reasonably straight face. He hesitated, then added, "So how're you holding up, Zee? I know this is hard on you, the waiting."

  "Yes, but everyone's sick who should be working at the shelter, so I've been there every spare minute. I even took the afternoon off from the quilt shop to cover for someone—although I can't do that too many times, or, yikes, I won't be paying my rent."

  That will not be a problem, Zack insisted to himself.

  He said, "How's the skunk?"

  Zina laughed and said, "Cassie's fine and she says hello. I'm becoming so attached to her; I'd like to adopt her myself, except that I promised my landlady I wouldn't start doing that—bringing cats home and keeping them, I mean. I think Margie's afraid that I'll end up old and gray with forty-two cats."

  "You're not old," Zack said gallantly. "And you're not gray."

  "But I would like forty-two cats."

  "All right, then, Zee; I'll see what I can do to make your wish come true."

  "Honestly, Zack. Where would I put forty-two cats?"

  ****

  The move by Wendy and Jim from the half-demolished house on Sheldon Street into the wonderful house on the beach took place over the weekend. They weren't moving enough of their things to justify calling in professional movers, so Wendy had her husband buy some boxes and wardrobes from U-Haul, and they did the job themselves. They packed their clothes, their music, some books, and their favorite pillows; more than that seemed pointless. Besides, Wendy didn't want their stuff to feel bad that other people's stuff was so much better than it was.

  Jim refused to rent a U-Haul truck—too low-rent—and instead used the SUV to run a shuttle back and forth between their house and the beach house while Wendy packed and Tyler pretended to pack. The neighbors nodded knowingly when Wendy told them of the temporary move; clearly they didn't expect to see the Hodenes living again on Sheldon Street.

  "Which is not true," she told Jim as they wolfed down pizza in the dust-filled kitchen of their house between runs. "As long as Tyler has so many friends and family here, why would I want to move? How many kids get to enjoy the experience of growing up in a traditional way in their ancestors' home nowadays? Almost none."

  "We'll see," Jim said noncomittally between huge chomps of pizza.

  He was hungry and he was in a hurry. Wendy knew that he had been working like a fiend all day because he was absolutely determined to sleep in the new house that night. Tyler was all for it, too, and even Wendy was excited about living in another house after having spent most of her thirty-four years on Sheldon Street.

  "It'll seem odd not to wake up looking at the Almeidas' roof," she mused. "We've done it for eight years. I remember at the time thinking, what if we can't keep up with the payments? What if we end up on the street? I was so scared. And now look."

  She finished her last slice of pizza and began folding up the box. "Jim?"

  "Hm?" he answered, swigging down the last of his beer.

  "What was it you wanted to tell me the other day?"

  She hated asking the question; but the question had to be asked. A wife didn't forget an expression on her husband's face like the one Wendy had seen. A look like that clung to a woman's subconscious like a burr on a sweater.

  The blank look on Jim's face made her give him a extra nudge. "Wasn't that the point of finding a house to live in—so we could talk in private?"

  Damn it, she thought with dismay. You really are hiding something. You're going to ruin this for us, aren't you?

  "Whatever it was, it's gone," he said with a shrug. "It couldn't have been too important." Going on the offensive as he liked to do, he added in a testier tone, "Besides, we're still in this fishbowl of a house at the moment, even if I could remember."

  "It's Sunday, Jim; the contractors aren't here."

  "Tyler is."

  'Tyler lives here!"

  "He's getting older, more observant," Jim countered. "It's harder to talk—or do—anything in private around him now."

  At that point, she wasn't certain whether Jim was dragging the conversation around again to the need to buy a mansion, or whether he was simply trying to change the subject, period. In any case, Tyler came clomping down the stairs at that moment, so Wendy let the matter drop. But the burr clung to her sleeve; she could feel its prick, and it was upsetting for her not to be able to clear it away.

  The doorbell rang at the same time as the phone. Tyler had reached the foot of the stairs and got the door, so Wendy automatically picked up the phone, much to her husband's dismay.

  "The machine, the machinel" he said in a hiss.

  "Hello?" she answered, wincing in apology at him. Too late now.

  No one responded, though Wendy definitely could hear something in the background. Voices, sporadically. A television? Wendy frowned in concentration, trying to make out what was being said. She thought that maybe she heard a cry ... or a groan. Something.

  "Damn it, Wendy!" her husband said, and he depressed the plunger on the phone.

  Stunned, Wendy said, "What'd you do that for?"

  "I told you: I want the machine answering."

  "Why? What're
you trying to hide?" she shot back.

  He scowled and said, "I'm sick of the nuisance calls."

  "Too bad! I can answer the phone in my own home—"

  A voice from behind her said, "If you do, it'll be a first. I've been getting your machine for days now."

  Wendy spun around to see her mother holding a box with a bow on it and looking reproachful. Gracie Ferro said, "So: you're just ignoring all your calls nowadays? Even from family?"

  Turning her attention away from Jim to deal with their visitor, Wendy said patiently, "If you had begun to leave a message, Mom, obviously I would have picked up."

  "You know I don't like talking to a machine."

  "Aaaggh! But if I'm not near the phone and can't see my caller I.D., then how can I know you're calling?"

  "You're saying I'm a nuisance?"

  "You're a—? How did you get there?”

  The phone rang again. With a defiant glance at her husband, Wendy snatched it back up and snapped out a hello. When no one responded again, she barked, "Listen, what the hell do you want? If you have something to say, then just say it!"

  No response. She hung up on the sound of a low, languid voice somewhere in the background. "Damn it!"

  Her mother gave her a baleful look and said, "Someone seems to have her nightie in a twist."

  Tyler, nose in the refrigerator, snickered from behind the door. Wendy told him to go straight back to his room and bring down his pizza plate, because just because they were moving—temporarily!—it didn't mean that he could leave the place a pigsty.

  Her son stomped off, muttering, "Everyone takes everything out on me."

  Which everyone more or less did. Wendy had to do a mental backflip to put herself in a better frame of mind: they were about to move into a big new playhouse, and at the moment she wasn't feeling the least bit playful. So she took a deep breath, smiled at Jim, hugged her mother, accepted the box from her, and started over.

  "Mom! How nice of you to stop by! What can I do you for?"