A Charmed Place

by Antoinette Stockenberg

  Maddie set thick candles on fat stands in several of the rooms and put matches next to the hurricane lamps. The flashlights were handy, the rechargeable batteries topped off. All she had to do now was wait.

  And wait. Despite her deep conviction that the storm would be a bad one, the wind stayed fairly steady for the next hour or so. The gusts, when they came, no longer seemed like premonitions. They were simply welcome relief from the muggy stillness of the boarded-up rooms.

  In the meantime, Maddie was going just a little bit stir- crazy.

  She would have liked to call Claire or George or her mother, but she had no real excuse for doing so; everything was depressingly under control. She'd already talked with Tracey. It was a strained conversation, to be sure. Maddie had suggested that they put off any discussion of Friday night until Tracey came home the next day; the girl was more than willing to do that. Maddie had talked with Joan, too. Joan was riding out the storm at Norah's house. She'd talked with most of her neighbors, many of whom had chosen to stay in their homes. There was literally no one left to talk to, nothing left to do.

  Except wait. And so Maddie wandered from one room to another, returning to the cable weather station every few minutes to see if there were new developments. The message to the Cape was the same: batten down and then get out. Maddie glared at the weatherman. "Easy for you to say," she muttered.

  And then came the news that the big bridges on the Cape had been shut down. She was glad to hear it, grateful to have an end to her second-guessing the evacuation option.

  Finally the phone rang, and she picked it up eagerly. It was Dan, and he sounded tense. "Maddie—I'll be over later. There's a sailboat aground a hundred yards out; we're gonna see if we can get them off. I gotta go."

  "Be careful!" she said, and then he was gone.

  One more reason to pace. Although she'd wanted Dot to come ashore and get it over with, now Maddie prayed that the hurricane would sit out there long enough for Dan to complete his mission and come home safe to her. Damn it, damn it, damn it. Was it possible for the ones she loved, to be any more scattered to the wind?

  She listened with growing dismay as the gusts blended into one long howl. Finally, unable to bear any more inaction, she slipped into a foul-weather jacket and was on her way out the back door when the phone rang. She pounced on it, expecting it to be Dan.

  It was Michael—the one person she had absolutely no interest in talking to.

  "Tracey and I had a long, serious talk today," he said, ignoring the impatience in her voice. "I know it's late to call, but by tomorrow you'll be too distracted fussing over your trampled garden to listen to what I have to say. Is lover-boy there?"

  He was trying to hurt her. It seemed bizzarely inappropriate with a hurricane bearing down. She considered simply hanging up on him, but she didn't dare, so she said in measured tones, "What is it, Michael? What do you want?"

  "Tracey, that's all; I want Tracey."

  "But you already ha—"

  She realized then that he wasn't talking about the weekend, or spring break, or the week between Christmas and New Year's. He was talking about tomorrow and the next day and the next. Stunned, she pulled out a kitchen chair and sat down on it, still in her yellow slicker, and tried to clear her brain of every other thought but him.

  "What exactly do you have in mind?" she said, pressing the palm of her hand over her left ear to drown out the wind.

  He made a tisking sound and said, "See? I told you you never listened. Tracey. Can I say it any clearer than that? Tracey. T-r-a-c-e-y. You know—the daughter that you and I created in an act of passion? Or wasn't it passion, Maddie? Were you faking it all those years—hmmm?"

  She tried to shut out the lascivious sneer in his voice. "Why are you doing this, Michael? Why?"

  "Why am I doing what? Behaving like a concerned father? Isn't it obvious? Because you're a whoring slut, that's why."

  "Michael!"

  "Don't get prim with me! You were faking it, weren't you? You were waiting for him. All those years I didn't have a clue that you were waiting for him. What a fool I was. Oh, yeah, I can admit it now. I was a fool. Standing meekly at the door after you threw me out ... standing there hat in hand, waiting to be let back in again. Taking whatever crumbs you threw at me. Ohh, you made me want you ... that was your revenge, wasn't it? Making me want you. Holding me at arm's length and leading me on, leading me on ...."

  "I wasn't leading you on, Michael," she said, beating back a wave of nausea. "I wasn't. I wanted us to be civil for Tracey's sake. If you misread that, I'm sorry. Truly I am."

  He seemed not to hear her. "How was it on the beach that night, hmm? Good? Was it good? Was he good? How were you? Were you good? Were you good together? You didn't hold anything back from him, I'm willing to bet. Not if you had to have it on a beach. We never had it on a beach. How come, Maddie?"

  He didn't want answers; he wanted only to rant.

  Maddie said, "Please, can I talk to Tracey now? Just for a minute." She was terrified that he'd done something to her.

  "When I'm done!" he snapped. He laughed softly and said, "You shock me, Maddie, really you do. On a beach! Prim and proper Maddie Timmons Regan. Timid Timmons, romping bare-assed on a beach. Your mother's not too happy with you, did you know that? Ah, of course you did. She told me she made that very clear to you. We were over there this afternoon, Tracey and I—did you know that? Sarah and I had a long talk, a long talk, when Tracey was at a neighbor's. Sarah's not happy with you at all."

  A terrific gust of wind slammed the house, rattling the kitchen windows. Maddie turned away from them, trying to focus on Michael and not on the storm, trying to make out his nearly incoherent muttering. It was a futile effort: she could hardly hear him over the pounding of her heart.

  "My mother's entitled to her own opinion," Maddie said, just to say something.

  It seemed to snap him back to a semblance of rationality. "Yes, she is entitled, isn't she. And your mother's opinion is—ta-dah!—that under the circumstances, Tracey belongs with me. Now ain't that a hoot? She thinks I'm a better parent than you—for the time being, anyway. With all due modesty, I would have to agree. I'm friendly, well mannered, and presentable. I'm not running around—anymore. I've got money and I don't need to work. I adore my kid and she—well, let's face it, Maddie. She prefers living with me. A court pays attention to stuff like that."

  A court!

  "You can't do that, Michael!" Maddie cried.

  "Why not? You did it to me. See how it feels, hmm?"

  "Tracey would never want that," she said vehemently.

  "Aw, a mother in denial—is there anything sadder?" Michael said, oozing with sympathy. "I admit, Tracey was a little confused about her own power. But I explained to her that fathers got custody all the time nowadays, and that she was old enough to have a say. And now that she knows her grandmother's going to back me up—and that she can go there whenever she wants—she's a lot less nervous about the whole thing."

  "Bring her back right now, Michael. Bring her back or I'll have the police at your doorstep so fast—''

  "Don't threaten me!"

  "Let me talk to her. Now."

  There was a pause. He ended it by saying, "You know, I think I'll do that. Go ahead—alienate her once and for all. Threaten to have the police drag her from her father's hearth. Hold the specter of psychiatric evaluation over her head. She'd like that, I know. Yeah, talk to her, Maddie. Finish this off nice and clean. Hold on; I'll just go wake her up—"

  "Michael, wait!"

  Maddie was shivering under the oilskin jacket, even as the sweat trickled between her breasts. She felt faint, she felt enraged, she felt completely unequal to the sudden challenge to her role as custodial parent. Even as she felt all of those things, she felt something else: a conviction, deep inside, that Michael was negotiating. What did he want? To screw her on the beach and even the score? Whatever it was, it was bound to be cruel and humiliating. Nothing less would sati
sfy him.

  "I'm waiting," he reminded her, almost amiably. "Do you plan to tell me what I'm waiting for?"

  Not me, please, not me, she thought. "What will it take," she asked him humbly, "for you to give up this fight?"

  Chapter 28

  The pause this time was much longer.

  Finally she heard him let out a long, thoughtful sigh.

  "What will it take?" he mused. "Obviously not money. Hmm. What will it take," he said again. "Well, you could always come back to me. Tracey would have both her parents then. Problem solved. But frankly? I don't think so. You'd make my life hell, wouldn't you, my darling. Let's think of something else."

  He was so incredibly sick. She had to get Tracey away from him.

  "Hey, here's a thought!" he said with perverted brightness. "Blow off Daniel Hawke! No, wait, let me rephrase that," he added with a merry chuckle. "Tell him—firmly is best—to get the hell out of your life. Without Hawke around, I think I'd feel—we'd all feel—that Tracey's environment was much more wholesome."

  For a moment Maddie went absolutely blank. Twice? Twice in one lifetime? "I can't do that, Michael," she whispered. "Please don't ask me."

  "Oh, Maddie—of course you can!" he said cheerfully. "It would please Tracey, who's had a grudge against him ever since the tower. It would please Sarah; we know how far back her grudge goes. And George; it would please him no end. But most of all—it would please me, Maddie. It would please me."

  Her breath was coming shallow and fast; she rocked back and forth in her chair out of sheer nervous agony. "But if Dan can't have me and you can't either—I don't understand, Michael," she said, closing her eyes, trying to will him away. "What's the point?"

  "You're the point, bitch!" he said with sudden savagery.

  She understood, then, that he didn't want to humiliate. He wanted only to inflict pain.

  "So what's it gonna be, hmmm?"

  Give him what he wants; he has a hostage. That thought, and that thought alone, drove Maddie to say, "All right. All right. I'll end it. Just ... bring her back. Right now. Tonight."

  "How am I supposed to do that?" he asked, sounding genuinely baffled. "You know the bridges are closed."

  Obviously he knew it, too. "Yes ... no, of course ... I know that. Take her to my mother, then!" she said suddenly.

  "Now? It's nearly midnight." His voice became suspicious and hostile again. "What's the matter? Don't you trust me with our own daughter? For crissake, Maddie, you know I'd cut off my painting arm for her!"

  "No, of course, I trust you. It's just that I thought—I don't know. I wasn't thinking. Can I talk to her, please? Just for a minute?" Maddie was begging him now. "It's getting really bad out," she said as another blast of wind rocked the house. "I don't know how much longer I'll have a phone connection. Please, Michael."

  "Yeah, okay. We have an agreement, though—right?''

  She assured him that they did.

  "If it was anyone else but you—but I trust you, Maddie. You hear me? I'm taking you at your word. If you break it, I'll know. Believe me. I'll know. Do ... not ... break your word."

  "Yes. Please ... let me say good night to her."

  It took a wrenching moment before Maddie heard her daughter mumble sleepily, "Mom? What?"

  "Hi, honey. Um ... we have some big, big stuff to talk about, but it's late and you're asleep. The hurricane is going to come ashore soon, and you know what that means: no electricity. We might lose the phone, too, so—"

  "Hurricane?" she said, her voice wavering higher. "I thought it was just a storm."

  "It is, really, just a biggish storm. But I wanted to say good night. I wanted to tell you that I'll be up th—"

  No. He might take off with her. Better not to say.

  Completely unnerved with second-guessing herself, Maddie said, "Good night, Tracey. I love you."

  She heard her daughter hesitate and then say simply, "G'night."

  No I love you. It was a blow, but Maddie hardly had time to feel the pain from it. There was too much to think about, too much to plan. Overwhelmed by the horrible combination of circumstances, she tore off the sweltering vinyl jacket, then drank down a tall glass of water, fighting the urge to throw it all up. Sick with apprehension, she slapped both hands over her mouth and circled the phone, her mind racing in circles of its own. Who to call? Her mother, the police, George, anyone at all?

  Was he dangerous? That was the first thing. Was he dangerous. Yes, obviously—but to Tracey? Maddie honestly couldn't say yes to that one.

  But it didn't stop her from calling the Boston police.

  She was put through to the officer on duty in the Fourth District and quickly explained the situation. The officer was less than enthusiastic about intervening—exactly the reaction she'd feared.

  "He's not in violation of the custody agreement," the officer said. "He hasn't done or said anything that you consider a threat to your daughter's safety. He has attempted, you say, to blackmail you, but again, what goes on between ex-spouses isn't always pretty. Let me ask you: did he in any way prevent you from talking to your daughter?"

  The answer, most dismally, was no.

  "Did he indicate that he was going to bring your daughter back down to the Cape tomorrow? Which, by the way, might be difficult if not impossible."

  "Yes, he's going to bring her—but only if I give up the man I'm involved with!" Maddie said, exasperated by the officer's calm manner.

  "Whatever. Until he's actually in violation of your agreement, I'm afraid there's nothing we can do. At that time—if he does go into violation—then you would come down and file a police report, which would be referred to court. I wish I could help you, ma'am."

  Maddie hung up more frustrated than ever.

  Where was Dan?

  The hurricane was lapping at the edges of Sandy Point. Outside, a gust of wind attacked with a vindictive shriek, shaking the house to its rafters. The rain had arrived as well: it came in sporadic, battering squalls, swinging wildly in its fury, then easing long enough for Maddie to see another broken limb lying in the yard, another layer of tom-away leaves covering the ground. The house was shuddering nonstop now. It was old. It knew all about hurricanes, and it feared them more as it grew more frail.

  Maddie was staring out the kitchen windows—from a safe distance back—when the power went out, plunging the house and the spotlit yard into murk. She'd been expecting it, and yet when it happened she let out a sob of despair. She picked up the phone: dead. A line was down somewhere. She was apart from the ones she loved, and trapped in a rose-covered tomb.

  Where was Dan? He couldn't possibly be on the water still. If they hadn't been able to free up the sailboat, then that boat was as good as lost. Surely its owner and crew had abandoned it by now. Quickly she lit a kerosene lamp, stumbling with the match in the pitch-black house.

  I can't stay here any longer; I can't, she realized. The waiting, the uncertainty, the horrifying scenarios that seemed much too willing to play out in the theater of her imagination—all of it made her want to run screaming into the night.

  Was she losing her mind? Anything seemed possible in the chaotic unraveling of events. One thing Maddie knew: she had to find Dan. Unable to bear a minute more of inaction, she donned the clammy jacket again and made herself wear the pants as well, to protect against flying debris. Dunned by the incessant roar and shriek of wind and rain, she groped her way through the unlit hall to the front door. Not until she had her hand on the doorknob did she realize that the door was pumping in place. She laid her other hand flat against a panel. It was pulsing, like a heart beating wildly in a chest. If she opened the door now, it would break her arm.

  She cracked open a couple of windows to relieve the pressure inside the house, then ran to the back door, determined to make a break for it. Was she insane? Very possibly. But if she stayed, she had no doubt that she'd break down completely. She got a good grip on the doorknob of the massive Dutch door and pulled it open. It swung a
way without fuss, giving her hope. It only sounded bad out, she decided. All sound—no fury.

  In the yard, in the lee of the house, it wasn't too bad—horrendously noisy and windy, but bearable. Heartened, she felt her way carefully over branches and flattened shrubs until she turned the corner onto the shell-lined drive.

  First surprise: her neighbor's maple tree was draped across her Taurus. Second surprise: the wind wanted to tear her face off. Gasping, she turned her back instinctively to the force of it and pulled the drawstrings of her hood more tightly across the front of her chin. Then she turned, leaned into the fury that was Dot, and began plowing forward. Foot by foot by foot, Maddie made her way to the lane, then turned left in the direction of the lighthouse.

  Nothing; she could see nothing. If only the tower were lit!

  Sheer blind instinct drove her on. She had no idea where the horizon was, where the lane ended, what had happened to the picket fences that used to line its sides. All she knew was that the lighthouse was ahead of her, and where the lighthouse was, Dan was. She drove herself forward, whipping her determination, telling herself that she wasn't crazy, that this was the way to life everlasting, that this was the way to Dan.

  Something hurtled past her with the speed of a well-aimed missile. In the next instant, the next missile—sharp, abrasive, a roof shingle?—caught the edge of her hood, searing a path across her cheek. She raised her hand to the pain and felt warmth. Oh, damn—blood. Another scar.

  She plowed on.

  The rain came again and still—thick, blinding sheets of it, stinging and brutal and cruel. She hated the rain, she couldn't see through the rain, and yet she knew it was so much kinder than the sea was going to be at high tide. She was completely disoriented now; for all she knew, she could be headed back to the cottage. She raised her head and opened one eye a slit's width, trying to peer ahead and get a bearing.

  She staggered back, rocked off balance not by a gust of wind this time, but by the sight of what lay ahead.