The Girls of August

by Anne Rivers Siddons

  “In the unlikely event that ever happens,” Rachel said under her breath, glowering out the window.

  Baby guffawed. I’d give her that: She had a big-girl laugh and she wasn’t afraid to let it rip. “When I grow up! I said to him, ‘Why, sweetheart, I AM grown up. Lookee here. I have the boobs to prove it!’”

  “How does he stand one minute—” Rachel started, snapping her gaze from the window and aiming it at Baby.

  This was going far worse than I had imagined.

  “Now, Rachel,” Barbara interrupted, clipping short what was surely going to be a cut-to-the-bone quip, “you know as well as I do how gullible grown men can be in the presence of a pretty young woman.” Barbara adjusted her big moon-shaped sunglasses and shot Baby a venom-dripping fake smile.

  I was actually taken aback by Barbara’s appearance. She had lost a good ten pounds since I’d seen her in June, had a new hairstyle with lovely platinum highlights, and had pretty much replaced her schoolmarm charm with sexy cougar sass. “Men don’t think straight when a pretty young thing walks into a room. They drool in places we don’t even know about.”

  “Thanks so much for the vote of confidence,” Mac said, adjusting the rearview mirror, probably to get a better look at the girls.

  “How old are you, anyway?” Rachel asked, pulling a sterling flask from her boho bag.

  Baby tugged on a halter top that barely contained her boobs—she really did have a nice rack, as Mac so demurely put it—and said, sweet as the first dew, “I am twenty-two years old, which is, I believe, close to y’all’s ages when you first became the girls of August. I have a degree in pharmacology from the University of Kentucky—go, Wildcats! But I don’t work, not now, anyway, because Teddy says we have all the money we need. I can recite all of the US presidents in the order they served in under one minute. And I am fluent in Arabic.”

  “No you aren’t,” Rachel spit.

  Mac started laughing that low, rumbling growl that takes over when he’s truly tickled.

  “Yes, I am,” Baby said. And then, in a breathtaking show of not getting it, rather than speaking Arabic, she proceeded to—very rapidly—spout off the entire presidential roll call. I didn’t know if it was a parlor act or not, given that I couldn’t keep up with her, nor did I know if Fillmore came before or after Pierce. And how did Grover Cleveland get in there twice but not consecutively? I gazed at her pretty pink lips, which were moving at the speed of light, and the smattering of freckles that moved in tandem with her words, and I thought for a moment that I had underestimated the child. I looked at Rachel, who was taking a pull from her flask, and then at Barbara, who watched Baby with all the disdain one casts at a bad lounge act, and decided that no, if anything, I had given Baby Gaillard too much credit.

  “Ta-daa!!!” Baby said brilliantly after “Obama” rolled off her tongue. And then she started texting again. Tap, tap, tap, tap, tap!

  “Give me some of that,” Barbara said, taking the flask from Rachel. In as ladylike a manner as possible, she took a sip, dabbed the corner of her mouth with her pinky, and said, “These kids’ thumbs are going to look like thighs one day.”

  “Who are you writing?” Rachel asked.

  “Texting,” Baby corrected her without looking up. “I’m texting.”

  “OK, who are you texting?” Rachel let the word drop off her tongue as if it were dung.

  “Friends. Teddy. Mostly friends though because Teddy’s too busy.” She gazed into the screen, her eyes scanning her latest message, and started laughing.

  Barbara said, “That’s all my kids do. They don’t even e-mail anymore.”

  “They text during physical exams,” Mac said. “Joe told me a young woman was in for a pap smear last week and she texted her way through the whole damn thing.”

  The image of a woman in stirrups texting away as the doctor inserted a speculum hit me as hysterically funny. Soon my giggles bloomed into all-out guffaws. Barbara joined in, tears streaming.

  But not Rachel, who wasn’t just annoyed at Baby—she was clearly hostile—and not Baby, who appeared to be fascinated with her latest message, her bright eyes scanning the tiny screen. While Barbara and I held our sides and howled, Baby began clicking away again, the fake keyboard sound a counterpoint to our laughter.

  “Oh, for God’s sake!” Rachel snapped, and before we realized what was happening, Rachel rolled down her window, snatched Baby’s phone, and hurled it out.

  Baby looked up, her green eyes wide, her mouth caught in a shocked, open-jawed silence. Barbara and I haltingly quit laughing and Mac scrunched down deeper in his seat as if he wanted to be anywhere on the planet except here, in this car, with an angry woman and a hurt child, ferrying us to an almost uninhabited island.

  “Jesus, Rachel!” Barbara muttered, staring out the window and then taking another long pull on the flask.

  This was not like Rachel. She might be a no-nonsense kind of gal, but tossing a phone out of a moving car was out of bounds even for her. I shot her a what-do-you-think-you’re-doing glance but she kept her gaze averted.

  “There’s no cell service out there anyway,” she said, glaring into the distance.

  We were traveling down a two-lane blacktop that was bordered by marsh on both sides. There was no way the phone could be retrieved, but Mac, who is as good-hearted as the day is long, started to slow down, and he caught my eye in the rearview.

  I shook my head no. “It’s all marsh grass and gators,” I said.

  Mac let out a heavy sigh and Rachel grabbed her flask away from Barbara. The sweet scent of bourbon mixed with the bracing salt air and the stink of decaying vegetation. It’s all that dead stuff that makes the marsh muck so rich, I thought ruefully, regretting I had ever agreed to this little outing. My stomach lurched and I was afraid I was going to be sick.

  “Baby, do you want me to call Teddy when I get home? Tell him to buy you another phone so that you’ve got one waiting for you when you get there?” Mac, the peacemaker.

  Baby, grim-lipped, nodded yes, but she did not speak.

  Rachel rolled her eyes. Barbara refreshed her lipstick. I pressed my hands against my belly and took a few deep breaths.

  And that’s how we traveled the rest of the way, to what could be described as the end of the earth, in silence, fuming, Baby’s bottom lip trembling as she fought back tears, sea light and birdsong all around.

  * * *

  Fossey Pearson was as barnacled as his boat, an old wooden-hulled retired shrimp trawler named Miss Lucky Eyes. The boat’s name struck me as particularly hilarious given the fact that grizzled Fossey Pearson had only one eye and precious few more teeth.

  “Got here just in time,” he said, popping out of the wheelhouse and keeping his singular gaze aimed at Baby. He stepped onto the pier and put out his hand. “Good afternoon, Ms. Gaillard. I mean Patterson. Nice to see you again. Tide’s just about to turn.” He nodded in the direction of a barrier island rising like an emerald out of the blue Atlantic. “Miss Lucky Eyes can’t get over to Tiger in a full-moon low tide. So, ladies”—his cigar bobbed from one side of his mouth to the other—“fire your engines. There’s no time to waste.” Then he aimed his good eye at Mac. “You coming too?”

  “No sir. Just the ladies.” Mac had donned a pair of aviator sunglasses, pulled his ball cap seriously low, and slipped on his windbreaker even though it was hot as blazes. If I hadn’t known better, I would have thought he was trying not to be recognized.

  Fossey stayed in motion, unburdening Baby of her small overnight case. “Everything on board! Right now!”

  Mac, who was carrying four duffel bags because he truly is a Southern gentleman, whispered in my ear, “It’s not too late.”

  But Fossey—his gruffness, his decayed charm—had rekindled my interest in Tiger Island and our time together. Rachel would calm down. I would make sure of it. “Not on your life,” I whispered back.

  He nodded, sensing my resolve. “Everybody got everything?” Mac asked,
dumping the duffel bags aboard.

  “Coolers. We need the coolers. And Baby, let’s go help Mac with the grocery bags,” I said.

  She looked as though she might go into a teenage sulk but evidently thought better of it. “Sure,” she said breezily, walking toward the SUV, adjusting her short shorts. “Gawd, I can’t wait to get out of these clothes and into the water.”

  “Clothes? That’s what she calls that getup?” Rachel hissed, wiping sweat off her upper lip and then hoisting a bag into Fossey’s sunburned, scarred arms.

  “Just wait, we’ll all be half naked with her before you know it. And it’s not just her. Nobody her age wears clothes anymore,” Barbara said, thrusting a second bag at Fossey, who appeared to be winded: His cigar was drooping.

  “Y’all plan on staying the whole doggone month?” he grumbled.

  “A prepared gal is a happy gal,” Barbara said brightly.

  “Is that so?” Fossey said, taking in her sweet, angular features, her jaunty ponytail. “Well don’t that beat all.”

  “Mr. Pearson, I do believe you’re flirting,” Rachel said, and for a moment her tense visage gave way, revealing the old, playful Rachel of a couple of hours ago.

  “A man might age,” he said, hoisting up his belt-less pants, “but an old salt like me”—he winked that faded blue eye—“never gives up.”

  Barbara beamed, her fresh red lipstick glowing in the high-noon sun.

  “He comes from an old, old family who have been in these parts forever,” Baby whispered as we made our way down the dock. “His great-grandmamma was a Cherokee princess and his great-granddaddy was a Gullah king. A very important man, his great-granddaddy.”

  “Really?” I asked, sizing up the bent, sunburned old man who was gallantly taking Barbara by the hand and helping her aboard. “Well, whatever he is,” I said, adjusting my bag of kippers and saltines, peanut butter and bread, “he’s our only way on and off the island, so I hope his royal heritage keeps him on the straight and narrow.”

  “Hurry up, ladies,” he called to Baby and me as Mac lifted the final cooler onto the deck. “The tide waits for no man,” he bellowed, his arms outstretched as if he were Poseidon himself.

  The sun was high overhead, bleaching the world of color, and I again felt sick to my stomach.

  Mac pressed the back of his hand to my cheek. “Are you OK?”

  I touched his hand and an odd urge to weep welled up inside me. I suddenly had no idea how I could spend two weeks without him. I flung my arms around his neck. “I love you so much, Mac.”

  “I love you too, sweet pea,” he said. He held me by the shoulders and looked at me sternly. “You need anything, I mean anything, head over to the village. Ask for Mama Bonaparte. I don’t know if she’s still alive, but if so…” He trailed off. “It doesn’t matter. The Gullahs will help out if you girls get in a jam.”

  He kissed me good-bye and whispered he would miss me. I heard the diesel engine blaze to life and one of the girls—I think it was Barbara—said, “Will you look at those lovebirds!”

  Before I succumbed to a full-out faint thanks to the heat and the stickiness of the salt air, I pulled away. Mac helped me aboard Miss Lucky Eyes and we all waved at him as if we were about to embark upon a transatlantic journey.

  “Bon voyage,” Baby hollered, jumping up and down.

  Mac stood on the dock, hands on hips, watching our departure. As the boat headed east, toward Tiger Island and away from the mainland, I gripped the rail, fighting seasickness in the moderate chop. For a while I kept my gaze pinned to the dock as Mac appeared to grow smaller and smaller, but finally I shifted it to the whitecapped sea because I didn’t wish to see him disappear altogether.

  * * *

  Over the throaty backbeat of the diesel engine, with Bull Island off to our north, Fossey Pearson yelled, “We’re coming up on her, girls. Tiger Island! Named for the tiger sharks that once swarmed thick as thieves in these shallows. Guess my granddaddy took his fair share of the fuc—um…monsters. I’ve been known to take a few myself.”

  “They won’t really hurt you,” Baby said. “Not unless you go swimming with a bucket of chum.”

  Fossey Pearson started laughing, pointed at her as if he were pulling a trigger. She smiled back at him and actually batted her eyes.

  “What do you know about chum, Baby?” Rachel asked.

  Baby didn’t answer. She seemed slightly afraid, as if there were a trip wire in the air.

  “Don’t underestimate Baby Gaillard,” Fossey Pearson said. “Her people have been out here almost as long as mine.”

  Before Rachel could come back with something suitably acidic, Baby yelled, “Look!” She pointed off the back of the boat. “They’re surfing!”

  I turned and was delighted to see a small pod of dolphin—seven to be exact—surfing the boat’s wake. “How fabulous!”

  “Doesn’t that beat all,” Rachel said, making her way to the rear. Barbara, Baby, and I quickly followed.

  “Aren’t they beautiful!” Barbara said.

  “Stare at ’em long enough,” Fossey Pearson said, “and an ol’ salt might think they’re mermaids.” He throttled down and took a more southerly route. “Right over there, that’s where we’re heading.”

  A dock, more rickety than the last, snaggled its way into a protected bay. I turned a full circle, taking in my new surroundings. The mainland was long gone. There were only sea, sky, and the approaching island. We had certainly gotten what we’d always said was one of our criteria for these August getaways: isolation. Only this time it was absolute. We could not pile into a car and go buy groceries. We could not nip over to a liquor store. We could not call up our husbands or kids and check in. Fossey Pearson, with his one eye and his chugalug boat, was our sole means of conveyance to an island that offered nothing but whatever nature supplied.

  Nevertheless, as Tiger Island came more clearly into focus, it reeled me in. Even from this distance, I was taken with its primeval beauty. White sands, clear water, coastal scrub leading into some sort of hardwood jungle hummock.

  “How did your people ever find this place?” I asked Baby.

  “My great-granddaddy made a lot of money in the stock market. Coca-Cola, mainly. And my granddaddy, he had a thing for the sea. So he, with Great-Granddaddy’s help, built himself a house right in the middle of it.” Baby gazed at the island that wavered in this bright sunlight, and I saw a calm come over her, as if Rachel’s ditching her phone no longer mattered.

  Fossey Pearson idled us up, slow and close, to the dock. He seemed fully in his element, as if the smell of diesel gas and the confusion created by too much sea salt and sunlight made him the happiest man on the planet.

  “Now listen here,” he said. “Baby knows this, but I don’t think she’s ever been out here with just a bunch of women.” His inflection suggested that we were little more than helpless, dumb creatures who were perpetually in need of masculine wisdom.

  Rachel’s eyes flashed. I saw her coil up, ready to pounce, but I waved her down.

  “Choose your battles,” I whispered.

  Barbara seemed unfazed by Fossey Pearson’s banter. Radiant, she took in our surroundings as though paradise truly were healing, as if nothing the one-eyed old salt could say—no matter how insulting or inappropriate—could pierce her armor.

  “There ain’t a damned thing out here,” he said, gently nudging the boat against the dock. “I mean nothing. No place to get your hair done. No place to spend your husband’s money.”

  “What about my money?” Rachel snapped.

  Fossey Pearson laughed. “Nope. No place for that either.”

  Without being asked, Baby helped him tie up Miss Lucky Eyes, her butt cheeks bared to all who would look every time she bent over. The rest of us began gathering our provisions. I think we all felt the same need: Get off the boat; get on with this vacation. I had a sense that some of us were already thinking it couldn’t end soon enough. And I hoped that as soon as we set
tled in, people’s frayed nerves would ease.

  “There’s no phone. Ain’t no cell service either,” Fossey said, at which Baby had the gall, or perhaps courage, to giggle.

  He helped us unload the coolers. “No computers. No TVs.”

  Fossey Pearson was enjoying this, I could tell by the righteous gait of his words.

  “No coffee shops. No shopping malls. No place to get your nails painted. Hell, they ain’t even a Laundromat out here.”

  The four of us stood on the dock, watching him unload the final bag full of all manner of items we had decided we simply couldn’t live without, and quiet washed over us as it sank in that we were about to be totally on our own.

  “One more thing,” Fossey Pearson said, disappearing briefly into the wheelhouse and then emerging with a pail filled with what, at first glance, appeared to be fireworks.

  “Here you go,” he said, handing the pail to Barbara.

  “What are these?” she asked.

  “Railroad flares,” he said, and he winked at her again before returning to the wheelhouse, and it occurred to me that it actually might be impossible for a one-eyed man to wink. Perhaps it was just an exaggerated, slow, and sultry blink.

  The idling boat engine thumped more quickly. “If you need me this week,” he shouted, pulling away from the dock, “light a flare on the beach. I’ll be here shortly. After that, light a flare and hope for the best because I’ll be in New York City.”

  New York City? “What do we do while you’re gone?” I hollered, hating the sick rise in my stomach that recognized abandonment.

  “Don’t worry,” he yelled. “There’s bound to be somebody on the pier over to the shore. Or a boat out in the bay will spy the flare. You ladies ain’t got nothing to worry about. And oh yeah, be careful of the storms. We’ve been having some nighttime doozies!”

  Those were his last words, which we barely heard over the engine noise and the breeze that seemed intent on blowing his instructions to smithereens.

  “Where do we go now?” Rachel asked, hoisting a duffel bag higher on her shoulder, squinting at the sun, her face drawn and piqued.