Beach House

by Mary Monroe

  “I know, I know. I hate this!”

  “It’s the price you pay for living in paradise, kiddo.”

  “What’s the latest report? I heard at the hardware store that it’s going to go out to sea.”

  “Mama and Toy are listening to the radio for updates.”

  They set the heavy piece of wood down while they gathered their own strength.

  “This is the last window, thank God,” Cara said, stretching her arms.

  “What about the side windows?”

  “We’ll just close the wooden shutters at the last minute. Otherwise it would be like living in a coffin.” Cara shuddered at the unfortunate image and looked out at the ocean for the hundredth time that day. Everything out there in the distance looked serene but a dingy gray. It was deceiving. No matter what the weather reports said, she could feel the coming storm in her bones. It was nothing she could identify, not the temperature, the wind or the humidity. It was more a heaviness in her chest that she couldn’t shake and made it hard to breathe. And it was the quiet of the birds. Even the insects were silent. The stillness was eerie.

  She shook off her wariness and focused her attention on the tasks at hand. There was too much to do to dawdle. “Rest time is over. Alley-oop!” she said, grabbing hold of the sides of the plywood again.

  “Why are we doing all this work now?” Emmi complained as she investigated a long white scratch down her arm. “If it misses us, we’ll just have to take it all down.”

  “Consider it insurance. If this is what it takes to strike a bargain with the gods, it’s worth it. Come on, now. Just one more. Lift on the count of three. One…two…three.” They hoisted the plywood over the front window, their muscles straining while Cara moved quickly to hammer nails into the corners. She slumped against it when she was finished. “There, that’s it. The last one. We’re done.”

  Cara lowered the hammer but could still hear hammering throughout the neighborhood. Many people had hurricane shutters these days, but the die-hards still relied on plywood and taped windows to get them through such storms.

  “You would pick a time like this to break up with Brett,” Emmi said, bent over with her hands on her knees, catching her breath. “We sure could’ve used his muscles now.”

  “He called and offered to help.”

  “And you turned him down? Again? Girl, you really are nuts.”

  “I didn’t. Mama did. He talked to her.”

  “Oh. I see.”

  “We couldn’t very well have him come over here to do work after I’d just refused his marriage proposal. That wouldn’t have been right.”

  “I suppose not.”

  “Besides, he’s got his own worries. He has to batten down the hatches and take his boats out to safe water. He’s already long gone.”

  Even as she said the words, she heard the double entendre. She cast a quick glance at Emmi, whose expression told her she understood all.

  Cara walked over to retrieve the two glasses of iced sweet tea, as much to cover her discomfort as to quench her thirst. Toy had set out glasses, ice and even little sprigs of fresh mint. Cara smiled at seeing it. Toy was becoming a mini-Lovie, she thought as she carried the glasses back and took a seat beside Emmi on the front steps.

  “Drink up.”

  “Thanks.” Emmi took a long swallow. “Mmm,” she said with relish. “Nothing like sweet tea.”

  Cara drank thirstily. The tea was as thick as syrup and so sweet it made her teeth hurt. But on a hot day, when she was working hard, Southern sweet tea packed a punch.

  Emmi turned to look at Cara and her eyes were shrewd. “You okay about all this?”

  “I think so. We’ve got all the windows done. Emergency supplies and medical records are packed. And Mama’s putting all her photograph albums and important papers in a plastic bin to take with us.”

  “I’m not talking about the hurricane, you idiot! I’m talking about you and Brett.”

  “Oh.” She frowned and rested her elbows on her knees. “Well, there isn’t a me and Brett anymore, is there?”

  “That’s nuts. Anyone can see the two of you are crazy for each other.”

  Cara only stared down at her sweet tea and stirred the ice with her finger.

  “Lordy, your mama must be going bonkers that you said no to a marriage proposal.”

  “It’s weird. I expected a long lecture on the horrors of spinsterhood but she hasn’t said a word. Not a whisper.”

  “Really?”

  Cara thought about this a moment then said, “Wouldn’t it be just my luck to have finally reached an understanding with my mother right before she dies?”

  They looked at each other and smiled.

  “Better before she dies than not at all,” Emmi said.

  Cara swallowed hard. “I’ll miss her terribly.”

  “And you’ll miss Brett,” Emmi said with feeling. “Sugar, why are you doing this to yourself? You shut yourself off from any chance at happiness.”

  “How come everyone thinks the only way for a woman to find happiness is to wear white and walk down a church aisle? I just feel that I don’t want to get married. Maybe I’m afraid to give up everything I know. Maybe if I’d met him at thirty instead of forty I’d be more malleable, more open to change. Maybe…it’s just too late.”

  “For heaven’s sake, we’re not dinosaurs, you know. Forty is still young. Women are having babies at forty all the time.”

  “Oh, please, let’s not start talking children. That will really put me over the top.”

  “You don’t want children? Not ever?”

  “It’s funny but I’ve really never thought about it much before this summer. But now that I have, no. I don’t think so. Don’t get me wrong, I love children. I absolutely adore Linnea and Cooper. But I just don’t have this need to have any of my own.”

  “Really?” Emmi thought about this a moment. “Well, just because you don’t want children doesn’t mean you can’t get married.”

  “Brett might want children.”

  “Have you talked to him about this?”

  “No.”

  “Well?” Emmi said, with a tone that said, why not?

  “There’s no point talking about children when I don’t even want to get married, is there? Besides, having children is not the main issue. I have a career. A home in Chicago. A life I’m used to.”

  “It sounds like you’ve got that answer down pat.”

  “I’m just not cut out for marriage.”

  “What have you got against marriage? Your mother and father were married for umpteeump years.”

  Cara closed her eyes. She and Emmi had grown closer over the summer and Emmi had been candid about her own troubles with Tom. They weren’t children anymore snickering over kisses. They were women with adult issues. She couldn’t see the point of keeping her history a secret any longer. When she opened her eyes again, she gave Emmi a knowing look.

  “I hate to break it to you like this, but my parents’ marriage is one of the reasons I don’t believe in the institution.”

  “What do you mean? They were the happiest couple around.”

  “It was a farce. All for show. They made each other miserable.”

  “Come on. True?” she asked, shocked. When Cara nodded, Emmi stared back, her mouth agape. “And you’re only telling me now?”

  “I wanted to tell you, lots of times. But loyalty in the family meant not talking outside the family about such things.” She took another sip of tea, trying to decide how much she dared reveal. “I don’t know if they were always unhappy. I don’t have any memories of them fighting when I was little. They seemed pretty Ozzie and Harriet then. But about the time we became pals, back when we started spending whole summers at the beach house, things began to change. Daddy never came here anymore and he started being cold to my mother. He didn’t listen to her and he spoke sharply to her, as if he were angry or even disgusted. Then the abuse started.”

  “No! I don’t believe you.
Not your parents.”

  Cara spoke these things aloud for the first time, needing to get it out, to tell someone she trusted before she burst with it. “It wasn’t physical abuse. It was more insidious. He broke her spirit. He was always implying that she was stupid or slow, especially about money. Not just her, but the whole female sex. That was his stance. Men were dominant and women were born to serve. Can you believe it? Whenever she ventured an opinion, he mocked her. Or he blew up if she said something ‘wrong.’ Finally she just stopped talking much at all.”

  “But she’s so open and lively.”

  “Only here at the beach house. You didn’t see her when my father was around. She was like a different person. I didn’t know it then, but he began a campaign to take all her money and property away with the excuse that business was a man’s work, that kind of crap. And he was so cheap with her, doling out small amounts of money, always forcing her to have to ask him for more. He was so controlling. And he’d do weird things like check the gas gauge on the car, or the odometer to see how far she’d traveled.”

  “I hate to say it, but that’s the kind of thing someone does when they suspect their spouse is having an affair. I should know.”

  “Mama? An affair? Aside from being too ridiculous to consider, how could she have had one? She never left the house unless it was for some social or charity event that Daddy approved of. No one would ever think Olivia Rutledge was isolated. She had parties and guests in the house all the time and she was very active in the community. But it was always to serve his needs. She didn’t have any real friends, except for Flo. Not even her daughter.” Cara paused for a moment as she had a small epiphany.

  “My God, I just realized how alike we are. I don’t have any real friends, either, back in Chicago. It’s like I deliberately isolated myself with my work.”

  “Why?”

  “Haven’t a clue. I’m sure a psychotherapist will have a field day with it someday.”

  Emmi was still working this out. “But why did she put up with it? Your mom’s a sweetheart and all, but I never thought of her as weak.”

  “That’s the million-dollar question. It couldn’t have been easy. As Daddy got older, he became a mean old man. His threats weren’t so subtle anymore. Especially when he started drinking. We could hear him yelling at her downstairs, calling her all sorts of vile names. And he’d accidentally, on purpose, break something she loved. Oh, nothing too dear. More like a piece of Chinese export porcelain or a teacup, always something from her side of the family. All those years I thought she put up with it because she loved him. And now she tells me that she hated him all that time.”

  “I don’t believe it,” Emmi said again.

  “Believe it.”

  Emmi leaned far back against the porch. “Well, there goes another role model down the drain. Whenever things got rough between me and Tom, I used to think of your parents. I thought they had the ideal marriage. It just goes to show you never really know what goes on behind closed doors. Makes my problems with Tom seem pretty small.”

  “Infidelity is hardly a small problem. You should talk to him before you lose what you have together.”

  “Look who’s talking! You’re giving up what you have with Brett because you’re both too stubborn to pick up the phone.”

  “It’s not at all the same. We don’t have a commitment to each other like you and Tom do.”

  “Commitment? He’s fooling around. What kind of a commitment is that?”

  “You’re married. You said vows. You have children together. You grew up together. Those are the ties that bind.”

  Emmi looked at her hands and fiddled with her wedding band.

  “Maybe that’s what I like about being single,” Cara said. “No ties. I’m free to walk whenever I want.” She paused, staring out as another thought hit hard. “Shit,” she muttered.

  “Let me guess,” Emmi replied. “You’re thinking that you don’t want to get married so you won’t get stuck like your mother did. Right?”

  Cara’s silence spoke for her.

  “Honey, if anybody needs to start talking, it’s you and Lovie. You’ve got a lot of history to mine through. And you better be quick about it.”

  The humidity was thick and the flies were biting. Cara swatted a pesky fly away. “I don’t want to upset her. Not now.”

  “This isn’t about upsetting your mother! You need to think of yourself for a change.”

  “I don’t want to be selfish at a time like this.”

  “It’s not selfish. It’s time to put yourself at the top of that to do list you’re always making! You’ve given everything to your job. Now you’re giving everything to your mother. When are you going to take a minute to stop and look at what you need to give to yourself? Something’s askew here and if you keep up that I-don’t-want-to-talk-about-it stance it’ll never get straightened out. Talk to your mother, for both your sakes. And when you finish with her, go talk to Brett.”

  Cara raked her damp hair and took deep breaths. “I can’t breathe. It’s this storm coming. The air’s so thick!”

  “It’s anxiety. Been there, done that.”

  “Oh, Emmi,” she said, leaning against her broad shoulder, feeling better just at the touch of her sweaty T-shirt. “What would I do without you?”

  Emmi sighed. “Sugar, I have to admit, I don’t know what I’d have done without you this summer, either. Sitting at the nests at night and talking to you about my mess with Tom helped me a lot. I couldn’t talk to anyone else.” She smirked. “You aren’t the only one with that loyalty thing.” She grew suddenly serious again. “Having a secret like mine and no one to talk to can be isolating, too.”

  They looked at each other, understanding. Each felt the bond between them strongly.

  “You know, you’re the sister I never had,” Emmi said.

  “Me, too.” Then Cara laughed lightly. “But Palmer would warn you off.”

  “Palmer…” Emmi said with a commiserating smirk. Having lived three doors down from him every summer, Emmi knew Palmer as well as anyone.

  They both laughed, breaking the tension.

  Cara put down her glass, stood and walked to the porch’s edge. “Let the storm come!” she shouted to the sea. “We’ve got each other to get through.” Grinning, she turned back to look at her friend.

  Emmi made one of those half-grimace, half-smile faces that made Cara think, Uh-oh.

  “I’ve been waiting to tell you this,” Emmi said. “I’ve decided to pack up and head back to Atlanta right away. Before the storm hits.”

  Cara felt like she’d just been knocked over by a category four. “You’re leaving? For the season? But I thought you’d decided to stay till after Thanksgiving.”

  “Tom called last night. He finished the job in Peru ahead of schedule and is coming home in two weeks. He sounded real excited, too, like he couldn’t wait to see me.” She shook her head and shot off a self-deprecating laugh. “I felt as giddy as a schoolgirl.”

  Cara stared back at her, speechless.

  “Oh, don’t look at me like that, Cara,” she said in a groan. “I talk a good game about leaving Tom, but the truth is, I never will. We’ve been together for twenty years and most of those were good ones.”

  “What about the other women?”

  Emmi avoided her questioning stare.

  “You can’t keep looking the other way.”

  “No, I can’t,” she said soberly. “You helped pull my head out of the sand. No more hiding. Tom and I will have to talk when he gets back.”

  “Will you?”

  She looked pained. “Try to understand, Cara. Tom isn’t just a summer fling for me. He’s the whole year, every year, forever and ever. He’s my husband. We took vows. Like you said, we have a commitment. I love him too much to let go. And after being alone all summer, I’ve decided I’d rather suffer with him than suffer without him. I’m not like you. Even when we were kids, I had to work hard just to keep up with you. Deep down,
you’re stronger than I am. I’m not cut out for being alone.”

  Cara stared at her best friend. Everyone was leaving her. Letting go and moving on to a husband, job, baby, even death. This glorious summer was truly over. It was all too sad. “I’ll miss you.”

  Emmi’s expression changed and Cara could see remorse at leaving her childhood friend behind to face the storm. When Emmi hugged her in her warm, motherly-sisterly arms, Cara didn’t want to be alone any longer. She held on tight.

  “I’ll be back at Thanksgiving. I promise,” Emmi said in her ear. “You’d better be here, too. Dinner at my house. Three o’clock sharp. No excuses.”

  “I’ll be there,” she whispered back.

  Then, pulling away, she wiped her eyes and looked out again at the narrow line of clouds gathering at the horizon. Cara looked at Emmi and they shared a knowing glance, one that all islanders shared at just such a moment.

  “Provided we have houses to come back to.”

  That evening, Toy stood on the porch and, like most people along the coast, looked out at the sea. The sunset backlit the storm front. Eerie, hallucinatory blue clouds stretched ominously over the water in layers with thin, fiery, red-orange clouds. The tapered edges streaked across the sky like fingers grasping out at the island. She shuddered. Everything seemed all out of proportion.

  Toy took deep breaths and stroked small circles over her belly. Her mind was whirling faster than the hurricane. She’d run out of time. She had to make a decision. Tonight. Darryl had called the house frantic, yelling over the phone how a big mother hurricane was coming straight for Charleston and how the guys in the band had decided to head out before the storm hit.

  “Those fuckers don’t care about nobody but themselves. But I’m not like that. I care about you and I’ll be damned if I’m going to let you stay out there for one more minute, hear? I want you off that fucking island. There’s a goddamn hurricane on its way! So you just pack up your things. I’m coming out to get you and we’ll just see if some old lady is going to stop us.”