They walked down the beach to the shore, where Katie kicked the calm water up a bit with her bare feet. She told herself she needed to behave like a grown woman, not like a bumbling tenth grader. The cold water on her toes and the salty, damp breeze woke her up a little, and reminded her that she was indeed able to make a decision and take action. Maybe even talk like a grown-up.
She wasn’t sure if Luke knew she was starting a relationship with George, nor did she know if he cared. She was sure that mentioning George would be a huge mood killer. So she gave herself leeway to do as she pleased. How was she to figure out how she felt if she didn’t venture out a little?
When they walked back to the dunes, Luke laid down the blanket where the sand rose and poured two glasses of wine into the coffee mugs. After splashing the ocean water and staring up at the stars, Katie seemed happier.
She took a sip out of a dirty mug full of the horrible, slightly above room temperature white wine. It did its duty, instantly calming her down, maturing her spirit.
Luke leaned in her direction so his chest brushed her left side. She could smell the wine on his sweet breath. He told her, laughing a little after a moment, “You know, I kind of stalked you through town that first night I saw you in the store.”
She turned and acted surprised. “What?” Katie felt invigorated suddenly, like she could make some mistakes in life and then fix them, and that was okay.
“The week after Memorial Day. You had these really preppy yellow shorts on, and the guys and I were hanging on a bench in front of the shop in town. We couldn’t peg you. You didn’t look like a stuck-up city person, but then you weren’t from here, so we couldn’t tell.”
Katie laughed a little, wanting to know more. “So the stalking was just that night?”
“No. It went on a little. Then you brought Huck to camp and I had to act cool and figure out something to say.”
“I don’t remember what it was.”
“Glad it was memorable. I just thought you were really pretty. And hot.”
She looked at him, her mouth a little crooked. “Both?”
“Yeah.”
“I’ll take both. That’s nice.” She pulled her hair behind her ears and rubbed her ear lobes to massage some more calm in. She took another sip of wine and cupped the mug with both hands.
Luke had enough waiting. He took the dirty mug of wine out of her hands and put it on the far edge of the towel. He placed his hand gently on her cheek, turned her face toward his, and kissed her softly. First he pressed his lips on hers, then played with her lips and teeth with his tongue. With his hands on her cheeks in what-the-hell mode, he finally kissed her deeply as he’d wanted for six weeks now.
He guided her back down on the blanket, laid partially on top of her, grabbing her butt tight. Katie arched her back and pushed into him. He then reached inside the back legs of her shorts while she dutifully pushed his hands to safer grounds.
After he drew back his hands for a short while, he then glided his fingers in again to feel the outer boundaries of her ass and inner thighs, and tried to creep his fingers farther inside, but she pushed him away again. They tussled on the sand, grinding sand grains into their hair and clothes. He started to kiss her stomach suggestively, to line her shorts with his tongue. As he did so, she looked down at his handsome face silhouetted by the flickering reflections of the moon on the water. His manner was at first soft, then more aggressive than she’d have expected, then softer again. She liked all of it. A lot.
“I don’t want to do everything tonight, here,” she said. She placed her hand on his wrist, and pulled it from the edge of her panties.
“Well, I’m so sorry, Miss, but I actually want to do everything here tonight,” he countered, which made her laugh a little.
“Well, I’m not going to let you,” she said gently.
“I can’t stand it.”
“I’ll succeed in not letting you.”
He smiled and kissed her forehead. “Tonight you will. But not for long you won’t.”
Chapter Thirty-Eight
Steps of Doom
Thursday, August 10
At 12:30 on a bright August day, Luke walked up the steps of doom. Only a woman would get him to tread on the dreaded Seabrook turf. He’d pulled his baseball hat with the Mets logo on it down to his eyebrows, and jogged from his van to make sure he could get past the walkway and ropes without any of his “colleagues” from camp seeing him.
Katie had refused to sleep with him, but their time together was nothing short of exhilarating: stolen moments in the back of the car when little Huck had been dropped off, furious make-out sessions on the beach at night, on a sandy towel, Luke gently fondling every body part he could. Katie always watched his dark profile as he kissed her breasts, the moonlight reflecting off the rippling currents below. He carefully took steps to make her feel cared for, but not crowded or forced. Every day since that Memorial Day in the shop, something about Katie flashed through his mind: her delicate gait, the crystal green of her eyes, the curve of her inner thigh, the way she smiled back when he flirted. He’d prevail, he’d just have to. His heart ached with a need to will it so.
“Can I maul you for real, please?” he’d asked her that very morning. “I’m not going to survive if you say no anymore.”
She’d been weighing going full steam sexually with Luke when George suddenly started calling more at night, checking on her, as if he could feel her pulling toward another man.
“Hey, baby,” George had said just the night before. “I bought you something today. It’s a red garter belt. I’m going to FedEx it to you. I want you to wear it, with the matching bra, under that silly sundress you wear. Put it on under that. Play with yourself a little; drink half a bottle of wine before I get there, so you’re ready for what I’m going to do to you.”
Today, with George still in the city, she sat beside the Seabrook pool, the sweet lifeguard giving Huck tips for another swim meet. Huck now decided he liked swimming competitions more than he thought—so much so that he’d begged to have Luke come watch his progress in the pool. Katie figured sharing a grilled cheese with a guy from town was fine. It wasn’t as if she and Luke were going to hold hands under the table; he’d come only to see Huck swim. The ladies at the club, Topper, Bitsy, and Cricket, would all be gathered at a far table, not even noticing.
As Luke bounded up the steps after the morning camp session completed, the guard immediately stopped him.
“Which family?”
“I, uh, it’s Katie Doyle. I’m not sure she’s with a specific family.”
He smiled forcefully. “She gets whatever she wants . . . or I’ll lose my job.”
This seemed strange to Luke. This club, with their staunch membership committee that checked the pedigree of people’s great grandparents, didn’t let anyone in for the summer just because they rented a house nearby. Luke had always heard they actually kept the non-Christians out by insisting every member have a grandparent who was also a member . . . and in the 1920s when those Southampton grandparents were eating deviled eggs and ham hocks, diversity wasn’t exactly a catch phrase.
The more steps Luke took into the club, the more his apprehension set in. At the next entry area from the lawn to the clubhouse, he saw a kid he grew up with working on the hydrangea plants that lined the front of the clubhouse.
“Yo,” Brian yelled and put his shears down in the posies by his knees. He stood up. “Didn’t know you were working here now? Are the boats broken for good?”
This was why Luke didn’t want to come here. He knew he’d bump into people working he knew from grade school, the waves, or town. “No. I don’t know, Brian. It was a bad idea. I’m just meeting a kid from our camp. I’ve never been inside here so when they suggested it, sure this is my last and only time.”
“Yeah. Well it’s a trip inside for sure, stuff you can’t see on the outside.” The kid wiped his brow with the back of his gloved hand and went back to pruning the bushes
.
Luke walked into the clubhouse. The rug beneath his feet was a hideous, tattered carpet with designs of flowers popping out of baskets in the center and a pink, yellow, and green border. A silver tub stood on a round center table, filled with inexpensive carnations, roses, and baby’s breath. Wooden plaques lined the walls announcing the winners of the club singles, ladies, men’s, mixed, and member-guest tennis matches over the decades. The gallery before him looked like a 1920s beach house that never had been updated: wicker chairs with faded striped fabric; polished wood side tables with coffee-table books first published in the 1950s; and small Chinese blue-and-white pots with spare, sad bouquets. Walking like a masked burglar, he tiptoed through the galley and headed to the paned doors, where he could see the lunch patio and pool, and then beyond them, the ocean, sparkling in the noon sun.
A gray-haired woman looked over her reading glasses disparagingly. “Can I help you?” she asked.
Luke, though dressed in real shorts and a clean shirt, knew he looked like he did not belong here, even as a guest of a member. She maneuvered around her mahogany desk. It had a 1970s style Rolodex wheel with the name and club number of each member. “Did Laurence check you in at the gate, was he there when you stepped onto club property?”
“I’m here to see Katie Doyle. Her son, Huck, wanted me here for the swim meet only, love that kid.”
“Oh.” She actually smiled. “Of course. Miss Katherine Doyle. I wouldn’t step in her way.”
So strange Katie, the newcomer, held sway. Sure, she could make yellow preppy shorts sexier than anyone, but why all these fawning comments from the gatekeepers?
Luke plowed forward out the paned glass doors, paint chipping in parts. He walked down twenty steps to a pool area teaming with little kids, their blond hair now a greenish tint from eight weeks of summer chlorine. It being Thursday, the fathers were few and the tables by the sea were mostly populated with women and kids of all ages: au pairs in from Sweden, moms, aunts, and grandmothers, all here to consume cold hamburgers and boiled turkey with like-minded people.
Luke spotted Katie at a table in a corner bordering the gate before the sand. She didn’t present airs like she belonged here in her casual pants and T-shirt, but she didn’t entirely look like she felt out of place. Katie timidly stood up and waved, then nodded to Huck, who was running from the pool to latch onto Luke’s thigh.
“My mom made you come because there’s a swim competition. It’s a swim meet, and I’m going soon.” Huck’s white-blond hair had grown unruly since he’d arrived, his tummy was fuller and his cheeks chubbier from all the summer corn and ice cream.
Luke knelt down. “You think there’s any other reason I’d be here, but you? I can’t wait.”
“Really. I appreciate it.” Katie smiled. “I know it’s not your scene, but Huck drove me so crazy. I told him okay, that I’d ask you to try your hardest to show.” She looked deeper into his eyes. “And, I did know you’d show. So thanks.”
Luke rubbed Huck’s head and neck affectionately and pulled him into his leg. “I’m starving. I’ve a waterskiing private just after—do you mind if I order some food? A grilled cheese or two?”
“Sure. Let’s sit and order.”
As his lunch arrived, the American cheese only half-melted on the inside, Luke explained how this very club tried to kick the guys off public sand, and how Kona always clarified that it was a public beach and tried to convince them they had no case. He was about to explain how this tool, Bucky Porter, policed the beach like a dickhead Marine sergeant when he saw him coming toward their table.
Luke pulled his cap down as far as it would go and started wolfing down his sandwich—anything to go unnoticed. Bucky might say something terrible about him to this beautiful woman that he’d grown more attached to by the hour.
Unfortunately, Bucky headed right for their table. Worse, he slowed and crept up behind Katie as if he knew her. Luke could not believe what happened next: Bucky put his hands around Katie’s eyes.
“Guess who?” he said, in an exaggerated deep, male voice.
He figured Bucky thought the new girl in town was cute—how could he not? Luke, cap further down, bowed his head and slurped on his 7UP straw to remain incognito. Katie placed her fingers on Bucky’s trying to guess who was behind her. Luke could see her playful upturned smile transform into a literal upside-down U, like a cartoon character.
“I thought you weren’t coming until the weekend because of your work?”
“I thought I’d surprise you in time for Huck’s swim meet. Is that a problem?” Bucky looked at the guy at the table with the baseball hat covering his face. “Who’s this?”
Luke stood up so fast, his chair bounced back on the floor. “Oh, hey, Huck wanted a lot of attention today.” He knelt over to pick up the chair while a few nearby members, several Southsides deep themselves, wondered if he had been over-served.
“And you are?” Bucky asked. And then, when he realized it was Luke from that godforsaken camp, he added, “Yep, I know him from the beach.”
Katie spoke up. “He’s the instructor who got Huck into the ocean. The one who got him over his fears. He’s rooting him on today.”
Bucky sat down and waved frantically at a waiter with his hand in the air like a kid in the back row of class. “I’m hungry.” He turned to Katie and whispered playfully, “What am I supposed to ask him, if he got tubed today?”
She whispered back, “He’s been very kind. Stop.”
Bucky chuckled, rolled his eyes and leaned back in the chair facing the sea, considering his options.
He turned to Luke. “And you make a real living in the water?”
“Yes, I make a good living all summer,” Luke answered. “And then, in the fall and winter, I work as a biology teacher, seventh grade. But my specialty is marine biology.”
“So, not high school?”
“Well, actually, I like middle school kids. They are so interesting, development-wise. And when they get antsy and difficult, the laboratory is right here.” He pointed out to the sea, while Bucky squirmed in his chair. “When the kids are feeling cooped up all day inside, I’m the lucky teacher who gets to let them out, on this beach, this public beach.” Luke didn’t need to be grilled by this asshole in front of Katie, and he still couldn’t figure out why Bucky had sat with them.
“Is this part-time or . . .”
“No, it’s full-time.”
“And you’re free now because . . .”
Luke leaned in. “Um, well, let’s see, it’s 12:30, camp is done.” As if you don’t know our hours, asshole? “And, well, because August tenth is not usually a school day, school kids around here are off for the summer?”
But then, Katie put her hand on his. “George. Freelance is the economy. Everyone works several jobs part-time. Luke’s got a full teaching degree that’s stable, but then in summer, he’s earning more with his camp. It’s just the way people manage. Look at me this summer, it’s hardly a secure pension and benefits deal until . . .”
George? This was George???
Luke glared at Katie.
“Excuse me.” Luke could not help himself. “We’ve met. He’s known as Bucky around here. But you called him George?”
Katie could imagine Luke would be upset and unnerved that George had surprised them. But Luke was more uncomfortable than made sense. Something was really wrong here. Luke and Bucky, or George, knew each other. They had a past of some kind.
“My real name is George Porter,” he explained. “George Herbert Bradford Porter Jr. Most people I meet now call me George. You may only know me as Bucky from the club. Most people here refer to me as Bucky.”
“Very true.” Luke swallowed hard.
“Katie and I met last spring at a conference out in Portland, so she never changed it to Bucky. It’s fine. She likes George, right? What did you say, Bucky was too cute or . . .” He rubbed her shoulder and kissed her forehead. Katie cringed like a child being embraced by an unwelc
ome relative.
“I said Bucky was old-fashioned, but anything you want to be called is fine, it’s all the same,” Katie said, staring at her plate.
“I’m going to excuse myself for a moment.” Luke walked over to the pool without explaining, too incensed and confused to stay.
After the meet, he hugged Huck, praised him for his eighth place ribbon in a field of eight, and walked to the entryway.
He again bumped into the kid Brian near the front gate, who asked, “Did you have a good lunch?”
“Yeah. Just great. Phenomenal. Outstanding fare.”
“You know that guy Bucky? I saw him sitting with you. Everyone’s scared shitless of him.”
“I know of him, from the town board election, plus he usually screams at Kona, not me. He knows the family I came to see. I guess pretty well, though, uh, I guess they call him George.” He paused, dumbfounded. “I was just watching the son in the pool. Just did the kid a favor. He doesn’t have a dad, so . . . I don’t know, the kid kind of likes me around. I guess Bucky doesn’t do it for him.”
“Well, that’s good because that Bucky is such a piece of shit,” the kid added, looking up at Luke from his knees and shielding his eyes in the hot sun.
“I know. Kona and I know all about him,” answered Luke as he walked away. And then, unable to help himself, he turned around and went back a few steps to ask, “But why do you say that? How does he show it? We just kind of take his bullshit behavior, and fight it. But you obviously can’t. You work here. Is he super abusive or what?”
“Yeah, well, I work for his club, not him technically. He’s a member. There are employees here, I have a boss who manages the place. But Bucky Porter, he’s a full-on creep. Ask the bartender, Henry Walker, one of the only cool guys around here. Henry is out to murder Bucky for being such a dick to all of us.
“Bucky’s super polite to the women and they buy his game. But then, on the sly, he takes photos of girls while they’re sitting in the lounge chairs in their bikinis. He has a whole selection of ‘beaver shots,’ that’s what he calls them. He put a little telephoto lens on his iPhone. He showed them to Henry only, and then Henry told us. Fucking sick-o, they’re all pretty young.”
It Happens in the Hamptons Page 22
