I nodded, heard and understood the word “then.” “I probably need to go back to work now.”
“Like that?” He grinned and pointed to my disheveled condition.
“Maybe not,” I said, stared out over the water, to the edges of the shore, and thought of Maeve.
Then we talked, Jack and I, about everything we could remember, and everything he’d wanted to forget.
When light dwindled to the farther corners of the creek and the frogs began their evening song, Brian came home. When he saw Jack he let out a holler and offered him a large hug.
“Man, I thought I’d never see you again. What’s up?” Brian asked.
“Bailing your sister out of trouble, as usual.” Jack lifted his beer to me.
“Oh?” Brian raised his eyebrows at me.
“His band is playing the tour benefit,” I said. “That’s all.”
Brian pointed at me, then looked at Jack. “What in the hell have y’all been doing? You’re a mess.”
“Kayak race,” I said, pulling my shirt out from my body.
“Who won?” Brian looked back and forth between us.
“Tie,” I said.
“Yeah, right.” Brian punched Jack’s side. “Y’all stay here and let me get a beer. I’ll be right back.”
The three of us sat with cold Coronas and watched the remainder of the day descend into the edges of spartina and cord grass, lighting them like the tips of sparklers. Brian and Jack talked over each other, their words and laughter echoing across the porch.
I closed my eyes, leaned my head back on the rocking chair and disappeared into the warm haze of this place, of my brother and Jack Sullivan. I floated above them, beyond them, as their words blurred together in a benediction. Then it was quiet, the air still and hot like someone had wrapped a blanket around me. A thrumming noise echoed across the black night—my eyes jerked open.
Jack and Brian were gone—I was alone.
The warmth fell away from me like a waterfall. I jumped up, glanced around. They’d left me. Panic, the irrational sort that brings numb toes and tingling fingers, cold mist around the throat, overcame me. Abandoned. Alone: these words twisted across the porch like mist.
“Brian,” I called out, but my feet didn’t move.
“I’m right here.” He came up the side steps. “You woke up.”
“How long was I asleep?”
“A good hour,” he said, then pointed toward the driveway. “Jack just left.”
A place inside me, directly above my middle but below my heart, which had been filled since our encounter in the ballroom, emptied in one final rush of air.
I slumped down into the chair. “I can’t believe I fell asleep like that.”
“Sis?”
“Yeah?” I looked up.
“He said to give these to you.” Brian handed me my shoes and jacket. “He didn’t want to leave.”
“What?”
“He knew he should leave—and he did.”
I released a long breath. “All the things we should do. So many damn things we should do.” I stood. “I need a ride to my car at the club.”
“I think I can handle that,” he said, and wrapped his arm around me.
CHAPTER NINETEEN
The two weeks before the tournament—advance weeks—were so completely full that there was no room for si lence or for wondering about my life. Peyton was enthralled with the prospect of winning his hometown tournament. His anger at me that I hadn’t gone to the last tournament with him dissipated in his desire to win the Palmetto Pointe Open.
I sat in Charlotte’s passenger seat and stared out the windshield at the spring day—sunlight pierced through the air with cut-glass clarity. I slid my sunglasses over my eyes.
Charlotte turned down the radio. “Whatcha thinking about?”
“That I have no business going to meet this makeup artist when the tournament is this weekend.”
“You’re the one who made the appointment. Relax. You’ve trained Caroline well enough . . . it’s all under control. Of course it is of the utmost importance that you decide which shades of makeup to wear on your wedding day. Whether to use brown or black mascara, whether to use silver or blue on your eyelids.” Charlotte slapped the steering wheel and laughed. “I just crack myself up.”
“Please just take me back to work, Charlotte. Even you think this is a joke.”
“Old pal, I don’t think it’s a joke—I’m just trying to lighten the mood. You’re very sullen today.” She pouted her lips.
“I don’t know what is wrong with me . . . let’s talk about you. How’s your latest article about influential women in Palmetto Pointe coming along?”
Charlotte blew out a long breath. “I’ve worked my butt off on this article and they keep telling me I need to change the angle. I really hope that other newspapers, the bigger ones, pick it up. Wouldn’t it be nice to have my work . . . appreciated?”
“Of course it’s appreciated.”
“Yeah, now I’d just like it to spread beyond our humble town, you know? Maybe I just need to . . . move on.”
“What are you talking about?”
Charlotte pulled the car into a spot in front of MaryAnne’s Beauty Shop. “I’d love to get bigger jobs . . . bigger pay. I can’t stay here my whole life.”
“Why not? Why would you want to leave?”
“Don’t you ever feel like there must be more? You know, more out there than all we’ve ever known?”
I leaned against the passenger-side door. “This doesn’t sound like you at all. This isn’t all we’ve ever known. We went off to college . . . traveled. Maybe this is just the best we’ve ever known. It doesn’t have to be bigger or fancier to be better. It doesn’t have to be new and shiny . . . it could just be the simplest and first thing you loved that is the best. Maybe, Charlotte, you can run all over this world looking for something better when it was here all along.”
Charlotte smiled. “Whoa . . .” She held a palm up. “Who are you talking to?”
“What?”
“You,” she said and opened her car door, “are talking to yourself.”
I opened my own door, stepped out and slammed it shut, looked over the car top at Charlotte. “What do you mean?”
“You . . . you keep talking about finding the best thing, about how you’re in a better and newer place with Peyton. Like you searched the whole wide world for the ‘right’ man and you found him. Like he’s a prize you won in a damn cereal box. Like he’s a car that’s got all the right extras. I’ve never once heard you say you love him because he makes you weak in the knees, because he is kind and fun. I’m worried about you. I really am. I’ve watched you my whole life—always wanting to be loved and adored—which, by the way, has been infuriatingly easy for you.”
“Stop, Charlotte. You’re saying things you don’t mean. I think.” I paused. “I hope.”
She leaned on top of her car and stared over at me. “I’ve loved you my whole life, Kara. And I’ve watched you change during the past year. If you love Peyton, marry him, for God’s sake, just marry him. But stop talking about him like he’s a prize. He’s not. He’s a man. Only a man.”
Charlotte turned from me and I watched her walk toward the beauty shop. I followed with intense love for my best friend. I spoke behind her back. “You don’t marry someone just because he makes you weak in the knees.” But after I said it, a small thought wandered across my mind like a lost memory—Be careful what you believe.
When I’d settled into a chair, a white cloth wrapped around my neck, the makeup artist, Sally, leaned toward me. “Okay, now this is for a wedding, right?”
I nodded. “Yes, a wedding. I just need to decide on colors, then buy the right shades. I’ll do my own makeup that day.”
“Who ya’ marrying?” Sally pulled a box of eye shadow from a drawer. “Anyone from here?”
“Peyton Ellers,” I said, and lifted my face as she swathed concealer on my skin.
“Oh, cool,” she said. “I know him. He almost got engaged to my friend Rebecca. But she didn’t want the sports-traveling kind of guy.” Then she slapped her hand over her mouth, made a strangled noise. “Oh . . .”
I waved my hand as if I didn’t care, but nausea forced its way upward. “Oh, I know about that.”
Sally leaned back, removed her hand. “I am so sorry, that was so stupid. I’m always talking before I think. I’m such a moron. She said he was the nicest guy in the world. Really.”
“He is.” I smiled, then grasped the cell phone on my belt as if it were vibrating. I looked down. “Oh, Sally, I am so sorry. I’ve got to go now . . . can we reschedule this for next week?”
Charlotte had been twirling in circles in the styling chair next to me. She stopped, squinting at me.
Sally stood with a makeup brush in midair. “Oh, please don’t tell me you’re leaving because of what I said.”
I touched her arm. “No, I really am swamped at work and they’re beeping me. Thanks for your help. I’ll be back,” I lied.
Neither Charlotte nor I spoke for long moments on the drive back to work. Then she looked sideways at me. “Do you want to grab something to eat before you go back?”
“No.”
“Don’t be mad at me, Kara. I’m sorry for what I said. You’re confused and frustrated and sleepless. I know Peyton is a great guy, and maybe this is just prewedding jitters.”
“It is,” I said. “Just because I’m nervous about work and the wedding doesn’t mean I don’t think I’m doing the right thing.”
Charlotte pulled up in front of my office. “Okay, tell me one reason you love Peyton.”
“I’ll tell you ten, a hundred.” I pulled the visor mirror down, wiped off the makeup that Sally had plastered on my cheeks. “You want to hear them?”
“God, you’re in a terrible mood.”
“No. I’m. Not.”
Charlotte held her hands up in the air. “Okay, go ahead.”
“I loved Jack when I was fourteen years old—adolescent angst. Nothing more. Nothing less. I love Peyton because . . .” And then I couldn’t find the answer, couldn’t find the why until I stared at Charlotte, at my friend I’d known my entire life. “Because when I met Peyton, he reminded me of Jack.”
“Well, I can tell you one thing, girlfriend—I don’t know a lot about love, but I do know that no man wants to be loved because he reminds a woman of someone else.”
“But then I came to love Peyton because he is . . . Peyton. Kind and good and funny, and he loves me . . . .”
“And?”
“And...”
“Everything you’ve ever wanted?” she asked.
Now tears came with my frustration. “Charlotte, what is so wrong, so damn wrong about marrying the man who is everything you’ve ever wanted?”
“Nothing at all.”
“Between you and Maeve, I’m going to lose my mind. It’s like a ‘don’t let Kara marry Peyton’ conspiracy. I’ve got to go to work. I can’t just walk around thinking about Maeve and Peyton and Jack. This is getting insane.”
“Did he tell you about Rebecca?”
I started to open the car door, glanced over my shoulder. “What?”
“The girl Sally talked about while she tried to make you look like Tammy Faye Bakker?”
I laughed. “Guess I won’t be returning like I promised. And, no, he hasn’t told me about every single old girlfriend, just like I haven’t told him about every single old boyfriend. Now go back to work on that article so you can leave this small town and make your way in the big world.” I stepped out of the car and blew Charlotte a kiss, then walked toward the job that would fill the remainder of the day, erase the questions Charlotte had thrown at me.
CHAPTER TWENTY
The tree bark scratched my back as I leaned against the live oak, attempting to shield myself from the torrential downpour. The rain had come to the tournament without warning: my fault according to Frieda. The umbrella-free crowd stood disheveled in the onslaught from what appeared to be a solid gray cloud mass hovering over the eighteenth green, and nowhere else.
My attempts at staying dry were futile. My hair was plastered to the side of my head, my peach silk shirt clung to my body.
Peyton and Phil Mickelson came over the hill to the cheers of the wet crowd. I’d left the party preparations in the main clubhouse ballroom to watch my fiancé. The Unknown Souls had been setting up on the stage, and I had watched in my white-and-peach pinstriped suit, until I’d finally handed the responsibility over to Caroline.
Peyton came over the hill; I shifted from one foot to the other, scooted farther back under the tree, where it would leave a smudge of bark and dirt on my suit. A gust of fresh wind, smelling of warm sea and a passing shrimp trawler, seeped under my wet clothes. I skimmed water off my face and focused on Peyton as he walked toward us. He lifted his head, scanned the crowd. I stepped from behind a branch and waved with two fingers.
The crowd was six or seven people deep along the sidelines behind the rope and down the entire length of the fairway. Dad, Deirdre, and Brian waved at me from the first row.
Phil lined up for a twenty-four-foot putt in the pouring rain. He squatted and squinted at the water, then stopped and tapped the ball. It rolled, then came to an abrupt halt in front of the hole, as if someone had held out a hand. The crowd released a collective groan; Phil grimaced.
If Peyton made this putt, an easy ten-footer on his home course, he’d win the tournament. I held my breath as he lined the ball up with assurance. I’d seen him do it a hundred times; recognized his stance when he knew he’d won something: an argument, a tournament, my heart.
He wiped the rain from his eyes and tapped the ball. It rolled toward the hole; the crowd held its breath. The ball hit a patch of standing water and veered to the right, circled the hole and stopped two inches away. The crowd groaned; a few released yelps. Peyton glanced up and looked directly at me. I formed my mouth into an expression of empathy: lips pouted, brows pulled together.
He exhaled and putted the ball in, picked it up and walked toward the golf official. It would now be a sudden-death playoff: playing the eighteenth hole again, where the winner of the hole would win the tournament.
As suddenly as it had arrived, the rain stopped and the sky opened up to a wide blue expanse. I lifted my face, pushed my hair back. I crouched under the tape and went to stand with my family. Daddy put an arm around me. “He’ll pull this off now, Kara. You just watch.”
I whispered, “I hope so.”
Sunlight poured through the wet leaves, splintered off the water at the end of the green as though the light itself were wet. After a solid drive, Peyton stood in the fairway of the par-five hole and slammed the ball; it landed just off the green in the low rough—a beautifully executed shot for a possible eagle.
Phil stepped up and attempted the same shot, but his ball landed in the sand trap on the left side of the green. The crowd gasped.
I stepped forward, leaned over the rope. Peyton’s mouth was pinched together, his eyebrows forced down, his jaw set.
He lined up and hit a chip shot. The ball dropped on the green and rolled toward the hole, then stopped five feet short. The crowd seemed to deflate; this was supposed to be the shot to win, the shot on the front page of tomorrow’s sports section. Peyton could still drop his putt for a birdie.
One of two things could happen now: Phil could hit out of the sand and putt for a birdie and another sudden death, or he could hit a miracle shot from the sand trap to the hole—which is exactly what he did. The crowed cheered, not so much for who won, but for how he’d won. Either way, Peyton seemed to shrink, as though each cheer for his rival made him less.
I scooted under the tape, reached Peyton’s side, and stood on my toes and kissed him. I whispered in his ear, “I love you. Good sportsmanship now, they’re watching.”
An uneven smile spread across his face, and he wrapped his arm around me, then walked us
both toward the clubhouse, waving and offering thanks to his fans.
When we reached the men’s locker room, Peyton released me, stared at me and opened his mouth to speak, but nothing came out.
“What?” I said.
A news crew lunged toward us, shoved a camera in Peyton’s face. “Peyton—ESPN here, can you give us a statement? What do you think happened out there?”
“They’re watching,” I mumbled as I walked away, headed out to the back patio to watch the interview on the large-screen TV with the crowd. Peyton’s face filled the screen. “It’s a tough loss, but that shot Phil made from the trap was one of the best I’ve ever seen. He deserved to win with a shot like that.”
A voice came from behind me. “I’m sorry—tough break.”
I turned to Jack Sullivan, nodded at him. “Yeah, this stinks. He really wanted to win this one.”
“You do belong here, Kara.” Jack leaned back on his heels. His eyes hid behind sunglasses so I couldn’t see the implications behind the words.
“What?” I stepped back.
“You’ve found your place, you know that. You’ve built a great life for yourself. You’re surrounded by family and friends and people who love you—a lot. This is the life you should have, the life you were made for.”
I nodded.
He touched my cheek, then withdrew his hand. “I’ve got to go help the band . . . see you around.”
“Yeah,” I said, “see you around.”
Jack turned to walk away, but I didn’t watch; I watched the TV screen, where Peyton smiled and answered questions. “They’re watching,” I said to the TV, to Peyton. “They’re watching.”
The room thrummed with the beat of the guitar and drums, to Jimmy’s baritone voice. Tables were spread in an oval with a dance floor in the middle. Palm fronds stood in vases with sand and starfish spread around the center of each table. Twinkling lights spread at even quarter-inch intervals on potted palm trees flickered around the room. I’d picked out the exact same trees for my wedding reception, and I loved how they looked in the urns.
Patti Callahan Henry Page 20
