Where the River Runs

by Patti Callahan Henry

Water filled my ear canal, dizziness rolled over my body, and I curled into a ball, sank into the water. I twirled under the surface, drifted. Silence, as familiar as the smoke that surrounded me the last time Danny held me over his shoulder, surrounded me. I had fallen into that silence fighting, kicking, gasping for breath. This time I let it enfold me willingly. But it wasn’t like hiding under the broken palmetto tree; here I couldn’t see him and I couldn’t feel him. Danny was gone.

  I swam back and reached the shore and the two men staring at me like I needed serious medical attention. Tim shook his head, glanced at Revvy. “Told you . . . crazy as a loon.”

  Revvy threw his head back and laughed, then looked at me. “Thought you might’ve needed some help. . . . He told me you were fine.”

  “I’m just . . .” I cleared my throat. “Fine, just fine.”

  Tim reached for me, but I held up my hand. “Really.”

  Revvy smiled, walked back to the dense forest. “I’m gonna check on a couple things. We’ll leave in a few minutes.”

  Tim handed me my shoes. “You know when you asked me if I missed Danny . . . that first day you saw me?” I said.

  “Yes.”

  “I told you I didn’t think about him. But I do miss him, every single day, and I just realized it. But you know what I miss more? Who I was with him. I miss the me with Danny.” I bent over with the weight of all I had hidden even from myself.

  Tim let out a breath with a groan. “Okay, this is probably why I’m divorced. . . . I’m terrible at this stuff. I want to say something really profound for you, but I’m sitting here like a moron.”

  I laughed. “God, you could always make me laugh.”

  “That’s worth something, right?”

  “Everything.” I leaned into his shoulder, not wanting this moment of contentment to end. Even if the salt water was starting to itch my head, even if mascara ran down my face, and my shirt stuck to the tummy I never could get flat again, I wanted to stay at the shore’s edge.

  Revvy’s voice came over the trees. “Time to get out of here . . . tide is going out.”

  Tim spoke low and soft. “You will not tell anyone what you told me, Meridy. It doesn’t matter anymore and you didn’t do anything wrong.”

  The sound of broken branches and crunching earth came from behind us. Then Revvy stood next to us. “Y’all ready?”

  Tim and I looked at each other. “Ever,” he said.

  I drove home sitting on a towel from the back of Tim’s construction truck. I crossed my fingers that Mother wouldn’t be home to witness my state of disarray. It didn’t work—she stood at the back door and watched me walk toward the house with her nose screwed up like she smelled something dead.

  “Meridy McFadden, what have you been doing?”

  “Mother, it’s Dresden and I’ve been swimming in the ocean.”

  “In your clothes?” Mother rolled her eyes, slammed the back door. I stared at the closed door, and then threw it open and walked into the kitchen. “Mother?” I called out.

  She turned. “Yes?”

  “Let’s sit and talk.”

  “Meridy, right now your hair is dripping salt water all over the heart-of-pine floors.”

  “Okay, Mother. I’m going to take a shower. Then I was wondering if maybe we could make one of those gorgeous shell lamps we used to do together. I’ve collected an entire basket of white shells and I thought . . .” It seemed very important to once again establish common ground with Mother—as if it were the only thing I’d come to do.

  “I haven’t made one of those in . . . years.” Mother stared out the window.

  “Well, good. Let’s do one today.” I walked out of the kitchen before she could argue.

  When I returned, dressed in a floral skirt and white T-shirt with pink rickrack trim, Mother still stood in the same spot gazing out the window. She looked so alone and suddenly old. My heart skipped in my chest; my hand fluttered to my throat. She was a woman living alone in a house where she’d once raised a family, been married to a vibrant man. Now I saw why she spent so much time away from home doing busywork.

  I hugged her, although she stood rigid. “Mother, it must get too quiet here sometimes.”

  Her face fell. “Oh, oh.” Her hand quivered in the air, landed on her middle. She shrugged off my arm.

  “I’m glad I’m here to spend some time with you,” I said.

  With her back turned, Mother said, “Where’s that basket of shells?”

  I reached into the walk-in pantry and pulled out the sweetgrass basket Tulu had given me, which now stored the shells I’d been collecting on my morning walks. “I saw a lampstand in the shed last week. I’ll go get it.” I placed the basket on the kitchen table.

  Mother nodded and I let the screen door swing closed behind me.

  When I returned she had spread out the shells, set out newspaper and two hot-glue guns. I smiled. “This looks like old times. . . . I used to love the way the hot glue stuck to my fingers, the way the lamp would look all lumpy; then all of a sudden it would be beautiful when I stepped back from it.”

  Mother looked up at me. “You used to love doing this?”

  I tilted my head. “Yes.”

  “I don’t remember that. . . .”

  “I do.” I almost hugged her again.

  We sat down and began to work without speaking. Mother hummed. I lifted up a white shell and shot glue onto the convex portion. The odor of hot glue filled my nose, replacing the sting of salt water. At length Mother asked me where I’d been all day.

  “I went to Oystertip Island . . . where they found Danny’s body all those years ago.”

  “Why did you do that?” Mother laid down her gun, her shells. “Why would you do that?”

  “Well, I didn’t know I was going at first—I probably wouldn’t have. Tim took me. But I needed it, Mother. It was important and I’m glad I went.”

  I felt warm inside—my hair wet, my face free of makeup, my hands on the shells.

  “That Tim is nothing but trouble.”

  I laughed. “Trouble?”

  “Yes. He’s always gotten you in so much trouble.”

  “I got myself in trouble, Mother.”

  “Yes, you did.”

  “Didn’t you get in trouble ever, your entire childhood?”

  Mother evaded the question. Instead she picked up a large shell, turned it over. “You should have left this one on the beach. It’s cracked.”

  “Okay, cracked shells stay on the beach. . . . You didn’t answer my question.”

  Mother squeezed the shell and it broke beneath her frail fingers; she opened her palm and let the pieces tumble to the kitchen table. “You don’t want to know about my childhood.”

  “You’ve got to be kidding. I’d love to know about your childhood.” I stood and swept the broken shell pieces into my palm, then walked to the trash can and threw them away. When I turned back to the kitchen table, Mother stared right at me.

  “You know how I grew up, Meridy. Living on a farm is hard work.” An edge of bitterness tainted her words. Mother turned away and spoke to the far wall. “I didn’t have time to get in trouble. Dad could barely keep the farm going and we all worked the land. Mom cleaned houses for the rich folk in town. I helped her. The Donnelly family—who we cleaned for—took pity on me and paid for my college education when they found out how high my grades were and how Mom and Dad could never afford to send me to college.” She spoke fast, clipped.

  “Mother . . . how come I never knew about the Donnellys? I never knew things were so hard. I’m sorry.”

  “I don’t need your pity, Meridy. I’m telling you this because you asked.” Her voice softened. “I met your daddy in college and I was lucky he fell in love with me. All the girls wanted him. . . . He was quite the catch.”

  “I’m sure.”

  “And I wanted to make sure his children and our family would never have the kind of hard life I grew up with, that no one in Seaboro would ever know t
hat Dewey McFadden married poor.”

  “You are not poor, Mother.”

  “I don’t need you telling me what I am or am not.” She tapped her forefinger on the table, accenting each word. “I’m telling you what I was.”

  “But . . . we’re always part of who we . . . were, aren’t we?”

  “No. We are not. You’re not.”

  “What does that mean?” I peeled some glue off my finger and stuck a shell below the one Mother had just placed.

  “Look at you now. You have this great life with this nice man and a nice son in a gorgeous house . . . and you were wild as they come.”

  “I was not that wild. Please stop saying that.”

  “Yes, you were.”

  “Did I ruin that reputation you were trying to build?” Although I knew the words were harsh, I said them softly across the table.

  Her head snapped up, her mouth opened and closed. “Don’t you judge me, young lady. I was trying to make a good life for your daddy, keep you girls in line.” She stuck a shell a little too hard against the base.

  She had been trying to build a life for her family, not ruin my good times in childhood. The difference between these two motivations now seemed as stark and obvious as day against night. “Mother,” I said in a whisper, “thank you for telling me. I’d love to know more about those days.”

  She nodded and glued. “There’s nothing else to know.”

  There wasn’t a way to tell this woman, who had spent her entire life building and shouldering a reputation and image as protection, my responsibility for the Keeper’s Cottage ruin.

  When the lamp was finished, she picked it up and placed it on the counter. “Well, well, that might be one of the prettiest lamps I’ve ever done.” She glanced over at me. “We’ve done. You can take it back to Atlanta for that fancy sitting room you have in your bedroom.”

  I smiled. “It’s nice. Thanks, Mother.”

  She raised her eyebrows. “Oh, I forgot to tell you. I called Mr. Cragg this morning at the historical society and told him about your art festival idea.”

  “You did?” I jumped up from the table. “What’d he say?”

  “He said it sounded like a mighty good idea and that he’d love for you to come share it with the society.”

  “Really?”

  She nodded. “Yes.”

  “You did that for me?”

  Mother screwed her face up in a question mark. “For you? I thought you wanted to do this for the cottage and Seaboro.”

  I blushed. “I do . . . but thank you for talking to Mr. Cragg. Thank you, Mother. What about Charlotte Hamlon?”

  “Ah, just ignore her naysayer doom. We all do.”

  “Will you go with me?” I grabbed Mother’s hand.

  She smiled. “If you want me to.”

  “I do. I do.” I hugged her.

  “Well, I told Mr. Cragg you’d probably still be here. I wasn’t really sure when you were going home.” She stared at me.

  “I don’t know either. I need to talk to Tulu at least one more time. I’ll call Beau at home this evening and see what his schedule is. Maybe he can come here. . . . I’ve only been gone a few days.”

  Mother nodded and left me alone in the kitchen to admire the lamp we’d created with the shells I’d collected. I ran my hand over this art we’d completed together—over the gift she had just given me that was more than this lamp. She’d handed me a hidden piece of who she was and the reasons why she cared about the things she did—why she was the mother she was with me.

  I couldn’t imagine how hard it must have been to prove herself worthy at all times. I took a sharp breath—yes, I could; I was doing the same thing.

  I turned and caught a wavy reflection of myself in the bubbled-glass cabinet holding the family china; I looked a disorganized mess with limp hair, no makeup and sloppy clothes. I looked . . . eighteen.

  I ambled up the stairs to my bedroom. I grabbed the curriculum folder and began to organize it. I needed to get information on stories, medicine, sweetgrass baskets and burial customs. Yet after a minute I set the folder aside. I squatted down and reached underneath my childhood bed for the wooden box Tulu had returned to me. I ran my fingers over the dolphin, under the rusted hinges, and placed it back under the bed. I didn’t need to know what my dreams and goals were then. I needed to figure out what they were now.

  The phone in Mother’s library stared at me with accusing black-numbered eyes. I picked up the handset and dialed my home phone number with a shaking finger. How would I tell Beau about the fire? A jumbled mess of thoughts, about not understanding why the star moved away from the moon every night, the truth of the fire, a desperate need to run away and a rising longing that went along with remembering who I’d been, filled my head. I took the portable handset into the drawing room and curled into the plush green chair I’d once sat in for hours reading The Secret Garden over and over.

  I glanced at the grandfather clock against the wall while the phone rang—seven p.m. Then Beau’s voice came alive over the phone and into the room; I almost saw him standing in our kitchen next to the family desk.

  “Hey . . .” I stumbled into my hello.

  “Hey, sweetie. How’s it going down there in the life of luxury?” He laughed.

  I didn’t. “Okay . . . how about there?”

  “Well, the house is empty as hell and I’m a little sick of eating out . . . but everything’s fine.”

  “Anything new with the trial?”

  “Damn, they’re killing me. I’m so sorry you’ve had trouble catching up with me. We’re in meetings all day, then all evening, and when I get home I don’t want to wake you or your mother by calling so late. It’ll be worth it when it’s over. . . . But surely you don’t want to hear about my work. Are you almost done with that curriculum?”

  “I’m making progress.”

  “When are you thinking you’ll be home? It is so terrible here without you. Nothing gets done.”

  Did he miss me or what I did for him? “Beau . . .”

  “Yes?” The clatter of a glass, the slamming of the refrigerator door, came through the line.

  “You know those forsythia bushes behind the house?” I said.

  “Yes.”

  “When I left two weeks ago, I was looking at them and they were climbing over the back fence. I was looking at them and they’re all green now . . . and I never even noticed them turn yellow in the spring.”

  “Okay . . .” He coughed. “What’s wrong? Is something wrong with your mother or the house?”

  “Beau, I don’t know what’s wrong. I just don’t know if we’ve noticed anything in our lives in a very, very long time.”

  “I really don’t have any idea what you’re talking about,” he said in between blank spots of sound that I recognized as the call-waiting on our home phone. “Listen, someone’s trying to call in. . . . Can you hold on while I make sure it’s not B.J.?”

  “Sure.” I leaned back against the chair cushions.

  He came back on the line, his voice tight, controlled. “Meridy, Ashley is on the other line—some important news on the case. I have got to go. . . . I miss you.”

  “Ashley?”

  “You know—the junior partner . . .”

  “I know, Beau. The tall blonde who’s there to take care of things.”

  “What is that supposed to mean? This is work.”

  “I know it is.”

  “Meridy, I’ve got to go. . . . I love you.”

  “You too, Beau. You too.”

  I pushed END and dropped the phone in my lap; the hope of some connection and communication sank into the darker places of my heart and the anger rose. As I probed and discovered the girl I used to be, I wondered: Was Beau finding a new place for himself? I turned away from the emotion that had no grounds for arriving; Beau hadn’t done anything wrong. I had no right to be mad at him. I leaned back against the chair, closed my eyes.

  I curled my legs beneath me and let sleep
wash over me; it was better than the wondering and disillusionment that came with my first attempt at some real talk with Beau in as long as I could remember.

  The dream came before I was fully asleep. I wandered through a house, or maybe it was a cottage, but I did know it was mine. I was looking for something—but I wasn’t sure what. I’d know when I found it. The rooms were clean, the hardwood floors were polished, and the paint was unmarred. I flowed from empty room to empty room, opening doors, then shutting them again. I stood in a long hallway, framed photographs lining the wall with faces I might have recognized, but I wasn’t quite sure. Then I remembered—the large room at the end of the hall where I’d stuffed everything. I ran down the hall, opened the door at the end and stared into a room crammed to capacity with furniture, boxes, paper and pictures. I reached to pull down a wooden box when a long vibrating ringing sound caused me to drop the box, jump.

  I woke abruptly, jumped up from the chair in the drawing room, the phone tumbling to the ground. I grabbed it from the floor and pushed the ON button. “Hello . . .”

  “Hey there, little sister, how’s it going in Seaboro?”

  “Sissy?”

  “Sounds like I woke you up. . . . It’s seven thirty in the evening, Meridy. What’s up with that?”

  “You didn’t wake me up. . . . How are you? How are Annie and Amanda?”

  “Good, great. Guess what? Penn just bought me a new Jaguar.”

  “That’s fabulous, Sissy. I know you’ve always wanted one.”

  “Yep. So, how’s Mom? You taking care of her while you’re there?” Somehow Sissy had managed to move from Mother to Mom in our older years—I’d never made the transition.

  “Mother doesn’t need to be taken care of. There are more people here taking care of things . . . and she’s busier than any woman I’ve ever seen. She’s never home.”

  “You could still help, take her out or something.”

  “Trust me, Sissy. Mother does not want me taking her out.”

  Sissy’s silence was more agreement than I’d hoped for. “Did you call for a reason?” I asked, rubbed my temples and cursed the phone.

  “Just calling to tell Mom about the new car. Penn and I thought we might come and visit in the next week or so . . . but I wanted to make sure I wasn’t intruding on your time with Mom.”