by Lyla Payne
“Let’s not think about tomorrow, then. Let’s talk about right now,” I told this boy in the tattered clothes, this boy with a smile that could light up the whole lowcountry if people only took the time to see it. I scooted closer, turning my face up to his with a smile that came from a new part of me—a womanly part, one that wanted things I didn’t understand and couldn’t name, but James saw it.
He sucked in a quick breath, his cheeks flushing. His silky, dark eyes clung to my face, hungry, and one hand lifted to cup my cheek, the pad of his thumb running along my lower lip.
A thrill ran through me over and over, like a strike of lightning or that moment you get away with filching a hot bit of bread and honey without Lillie noticing. I struggled to breathe. We shouldn’t have been touching. We shouldn’t have been sitting that close. We shouldn’t have become friends at all, and it was unnatural, according to most folks, for our feelings to have stretched beyond that.
But they had, long ago. My feelings for James have always been huge, too big to even think about holding on to or tying down—they fly where they wish, but they’re always wrapped tight around the two of us.
But today—oh, today! I can still feel the press of his lips against mine, the glorious meeting of our mouths in a way my body and his seemed to agree upon and understand. They still feel swollen and hot with the wonder of it all. I can’t wait to do it again and again and again. He is my future, he must be. A life without him would be too awful to bear, and I think—I hope—that Mama and Papa wish for me to be happy.
At any rate, they have Charles Jr. and Bessie to take over the Hall. If they won’t give me their blessing, at least it will not break their hearts when I leave.
I have to blow out the candle before Bessie comes in to bed. She’s been out in the parlor reading for hours, but I hear her shuffling around now. She mustn’t find out about James or about my plans. No one can, not before it is too late for them to stop me from leaving. It is already too late to put a halt to my loving him. I exalt in the fact that nothing can do that, not in this world or the next.
I put down the journal with tears in my eyes, touched by Charlotta’s youth and passion, and devastated by the benefit of my hindsight. Even without knowing what parted them in the end—whether it was the pregnancy, the baby, her father, his mother, or a combination of the whole mess—I know her statement about nothing in the world being able to put a stop to her love will not turn out to be true. Still, it’s terribly romantic.
And as all truly romantic stories are, horribly sad at the same time.
I need to know what happened to the two of them. If Charlotta’s journals end in 1905, Mama Lottie had likely still been living. Her ghost, at least the one that appeared as a grown woman, seemed to be well into her sixties. If Charlotta couldn’t tell me what had become of James, perhaps Mama Lottie could.
If I ever see her again. And if she’s willing to divulge painful family secrets to a strange woman she doesn’t seem to like all that much.
It’s hard to say which is the bigger “if.”
A knock on the front door startles me out of the past and dumps me in the present, which feels dreary and monotonous after Charlotta’s lush descriptions. I wipe my cheeks on a dishtowel before letting Leo, who’s laden with a couple of paper bags and a pizza box, back into the house, but he gives me a look anyway.
“Good Lord, Graciela. You know those people are already dead, right? Isn’t your grams the one who used to get on people for cryin’ at funerals?” He thinks for a moment, going ahead of me into the kitchen to set down his burdens. “Only reason to bawl over the dead is if ya think they’re dancin’ with the devil. And even then, at least they’re still dancin’. Was that it?”
The memory of Grams and her way with words makes me crack a smile. I nod, lifting up the pizza box lid to find half-pepperoni and half-sausage. Half my favorite, half Leo’s. My smile grows. We might only have pizza from a gas station in Heron Creek, but that doesn’t mean it’s not damn good pizza. The only thing that would make it taste better is if they started delivering.
Leo snatches two giant pieces of sausage, and I put a slice of pepperoni on a plate, then hand one to him, even though his first slice is already gone. “Coke?”
“Sure.”
“Kind?” I ask, following the ridiculous custom of having to verify what sort of ‘coke’ a person wants in the South. In Iowa, it’s all pop.
“Dr. Pepper?” Leo requests, not missing a beat.
“Of course. Only diet, though, because pregnant women.”
He makes a face but takes the can from me anyway. “So what were you reading that has you so verklempt?”
“Oh, nothing. Just silly girl stuff.”
“Feelings.” He gives an exaggerated shudder and ducks away from my swat. “I’m going to go seal up your windows and change the filter on the furnace.” Leo wipes his mouth and dumps his plate in the sink, then grabs another slice for the road.
“Okay.”
I down a second slice and clean the plates, then put out some hamburger meat for dinner. Maybe we can make spaghetti when Amelia gets home.
The journals wait for me on the table, and I’ve lost myself for about three minutes into a different, more recent one when the sound of voices in the front hall distracts me.
A glance at my watch tells me time has slipped away. Saturdays are short at the library, and Mr. Freedman often takes pity on Amelia and lets her off early when she’s alone.
She’s not by herself now, though, and by the sound of it, I’m not going to enjoy the company she’s brought along with her.
Brick Drayton, for all his faults, has been good to my cousin. I repeat these words a couple of times to myself and manage to plaster on a smile by the time the two of them pop into the kitchen, laughing. They stop when they see me but can’t wipe the smiles off their faces, and underneath the happiness flows a river of relief. It’s as though there’s something they get out of being together that can’t be found elsewhere in their lives. Jealousy spikes in my blood. It’s unfair to want to be the one who’s there for Millie, and I don’t even mean it.
Like Charlotta and her description of her first kiss with James, it’s as though my body reacts without asking permission from my good sense. I don’t begrudge either of them happiness, honestly. It’s just awfully hard to sit and watch it when my own happiness, with a different Drayton, perches on a precarious ledge.
“Oh, hi, Grace.” Amelia’s eyes trail to the table, then narrow with interest. “Have you been reading? Did you find out anything?”
“Nothing we can use, I don’t think.” I do my best to keep the sadness off my face. It’s the last thing either of them needs. “Hi, Brick.”
“Graciela.”
“I ran into Brick at the library. He says he has some stuff to tell us about the Middletons so I figured we might as well hear it at the same time.” Her gaze lands on the pizza. “Oooh, pizza!”
She flips up the lid and then frowns. “Who’s the sausage for?”
“Leo brought it. He’s fixing some of the windows that are leaking.”
“That is so sweet. I’ve been half-frozen the last three mornings.”
“You could have said something to me,” Brick offers, sounding slightly offended. The look he shoots my direction leaves me blushing, as though he’s wondering if I’m finding a way to get over his brother so soon.
Amelia laughs, reaching out to put a hand on his forearm as though they’ve been friends for years. “Brick, honey, please. You’re good at so many things, but I have a hard time imagining you’re very handy.”
“I could have tried,” he grumbles, tossing his coat onto the back of a chair and loosening his tie.
I catch myself smirking at the idea of Brick, or any of the Draytons I’ve met, with dirt under their fingernails. Or in a hardware store.
Brick glimpses my amusement and rolls his eyes. “Fine, gang up on me. I’ll defer to Leo in this situation. But only this one.�
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“We can duke it out in the others later,” Leo comments, striding into the kitchen and straight to the sink to wash his hands. “The windows aren’t leaking around the casements anymore, but you guys really should think about replacing them sooner rather than later.”
“What about the furnace?” I ask.
He shrugs, drying his hands and eyeing the last piece of sausage pizza. “I’d say you’ve got a couple of years. No more.”
“Good thing we’re going to Charleston this weekend, huh, Grace?” Amelia’s tone suggests a joke, but she’s not smiling.
Neither of us are looking forward to spending time with her mother, and having to ask Amelia’s parents for a loan to fix up the house makes it even worse. Still, we can’t freeze to death all winter, and since the house belongs to Aunt Karen and Uncle Wally, keeping it up is technically their responsibility. We’re just renters.
Who aren’t paying rent, but now is not the time to split hairs.
Leo takes the last slice of pizza and sits down at the table with Brick. They nod at each other, Brick looking as though he’s not sure he wants to be on kidding-around terms with Leo, and Leo oblivious to the fact that his charm does not, in fact, work on everyone. As usual, on both counts.
“Gracie says you’re going to try to get the Middletons to cough up some dirt we can use to cover up me and Mel’s—” Leo pauses “—indiscretions.”
Brick raises his eyebrows, shooting daggers my direction. I shrug. I didn’t know his helping was a secret, and it’s not like Leo’s some stranger off the street. He’s part of this, too.
“If by indiscretions you mean getting caught breaking into the house of a US Senator, then yes.”
“That’s what I mean,” Leo clarifies, refusing to rise to Brick’s bait.
My old friend is something of an expert on handling difficult people. He cut his teeth on his mother and siblings, then faced off with me for a decade. Brick’s good, but not that good.
“Are you going to tell us or what?” I ask, interrupting for everyone’s sake. The last thing we need is a pissing match in the kitchen. Cleaning is the worst.
“We’re waiting for Mel,” Amelia says around a bite of pizza. “I called her, too.”
As though on cue, the front door opens and closes.
“Where are you people?” Mel’s Tinkerbell voice is unmistakable, and the mood in the room lightens because of it.
Which is quite the feat, considering Mel’s been arrested for snooping through confidential files and sharing them with us, landing her in just as much trouble as Leo and me.
“We’re in the kitchen,” Amelia replies, though the effort proves unnecessary when Mel appears before the last word leaves her lips, her three-year-old son, Grant, trailing behind her.
Even though Millie’s due date is almost a full month ahead of Mel’s, they’re about the same size. Something about second pregnancies and stretched out bodies, I don’t know. I try not to listen in case I ever have to decide whether to get pregnant one day. That’s one instance where the less you know, the better.
The sight of Mel stuffs a wet lump in my throat. I can’t stop myself from being overdramatic and fling my arms around her neck, hugging her as tight as I can with her girth between us. It’s so much better than the bars of the jail cell that had separated us the last time we were together. Grant peers up at me from behind her leg, two fingers in his mouth and slobber trailing down his hand. His eyes are curious, and bright, and his mother’s eyes.
My heart clenches. What would Will do without Mel? How could Grant, and baby Mary, manage without a mother? We have to fix this, all of it, or the curse on the Draytons will have competition for the worst thing I’ve ever done.
“Gracie, for heaven’s sake, you’re choking the life out of me. Let go.” Mel pats my arm, the kindness on her pixie features wiping away the sternness of her words. She shoots a pointed look toward her son and blinks away tears.
I get the message: No wailing and drama in front of the kid. We have to keep it together.
I’ve been faking it for the last several months, so I guess I can pretend to be a normal adult for another couple of weeks. After we figure out the cases against Leo and Mel, and I make sure Mama Lottie has cured Amelia and me of the Anne Bonny curse, I’m going to spend a week in my room and take only liquid meals. There’s been no time to feel sorry for myself about Beau, about how things have gone south so fast, and I deserve it. I deserve to wallow.
“Fine,” I say to Mel, plastering on a goofy smile and making a face at Grant. He giggles, and for a minute, I feel like a superhero. “Brick has something to tell us.”
Mel bends down and hands her bag to her son. “Sweetie, there’s a table in the living room where you can do your coloring, okay? Make something for Daddy.”
He grabs the bag and runs off, and a moment later the sound of crayons hitting the glass top of the coffee table finds its way into the kitchen.
Mel straightens up, with some effort, and holds up her hands. “I’ll clean it up, I swear.”
“Mel, Grace lives here, remember?” Millie says. “She won’t be able to tell a three-year-old’s mess from her own.”
I give my cousin the finger and turn to Brick, standing so that the pregnant ladies can both have seats, which they sink into without protest. Both Leo and Brick shoot to their feet and offer me their chairs. I take Leo’s, glad for the hundredth time to be back in the South where my soul belongs. Where I’ve started to believe I can belong, even with everything I’ve lost—Grams, Gramps, my mother, the idea that I knew my mother. Beau.
One look at Amelia reminds me of the things I’ve gained, too. Her friendship and presence in my life again is a gift. In a few short weeks, we’ll add a baby to the mix. Mel and Will, Leo… I had been away, and living without them, for so long, but I hadn’t realized how big the holes they’d left really were until they were filling them up again.
The good Lord giveth and the good Lord taketh away.
Another of Grams’s favorite sayings, and one that bothers me, in retrospect. It seems like an awfully arbitrary system. I wonder what Charlotta and her religious musings would make of that. Maybe we both have good reasons to be doubtful.
“Brick had a meeting with the Middletons about your cases,” my cousin starts, wiggling in her seat. She nods at Brick, encouraging him.
For his part, he appears grim. A little bit like he’d rather be anywhere but here, and not at all as he’d been with Millie a few minutes before. It’s as though the rest of us take a toll on him. He gazes back at Amelia for a moment, and I wonder if he’s wondering if she’s worth the headache.
If so, he’ll decide she is. People always do, because she is.
She and Brick obviously already discussed all of this, despite what Millie said about “running into” him at the library and deciding to bring him here so we could all hear his news at once. My teeth find my bottom lip, worrying at the skin. Amelia is a grown woman, and it’s her choice who she decides to let into her life. It’s just that, since we’re living together, she’s also letting him into mine.
You’d have less of an issue with Brick if Beau were at your side right now, the more enthusiastic of my devils sneers.
You probably would have even thought it was fun, dating brothers, his twin adds, doing a little jig on my left shoulder.
They’re right. Seeing Brick and Amelia together, at the bright beginning of something, makes my eyes burn with regret. Thinking about the fact that Mel will go home to Will, cuddle up next to him, and let him convince her that everything is going to be okay fills me with longing.
They don’t hide things from the men who care about them, the right-shoulder devil continues.
Shut up.
They do, but only because Brick finally starts talking, pulling my focus from my own addled brain.
“They agreed to meet with Birdie and me in a couple of days to give us a verbal list of anything that could have been found in their house
or files at the accountant’s office that could be used against them in this case.” He gives Mel a pointed look. “Other than the fact that they’re hiding money in offshore accounts. Nothing you obtained in what amounts to theft or an illegal search is admissible in court.”
I wave a hand. “We know that. Amelia’s attorney said as much before her custody hearing.”
“Right, but now you’ve insulted them and you’ve forced them to show a losing hand in a very public way.” Brick pauses, and if it’s for dramatic effect, it’s working. “They’re not the kind of people you want to piss off.”
“Well, it’s too late for that, and besides, maybe it’s time they learned what happens when you get on the wrong side of the Harpers.” Amelia lifts her chin, staring defiantly into Brick’s eyes. There’s a pop and a sizzle about her when he’s around that she struggles to hold on to when he’s not, but with every spark of her old personality showing itself, I believe more and more that it could stay.
And it makes me like Brick Drayton, damn him. Or at least, grit my teeth and tolerate his presence. For Amelia. That’s what all this is for, what everything is for—her and Jack.
“You really think they’ll tell you anything?” Mel asks, eyeing my cousin with curiosity. Her gaze slides back to Brick but doesn’t change much. She hasn’t figured them out, either, which is interesting. I know she and Millie talk quite a bit, and I figured they chat about more than just baby stuff. Maybe I’m wrong, but I wish Amelia would confide in someone about her friendship—or whatever it is—with Brick. It’s obvious she doesn’t feel as though the subject is safe to bring up with me, and hadn’t even before things with Beau and me had gone south. Hopefully just for the winter.
“They’ll tell us. They’re refusing to write it down, but they know the best way to build a defense is to be prepared to head off any unexpected accusations. I don’t know if there’s going to be anything we can use, though. We’ll have to wait and see.”
I have my own reservations as to whether or not the Middletons will reveal the worst of their transgressions, even to their attorneys. Paul Adams signed a nondisclosure, which means anything he tells us isn’t admissible in court. Anything we find won’t get Mel and Leo off unless we have the kind of proof that they’ll want to keep out of the papers. I mean, there’s always the possibility that they missed someone with the nondisclosures who would be willing to testify, but shedding an ugly light on the Middletons in the courtroom isn’t going to save my friends.
