THE BRIDGE BETWEEN BY LINDSEY P. BRACKETT
Published by Firefly Southern Fiction
an imprint of Lighthouse Publishing of the Carolinas
2333 Barton Oaks Dr., Raleigh, NC 27614
ISBN: 978-1-64526-076-9
Copyright © 2019 by Lindsey Brackett
Cover design by Elaina Lee
Interior design by Karthick Srinivasan
Available in print from your local bookstore, online, or from the publisher at: ShopLPC.com
For more information on this book and the author visit: LindseyPBrackett.com
All rights reserved. Non-commercial interests may reproduce portions of this book without the express written permission of Lighthouse Publishing of the Carolinas, provided the text does not exceed 500 words. When reproducing text from this book, include the following credit line: “The Bridge Between by Lindsey P. Brackett published by Lighthouse Publishing of the Carolinas. Used by permission.”
Commercial interests: No part of this publication may be reproduced in any form, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form by any means—electronic, photocopy, recording, or otherwise—without prior written permission of the publisher, except as provided by the United States of America copyright law.
This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, and incidents are all products of the author’s imagination or are used for fictional purposes. Any mentioned brand names, places, and trademarks remain the property of their respective owners, bear no association with the author or the publisher, and are used for fictional purposes only.
All scripture quotations, unless otherwise indicated, are taken from the Holy Bible, New King James Version®. Copyright © 1982 by Thomas Nelson. Used by permission. All rights reserved.
Brought to you by the creative team at Lighthouse Publishing of the Carolinas: Eva Marie Everson, Jennifer Slattery
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Brackett, Lindsey P.
The Bridge Between / Lindsey P. Brackett 1st ed.
Printed in the United States of America
PRAISE FOR THE BRIDGE BETWEEN
Lindsey Brackett, once again, brings Edisto to life in her second novel The Bridge Between. Her descriptions of the island were so real and stirring, I needed to step out of my office located on Edisto, and go take it in for myself! Her characters capture interest right away and her ability to project their emotions and empathy is a rare talent.
~Julie Gyselinck
Editor Explore Edisto Magazine
In The Bridge Between, Lindsey Brackett has penned a story that will hit you in the heart, in that sacred place between the sweet and the bitter. Reminding us that forgiveness is the only way to truly heal tangled thens and broken nows, she weaves a beautiful, sometimes heart-aching, tapestry of two families who stand at the cusp of what was always meant to be. A must-read!
~Carrie Schmidt
ReadingIsMySuperPower.org
A delightful story, rich in detail and nuance in both setting and character. The Bridge Between is insightful as to the heart's motivation and celebrates Southern culture as focused on South Carolina's wind-swept Edisto Island. This is a wonderfully entwined story that examines inter-personal relationships, the meaning of family ties, life's choices and far-reaching repercussions. Relatable, engaging, and full of well-drawn personality, The Bridge Between is an absorbing, satisfying read.
~Claire Fullerton
Author of Mourning Dove
Lindsey Brackett can weave a story that leaves you waiting for the next one. I loved her debut novel and her sophomore one, The Bridge Between, doesn’t disappoint. Realistic characters, a great plotline, sigh-worthy romance, plot twists and surprises ... what more can you want?
~Ane Mulligan
Bestselling author of the Chapel Springs series
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
If writing a first book is a dream, writing a second is when dreams become reality and reality becomes work. Which makes this by far my favorite job.
Once the words are on the page (this involves copious amounts of tears, coffee, and peanut M&Ms), there are many hands creating the book you now hold. I owe so much gratitude to the following people for their patience—and their ability to read between the lines of a text message or an email:
Eva Marie Everson who has believed in my words from the beginning and gave me the gracious gift, not only of her wisdom, but her friendship as well.
Jennifer Slattery, my wonderful editor, who unknowingly helped me find my niche when she sent back the first draft with instructions to rewrite as dual timeline.
Kimberly Duffy, Leslie DeVooght, and Hope Welborn—our friendship and partnership is a blessing. Here’s to many more books—and Voxer messages—together.
Taryn Souders, Sarah Bulls, and Heather Iseminger, aka the Party House Girls, for keeping me up too late drinking peppermint tea and writing rough drafts.
Leslie Terrell who asked me to please write this story, Melissa Wood who read it long before it was ready, and Salena McKay who found mistakes I missed.
Nurse Grace Holt and her father, Dr. Gordon Weigle, who answered my medical related questions and helped me figure out the best plan of care for Cole’s injury. Any mistakes are mine (and probably influenced by my watching of Grey’s Anatomy).
Every reader who took a chance on a debut author. You have given me the courage to persevere. I’m so glad to return to Edisto with you!
My Payne-ful siblings and Ashworth-Beeson cousins, who let me pull from our childhood to tell these stories. Remember Bo in the bathtub at Grandmommy’s?
The wonderful people of Edisto who helped make sure I got it right: John Girault of the Edisto Island Open Land Trust, Gretchen Smith of the Edisto Island Museum, and the lovely ladies of Explore Edisto, Julie Gyselinck and Caroline Matheny.
I could never live this dream if it wasn’t for the support of my husband, Joshua. Thank you for never letting me walk away from an argument—especially the ones about how I should just give up and go back to a regular job.
To my children, Madelynne, Annabelle, Amelia, and Gus who never fail to remind me that being Mom is my first and most important job, thank you for letting me use up all your sticky notes and sharpies plotting this book on the back porch last summer.
As always, to the One who seeks our reconciliation—thank you Jesus for putting words into my fingertips and allowing me to share them with the world as you show me your good, perfect, and pleasing will (Romans 12: 1-2).
DEDICATION
For Mama who makes the best biscuits and Daddy who sits on the porch with the whippoorwills.
CONTENTS
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Chapter 16
Chapter 17
Chapter 18
Chapter 19
Chapter 20
Chapter 21
Chapter 22
Chapter 23
Chapter 24
Chapter 25
Chapter 26
Chapter 27
Chapter 28
Chapter 29
Chapter 30
Chapter 31
Chapter 32
Chapter 33
Chapter 34
Chapter 35
Chapter 36
Chapter 37
Chapter 38
Chapter 39
Chapter 40
Chapter
41
Chapter 42
Chapter 43
Chapter 44
Chapter 45
Chapter 46
Chapter 47
Chapter 48
Chapter 49
Chapter 50
Chapter 51
Chapter 52
Chapter 53
Chapter 54
Chapter 55
Chapter 56
Chapter 57
Chapter 58
Chapter 59
Chapter 60
Chapter 61
Chapter 62
Chapter 63
Chapter 64
Chapter 65
Epilogue: The Wedding
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Chapter 1
January 2007
She still had trouble sleeping.
Standing back from the porch eaves, so the rain wouldn’t dampen her flannel pajamas, Lou warmed her hands around her coffee. She’d switched to decaf in the last year—and limited herself to only one cup after dinner—but nearly every night she found herself right here.
Wasn’t just Lowcountry storms or her uncertain future keeping her awake. More often than not it was the creaking of those old rockers on the front porch.
Memories rolled over her, keeping time with thunder and flashes of lightning. During storms, Daddy had always sat on the back porch, watching. Clouds, the color of the steel wool Mama used on the cast iron skillet, would bank low over the tidal creek then move across the pastures and pines.
“A storm can scrape land the way wool scrapes rust,” her daddy would say, the rocker creaking in tempo with his worry.
Her childhood had been a mix of faith—and superstition. Before she and the boys moved into the Edisto farmhouse, she’d had Tennessee Watson repaint the porch ceiling with a fresh coat of haint blue paint.
Yet those rockers still swayed, even when the wind wasn’t whipping a frenzy like now.
Storm debris whirled around the yard. The leaves of the weeping willow, of course—and tiny branches from that big old live oak with the tire swing. Pine needles, because what Edisto Island lacked in sophistication, it made up for with pine trees.
“These trees are our bread and butter,” Daddy had told her time and again. Then he’d hold up hands sticky with sap remnants, red and chapped from bundling pine straw into bales for hauling and selling to the landscape designers of Charleston. “Even if they don’t taste as good.”
Lou stepped back inside, fingering the greenery looped over the back porch door. At Christmas, she and Carolina had strung pinecones and magnolia into garland. Just like Mama always did.
She turned a slow circle until she faced the closed door of the little room where her mother had drawn her last breath. Cora Anne was after her to clean it out, set it up as a little office. After only a semester at Tulane University, her daughter had come back to Edisto. Said she’d found where she belonged.
Time for Lou to do the same.
She pushed at the door. It swung easily. Winter’s cool had drawn back the wood’s summer swelling. Probably why she kept finding it creaked open an inch or two.
Inside, the spindle bed sat neatly made, but the rocker in the corner swayed with the breeze through the now open door.
She shivered, though despite being shut up, the room’s air wasn’t cold. This house was simply old—her grandfather had built it, after all—and settling with its memories. Swallowing past the lump gathering in her throat, Lou edged her way inside.
Things were left just as they had been when Mama passed. Pictures and afghans warming the new paint and refinished floor. Lou spied a green shoebox on the side table.
Her own cache of secrets.
She’d left it there the day after Mama’s funeral and hadn’t opened it since. Too many other things to worry about besides old letters and mementos from her college days. Now she strode across the room and flicked off the box lid. Ran her fingertip across the neat filing of correspondence.
If technology kept advancing the way it had in the last decade, her children wouldn’t have boxes like this.
Her hand paused over the envelopes—and a whelk shell that had just fit the palm of her hand. She drew away. May be better if some things remained hidden.
But words her mother had once written Cora Anne came to mind. We can’t carry past despair into the future.
Lou whipped out the letter.
October 1, 1974
Dear Mama,
Patrick Watson has been writing me. I know you disapprove, even though you say you don’t. The way you press your lips together in a thin line when I mention his name—that’s your tell. Maybe we’ll just be friends. Maybe we’ll be more. I don’t know. It was one dance at the Pavilion on the last night of summer vacation.
But he makes my heart skip a little.
Her fingers trembled. Once, Pat had made her heart skip. Then David made it gallop like the horses of old, racing down the Botany Bay road. Now he and she both lived with broken hearts.
But at least they lived.
~~~
David didn’t know how else to prove he wanted to be here.
Bumping his newish four-wheel drive Jeep into Lou’s yard, derelict leaves and sticks ground beneath his tires. A vehicle meant for this rural community, not the suburb they’d left behind.
The boys’ duffels were in a heap at the bottom of the porch steps. Between great arching runs on the tire swing, his triplet sons tossed treats to the barn cats. They were in the gangly-ness of adolescence, all arms and legs—and mouths to feed.
David loped across the dead grass, ducked as he got too close to the swing, and met his ex-wife at the kitchen door. “Since that tree survived their Uncle Jimmy, I guess it’ll hold our boys.”
“Lord, I hope so.” Lou shaded her eyes. The morning sun trekked across the sky. Tonight it would set in one year, and in the morning, rise with another.
David scrubbed a hand through his cropped hair. He’d buzzed the sides extra short yesterday when he noticed gray at his temples. What a thing for a man to realize, that at nearly fifty, he was vainer than he’d ever thought. “You sure you’re okay with me having them?”
She crossed her arms. “It’s your weekend, David.”
“I just meant, because it’s New Year’s Eve—”
“And I’ll be all alone?”
“No one should be alone on New Year’s.”
She lowered her chin, eyes raking over his old sweats emblazoned with the logo of the high school where they’d taught together for twenty years. “I’ll be fine. Cora Anne’s coming back.”
Huffing, he rolled his eyes like the teenagers in his classroom. “She’ll have that boy with her.”
“That boy is a man.”
“Yeah, that’s what I don’t like.”
Now she smiled. “Yes, you do. He grounds her in a way we never could.”
David flinched. “It’s coming, isn’t it?” He could feel it every time Tennessee Watson spoke to him. As if the young man were biding his time until he was sure David wouldn’t protest his daughter was far too young to get married.
Of course, she was nearly the same age he and Lou had been. Then again, look how that worked out.
“No doubt.” Lou tugged at her sleeves, drawing them down over her fingers.
“You look good.”
She shook her head, but he caught the slight upturn at the corner of her lips. He wasn’t kidding. Lou in a ratty long-sleeved tee, and jeans that hugged her in all the right places, had always been his favorite. But mostly, he meant the lines of her face. The furrow between her eyes—the one he
had caused—had lessened in the last few months.
“Why are you so chipper today?”
“Got good news. Colleton High hired me to finish out the year. History teacher had to take an extended leave of absence.”
She held his gaze without blinking, unfurling something he thought he’d long ago put to rest. “That is good news.”
He stepped closer, heard her breath catch. “What about your job hunt?”
To his disappointment, Lou opened the screen door, putting space back between them. “Interview with Dr. Whiting next week. Let’s get those bags loaded so you can be on your way.”
He followed her inside anyway. “College of Charleston doesn’t know what they’re missing. You’ll be a full-time professor before long, I’m sure.”
“Are you?” Her tone turned icy. The triplets’ whoops from the yard pierced the heavy silence falling between them.
“What you got going on today?” David changed the subject by perusing the house. All her mother’s antique canisters were in the same spots on the worn countertop, though she’d added a basket of grab-and-go snacks for the boys. One of the few changes she’d made since moving in.
And why should he care? She was the one living here with the ghosts of her parents in every knickknack and basic necessity. Like that box of old letters sitting on the kitchen table.
“Thought I’d take down the decorations. Bad luck to leave the tree up past New Year’s, you know.” How much she sounded like her mother.
“Hey, Dad!” Cole hit the door first, Mac and J.D. panting behind. “Got sparklers for tonight?”
“You know it. And some frozen pizzas too.”
They groaned as a unit.
J.D. sidled up to Lou. “You know, Mom, you could come over for dinner…”
“And bring that lasagna you already have made…” Mac wagged eyebrows under his fringe of dark curls.
David grabbed their sons in a headlock, one under each arm, except for Cole, who used his smaller size to his advantage and dodged away. “Are you saying my culinary skills are no match for Mom’s?”
“Definitely.” That was Mac, ever truthful.
“Boys, go get your duffels in the car.” They swarmed through the door. David reached out, crossing the line Lou and he kept with one another. Touched her shoulder, gently, as he would a friend. “Come on over if you get lonely.”
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