The Bridge Between

by Lindsey Brackett

  Chapter 29

  On Wednesday, in the interest of time—and presenting a united front—Lou picked David up at school where he’d secured a half-day substitute. Her van, which hummed nicely thanks to a new alternator and new rotators and something else she couldn’t remember but came with a hefty price tag, hardly belonged in Charleston’s upscale historic district.

  He whistled, low, when he slid in the passenger seat. “Wow, Lou.”

  She ducked her head, thankful her new haircut hid the pleased purse of her lips. She’d changed outfits three times that morning, a knot in her stomach every time she imagined Charlotte’s disapproval. But David’s obvious appreciation might make up for that. The day, balmy for early March, meant she’d opted for a black dress with a floral print—acceptable for pre-Easter. With a cardigan, pumps, and pearls. She might prefer wearing waders in the creek with her students, but Lou hadn’t forgotten those basic tenets her mother had taught her about dressing like a Southern lady.

  “We made a plan.” She filled him in on the basics of the engagement party Hannah would execute, with Charlotte’s blessing, of course. Based on the tension both Cora Anne and Grace exhibited, Lou knew Charlotte’s blessing was really the only thing that mattered.

  When she rested her right hand on the console as she drove toward the city, David squeezed her fingers in much the same comforting gesture she had done with their daughter as each detail was decided.

  Except his touch made the knot in her stomach dance.

  And cinch again the closer she drew to the exclusive South of Broad neighborhood where Charlotte lived in the Georgian-style mansion her great-grandfather had built in the 1820s. The imposing white columns and wrought-iron gates, artistically crawled with ivy and flanked by live oaks dipping their branches over the sidewalk, hadn’t changed in the thirty years since Lou last visited. To her then—and now—it was a grand palace.

  The kind of place for those considered Lowcountry royalty. The kind of place her mother had lived and disdained for the pluff mud of Edisto.

  Beside her, David chuckled. “Guess I see now why all you ladies worked up such a frenzy.”

  “Impressive, huh?”

  “It’s gorgeous. I bet Cora Anne wants to write a thesis about it.” He couldn’t contain the smile he always had that their daughter had followed his footsteps into the realm of history, her love the preservation of historic architecture.

  “She probably does.” Lou parked on the side street. She unbuckled. Loosing the seatbelt did nothing to relieve the tightness building in her chest. Even though David scooted out first and came around to open her door, she climbed out and stood, heaving.

  “You all right?” He slipped a hand under her elbow.

  “A little nervous, that’s all.”

  He tipped his head and studied her. “What happened when Patrick brought you here?”

  “The same that happened to Grace, I imagine. Charlotte’s standards are … rather high.”

  Rubbing her sternum, she stumbled up the walk. David caught her, his touch once again a comfort. Breathing suddenly required more effort than she had. The fleeting thought she might be having a heart attack South of Broad in Charleston seemed ludicrous and ironic all at the same time.

  “Let’s sit over here.” They’d passed through the gate, which Charlotte must’ve instructed the groundskeeper to leave open for her visitors, and into the Robert Chesnut-designed garden. She couldn’t breathe, but she could remember all the boasts about this garden and its fountains and hedged paths as ornate as the trim on the eleven-foot ceilings of the house. David sat her on a stone bench and knelt in front, his hands on her knees.

  “Louisa, listen to me.”

  She closed her eyes against the assault of so much green, so much light, too much brightness for the task at hand. Seeing this place where she could never have belonged.

  Seeing this mother whose son she had taken away.

  David put a hand to her cheek. “Open your eyes and look at me.”

  She did and slowly he, and his face only, came into her focus.

  “Breathe, nice and deep, with me.”

  They lifted breaths together, in that garden of stateliness, until her pulse—he’d set his fingers on her neck, she realized—calmed beneath his touch.

  “You haven’t had one of those in a good long while.” David sat beside her now, and kept his hands in hers. How many years had it been since he had to breathe her through the panic? The attacks stopped when she’d detached herself from feeling—anything.

  From believing she could ever be enough for anyone.

  David glanced at his watch. “Grace might send out a search party if we’re late.”

  Lou took in another deep breath filled with the early spring garden and willed herself to see only the here and now. David, her support even if no longer her husband, and Cora Anne, her daughter loving Charlotte’s grandson enough to let go of her guilt.

  Surely she could as well.

  “I’m ready now.”

  They stood together, and she let David keep her hand, a living reminder he’d never intended to let her go.

  Chapter 30

  The urge to flee with her from this place rose up in David. But he had learned long ago how to hide his feelings until Lou got a handle on hers.

  Maybe they’d have survived if he’d been more transparent. Instead, he had set her up to bear all the culpability of both their shortcomings.

  He took her hand and they walked to the portico. Charlotte may have the means to give their daughter a glorious wedding, but he intended to make sure Cora Anne received what she wanted. No matter the cost.

  The heavy oak door opened slowly, a maid on the other side. “Welcome. You must be Mr. and Mrs. Halloway. Please, follow me.”

  Neither of them corrected her mistake, though Lou let go his hand as they stepped over the threshold. The woman, her dark hair smoothed into a low bun, her uniform pressed crisp and neat, could not have been older than they.

  Except in her eyes.

  If he ever had the chance, he’d want to talk to this woman whose eyes would tell him a truer history than any he’d read in textbooks.

  She led them through a foyer with polished floor and a parlor of polished antiques. In a sunroom, facing the opposite side of the garden where they’d sat, the others waited.

  “How nice of you to join us, Louisa.” Charlotte Ravenel Cooper Watson had aged well, her silver hair tucked into place, her mouth pursed in a way David imagined she’d only enhanced over the years. Her brown eyes glittered over them both but settled on Lou. The rustle of her skirt as she rose indicated silk, and David wished he’d heeded both Lou and Grace when asked to wear a tie.

  Charlotte lifted one hand. Only the thin skin over a web of veins betrayed her age. “Please introduce me to your husband.”

  She knew they were no longer married and had intended the insult. He feared for a moment Lou might release her long-held fury, but she took Charlotte’s hand and pressed it briefly. “How nice to see you again, Mrs. Watson. This is David Halloway, Cora Anne’s father.”

  She sidestepped the moment with grace. Her mother would have been proud.

  Charlotte extended her hand to him, and he took it. Her fingers lacked warmth, much like her eyes. “A pleasure to meet you, ma’am.”

  “Mmm.” The sound was disapproval. “But not so much of one, you dressed for the occasion. Observe my grandson.” Her chin tipped toward Tennessee, who crossed his arms over his tie and grimaced. “I have finally won him over to the rules of fine etiquette.”

  David owed an apology to all these women for doubting their admonitions. He offered atonement to Charlotte. “My apologies, ma’am. I’ll do better next time.”

  “Mmm.” That sound again. She rang a small silver bell, its sound like breaking glass.

  The maid reappeared in the doorway.

  “Chloe, we shall come in for luncheon now.”

  “Yes, ma’am.” She clasped her hands
in front of her, eyes down.

  The walk across the house to the dining room, with its crystal chandelier and silver candlesticks, seemed a promenade, with Charlotte the queen they all followed. David hated this feeling of servitude.

  Beside him, Lou gasped.

  He tracked her gaze to the portrait over the fireplace. An oil painting so lifelike it might have been a photograph. Patrick, arm propped on his knee, a spaniel beside him, the two of them offering life back to this mausoleum of a house. He had his mother’s eyes, David noted. That is, if Charlotte’s had been prone to laughter, like Patrick’s. The artist had captured their twinkle, and when Tennessee stopped in front of the mantel for a moment, it was as though the portrait had come to life.

  Grace laid a hand on Lou’s arm. “I always thought she should have had it done of him with a cast net or a tool belt. Except for the smile, that’s not my Patrick.”

  “No …” Lou’s voice sounded strangled. Her eyes darted back to his and he knew. This picture wasn’t Grace’s Patrick, but the one she had known. His mother had immortalized him as she expected him to be, though the smile beaming down at them all hinted rebellion.

  David squared his shoulders. Patrick would have been on their side.

  “It is rude to linger in doorways, Grace, and Louisa, I expect better of you. Annie, though she disdained her own upbringing, surely taught you better.”

  Lou’s face paled with the intimate mention of her mother’s name.

  “Come, Mama, sit by me.” Cora Anne smoothed over the moment, reminding them all why they were here, and Lou sat, her back to Patrick’s smiling face.

  The only seats left were on the opposite side of the table, putting him across from Lou, but between Grace and Charlotte. The older woman’s mouth pinched when he pulled out Grace’s chair. He ignored her, sought Lou’s eyes over the water goblets and centerpiece of sterling roses, and blinked twice in rapid succession. The corners of her mouth tightened in a small smile, just for him. Their old code of communication, when she’d first brought him home. Tell me if I’m doing something wrong, his blinking said.

  Annie and Thornton Coultrie’s farmhouse table, with blue geisha china filled with shrimp and grits, now seemed much farther away than a mere forty-five miles down the road.

  He’d worried, but Annie hadn’t cared that a boy raised by blue-collar folks never learned which fork to use.

  And on it went, during a luncheon David could never have imagined they’d have.

  The women didn’t argue. David’s debate students could have learned a lesson or two about temperate discussions. Charlotte wanted the party to be black-tie and invitation-only. She conceded to Hannah as planner—“only because I have heard she does exquisite work”—and David figured Lou filed that tidbit away to tell her sister. They seemed hung up on the menu, with Cora Anne insisting hors d’oeuvres made the gathering chic—though she probably meant less stuffy. Charlotte sought a three-course dinner.

  And all the while, even as she agreed with their daughter and spoke like a diplomat to Charlotte, Lou watched for his signal. He expected it gave her comfort to prompt him, and he allowed her the grace of this small distraction.

  “Well, it seems,” Charlotte said as the dessert of sorbet and cake arrived, “there is little left for me to contribute.”

  Silence replaced the chatter. David blinked at Lou. With the tip of her finger, she nudged the dainty spoon and fork, though they were the only utensils left.

  Tennessee cleared his throat. “Lunch has been wonderful, Grandmother. What about the cake? This one looks good.”

  Charlotte cut her gaze around the table. “Chloe, the coffee service.”

  “Yes, ma’am.” The maid skittered away.

  “Cake—” and each word came out clipped and measured—“is for a wedding reception. An engagement should have more variety, perhaps. Would you agree, Louisa?”

  Lou’s gaze darted to his and she blinked twice in succession. He barely lifted a shoulder. No idea about these things. Could they not have pie if cake were meant for a wedding? He glanced toward Grace. Lou’s cheeks pinked.

  Too late, he realized, he’d broken their game.

  “What is it, dear?” Charlotte picked up her spoon now, allowing the rest of them to do the same. “You can no longer state opinions without consulting this man? Seems odd, given your current marital status. But there are many things about you I do not understand, Louisa. Why, for instance, you have moved back to Edisto. Surely your career prospects would thrive elsewhere.”

  Lou turned only her head, her back stiff as their surroundings. “Currently I am conducting tidal creek research under a grant for the College of Charleston. So you see, Charlotte, my career is quite well.” She lifted a spoonful of the sorbet. “But thank you for your concern.”

  “Well, then, what of your husband?” Charlotte turned her daggers to David. “How are your prospects? Because it seems to me, the only reason you all are here is so I can finance the party you’ve already chosen. Surely, Cora Anne, your father realizes it’s the duty of the bride’s father to handle such events?”

  David balled his napkin, tossed it on the table, and stood. “The only opinions being offered today are for the party you wish to give my daughter and your grandson. They have told you what they’d like, and yes, there is much you can contribute. But rest assured, Mrs. Watson”—he swung his gaze to Lou—“we are prepared to match you financially.”

  Lou glanced once at Patrick’s portrait. “Though we know it pains you to spend money on an idea that is not your own.”

  “Mama …” Cora Anne’s hushed whisper echoed off the crystal.

  “It is as I suspected.” Charlotte folded her hands. “My money is all I am worth to you.”

  “That’s not what she meant.” Grace spoke, and she sounded tired, as though she’d already had this discussion too many times.

  “I can speak for myself, and yes, that is exactly what I meant.” Lou stood and the pink in her cheeks had gone crimson. “No one wants this party, except you, Charlotte. We were all fine with Lowcountry boil and lawn chairs. I don’t expect you to appreciate a life you have never respected. Resent me—and my family—all you want. But you should honor these children’s wishes because all they have ever done is give you the second chance Patrick never could.”

  In that moment, Charlotte looked like an old woman, face pale and mouth drooping. But then, her lips curled. “You all took my son from me, and then have the audacity to sit at my table and tell me how to give my gifts.”

  “Charlotte, please—” Grace’s voice quivered.

  Her mother-in-law snapped. “Hush, Grace. You’ve never been very good at speaking up. Don’t start now.”

  “That’s enough, Grandmother.” Tennessee covered his mother’s hand with his.

  Lou, one last look flung David’s direction, stalked away, the sound of her heels echoing in the empty house.

  Chapter 31

  Lou flung her van into drive. David jerked open the passenger door.

  She dropped the gearshift back into park. “What?”

  “Seriously? You’re leaving me?”

  “You left me.”

  The storm crossed his features and twisted his lips into a grimace she remembered all too well. “Because you asked me to.”

  “Well, now I’m asking again.”

  “I thought we were together back there, just now.”

  She shoved hair behind her ears, ruining the smoothness that had taken an hour to achieve that morning. “I never agreed to finance this event. You and I haven’t even talked about it.”

  He hung his head. “Lou ... I’m not asking you to pay for anything.”

  She shrugged.

  “This really about the money?”

  “It’s about everything, David. How nothing I do is ever good enough.” She had expressed those words before—but he never took her seriously. When she said them today, he whooshed out a sigh.

  She knew then. He still di
dn’t hear her. “Let me go, please. I need to clear my head. Ride back with Cor and Tennessee.”

  “Don’t you care? About more than the opinion of Charlotte Ravenel Cooper Watson?” He spit out each of her names and leaned in, his nose almost brushing hers. “Don’t you care about us?”

  She turned from the intensity of his gaze. “There is no us.”

  The air around them had been sparking, like an electrical storm about to crack open, but her words shut it down. The heat and the flirting and the hint of possibility there’d been all died, and only the thin coolness of the March air was left.

  ~~~

  After Pat died, Grace regretted her moment of cowardice in Charlotte’s parlor. In the happening, it’d seemed prudent to guard her heart from words she could never un-hear, in the hope one day her mother-in-law might rejoice in their choice.

  Now she knew, had she stood with him that night, she’d have been prepared for the later and the now, for the battles she had waged alone all these long years without him.

  After Lou fled the table, and David followed, Grace retreated from Charlotte’s bitterness. Outside, she curled into the largest, lowest branch of that tree like a child—or a coward, once more.

  She left her son to pacify his grandmother, as only his blood could.

  Grace had believed, so many years ago, Tennessee’s birth would be the balm Patrick and his parents needed. But the stubborn pride of her husband’s family bound them stronger than anything else. As an adult, Tennessee built the tentative bridge now existing between them and Charlotte.

  Tracing her fingers through the grooves of the tree’s bark, Grace admitted to herself he had extended what she had not. His grandmother, however, sometimes refused to meet him halfway.

  The door of the back piazza opened, and Tennessee strode out, Cora Anne’s hand clutched in his. Even from across the garden, she could mark the square set of his jaw, the tension of his shoulders, how his hips didn’t sway with his usual easy gait, but clipped each step with finality.

  Walking away.

  Charlotte had lost again.