The Beach House

by Rachel Hanna

  “Can we just sit?” she whispered as she fake smiled at the people around them. When they all took their seats, Julie noticed the women staring at her with all the pity one would have looking at a matted, homeless dog on one of those late night TV commercials that are designed to make you sad and depressed right before going to sleep.

  “Oh, Jules, we’re all just so sorry about what’s happened to you!” Heidi said, her lower lip poking out far enough to hold a large bird. Of course, her lips… and most of the rest of her body… were fake and plumper than God intended.

  “Guys, I’m okay. Really. Please don’t make a big deal out of this.”

  Tiffany cocked her head. “Fine? Darling, we know you’re not fine. We heard what happened after the closing.”

  Julie stilled in her seat. “What do you mean?”

  “It was all the talk at the club the next day. How you and the mistress had a loud argument right there in front of Michael’s love child. I just can’t imagine how you felt!”

  “Tiff, there was no argument. None. We didn’t even raise our voices.”

  “Well, either way, you must know that we’re here to support you. We’re on your side.”

  “There aren’t going to be sides. Our attorneys are finalizing the paperwork, and soon this will all be over.”

  “Over?” Mallory said. “Sugar, this will never be over. You have kids with this man. He’ll be bringing that tart to every family function, along with their child. Your daughters’ weddings… when grandkids are born… and then their birthdays… You have a lifetime of him throwing this in your face. Surely, you must be devastated?”

  It sounded like they wanted her to be devastated. And she was. In fact, she was completely shattered and spent most nights lying in her tiny hotel room bathtub with a pint of ice cream. But they didn’t need to know that. Her mother, a problem in her life in her own right, had at least taught her to not let people see her sweat.

  “Listen, the shock has worn off. Life goes on. I’m doing well, considering. I’d really rather not talk about this anymore. Can’t we just have lunch like we’ve always done?”

  “Oh. I guess we can try that,” Tiffany said, scanning the other women’s faces for agreement. They reluctantly nodded.

  “Good. Now, what’s the special today?” Julie asked, looking at the menu she had memorized after going to the bistro dozens of times.

  “The club sandwich, I believe,” Mallory said.

  “I’m sorry, but I have to ask,” Heidi popped up, her way too perky French voice grating on Julie’s nerves so early in the day.

  “What?”

  “Didn’t you… notice?”

  “Notice what, Heidi?” Julie asked, trying to give her a tone that would indicate her unwillingness to talk about this issue anymore. But Heidi was a ditz, and she didn’t pick up on such social cues.

  “Well, I mean, he was sleeping with this woman, right?”

  Julie saw Mallory roll her eyes. “That’s the requirement to have a love child.”

  Heidi giggled. “Oh, right. But, I mean, couldn’t you tell he wasn’t… that into you?”

  “Heidi!” Tiffany scolded.

  “Sorry. I just think my Pierre would show signs. You know, like not wanting to…” she said, not finishing her thought.

  “Jules, you don’t have to answer that,” Mallory said.

  “I’ll just say this, Heidi. Michael showed no signs at home, but remember he was traveling a lot. Hmmm, come to think of it, a lot like your Pierre, right?”

  Heidi stared at her for a long moment, her big brown eyes eventually popping open. “I need to make a call!” She grabbed her cell phone and ran toward the bathroom, and it was all Julie could do not to laugh.

  “Seriously, how are you?” Mallory asked, a genuine look of concern in her eyes.

  Julie paused. These were the only friends she had right now, even if they weren’t exactly the best ones she could imagine. Maybe she shouldn’t write them off so quickly. After all, who else did she have right now that she could count on? Her daughters were far away, Michael was gone, her mother was too much to take at the moment, and her sister - yeah, that would be a big, fat no thank you. Family drama on top of losing her marriage wasn’t on her list of things to pursue. It was one of the reasons she hadn’t told her mother about the pending divorce. She didn’t need any of her backhanded remarks not-so-cleverly disguised as “helpful advice”.

  “It’s tough right now.”

  Tiffany reached across and touched her hand. “I’m sorry, honey. I really am.”

  “Where are you staying?” Mallory asked as Heidi reappeared at the table, eyes red.

  “At the extended stay place down the road.”

  “Extended stay? What does that mean?” Heidi asked, wiping her eyes with a cloth napkin.

  “It means my cheating ex thought he was doing me a favor by getting me a studio suite at a cheap hotel for a few weeks.”

  “And then what?” Mallory asked.

  “I don’t really know. I haven’t made any definitive plans.”

  “You are welcome to stay with me and Allesandro. We have that whole in-law suite available, you know,” Tiffany offered. Julie smiled, gratefully.

  “I appreciate it, Tiff, but I need to start over. On my own. I don’t even know where I’ll end up.”

  “Wait. You’re not staying here?” Heidi asked.

  “I’m not sure. I’m weighing all of my options.”

  “But you can’t leave, Jules. You’re on the board at the club. And the tennis team needs you!” Heidi said, her voice traveling higher and higher.

  Julie literally bit her tongue. Her entire life had fallen apart, and all one of her closest “friends” could think about was the club and the tennis team?

  “I resigned from the board yesterday. And the team will be fine without me.”

  Tiffany poked her lip out again. “Listen, you don’t have to give up your whole life, Julie.”

  “What do you mean?”

  Tiffany leaned toward her and the other women followed suit. “I know a matchmaker in Atlanta. She has the wealthiest single men in the Southeast on speed dial. A quick trip to the salon to update your hairstyle…”

  “Stop!” Julie heard herself saying way too loudly. People at tables around them turned to look. The women all sat back, their eyes wide and Heidi’s mouth hanging open. “I’ve tried to be nice here, but back off! My whole life has fallen down around me, and all ya’ll can talk about are tennis teams, boards and matchmakers. I don’t want another man right now, and maybe ever. My nerves are raw. My heart is broken. All of this surface level crap is way down my list of things to worry about!”

  “Sorry,” Tiffany said, but in a sarcastic way. She crossed her arms and didn’t make eye contact.

  “Forgive me for saying so, sweetie, but this attitude isn’t going to inspire people to help you out of this mess,” Mallory said, taking a long drink of her wine.

  “Help me out of what mess?”

  The table was quiet for a moment before Tiffany finally spoke again. “Look, we’re trying to help you save some face here. Michael’s actions have tarnished your family name all over town. He’s in Boston now, but you’re here. If you want to stay in your current social circle…”

  Now, Julie’s mouth dropped open. “Seriously? You think I care about my social standing right now?”

  “Darling, you should. At this point, you can still salvage everything you’ve built here. But if you keep melting down in parking lots… and at bistros,” she whispered. “Well, let’s just say there’s only so much we can do for you.”

  Suddenly, Julie felt like a stranger in a strange land. Who were these people? Were these the same women she’d spent so much time with on couples’ trips and at charity events? The ones she thought were good people, albeit a bit vapid?

  They were much, much worse. In that moment, she realized she couldn’t stay in this town anymore, but not because of her reputation. It was bec
ause she didn’t want to be thought of like she was currently thinking of these women.

  “I have to go,” Julie said, her own voice incredulous.

  “Go? But we haven’t had lunch yet,” Heidi said, holding up her menu as if Julie didn’t understand how to order lunch or something.

  Julie stood and looked at each woman’s face, all made up with expensive cosmetics and touched up by Dr. Kauffman, the local plastic surgeon. They were shells of real people, only seeking to get the approval of people who didn’t really care about them. Had she been doing the same thing all these years? Trying to get the approval of these women? People at the country club? And for what? What had it all meant? The big house, the maid - even though she adored her - the expensive cars?

  She was alone. Her marriage had been a facade, apparently. Her kids were wonderful, despite it all, but even they were gone. Her only chance at having a life was getting away from this place and these people.

  Julie turned and walked toward her car without saying a word, Mallory and Tiffany hot on her heels. “Where are you going?”

  She turned to them and smiled for the first time in weeks. “I’m going to live my dream, that’s where I’m going.”

  She climbed into her car, turned the key and contemplated what her dream really was.

  Julie couldn’t believe what she was doing. Who in the world would spend their nest egg on a fixer upper beach house in a town they’d never visited without ever visiting the house in person?

  Her. That’s who would do such a thing.

  She had obviously lost her mind.

  Meg was worried about her and threatening to fly home almost daily. Only, home wasn’t their home anymore.

  Colleen had taken to giving her nightly talks that involved therapy terminology she was apparently reading on the Internet.

  But it felt right for some reason. Even though she’d gone about it all wrong.

  Now, there was no turning back. She was driving over the bridge onto Seabreeze, a small island off the coast of South Carolina that was barely a dot on the map. During her online pursuit of property, Seabreeze Island had come up a couple of times in her price range, but most people had never even heard of it.

  A part of her was dubious, of course. She’d always been a practical kind of person who needed everything in the right place and a super clean house. That hadn’t bothered her sister, who she shared a bedroom with for most of her life. No, Janine had been what Julie would later call a “beginner hoarder”, keeping every movie stub, gum wrappers with jokes on them and every note her best friend in seventh grade had passed to her in class.

  But Julie hadn’t been that way at all. She wanted order, in her life and in her space. So, jumping into a fixer upper with no experience even hanging her own pictures on the wall was daunting to say the least.

  As she drove over the bridge onto Seabreeze, she was astonished at just how small it was. The tallest building she saw was two stories, and houses were few and far between. Her little bit of research on the town had only yielded bits of info about its history and important historical buildings. But she didn’t know much about living there because only about one-hundred people called it home. One-hundred. Could they even call it a town with that few people?

  She glanced around at the little mom and pop shops that littered the area, looking for somewhere she could get a job when she was ready. There was a place called “The Shrimp Shack”, but that didn’t seem like the career path she wanted to take. Getting a job might prove harder than she anticipated. Luckily, she’d gotten a great deal on her house, but the repairs would need to be done out of the money she had left, which wasn’t all that much.

  Her online boutique was struggling, as it usually did during the summer months, but at least it had paid for the movers to bring her things in a week or so. For now, she only had what was in her small car, and that was enough for her.

  Looking at her GPS, Julie turned down the street the house was on. It was covered in a canopy of trees, thick moss hanging from them that made it almost seem like nighttime, only intricate streams of sunlight on the street, like little pieces of artwork.

  She felt her palms sweating from nervousness. What if she pulled up and the house was unlivable? What if it was overrun with alligators or some other terrifying creature?

  “Your destination is on the right in one hundred feet,” the pleasant sounding woman on her GPS said. She was almost afraid to look.

  She stopped her car in front of the short driveway and took in a deep breath before finally turning to look at her new home. It wasn’t as bad as she had feared it would be. In fact, it was quite cute with the same moss covered trees dotting the front yard and the little white cottage standing out like an angel in the midst of the shade.

  The island was only about three miles long in total, with the width only about half a mile in most places. It was surrounded by water; on one side, the Atlantic Ocean and on the other side filled with tidal creeks and marshes. Her little cottage sat on the marshland, which wasn’t exactly what she’d wanted at the beginning, but the ocean was only down the dirt road a bit.

  She had no neighbors around as the cottage was at the tip of the island in a mostly uninhabited area. From what the real estate agent had told her, most people wanted to buy in the beach areas, and homes there rarely came up for sale. When they did, the price was more than double what she paid, even for a fixer upper.

  Starting over required compromise, and if being so close to the ocean meant she had to swat mosquitos and look out for alligators every so often, she would gladly take one for the team. Well, for her team of one, anyway.

  She got out of her car and walked up the short gravel driveway, looking around her lot as she did. It wasn’t big, but it was hers. She was proud of her purchase so far. It was the first thing she’d ever really done for herself as an adult. After all, she’d gone from her parents’ home to her dorm to her married home. There was never a moment she lived alone.

  She walked up onto the small porch and immediately noticed the rotting wood with holes scattered around. That would be high on her list of things to fix as she had no intentions of falling through her own porch. No telling what was underneath it.

  She turned the key, the sound of birds and bugs she’d never heard before playing in the air. That would take some getting used to. The whole area was like something out of a book or a movie, with vegetation growing she’d never seen in person.

  The door stuck as she pushed on it, age and battered chips of paint keeping it from opening. She leaned back and hit it three times with her shoulder before it finally opened, a plume of dust hitting her in the face like powder shooting from a fire extinguisher.

  “Yuck!” she said to no one in particular. She rubbed the dust from her eyes and opened them to reveal a house in shambles. The outside had been deceiving. The place was a wreck with holes in the hardwood floors, dust and yellow pollen covering every surface and some smell she couldn’t quite identify yet.

  “Oh my gosh…” she said, holding out the last word as she looked from room to room, trying to find a place she could sleep safely. That would be impossible. The place needed a thorough cleaning before she could even think of sleeping there. Plus, there was no bed, no air conditioning and no electricity. How had she been so naive as to think she could stay there even for a night? Had she wasted all of her money on a death trap no one else had wanted?

  In despair, she walked out onto the back porch, which had weirdly been renovated recently, and stared into the marsh. The sunset was beginning, and streaks of pink and orange swept across the sky like God had painted it himself. Unable to hold in her emotions, she began to weep.

  She wept because this place wasn’t even close to being habitable.

  She wept because her marriage was over.

  She wept because even in that shambles of a house, the sky made her believe anything was possible.

  Possible, not probable. But what choice did she have?

 
; Chapter 4

  Julie drove around the island and finally found a small inn at the other end. The place didn’t look much bigger than her own, but it was in pristine condition and had a sign in the front from the local historical registry. Whoever owned it was meticulous in the way they cared for it. The cream colored boards were accented by navy blue trim and shutters, and the ocean sat in the background like a perfect picture postcard. It was a totally different scene than the one playing out on her lot.

  “Lancaster House” was carved into the wooden sign that sat at the end of the road. The home was built in 1918 according to the sign, but it looked brand new.

  There was an “open” sign in the window and a couple of lights on in the front room, an orange glow the only illumination other than the quickly setting sun. Julie stepped out of her car, slung her bag over her back and prayed to God the place had a vacancy as she walked up the three steps to the front door.

  The bugs of the marsh nearby seemed to be preparing a full choral concert as they got louder and louder. It occurred to her that this would take some getting used to, all of the noises and colors and smells.

  She heard the door open and looked up to see a man, maybe a little younger than her, standing there. He had what her grandmother would’ve called a “lazy smile” with one side of his mouth turning up more than the other. He leaned against the open front door, one arm above his head touching the top of the frame. He wore a pair of khaki shorts, a baby blue t-shirt and no shoes.

  “Can I help you?” he asked, his Southern drawl deeper and more authentic than any accent she’d heard before. It sounded like he’d stepped right out of Gone With The Wind, one of her favorite movies of all time. She would still marry Rhett Butler right on the spot if he appeared in front of her - and wasn’t a completely fictional character.

  “Yes. I’m Julie. I bought the cottage at the other end of the island.”

  “Oh, yes, the cottage on the cove, right?”

  Cottage on the cove. It had a nice ring to it. She wanted to say she bought the deathtrap on the dirt road, but that didn’t sound nearly as fancy.