by Leanna Sain
My cheeks burned. I snatched a handful of paper towels. “Townsend,” I ground out through clenched teeth.
“Oh, yeah. That’s right. Maybe that’s why he dumped you.”
Darren Townsend. Remembering the name made my blood boil. The one and only time I’d outwardly shown any interest in a guy had been during my senior year in high school. In spite of my nearly debilitating shyness, I’d worked up my courage, practicing in front of a mirror until I was finally ready to talk to him. But just as I was about to take the plunge, Hurricane Ellie swept in and poured on her charm.
“I did you a favor, you know. You should thank me.” She smirked. “The guy was a loser. Did you know he dropped out of school? I heard he’s living in his parents’ basement, now. He’s got a job sweeping floors at the Piggly-Wiggly. Squanders all he makes on lottery tickets.”
“Thank you?” I choked out, outraged at her suggestion. Because of her, I’d sort of given up on the idea of dating, allowing my shyness to take control of my life. The whole ordeal might not have been so bad, but she’d dumped Darren within days. She hadn’t really wanted him. She just didn’t want anybody else to have him, namely me. I decided to sit back and watch her after that, observe her in action. I even kept a notebook for a while, which in retrospect sounds pathetic, but I had documented proof that she systematically pulled the same routine with every guy in school…including teachers and the assistant principal. She was a black widow with an insatiable appetite.
“You’re welcome.”
It felt like a slap. She actually thought I’d thanked her. My hand fisted around the paper towels, itching to commit bodily harm.
“You have a cute face,” she went on as if nothing was wrong, studying me like a specimen under a microscope. “Nice, thick brown hair. I like the cut; bobbed off chin-level like that and pulled back with that pretty clip. The fringe of bangs. You don’t wear much make-up, but with your skin and those eyes, you don’t have to. Of course, that’s not your real eye color. No one has turquoise eyes. Where’d you find them? The contacts, I mean.”
She didn’t give me a chance to answer; just kept serving a barrage of backhanded compliments. “You have a flair with clothes. Fluttery and feminine in layers. That helps hide things…or lack of things, I should say. Smart move.” She winked and began gathering up her war paint, dropping the items into a zippered cosmetic bag and then tossing it into her large red leather purse.
Finally, she fluffed her hair, unloaded half a can of hairspray on it, then did that duck-lip thing that girls mistakenly think is sexy. “Adam’s waiting for me. Toodles.” Flouncing out the door, she left me gasping for breath in a wake of hair product and strong perfume; her mocking laughter echoed off the tiled walls.
I unclenched my fist and threw the paper towels in the trash, then glared at my reflection. A relatively attractive, dark-haired girl glared right back at me. Mom’s face; Dad’s eyes…a constant reminder of parents I’d never see again. They died in a car accident when I was nine. That’s when I first came to Savannah to live. Eleven years ago.
I stopped glaring and studied myself, starting with my eyes. They were my best feature. Unique…sky blue with green flecks around the pupil, giving them the turquoise appearance Ellie had mentioned. They weren’t contacts and she knew it.
“What’s wrong with you?” I whispered. “You’re reasonably attractive. You’re not weird. No dreadlocks. You’re not covered with tattoos or multiple piercings like so many of your classmates. Yes, you’re a “brainiac,” but is getting “A’s” bad? It doesn’t mean there’s something wrong with you, does it? Besides, with no friends, what else are you supposed to do with your time?
“You’re shy…too shy. Of course, with “friends” like Ellie and a name like Cleo, what do you expect? Why couldn’t your mother have named you something normal, like Ann or Beth or Melissa? Why did she have to be all into ancient Egyptian history and name you after Queen Cleopatra? Who does that to a baby? A normal name would’ve saved you a lot of teasing growing up.” A deep sigh fogged the mirror and my reflection shrugged. “It could’ve been worse. She could’ve been into Greek mythology and named you after one of the nine muses. Just think…you could’ve been Erato, or Calliope, or even Urania. Cleo isn’t the worst she could’ve picked. Besides, you’ve gotten past the issue with your name, mostly—”
The bathroom door swished open, and I jumped so hard, I think my feet actually left the tiled floor. I whirled away from the mirror and slid past the two chattering girls so I wouldn’t have to speak to them.
Head tucked down so I wouldn’t have to make eye contact with anyone, I barreled out of the building and crashed headlong into someone who shouldn’t have been there. The impact was so unexpected and so solid, I lost my balance and would’ve fallen if the obstacle hadn’t reached out a strong hand and grabbed my arm.
“Are you okay?” the low, anxious voice asked.
No! I’m mortified! I wanted to scream. “Yes, yes. I’m fine. So sorry.” I brushed away his concern and his hand, too embarrassed to actually look at him as I hurried away. My cheeks were on fire. I prayed for the ground to open up and swallow me, but it didn’t.
When I’d put enough distance between us, I chanced a look over my shoulder, and groaned when I saw him still staring after me. “Of course, he’s Adonis personified. Just my luck.” I was too far away to read his expression. Probably wondering how I’d escaped from my straight jacket. Finally, he reached down and picked up the notebook he’d dropped when I crashed into him, and turned back to the cluster of students standing beside a bike rack. Hopefully, I’d never see him again.
Once my cheeks cooled, I drew a deep breath, forcing myself to exhale the tension from both the Ellie encounter and the collision. The crisp December air felt just about perfect. It was the only time of year I really liked it here. Savannah doesn’t have four seasons like the mountains of North Carolina, where I lived before my parents died. It’s more like three…or maybe even two and a half. There are a couple of months of what they call winter, I call it fall. A very short spring follows, which you better enjoy because it doesn’t last long. I generally used it to prepare myself for what was coming next. Summer in Savannah is hotter than Hades. If you don’t drown in the humidity, you’ll get eaten alive by all the insects. The only way to survive it is by staying inside or heading out to Tybee. The beach breeze makes the heat semi-tolerable and keeps the insects mostly blown away.
It was too early to head home, so which way should I go? Toward the river or toward the park? River Street would be a congested mess. Too many tourists. I needed peace and quiet if I was to figure out what to do about a model for my assignment…or lack thereof.
Right. Forsyth Park, then.
Whoops! Two old, blue-haired women, bearing fistfuls of shopping bags exited the Gryphon Tea Room right in front of me. Barely avoiding a collision, I managed to zigzag around them and keep going.
“Cleo? Is that you, dear?”
Oh, no! I recognized that warbling, sugar-sweet drawl. Myra Davis…and Nanette Holcomb was sure to be with her. I winced, then pasted on a smile and turned to face them. Yep. I was right. There they stood, looking like they’d just stepped away from a photo shoot for some fashion designer’s holiday collection. The amount of gold and diamonds glittering from their ears, necks, and hands made me squint. It rivaled a jewelry store display window. They were widowed friends of my aunt. Old money. Their husbands had died in a boating accident a few years back. Rumors had flown like a swarm of bees for a while after that, especially when it was discovered that the husbands had just increased their already-huge life insurance policies. There’d been an in-depth investigation for insurance fraud, but I guess they never uncovered any wrong-doing on the women’s part. I remembered overhearing my aunt telling someone they’d received boatloads of insurance money and were running around, spending it like “drunken sailors.”
“Afternoon, ladies,” I said, hoping I didn’t have to endure the
m for long. “Beautiful day, isn’t it?”
“My, my, my,” Nanette drawled, wearing her normal sour expression. “We were just talking about you. Weren’t we, Myra?”
Myra set her shopping bags on a nearby bench and tugged her bright red beret to just the right angle before answering. “Yes, we were. Not five minutes ago. I just asked Nan if she’d heard how you were getting along since Patricia passed, God rest her soul. You must be practically rattling around in that big, ol’ place by yourself. Is Patricia’s house-help still with you?”
“You mean Minnie and Tobias?” I gritted my teeth behind my smile. It made my blood boil when anyone referred to them as “house-help.” They were all the family I had left. I doubt I would’ve made it this far without them “Of course, they’re still there. It’s their home too.”
“We haven’t seen you at church since your aunt’s funeral, dear,” Nanette deftly changed the subject.
The accusation was there…just under the surface. These ladies were members of the same church my aunt was. The same church I vowed I’d never set foot in again.
Myra’s syrupy drawl poured right over the uncomfortable moment. “You’re lucky, you know.”
“Lucky?” My pasted-on smile wouldn’t last much longer. “How do you mean?”
“She means,” Nanette interrupted. “…you’re lucky you didn’t end up in an orphanage, dear; lucky your aunt came to the rescue and took you in after your parents died. A lesser person might not have done the same.”
I almost choked. Lucky? Lesser person? The only reason my aunt “came to the rescue,” was because she was my only living relative. Both sets of my grandparents were deceased, and neither of my parents had siblings. Ahnt Patricia was my mother’s spinster aunt, and she took me in to save face. She didn’t want Savannah tongues wagging about the fact that she’d turned a blind eye toward her niece’s orphaned child, but when I say she wasn’t “happy” about the situation, that’s very likely the biggest understatement in the history of mankind. And yes, she required me to call her “ahnt” rather than “ant,” like we said in the North Carolina Mountains. The only time I ever used the pretentious word was within her earshot. I didn’t have to worry about that now, though.
The fact that my mother had never wanted to visit her aunt should’ve been a clue to me. Shoot, Mom had never even talked about her, other than to briefly mention that Aunt Patricia had been her guardian. It hadn’t taken me long to figure out why.
Aunt Patricia was a tyrant, pure and simple.
Silence finally penetrated my thoughts, and I panicked. How long had my sidewalk companions been quiet? Two sets of eyes stared at me; one curious, one judging. Oops. I’d obviously missed something. “Forgive me, ladies. I’m afraid I’m preoccupied with an important assignment for one of my classes. What did you say?”
Myra patted my arm. “That’s fine, dear. We understand, don’t we Nan?”
Nan just sniffed; obviously offended that I hadn’t been hanging on her every word.
“You want to do your best in school,” Myra continued. “Why, it’s only natural. It’s the perfect way to show your gratitude to your aunt for all she’s done; you know…taking you in, raising you, paying for your college… MmMm. She’s a saint, all right. You can ask anyone. They’ll say the same. I know you miss her,” she wagged her head back and forth wearing a mournful Bassett hound expression. “We surely do. Don’t we, Nan, dear?”
“Patricia was an invaluable asset to the community,” Nan intoned, sounding like a funeral director. “Every committee on which she served bears an empty hole that can never be filled half as well.”
“A-men” Myra chimed in. “I still can’t believe she’s gone, and to be taken like that…”
“It was very sudden,” I agreed.
“To think something as simple as the stomach flu could come in and steal her away like that…just dreadful.”
It had been dreadful. That bug had hit half the town’s population last summer, but it really did a number on Aunt Patricia. At her plumpest, she could pass for an anorexic, so the non-stop vomiting and diarrhea quickly took its toll. By the time she finally relented and let Tobias take her to the hospital, she was severely dehydrated, to the point that her body systems were actually shutting down. They tried to get fluids into her with IV’s, but it was a case of “too little, too late.” She slipped into a coma and never woke up.
“I heard tell they might have been able to save her if she’d just come in earlier,” Myra lamented.
I nodded, not trusting myself to speak.
Her head did another Bassett hound shake. “Just dreadful.”
I hoped my expression was an appropriate mask of sadness, and didn’t give away how I was really feeling. My aunt’s aversion to doctors and her stubbornness is what killed her, and I didn’t miss her one bit. I needed to leave before they started pushing me to join some of their stupid committees. They’d already dropped several not-so-subtle hints by way of phone calls and cards. Well, Myra had. Nanette was too busy looking down her nose, finding fault with one thing or another. Right now she was eyeballing my worn jeans and scuffed cowboy boots. I wasn’t interested in their committees or their opinions. At. All. “Well. I’m sorry to have to cut our visit short, but I have an appointment, and I really need to run. It was nice seeing you ladies again.” I took a couple of backward steps away from them, planning to bolt if necessary.
Nan nodded and gave me her usual stiff, judgmental smile.
“Delighted,” Myra drawled. “Do let’s get together for tea, soon.”
“I’ll check my calendar,” I lied. “Bye, now.”
I turned and speed-walked as fast as my boots would take me, my mind churning. Was it wrong for me to be glad Aunt Patricia was dead? My life was certainly less stressful. That was for sure. My aunt had hated me, and no, it wasn’t my imagination. She hid her true feelings from everyone else under a mask of gracious gentility, portraying herself as the perfect Southern belle, but with me, the mask came off. The Jekyll and Hyde routine had made it impossible for me to explain my situation to an outsider. I’d tried…believe me. My teachers, guidance counselor, and pastor all thought I was crazy. Especially Pastor Maitland. He thought Aunt Patricia walked on water, but he would. Look at how much she gave to the church.
It wasn’t just him, though. Every single person with whom my aunt came in contact thought she was the greatest thing since sliced bread; that the Savannah city planners needed to put their heads together and figure out how to add a twenty-third square so the great Patricia Davenport could have a larger-than-life sized statue put up in her honor.
So what was wrong with me? Why was it me she hated? I’d done nothing. She had treated me that way from the moment we met. Something made Aunt Patricia look at me through glasses tinted with a secret sin from the past. It colored her opinion of me and painted a big red letter across my chest. At least poor Hester Prynne knew what her letter stood for. Something I couldn’t say for myself.
I paused in front of a shop window, glancing over my shoulder to make sure the women weren’t watching me, and turned back to study my reflection, almost expecting to see a red graffiti-like image scrawled across my torso, but there was nothing.
I repeat…nothing.
“Ellie is right,” I whispered. “You do look more like a boy. All the fluttery layers of lace and femininity in the world can’t hide what isn’t there. Even a Wonder Bra has to have something to work with, right?”
Poor body image…that’s what the experts call it. That’s the biggest reason I was so shy. Of course, losing everything familiar as a young girl in one fell swoop—parents, home, and friends—didn’t help, but people get over stuff like that. However, when you’re a girl, but you look more like your Dad than your Mom in the boob department, it isn’t something easily gotten over.
I turned away from my reflection in disgust and headed for the corner of Gaston and Bull Streets. At the other end of the crosswalk was an entrance
to the park. I could just catch glimpses of the Fountain through the trees. There was nothing I could do about some of my problems, but maybe, just maybe I’d find a model for my project. I was due some luck
This was probably my millionth time visiting Forsyth Park. From the very start, it was my favorite place in Savannah—an escape of sorts—ever since I first moved here. Sometimes I brought my painting paraphernalia, sometimes I didn’t. This was a “without” day.
Once I reached the Fountain, I closed my eyes and drew a deep breath, hoping to exhale the stress that had my shoulders as taut as a piano string. Pine tingled my nose and my eyes popped open to discover the source since I knew there weren’t any pine trees in the park. It was the garland. Someone had trimmed the wrought iron railing that circled the fountain with the real deal, not the usual plastic stuff. Real evergreen and red velvet bows. It not only looked like Christmas, it smelled like it too. Holiday music wafted in the same breeze that misted my skin from the fountain’s spray. Afternoon sunshine tinseled everything it touched. The fountain’s tritons and swans fluted arcs of molten gold into the December air.
Ahhh. I could feel myself relax. Watching moving water always did that to me, same as watching flames in a fireplace. It was more than just seeing it, though. Sound played almost as big a role as sight, providing a steady white noise that guaranteed a coma-like condition.
“Mommy, look at that lady!”
The shrill cry of a young child broke through my hypnotic state, and I turned in curiosity.
Her long, dark overcoat nearly dragged the ground, hanging open in the front, revealing multiple layers of faded clothing in various plaids, stripes, and florals. Her feet scuffed along in men’s work boots several sizes too large. Their long laces had been pulled extra tight, cinching the tops of her boots, and looked cutting-off-circulation painful. It was probably the only way she could keep them on.