The Summer House

by Lauren K. Denton

  Worth’s eyebrows hitched up. “What?”

  “We’re not getting the contract,” Lydia said pointedly.

  “Yes, I get that, but what happened?” Red splotches rose in Worth’s cheeks. “I thought we had them. They told us—”

  “It doesn’t matter what they told us. What matters is where they signed their names. And it wasn’t on our contract.” Mertha lifted a glass of brandy from a passing tray and smiled a hello to a woman in a dark mink stole making her way to the outdoor fireplace. A stack of kindling nearby had dwindled during the evening as party guests fed the fire to ward off the chill of the early spring evening.

  “We needed them, Worth. If we’re going to keep Bishop Lumber at the top of the food chain, we can’t lose clients like the Albrights.”

  “I know. I know.” He took a long swig of his bourbon, neat.

  “They’re close friends with the Dennis family,” Lydia added. “Who knows if the Albrights went straight to Jack Dennis and told him they’d changed their minds. What then?”

  Worth hung his head. He seemed so despondent, Lily spoke up.

  “He’s trying,” she said. “He works so hard for the company. It was just, what, three weeks ago that he secured the deal with Carrier Whiting? That was a big deal, wasn’t it?”

  “It was good,” Mertha said slowly, “but Carrier Whiting is not the big league. That’s where we operate.” She turned back to her son. “Worth, Jack Dennis is standing in my kitchen at the moment talking golf with Dave Skillen. I want you to take a minute and compose yourself, then go in there and calm any concerns he may have. I’m leaving it in your hands.”

  “Mother,” Lydia started, but Mertha silenced her with a look.

  “It’s up to Worth. He can handle it.”

  She tossed one last penetrating glance over her shoulder at Worth, and then she and Lydia moved as one toward a group of men laughing near the stone steps that led down to a lower terrace.

  Next to her, Worth exhaled deeply and a curse slipped out.

  “You okay?” Lily asked.

  He shook his head, but before he could speak, the small three-piece band Mertha had hired for the night struck up a jaunty Frank Sinatra tune. A smile tweaked the corner of Worth’s mouth, and then it stretched into a grin.

  “You remember this song?” he asked before singing a few bars adorably off pitch. “‘The best is yet to come and babe, won’t it be fine?’”

  Lily laughed. “Our wedding dance.”

  He glanced across the yard to where his mother and sister had joined the group of men, their backs turned toward him, and then he took her hand and gave a tug. “Come on. Follow me.”

  “Worth, I don’t have anything to talk about with Jack Dennis.”

  “We’re not going to talk to Jack Dennis.”

  The Bishop home was situated on an acre of natural gardens, and while the inside of the house was crammed with stuffy centuries-old antiques and paintings, the outside was airy and relaxed with gently manicured rows offering winter honeysuckle, snowdrops, and daffodils. Worth led her past those to a large cherry tree in the corner. Standing on the other side of its low branches, they were mostly hidden from the guests but could still hear the music.

  He pulled her toward him, circled her waist with one arm, and took her hand. As they swayed, he hummed the tune softly in her ear. She waited a bit, enjoying the quiet peace of the moment, before she questioned him.

  “Are you not going to—”

  “Shhh,” he’d said.

  “But . . . what are you—”

  “Nothing. I’m doing nothing, except dancing with my wife. It’s our anniversary, isn’t it?”

  “It is. And I appreciate the gesture, but . . .” She trailed off as Worth turned them in a slow half circle. Lily rested her cheek against Worth’s shoulder and closed her eyes. “I just know your mom and . . .”

  “It’s okay,” he whispered. “I don’t care anymore.”

  When she opened her eyes a moment later, Mertha was watching them from across the yard, her mouth rigid with disappointment.

  Eighteen days later Worth told his mother he wanted out of the family business. A few days after that, Lily was packing boxes for their move south. And tonight, two months after their last dance, she signed the divorce papers her husband had left in the kitchen for her to find.

  * * *

  After making up the bed with clean sheets and sinking down on her soft pillows, Lily picked up her phone and called Worth. He didn’t answer, though she hadn’t expected anything different. Next she called Mertha, who did answer, just as Lily knew she would. This time Lily skipped the polite niceties that usually started off their phone conversations.

  “Mertha, I know you know where he is.”

  “What makes you say that?” Her voice was taut.

  “You’ve been hyperaware of every step of your son’s life, and I’m sure you know about this step as well.”

  Mertha sighed. “At this moment I don’t know exactly where he is, but I have a general idea.”

  “If I can’t find him, I can’t get these papers back to him, so that means you’re going to have to do it for me.”

  “Excuse me?”

  “I’ve done my part. I’ve signed my name. It’s all over now. I’ll mail the papers back to you, and it’ll be up to you to get them to Worth.”

  “I think you’re being hasty. I told you Worth just needs some time . . .”

  As Mertha rambled, blood rushed in Lily’s ears. In and out, breaths and blood. She began to count slowly as Mertha told Lily all the things she was doing wrong in this situation. All the things she should have done differently to make this easier on Worth. As Lily breathed, she reminded herself she was done with Worth and his apologies, his unpredictability. His meddling mother. His secrets.

  “Lily, are you hearing me?”

  “Does this have anything to do with Delia Park?”

  Mertha paused. It was so short, most people wouldn’t have noticed, but Lily was well versed in Mertha’s quick, confident answers, and she knew a hiccup in her mother-in-law’s composure when she heard one. “Lily. You have to understand—”

  “You know what? Never mind. I don’t care.” She was surprised to realize she actually meant it. The jealousy that should have been there . . . wasn’t. Anger? Yeah, a little. But also comfort. A strange sense of lightness. “I don’t need to hear your explanation. Worth, Delia—it doesn’t matter anymore.”

  She ended the call and set down the phone on the table beside her. Under the sheets she pointed her toes and extended both arms out to the sides, stretching herself as far as she could. She inhaled deeply and let the air out slowly.

  In her stilled mind she turned the page.

  Eight

  Having lived alone for the better part of forty years, Rose generally didn’t mind her housekeeping duties, but cleaning the kitchen after preparing a meal was another thing altogether. If she made the switch to microwave dinners or cans of soup and crackers, she wouldn’t have as much to clean and put away, but she refused to eat like she was a sad old woman. She was neither sad nor old. Plus, she liked cooking. She learned a lot from the Food Network. That Bobby Flay taught her how to add some Cajun heat to her fish fillets, and she’d started sprinkling Parmigiano Reggiano on most of her roasted vegetables thanks to Giada with the big smile.

  Tonight was different, though. Instead of her usual cleaning-the-kitchen scowl, she had a smile on her face as she waited for her guest. She didn’t mind scrubbing the pot or rinsing the baking pan after making chicken, buttered rice, and roasted asparagus. As she wiped her skillet dry, she hummed to a song she’d heard on the radio earlier in the day.

  She’d even considered making a little extra chicken this evening and taking it down to Lily, but Rose knew the woman would probably be buried under a mountain of welcome food and didn’t want to be a burden. Rose was about as Southern as one could be, her family having been rooted in the same few square miles of coast
al Alabama land for generations, but no matter—the Safe Harbor villagers, most of whom came from parts much farther north, had her beat when it came to bringing food to help smooth life’s curveballs. Births—of grandchildren, of course—deaths, welcoming or going away, the residents had an itchy trigger finger when it came to food. Rose had never grown comfortable with inserting herself into someone else’s joy or pain. Instead she usually let someone else step up and do that particular job, and around here there were plenty of willing volunteers.

  As Rose leaned down to set the skillet in its place in a lower cabinet and hang her dish towel on the oven handle, she heard a knock at the door. Three quick raps, then a fourth. She smiled and glanced at the clock on the microwave: 7:30. She was almost embarrassed by how much she looked forward to this evening each week—the one night she cooked for two, though tonight she’d eaten alone, as her guest had called to say he’d be late.

  Rose twisted the lock on the door and opened it to see Rawlins standing under the porch light. “Sorry I missed dinner,” he said. “I figured you’d appreciate me taking the time to shower before I came.”

  “I do appreciate it. And I saved you a plate.” She opened the door wider and he stepped in, leaning down to give her a quick kiss on the cheek as he passed. He smelled of soap, like a little boy fresh from the bathtub. “I’m sorry I went ahead and ate without you. You know how my stomach acts up if I eat dinner too late.”

  “No worries.” Once inside, he passed straight through to the glass doors overlooking the grass, then the bay. She gave him a moment as he silently greeted the living, breathing thing that was both his friend and foe. He tucked his hands in his back pockets and exhaled.

  “Season opens next week.” She pulled the foil off his plate and set a fork next to it. “How are you feeling about it?”

  “It’s hard to say. Canaan and I are going out early tomorrow to have a look. See how the water feels.”

  “How early is early?”

  “We’ll be on the water by five thirty.”

  She looked at her watch. “What about your bedtime, young man?”

  “Bedtime?” He turned away from the door and sat at the table, pulled the plate toward him. “Don’t worry, Aunt Rose, I’ll keep an eye on my bedtime.” A crack of a smile. “Make sure it doesn’t run off on me.”

  “Oh, you.” She scoffed and reached over the table and pinched his shoulder as he dug into his chicken. “I know you’re not little anymore. You’re a grown man. Sometimes it’s hard to see you that way, though. Especially with all that scruffy hair.” She reached up and smoothed the curls that flipped up at the back of his head.

  “Lucky for me, Canaan doesn’t care what my hair looks like.”

  “I imagine you’re right about that.” As he ate, she took the wax paper off her pound cake and set it on a tray, then cut two slices. “How’s Hazel doing? Is she still trying to pull her own tooth?”

  “She’s fine, and yes. She’s determined that it’s loose. I keep telling her it’s not coming out anytime soon.”

  “She’s with her mom for the weekend?”

  Rawlins nodded. Rose didn’t press. She knew he missed Hazel when she was gone.

  She let him eat in peace while she grabbed two glasses from the cabinet and filled them with milk. When he finished eating, he set his plate in the sink, then grabbed two small plates. Rose slid a slice of cake on each one and added a fork, and then picked up the two glasses of milk and followed him out the back door.

  All of the cottages in the village had sunset views, but Rose’s cottage was situated away from the others on the tip of land that pushed out into Bon Secour Bay, making her view unparalleled. A large swath of grass led directly down to the water, and without a neighbor on either side like the rest of the cottages lining the marina, her view was unbroken. No fence or flamingo bird feeder in sight. Just wide, blue-gray water.

  Two Adirondack chairs and a small table were in the middle of the grass facing the bay. Sitting there, her back to the rest of civilization, with nothing in her sight except water and sky, it was easy to imagine she was an explorer, perhaps the first person to have stumbled on this particular slice of beauty.

  But of course she wasn’t. Her great-grandfather had been the first, all the way back in the 1800s, long before anyone knew the water around this jut of land was teeming with brown, white, and pink shrimp. They figured it out quickly though, and subsequent generations of Willett men, and a few women, had traveled the water by trawler, seeking its bounty and goodness.

  At one point in her life, many moons ago, Rose thought she’d be one of those women, one strong and brave enough to stand with the men, haul in the nets, gather the shrimp, bring them to shore. She wanted to help carry on the Willett tradition. But life had beat that particular ambition out of her, setting her on a path that culminated in Terry. It was only fitting that the man she married took a chunk of Willett land to build himself a village.

  Oh, come off it, Rose, she chided herself. At this point in her life there was no reason to sugarcoat or soften blows. She couldn’t blame it all on Terry. Or even half of it.

  Regardless of how it happened, the village was built, and now, and for the last several decades, when Willett shrimpers navigated back home—through the gulf waters, back to Bon Secour Bay, and continuing along the narrow passageway of the Bon Secour River—the village flaunted itself right there, on the tip of the land, in all its landscaped, sunscreened glory.

  Rose had long ago accepted her lot as owner of this village, the creation of which had so angered her family. People who had no knowledge of the Willett family and all that had happened before had flocked to the village from far-flung places, seeking their own type of bounty and goodness from these waters and this land. Who was she to ask any of them to give that up? At sixty-eight years old, she was just like them, seeking all manner of things from what she saw around her. Solace and comfort. Forgiveness. Redemption.

  She stabbed her cake with her fork and pulled off an unladylike hunk. She hesitated, then went ahead and popped it in her mouth.

  “You’re quiet tonight,” Rawlins said.

  He’d stretched his long legs out in front, one ankle crossed over the other, his head tipped back in the waning blue glow. Eyes closed. His slice of pound cake sat untouched on the table between them.

  “I could say the same about you,” she said.

  He shrugged one shoulder, then reached up and rubbed both hands over his face as he sat up in his chair. He picked up his fork and took a bite. “Mmm.” He tapped his slice with the fork. “Something’s different.”

  “Good different or bad?”

  He paused, swallowed. “Good. Definitely good.”

  She pressed her lips together as her cheeks tried to stretch into a grin. “I added orange flower water.”

  He stared at her a moment, then took another bite. “Huh. I didn’t know oranges had a flower. Or flower water. But I do taste orange.”

  “See what you would’ve missed if you’d changed your mind about coming?”

  “I wasn’t going to change my mind. I told you, I just needed a shower. I was moving furniture and boxes all day. As you know, since you volunteered me for the job.”

  The hint of a smile on his face betrayed his testy words.

  “And I’m very thankful. I wouldn’t have asked you to help if I thought she had anyone else. I think there’s a husband, but something tells me there’s trouble.”

  “Something? How about her leaving half her furniture behind and filling in the gaps with secondhand gems from Mrs. Mary?”

  “You don’t say.”

  “I do. I don’t know what’s going on there, and I didn’t ask any questions. I just did what she said.”

  Rose nodded, pensive. “That was probably the best course of action.” She sighed and leaned back in her seat. She decided not to mention what Lily had said about her husband not being her husband anymore. Something that big was best kept between the two people doing
the deciding. “I don’t know what all’s going on with her, but she has some gumption, I’ll grant her that. Whatever predicament she’s in, she’ll figure it out on her own.”

  She felt Rawlins’s gaze on her face. “What?”

  He chuckled. “Nothing. It’s just not like you to take in strays. You don’t typically . . . like people.”

  “I do too. I like you plenty. Usually.”

  “I know. It’s just . . . It usually takes you a while to warm up to people. Look at Mr. Beaumont. He’s been here, what, five years? And you still wrinkle your nose every time he comes around.”

  “That man is nothing but an annoying ray of sunshine. They don’t make SPF high enough for him.”

  Rawlins stared at her, then laughed. “See what I mean? And here’s this woman you met five minutes ago and she’s already moved in.”

  “Okay, okay, I get it. It’s . . . unlike me. But who said anything about liking her? You don’t hire someone to do a job because you like her. If that was my hiring practice, I would have hired you to be the new hairdresser. How’d you like that? You feel okay trimming Peter Gold’s mustache every week? Or covering up Janelle’s grays?”

  He smiled again—they always came easier once he let the first one go—and shook his head. “You’re impossible.”

  “I’m not either. But I am a good businesswoman. I hired Lily because she came along at the right time. She needed a job, I needed a hairdresser. It was a business decision, pure and simple.”

  But darn if there wasn’t more to it. Rose couldn’t deny it, though she wouldn’t admit it to Rawlins or anyone else. Watching Lily in the middle of that empty salon as she made her case for the job and the living space, seeing the fire in her eyes—it was obvious she needed an escape. What kind of woman would Rose be if she turned her down?

  Despite all her willy-nilly emotions, Rose had done her part. She’d gotten Lily here, provided her with a job and a place to live, and now Lily was on her own. It was a trial run and it was up to her if she made it out the other side.