It was him, knocking on my door and my heart.
CHAPTER 7
July 2018, Present Day
Islamorada, Florida
While Philip showered, his phone buzzed. The clanging sound plucked me from a flurry of painful memories, and I was unsure how we had arrived here. Philip and I had once been on track, but we’d veered off course. Normally the ringing was his to deal with, but the caller was insistent, a beating drum tapping and tapping. When I saw Natasha’s name on the screen, I picked up.
“Natasha.”
“Charlotte.”
Her silky accent magnified the differences between us, though she never held it against me. What I once heard as disregard now sounded friendly. Natasha was amusing, almost as charming as Philip. She never failed to mention how grateful she was I’d come along. She’d once said that my down-to-earth personality was a good match for her ex-husband, and at the time, I believed her.
“Where’s Philip?”
“Showering.”
She paused. Something Natasha rarely did. She was purposeful and matter-of-fact. “What’s wrong?” I asked.
“What could be the matter?” The change in her voice was slight, but I picked up on it at once. “A dreary day here in London”—and she laughed—“though every day in London is dreary. You’ll be a doll and have Philip ring me?”
Natasha was hiding something from me. “Is everything okay?”
Her nervous chatter took over, and I listened as she recounted an episode with a recent client—an old acquaintance of hers and Philip’s—and the work she was doing on his home in Holland Park. She thought I wouldn’t notice her attempt to distract me.
“Natasha. Spill.”
A door slammed shut in the background. “Charlotte, I’ve got to run. Bruce just got home. Pass along my message to Philip. He needs to call me at once.”
I met Philip outside the shower as he was toweling droplets of water from his body.
“Natasha called. She was strange.”
“She’s always strange.”
“No, this was something else.”
“I’m sure it’s nothing, Charlotte. What’d she say?”
“It’s what she didn’t say.” I grabbed the towel and dabbed the spots he’d missed. His skin was soft, and I noticed a freckle I hadn’t seen before.
“Philip, is something going on?”
He touched my nose with the tip of his finger. “You worry too much, darling.” The horn outside signaled he was late, and I watched as he readied himself for the drive to downtown, tucking my concerns away in the folds of washed linen.
“This was poor planning,” I reminded him. “You should’ve gone straight from the airport.”
“But then I wouldn’t have had this, Charley,” he said, pulling me into his arms for a deep embrace.
He was on his way to his Brickell office when I planted myself at the island in our kitchen. The drive to downtown was over an hour, and Philip spent the time perusing newspapers and catching up on calls. With elbows resting along the white marble, I stirred my tea in a daze and stared out at the choppy water. I was used to our fleeting, abrupt meetings, Philip coming and going before we had a chance to recalibrate, though a feeling gnawed at me. Sunny whimpered at my feet, echoing the sentiment. For him, the need to be touched, to be petted, was primal. He had become my shadow, following me wherever I went.
My phone buzzed as it always did. He’d be traveling “the Stretch,” the eighteen-mile section of highway US 1 that connected Florida City to Key Largo.
Stop worrying, Charley. Everything’s fine.
The tension I’d been holding in released, taking with it my earlier concerns. I patted Sunny’s head. “Your daddy’s crazy,” I said to his pouty eyes and shiny black nose. “What should we write him?”
Sunny panted, and I reached for the phone and began typing.
I love you. And I did. I loved the way he chuckled, not quite laughed. How he woke me in the morning by kissing the bottoms of my feet. How he thought nothing of watching marathon sessions of chick flicks on lazy Sundays and eating breakfast for dinner. I loved his stupid, senseless facts: Prince Charles’s last name is Mountbatten-Windsor, the scent of the rain is termed petrichor. His raunchy jokes. I loved each and every cheesy snow globe he brought me from all the cities he visited. Better than the gifts was imagining him entering souvenir shops and requesting the location of the snow globes. He’d be dressed in his pressed suit and Italian loafers, and the salespeople would follow him down the aisles, curious to know whom he was buying for. Was it his daughter? His girlfriend? Wife?
Wife.
The word spread through me and down to my fingers. I typed. I can’t wait to be your wife, Philip.
He replied at once: You already are. Dinner’s at 8. Goose can’t wait to meet you.
I dropped the phone in my bag and left Sunny downstairs with access to his doggy door. As I made my way to the front gate, our clapboard guest house smiled down at me, her demeanor much like Philip’s. Silly. Obtrusive. Evocative. She’d come with the property, an island bungalow on stilts, and we’d left her in her original beach getaway condition. It was for our guests, complete with a kitchen and bath, and her sign dangled across the porch: “The Love Shack.”
The air was warm, as it always was in the Keys, and I began the short walk to Liberty’s clinic. Philip had never really wanted me to work. He encouraged ambition and supported my job search, but he kindly reminded me that I didn’t need to work ever again. The schools down south were heavily staffed with capable teachers, and the union members eyed me sympathetically before letting me know they’d be in touch. A yearning for my students tucked itself away, and while doing nothing was foreign to me, the tides turned when I’d met Liberty.
When I first saw Liberty traipsing up and down Anne’s Beach, I remember thinking she was the kind of pretty that meant a life well lived. Before she’d handed me her business card and drawn me under her spell, I was caught in her lively energy. Liberty was a frenetic speaker, rarely stopping to catch her breath, her words jamming into each other like one exhausting monologue. Sunny had been pawing at something in the nearby sand that resembled a bone, and Liberty called out, “Don’t be fooled by those bones.” I hadn’t had a clue what she meant, and quite honestly thought she might be a little nuts, so I tugged on Sunny.
That only made Liberty move in closer. She had pale, flawless skin. “You’re new here?”
I’d nodded, and she sidled up next to me, grabbing hold of my wrist. Sunny hadn’t flinched. “Legend has it there’s human remains along this beach.”
It had been our second week in town. Philip and I had finally finished unloading boxes, and I was not in the mood for farfetched tales. I wrested my arm from hers, but she latched on tighter. Sunny and his discriminating taste and fiercely protective watchdog skills were of no assistance either. He liked the lively woman, choosing to sit patiently by her feet, biting down on the object that might or might not be mired in folklore.
She continued, detailing the grisly story of the great hurricane of 1935. Roosevelt had sent veterans to build a highway connecting Key West to Miami, and they tragically perished in the strong storm. “A horrific aftermath,” she’d continued. “The lost souls, without refrigeration, without transportation . . . there was no way to give them a proper burial. The only option was to burn the bodies.”
Try as I might, my feet were unable to take me in a direction away from Liberty Scott. Her story tethered me to the ground.
“I think the skeletons of those poor souls wash up on the shores from time to time.”
I’d reached down and inspected the matter hanging from Sunny’s jaws.
“Spooked you, didn’t I?” And then her mouth burst into a laugh.
“Was that some kind of joke?” I asked.
She peered inside my eyes. Hers were a clear blue. “Why would anyone joke about something like that? Legend has it those angry men stormed the skies and churned Irma our way. Eighty-two
years later.”
I soon learned that Liberty was born and raised in the bosom of the connected islands and was famous for sharing its tales. That first afternoon stretched into miles of terrain, and Liberty entertained me with a long tapestry that formed the island’s history. She told me Islamorada attracted all types, though they shared some things in common: an affinity for natural splendor, a deep appreciation for earth’s treasures, and, of course, Jimmy Buffett. I liked to believe I fell in love with this part of the country by peering through Liberty’s colorful lens, but I knew there had to be more.
The stand-alone building resembling a charming cottage came into view, and I turned the door handle. Liberty’s cheerful, rambling voice spilled through the hallway even though I was late. Despite her attempts to shock me with her strange, ghoulish stories and chilling legends, she had taken me under her wing, and I would always be grateful.
It was easy for those who didn’t understand Liberty to call her a “kook” or a “crackpot.” Sunny liked her, from the very start, and that always stood for something. My body softened thinking about that afternoon and all it opened up for me. She’d insisted she could help with the almond allergy, that I didn’t have to live in fear, and she demanded I call her the next day. And I had.
I noticed one of our signs dangling from the bulletin board in the waiting room. “Out of consideration for those with serious allergies, please do not bring food or drinks into our clinic and refrain from using perfumes or strong scented lotions.” I pressed the pushpin into the crisp paper and smoothed out the edges.
The clinic was Islamorada’s first and only center for NAET therapy. I had come to learn that Nambudripad’s Allergy Elimination Technique was as widely criticized and debated as Liberty, but since I’d graduated from its program, I was qualified to defend its virtue. After my own Google search, I read that NAET treats those who suffer from mild to severe allergies in a noninvasive, needle-free environment. It was a long way from my teaching background with the practicalities of sentence structure and the precise rules of grammar. The treatment was not for everyone, and I understood and respected the skepticism.
I would never forget Liberty’s expression, her beaming smile, tears sprouting from her eyes, when she shared the picture of a former patient tasting birthday cake for the first time. The child was twelve. A lifetime without chocolate and frosting was the result of a plethora of unkind allergies. If I had once questioned gravity and the principles that tugged us in the direction of someone so foreign and wrong for us, I had fallen into my own trap when Liberty offered me a job in her office.
“You can be my office manager,” she had said one afternoon at the beach when we were walking toward our cars, the evening sky dusted with stars. “Just until a teaching job opens. I’m good at what I do, Charlotte, but I’m highly unorganized. I bet you could whip my office into shape, am I right? It’ll be fun!” She used her fingers and hands when she talked. “Charlotte, you’ll love it!”
Though I missed teaching—the students and the interaction—Liberty Scott was not someone I could resist.
It was Friday and we didn’t see patients until two. Normally, I arrived at one, but today was an exception. The clinic was not solely for the treatment of allergies. Liberty practiced acupuncture and claimed to treat weight imbalances, infertility, anxiety, and pain. She also professed not to profess. NAET was a “personal decision” and Eastern and Western medicine, “combined, could be very effective.”
Settling myself behind the desk, I powered up the computer and turned on NPR. My fingers had just reached the keyboard, when Liberty’s shrill voice called out, “Some guy Ben is coming in with his son later this afternoon. Said you referred him?”
CHAPTER 8
May 2016, Back Then
Kansas City, Missouri
My mother once told me that you should never marry someone if you’ve slept with them on the first date. She said, to be precise, “Don’t be that kind of girl. If he slept with you that easily, he’s probably doing it with a lot of others.”
I was an adult with my own set of limits—and I’d hardly call it a first date—but, admittedly, I had slept with Philip on our first date. The operative word being slept.
He showed up at my door, eyes bloodshot and clouded over with a sultry mist. The sun was beginning to rise, and with its gentle rays came longing. A longing to be touched. A longing to fit our pieces together so they could never break apart.
His phone dropped on my tiled floor with a loud crash. I was sure I could see my reflection splintered in the cracked glass, each sliver calling out, “Protect yourself.”
He stepped over the shattered device and took my hand. He wasn’t dressed to get on a plane. He was in faded blue jeans and a thin gunmetal sweater. It was nearing June in Missouri. Temperatures were climbing well out of normal range. His palms were sweaty, his breath that of someone in a rush. I turned around thinking I’d see his suitcase on the floor. This was a goodbye. He’d come to say goodbye before heading to the airport.
But there was no suitcase.
“Your flight?” I asked nervously as he guided me the few short steps toward my bed.
“Is that what I think it is?” he asked.
I was out of breath, too. His question threw me. A bright-red embarrassment crawled up my neck.
“I haven’t seen a Murphy bed in years.” He turned around, aghast. “Oh, Charley, I shouldn’t be here.”
I was too surprised to speak. Philip was in my apartment.
“It’s not proper for a gentleman to be in a lady’s bedroom.” He turned to leave.
My voice rose. “It’s the other way around.” I shifted nervously. The air conditioner kicked on, and a loud noise mingled with desire. “The lady shouldn’t be in the man’s bedroom.”
He eyed the bed and then me. A thin white tank top accentuated parts I wasn’t yet ready for him to see. He took his time, noticing how I tugged on the fabric, pulling it down to cover my stomach. A hand came down on mine, the other grabbed the back of my neck. His lips were on mine as I whispered, “Maybe I’m not a lady.”
The kiss was slow and deliberate, a canvas of blank sky spread out for miles. I was trapped in a silky tunnel I couldn’t escape. Didn’t want to escape. I don’t know what I thought in that moment. I had an idea of where the kiss would take us and the allure of an unmade bed. A dozen images swirled around my mind, though nothing measured up to what occurred that morning.
Philip pulled away first. He gathered me in his arms and led me toward the bed.
The clock beside my bed read 7:17. He caught me gazing at the numbers, and in one swoop, he pulled the clock from the wall and flung it aside.
“I’ll replace that,” he said through pressed lips when I heard it smash against the floor.
“You’re supposed to be getting on a plane . . .”
He dropped me on the bed while the early sun cast a beam of light across his face.
“Change of plans.”
Seems I didn’t need to worry about physical imperfections, because Philip wasn’t going to undress me, he wasn’t going to make us that couple. He held me in his arms, fully clothed. And we talked.
“You’ve done something to me, Charley Miles.”
I lightly jabbed him with my fist. “Myers.”
He pretended not to notice and adjusted his body comfortably beneath my blanket. Our bodies were in sync, and I rested my head against his sweater, fingering the delicate fabric.
“You don’t like when I call you Miles?”
“I don’t.”
“Everyone calls you Myers. I’m not like everyone.”
“It’s my name, Mr. Stafford.”
“Names—those can be changed.” He smiled.
That would become one of my earliest memories of Philip. His strange sense of humor. A man who intrigued me intellectually. Someone, I suppose, who mirrored my suffering and knew how to hide the hardest feelings. We held each other, paying no mind to the time or
Philip’s immediate travel plans.
It was an embrace that lasted four days. Four days of exploring each other’s minds, and eventually each other’s bodies. We talked of his work, the company he and Meghan grew and managed internationally. About buying and selling faulty businesses, properties, and land, and turning them into viable companies that employed thousands. Until we reached the deeper subjects. It was easy to sum up his success and the careful path he took to achieve it, but there was so much more to Philip than his conquests.
For one, Philip cried when he sang the national anthem at a sporting event. I knew this because I watched him at the Royals game. We discussed it later over barbecue after I reminded him Kansas City has some of the best ribs in the country. “There’s something remarkably patriotic standing shoulder to shoulder with our comrades, hands upon our hearts. The pride. It’s just lovely.”
“You’re British,” I reminded him.
“I have a heart, Charley. It hears things. Many things.”
Which explained why he visited Boys & Girls Clubs in most every city on his itinerary. There he’d eat lunch with the kids, play a game of basketball, and discuss their futures. Those afternoons were as inspiring and motivating for him as they were for the children.
“My business takes me all over the world, Charley. As glamorous as it sounds, poverty prevails. There’s no charm to any country that dismisses those in need. I can lavish money on the cause, but these kids require a connection with people they can look up to, someone who believes in them. It’s far more productive.”
I leaned in closer. “I bet women find you incredibly desirable when you talk like this.”
“Most of them,” he said, biting into a corn muffin.
“That’s how I feel about my students. And that’s why I encourage them to read. It’s a free vacation, a chance to visit places they’ve never been, may never have a chance to go. It improves their vocabulary, makes them better spellers and speakers. It’s my one shot at making a difference.”
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