by Jenny Hale
The hedges had grown out of their usual boxy shape, the branches pointing upward resembling haphazard, leafy fingers, as if even the foliage were reaching for Aunt Clara—nothing like the way her aunt would’ve kept them. The whitewashed exterior was in need of touch-up painting, and the driveway had become slightly overgrown with weeds. The last year, while Aunt Clara had fought for her health, had clearly taken its toll on the property. Where was the staff that usually took care of the grounds?
The peeling bottom step was now obscured by thistles and weeds that had pushed their way through the crack between the wood and the seashell walk. Hallie moved past the sight to realize the front door was open, and in the entryway she could see just a corner of the old black-and-white photo of Aunt Clara and Uncle Hank standing beside the clapboard Starlight sign, holding a glass of champagne. The cottage had been in the family for generations, but they were the first to give it a name. The photo captured her memory of them perfectly. Aunt Clara’s heart-shaped lips were smiling, the gesture reaching her eyes. Beside her, Uncle Hank had an undeniable sophistication. Hallie had always admired him in that photo. He looked like Cary Grant.
They’d named the cottage Starlight because of the lighthouse that sat on its own private peninsula, jutting out into the sea, behind the main building on the Eubanks’ expansive property. For years, the lighthouse illuminated the water with a breadth of nearly twenty miles, assisting the usually dazzling stars when cloud cover hid them. With the increased use of electronic navigational systems, it wasn’t a working lighthouse anymore, but Aunt Clara had always maintained it, and on Christmas, she lit it. She said that, on that night in particular, she wanted just one more opportunity to get sailors home to their families where they belonged. Hallie used to play in its echoing staircase, facing the gulf, pretending she was alone, shipwrecked on a deserted island. The lighthouse seemed isolated now, abandoned and showing wear like the main house, giving her an eerie feeling that her childhood musings had foreshadowed future events. It made her shiver.
Suitcases dotted the long country porch that wrapped around the enormous dwelling. Hallie and Ben had been quite a distance behind Mama on the way there, so she wondered why her mother hadn’t finished unpacking. Mama’s car doors were still ajar, the trunk open. Sydney would’ve gotten Robby’s things, certainly…
Beau jumped out of the jeep, landing beside her, his tail wagging furiously, while Ben pulled two bags from the back and set them onto the drive. Hallie focused on the hissing of the small gulf waves as they broke onto the shore behind the cottage, and the tinkling of the wind chime on the corner of the front porch, which was missing one of its sea-glass pieces.
Ben offered a wide glance of the property, but his appraisal didn’t show any judgment. It was clear, when he turned his attention back to the jeep, that he didn’t want to linger on the disrepair or the fact that things were amiss with her family. He was clearly trying to keep her spirits up, not knowing what they would find inside. “I’ll get everyone’s things into the house,” he said. He pulled a duffel bag from the back and dropped it onto the driveway, the bag making a smack as it hit the pavement. “I’m guessing your mama’s gonna have her same room in the main house. Want me to put our things out back?”
By “out back,” Ben meant the guesthouse. Hallie had always stayed in the guesthouse. It was her own little retreat, nestled on the edge of the property, a stone-walk away from the main dwelling. As a teenager, she’d liked the independence; in college, she’d savored the solitude; and now, it was a safe distance from the grief she knew would wash over her completely the minute she set foot in Aunt Clara’s house without her. She couldn’t shake the feeling that this moment in her life was the most important time to have Aunt Clara to help her, but she’d left them all, and if Hallie allowed herself to think about the permanence of everything that had happened, panic would set in.
“That’ll be good,” she managed. “But let me help you.”
“Don’t worry yourself with it. You need to find your family. Check on your uncle.” He lifted another bag from the backseat and slid it onto his shoulder, then took one of the suitcases by the handle. When she didn’t respond, Ben moved in front of her. “You can do this, Hallie.”
She knew she should listen to her best friend—she’d learned how important that skill was—but this wasn’t like anything she’d faced before.
“Hey,” Ben said, bringing her attention back to his face. “The minute you need me, I’ll be right in the guesthouse.”
“You won’t come with me?”
His face softened, an affectionate look in his eyes. “I will if you want me to, but I think facing this is something you need to do with your family. I’ll hang back and get some work done. And I also think once you realize you have the strength to do this, everything will seem easier.”
“Okay.” She didn’t believe him. He didn’t know what he was saying with the word everything.
Ben whistled and Beau trotted over from the edge of the yard, standing at attention beside him. “Let’s get all these bags in, boy,” he said, patting Beau’s side with his free hand. Then they headed to the guesthouse, and when he left Hallie in the drive, it felt like he’d taken all her oxygen with him.
Hallie slowly moved down the seashell walkway leading to the house and climbed the wide steps to the front door, the boards creaking under her feet. She stopped in the entryway, Aunt Clara’s familiar scent of lilac and cinnamon taking her breath away again momentarily. She longed to nestle down into her aunt’s loving embrace, under the spell of Aunt Clara’s soft words telling her it would all be just fine. She held her breath briefly and closed the front door behind her, shutting out the coastal breeze.
Hallie steadied herself, fighting off the feeling of loss before it swallowed her. She counted her breaths to refocus until her inhalations were shallow but manageable. She called, “Mama? Sydney?”
No one answered.
She passed Uncle Hank’s old Steinway piano in the corner of the grand formal living room just off the entryway. It sat empty, dust having dulled its usually shiny black surface over the long year he’d had, nursing Aunt Clara and mourning her death. The ghostly tune of his rendition of Franz Liszt’s “La Campanella,” the tink tink tink of Uncle Hank’s fingers against the keys, his head down, his arm stretching to the furthest end of the piano—it played in her mind, making the hair stand up on her arms.
Hallie moved down the hallway toward the back of the house, pausing at the antique table against the stairs to find Aunt Clara’s car keys, presumably still placed where she’d put them last. Her chest constricted with an unbearable force. She reached into her pocket and wrapped her fingers around the list, as if it would summon her favorite aunt back into her life.
“Mama?” she called again, her voice breaking. “Where is everyone?”
In the silence, her flip-flops slapped the hardwoods leading to the family’s preferred gathering place, facing the southern side of the property and the glistening gulf. The kitchen stretched along the entire back of the house, with a farm table that could easily seat sixteen, a vase she remembered someone sending in condolence after the funeral, now containing only withered stems and remnants of baby’s breath, in its center, the rest of the flower arrangement long gone.
The back was open just like the front had been, and the screened porch door outside rattled against its frame in the coastal wind, the heat sailing inside and enveloping her as she neared it. Hallie stepped out, facing the backyard, closing the door, and slipped on the sunglasses that were on top of her head. The sun was relentless, beating down on the coastline, which snaked around the peninsula like a soft sandy pearl-colored ribbon. Robby was down on the beach, playing in the sand, and Hallie made out the rest of them just past the lighthouse, in the gazebo at the end of the dock that sat in a tiny alcove of calm water, where Hallie had learned to swim.
“Oh, Hallie! You’re here!” Mama called, waving to her from the gazebo across the hug
e stretch of property. “Come help us with Uncle Hank!”
Mama’s voice was strained, worried—Hallie could hear the alarm in her tone even from that distance. Picking up her pace, she pushed any thoughts she’d been having out of her mind, her total focus on the present situation. Her strides swallowed the massive yard as she ran through the grass toward the shore, where Mama and Sydney were struggling with Uncle Hank on the dock.
Dismay and uncertainty pelted her while she ran. Uncle Hank was like a father to her, since her own father had left them when she was only three. No Flynn had been successful in love except Aunt Clara. She’d managed to find happiness with Uncle Hank. Because he was a good seed. Uncle Hank was different from the others. He was always there, as reliable as the morning sun. When Hallie arrived, she’d hoped to come through the door with him quietly sitting at his piano or reading the paper on the back porch like he used to, but she found herself in the reality she’d feared instead.
She reached the dock that had seemed to stretch into eternity when she was a child, but was now much shorter. Hallie rushed down to her uncle, careful not to wobble in her flip-flops as they slid around her feet with perspiration and the humid air.
When Hallie got to the gazebo and to Uncle Hank, Mama was leaning over him and Sydney was at his side, holding his hand as he sat, slumped, on the bench.
“What’s wrong?” she asked, out of breath.
Hallie was immediately overcome with her uncle’s appearance. He was frail, thin, nothing like the towering man who had been her family’s protector growing up. His shoulders hunched forward as he tipped his head up to her, his skin almost translucent, and she wondered when he’d been outside last. She choked back a sob, the great loss they all had suffered overwhelming her. She pressed her lips together and pushed her shoulders back so as not to crumple into tears.
“I’ve just been dizzy, that’s all,” Uncle Hank said. His voice was gruff and lifeless, not the voice that had cheered her on as she took off down the pavement on her first bicycle after he’d let go of the back of the seat. Sydney gave her a worried look out of his line of sight.
“He lost his balance when he tried to greet us,” Mama said, her face no softer than it had been when she was packing the car. “I’m calling the doctor as soon as we get him inside.”
“You don’t have to talk about me like I’m not here,” Uncle Hank barked.
“I’m sorry,” Mama said, whipping around to face him.
Uncle Hank showed remorse before he peered over the railing at the water that ceaselessly lapped under them. He looked older, more tired than he had at the funeral. The rims of his eyes were red.
Hallie bit her lip to keep from breaking down. The tidal wave of emotion that had plagued her in the last weeks was washing over her, filling her up again, and she didn’t want to fall apart here. She’d been right to be scared to come. She felt empty, no tears left, but they still managed to prick her eyes. She wasn’t in any shape to help Uncle Hank, and he looked like he needed a lot of help. He deserved to have family around him to lift him up—and she couldn’t. She tried to think of what Aunt Clara would do in a situation like this, but she was so emotionally spent that her mind was blank.
Clara was the sister of Hallie’s grandfather, but Hallie had never met him. Being considerably older than Aunt Clara, he’d passed away before Hallie was born, and her grandmother a few years later. With no other family to help Mama when her husband left, Uncle Hank and Aunt Clara had taken in her, Sydney, and Hallie until Mama could get on her feet financially.
Aunt Clara and Uncle Hank had never had children of their own, and when Aunt Clara wasn’t consumed with her company, she took great care to rest at Firefly Beach. She was a firm believer that one should work and relax in equal amounts, so Hallie guessed that, given how hard she worked on the business, there was no room for children if she wanted to have the down time she needed. But her love was enormous and all encompassing, and if anyone would’ve been a wonderful mother, it was Aunt Clara. Without her, it was as if they were all floundering around, unable to take care of one another.
“I’ll get Ben,” Hallie said, her voice breathy, taut with the sadness that had welled up in her throat. “He can help us get you to the house.”
Uncle Hank wobbled as he tried to stand, his twitching hand clutching the railing, the other pressing into Sydney’s grasp, causing her sister to scramble to support him. “I’m fine. I got myself out here; I can get myself back inside.”
“I panicked when he wasn’t in the house when we arrived,” Mama said. “We found him sitting by himself out here. Where are the groundskeepers and your cleaning staff?” Mama clipped, her concern for him making her edgy.
“I let them all go.” Uncle Hank grappled again for the railing, but he couldn’t get a hold on it and collapsed back down on one knee. Mama helped him up. “Someone keeps prowling around near the windows in the evenings, and I’m not in any shape to ward anyone off, so, since I couldn’t tell who it was, I gave everyone their notice.”
Mama’s eyes widened as she put her arm around his waist, Hallie and Sydney supporting his other side. “Someone’s been lurking on the property?”
Sydney tipped her head up and scanned the beach frantically, exhaling loudly when she caught sight of Robby.
“I haven’t been able to sleep well,” he said, once he was securely standing with their help. “It’s a lone figure in the night, a male. Lumbering, not in any hurry. I don’t know what he wants.”
“Have you called the police? At the very least, that’s trespassing,” Sydney offered, her forehead creased with concern. Her head continued to swivel, her maternal instincts on overdrive.
“No. It was only a few times. And to be honest, what is there that he can take from me that isn’t already gone?” He became unsteady again, grabbing on to them.
“We’ll get someone to look into this,” Mama said.
“I thought the fresh air would do me some good. I’m suffocating in that house…”
“Robby!” Sydney called. “Let’s go inside for a little while.”
Robby ran toward them as they labored to hold Uncle Hank. Despite his deterioration, he was still a big man, and it was taking all their might to keep him steady. With nothing but water on either side of the dock, Hallie didn’t even want to think about what might have happened if he’d lost his balance getting out to the gazebo.
They all stopped for a second to catch their breath, and Hallie took stock of her surroundings. The breeze blew in, carrying with it the briny air and salty residue that settled on her skin whenever she was there. The sky was a perfect shade of blue against the emerald sea that pawed at the powdery sand the same way it had when she was a girl. The lighthouse cast a long shadow across the once pristine yard, in need of work now. Other than the yard requiring a little sprucing, nothing had changed on the edge of the water she knew so well, yet at the same time, nothing was the same. She squeezed Uncle Hank tighter, stepping along beside him as they began to move again, wondering what the weeks ahead would bring.
FOUR
Hallie was shaken to the core, unable to understand how anything could ever be okay from this point forward. Once they’d gotten Uncle Hank into the kitchen, she went back outside, around the side of the house where no one could see her, and cried until that familiar feeling of emptiness took over and her tears stopped. The wind blew against her, tunneling from the sea, past the boathouse and up to Starlight Cottage. She caught sight of a sailboat on the horizon, and focused on it to try to get herself together.
“Oh, sorry.” A voice startled her, making her yelp.
She wasn’t prepared to see anyone. And the man standing in front of her was someone she didn’t recognize. She looked around carefully to find a clear path in case she needed to run, her hands beginning to tremble. Once she had a well-defined line of exit, she made eye contact with him. He didn’t seem dangerous, but she didn’t trust her intuition these days. He was wearing paint-splattered
clothes with a clearly unintentional streak of blue in his hair, and he had kind green eyes. “Are you okay?”
“Yes,” she sniffled, squaring her shoulders and blinking rapidly to clear her vision.
Compassion washed over his face. “I wasn’t trying to sneak up on you. I’m so sorry—I know your uncle has been careful about who he lets onto the property.” Cautiously, he leaned around her. “My paint cans are behind you.” He nodded toward a stack of silver containers by the spigot. “I’m Gavin Wilson. Hank Eubanks hired me to redo the trim on Starlight Cottage. The storm last winter really put a hurting on it.” He held out his hand in greeting.
“I’m Hallie Flynn, his great niece.” She shook the man’s hand.
“Nice to meet you.” He had a gentle smile, as if he were treading lightly, given her obviously emotional state. “Hank and I had a long talk when we first met a couple of months ago, and I know he prefers to be alone out here, but when he’s on an up-day, as we call it, he gives me a ring and I come out to see him. He’s still very particular about when I’m to come. I can’t get here too early and I have to leave before dark. He sits in the front living room and watches me go from the window. He said he’s concerned about my safety. I’m not sure why…” Gavin huffed out a little chuckle. “Shouldn’t it be the other way around?”
“I’m surprised he’s painting the trim when there’s so much more that needs to be done,” she said, still a little suspicious, taking stock of every twitch or movement Gavin made.
“Well, he didn’t seem interested in aesthetics. He noticed an area that was rotting and causing a leak inside because the wood was bare and open to the elements. He only wanted to seal it up, but I replaced it with weather-resistant wood. Painting it all with a good water-repellent paint and then the sealer helps to keep it in good shape during storms.”
“Oh,” she said, figuring he seemed to be genuine. She wiped her sweaty hands on her shorts, her nerves getting the best of her.