The Guests on South Battery

by Karen White

  I heard JJ laugh and I smiled as I took the stairs two at a time to reach the nursery. I opened the door and paused, my own smile quickly fading as I took it all in. Jayne sat in the rocking chair with her foot resting on the ottoman, her ankle wrapped in a bandage. Both of my children sat on her lap holding a brown paper lunch bag—definitely not one of the educational toys that lined the room and the bookshelves—and laughing each time one of them squeezed the bag and made a crinkling noise. Jack, his button-down shirt discarded on the side of Sarah’s crib, wore only his sweat-soaked T-shirt. But the most disconcerting sight of the entire scenario was the furniture, all moved into a new position and ignoring the feng shui design created by the interior designer I’d hired to help set up the nursery.

  Jack grinned at me as he wiped the sweat from his forehead. “What do you think? Jayne suggested that the room would be more functional this way, with more play room, and I agreed.”

  Sarah smashed her paper bag between two fists, causing both children to start chortling with glee. I looked down at the beautiful handmade rug that had been a gift from Jack’s mother, the primary color design of building blocks with the children’s initials on each one, now completely hidden by the bucket of toys upended in the middle of it.

  Jack approached to kiss me hello, but I stepped back, citing his sweat as my main reason. “Looks like you’ve been busy,” I said.

  “We have,” Jayne exclaimed. “Sarah and I were building all sorts of structures with the blocks, and JJ was having a blast knocking them down. That’s when I realized that they needed more room, so I asked Jack to help.”

  I stared pointedly at the wrap on her ankle. “I thought the doctor told you that could come off in a day.”

  “It hasn’t been a full day yet, but Jack said I should rest it as long as I could and to keep it on at least until tomorrow morning. I think he was just looking for an excuse to play with the children.”

  “Probably,” I said, my lips feeling brittle.

  “I guess since all the heavy lifting is done I’ll go take my shower and then we’ll go see Yvonne.” Without warning, he kissed me on the cheek and left.

  “You forgot your shirt,” I called after him.

  “I’ll put it in the laundry chute,” Jayne offered.

  Sarah clambered off her lap, then crawled to a corner of the rug where the large, chunky Duplo blocks had been snapped together to make what resembled a house, complete with a roof, two chimneys, and a front porch that looked as if a chubby fist had taken out a chunk. I noticed that she and JJ were in matching outfits—if you considered white onesies and diapers outfits. She picked up a Duplo girl with yellow hair and began to pound it against the side of the house.

  I waited for Jayne to tell Sarah that people used doors, but she didn’t say anything, preferring to study her as if my daughter were an anthropological experiment. With a frown, I squatted down next to Sarah and looked into her sweet face that at the moment was scowling at me. “Sweetheart, people use doors to go inside the house.”

  “Uhhh,” she grunted as she resumed banging the poor plastic girl against the fluorescent yellow wall.

  In a gentle voice, I said, “Sarah, can I please have the little girl?”

  She continued to hammer the girl against the house like a weapon, ignoring me. Jayne placed JJ on the floor, then knelt in front of Sarah. “She’s been doing this all day—it’s like she’s made up her mind that girls going through walls is the right way.” Jayne held out her hand. “May I please have the girl? I’ll put her to bed inside so that she’s all rested for tomorrow.”

  Sarah solemnly dropped the toy into Jayne’s outstretched palm. With an apologetic glance at me, Jayne said, “Like I said, we’ve been doing this all day. She has a very firm belief in the way things should be.”

  “I wonder where she gets that from,” I said, curious as to which branch of Jack’s tree that particular trait might have fallen out of. I thought of his parents and figured it had to go further back than that.

  Jayne was looking at me oddly. “Yeah. I wonder. So, Melanie, could I ask you something?”

  “Sure,” I said, hoping she was about to suggest replacing the furniture where it had been.

  “I don’t want to go back to that house on South Battery until it’s fully renovated. I find it . . . unsettling.”

  I struggled to keep my expression neutral. “All right. I understand. You did tell me that you didn’t like old houses, so I’m not surprised. Are you saying you changed your mind about keeping it?”

  She shook her head. “No. I agreed to keep the house for now out of respect for Miss Pinckney’s wishes and to see if the house’s aura changes any with the renovations. But she didn’t say I had to live in it. For now, I really have no desire to cross the threshold in the foreseeable future.”

  I hoped she didn’t see my relief. “That’s not a problem. I spoke with Sophie today and she’ll be happy to lead the restoration, determine if any grants might be available, and if she can use parts of the work as curriculum. She’ll figure out the numbers so she can discuss them with you, and any major decisions will have to be signed off by you. I’m sure for the sheer happiness of working on the house she won’t mind being in charge.”

  “What about the doll?”

  I shuddered, remembering the doll standing by the opened attic door. “Sophie spoke with her friend the doll expert and he’s eager to take a look. He’s stopping by tomorrow to pick it up and says it will take a few weeks before he can get back to us.”

  “Tell him to take as long as he needs.”

  I smiled. “Will do. Well, then, we’ll see you in a couple of hours. Hopefully we’ll find something in the archives that will tell us more about the house. Maybe even something about the family.”

  I kissed the children good-bye, then turned toward the door. Jayne called me back.

  “Melanie?”

  “Yes?”

  “Nola’s friend—Lindsey. Do you know her well?”

  I shook my head. “I met her the first time when you did. She says her mother and I went to college together—I don’t remember her. I need to pull out my yearbook to see if I recognize her. Why?”

  JJ reached his arms to be picked up again and Jayne lifted him, her eyes focused on his little face. I couldn’t help wondering if she was using him as a reason to avoid eye contact with me.

  “I’m not sure,” she said. “It’s just, well, you know how some people seem . . . haunted?”

  “A little,” I said, glad her focus was on JJ.

  “Well, that’s the sense I get from her. As if she’s being dogged by something.”

  “Because she brought the Ouija board?”

  “No,” Jayne said, finally looking at me. “I think because she reminded me a little of myself when I was that age. All alone, even in a roomful of people.”

  I nodded, unwilling to admit that I knew exactly what she was talking about. It hadn’t been that long ago that I’d felt the same way—before Jack, and before I’d reconciled with my mother and father. There was something about being raised with absent parents that made a permanent scar in a person’s psyche.

  I pondered my next question for a moment. “Since you’re kind of a child-rearing expert, do you think I should limit Nola’s association with her?”

  Jayne shook her head. “Nola’s pretty grounded, which is a tribute to both her own strength and the parental guidance she’s received from you and Jack. I think she and Lindsey could be good for each other.”

  I nodded. “Thanks. And I’m not going back to the office when we return, so you can have the rest of the day and evening off.”

  “Thank you.” She looked up at me. “I’m kind of hoping you don’t find anything in the archives.”

  I raised my eyebrows.

  “I don’t mean to sound ungrateful. Really, I don’t. My lawyers
have explained that there’s enough money in the estate to do the restorations, which will allow the house to be sold for a pretty hefty sum. I won’t have to worry about money after that, which is a nice thing to know.” She paused. “It’s just . . .”

  “It’s just . . . ?” I prompted.

  “Do you ever think that it’s just easier ignoring bad stuff in the hopes that it will go away?”

  I thought for a moment, debating whether I should tell her that I’d cut my teeth on that very same philosophy. And remembering the invitation downstairs that I’d tucked beneath a bill, hoping it might get overlooked and forgotten. I decided that as her employer and the mother of two, I needed to come up with a more mature response. “It probably is easier,” I said. “But in my experience, the bad stuff isn’t like a mosquito bite—you know, leave it alone so it disappears instead of scratching it and making it worse. Usually the things you don’t want to deal with get worse the longer you wait.”

  She contemplated me for a long moment. “Do you believe in . . .” She stopped suddenly, and I wondered if she’d also felt the temperature in the room drop. JJ continued to babble, but Sarah looked up, then stared at the door expectantly.

  “Do I believe in what?” I asked, remembering Jayne being pushed down the stairs the previous day. And her opposition to the Ouija board.

  Sarah began whimpering and Jayne bent to her eye level, her answer lost as she soothed my daughter and I took the opportunity to look around the room. But all I could sense was that dark curtain again, pulling tightly closed and blocking my view.

  I bent to kiss the top of each baby’s head, then retreated to the door. “We’ll be back soon.”

  We said good-bye and I closed the door behind me. I walked slowly down the stairs, fairly certain I knew what she’d been about to ask me, and still unsure I knew how to answer.

  CHAPTER 11

  “Was there anything in the mail?” Jack asked, one hand on the steering wheel, the other thrown casually around the back of my seat. The Fireproof Building on Chalmers, where the South Carolina Historical Archives were kept, wasn’t that far and Jack had suggested we walk, but my feet were close to bleeding because I’d worn my favorite pre-pregnancy heels all morning. Despite the numb tingling on one side of each foot and the blisters on the other, I’d promised my beautiful shoes that I’d wear them for the rest of the day before I added them to the shrine at the back of my closet.

  Jack smelled of shampoo and soap and Jack, and I couldn’t make myself ask him to remove his arm until he apologized. For what, I wasn’t sure. All I knew was that I felt unsettled, and that it had started when I walked into the nursery and saw him and Jayne and our children together. I’d felt somehow superfluous, my old insecurities resurfacing like a rash that hadn’t completely faded. Because, deep down, I still believed that capturing Jack’s attention had been a fluke, and that one day he’d wake up and really see me as the pathetic, awkward, and insecure teenager I’d once been and was afraid I still was.

  “Mellie?”

  I realized I’d been staring at his jawline while allowing my thoughts to ramble down a road I didn’t want to travel. “Um, I’m sorry, what did you say?”

  “Was there anything in the mail?”

  Crap. “A couple of things, I think. There’s another bill from Rich Kobylt. I didn’t look at the amount because I didn’t want to start thinking ugly thoughts about hiding a body in cement. I mean, it’s not like it hasn’t been done before.”

  “They’d know where to look,” Jack said seriously.

  “True. And who knows what else they’d dig up while they’re looking, and then we’re falling down another rabbit hole. So I’ll let you deal with the bill.”

  He seemed to be waiting for me to say something else.

  “What?” I asked. “You think I should handle the bill?”

  “No. You said there were a couple of things in the mail. What was the second thing?”

  I considered throwing myself out of the car while it was still moving. He wasn’t going that fast, and I was close enough that I could walk home even if it made me permanently lame.

  “Oh,” I said, flicking my wrist to show him how unimportant it was. “It was an invitation.”

  Jack was a true-crime writer, used to digging for details and asking questions. I had no idea why I’d thought he wouldn’t notice my evasiveness.

  “An invitation?”

  I nodded.

  He sighed. “An invitation to what?”

  I stared longingly at the side of the road, my hand hovering over the door latch. “A party. At Cannon Green.”

  “A party? Well, that’s something. What kind of party? Baby’s first birthday? Retirement? Engagement? Celebrating Sophie’s new enterprise of handmade grass skirts from Africa?”

  “A book-launch party,” I said quickly, coughing into my hands in the dim hope that he wouldn’t hear and would let it drop.

  “A book-launch party?” he repeated, each consonant perfect. “For whom?”

  When I didn’t answer immediately he glanced at me, a look of incredulity mixed with uncertainty clouding his features. “It couldn’t be . . .”

  “It’s for Marc. For Lust, Greed, and Murder in the Holy City. I think it’s a big deal—the invitation was sent by his publisher. Maybe that’s why we’re on the guest list—it’s a mistake because they don’t know your history with Marc.”

  “Oh, they know it. And I’m pretty sure Marc made sure we were on that list.”

  “So we’re not going, right?” I asked hopefully. Spending money on an evening gown for a party for Marc Longo was right up there on my priority list alongside doing psychic readings at the Ashley Hall alumnae weekend (as suggested by Nola).

  Jack didn’t even hesitate. “Of course we’re going.”

  “But why put ourselves through the misery of seeing Marc gloat, and watching people who should know better fawn over him? He stole that book from you. And then he tried to steal our house from both of us. Why on earth should we go to a party to celebrate him? Don’t forget that Rebecca will be there, too. She’ll be wearing some atrocious pink gown, and just the sight of her in it and her smug, self-satisfied expression will probably make me throw up.”

  Jack grinned, his dimple deepening. “And that alone will be worth it. Just make sure you aim it at her.”

  I elbowed him. “But seriously, why would you want to put us both through that?”

  “Because if we don’t show up, it will send the message that we’re deeply hurt. By being there, we show them that we don’t care. That we can rise above their pettiness and appear at a celebratory party for Marc and his book because we’re happy for him and his success. Because we’re better than that. We’re mature adults who can put bitterness behind us and move on without hard feelings.”

  “Is that how you really feel?”

  “Heck no. I’m mad as hell and I think Marc is a completely dishonest jerk and if this were another century, I would have called him out at dawn for a duel. Sadly, I can’t do that. So instead we’ll go to his party with smiles on our faces and eat as much caviar as we can. Put some in napkins to bring home if we have to. And make them think that we’re up to something.”

  He studied the road in front of him, and I had the feeling that he was avoiding looking at me for a reason—and not just to avoid the tourist standing in the middle of Broad Street taking a photo of St. Michael’s.

  “Is this about using our house for the movie? Because we are not going to agree to that, right?”

  As if even parking spaces in Charleston weren’t immune to Jack’s charms, one opened up on Meeting Street just as we approached the Fireproof Building. He easily slid the minivan into the spot before turning to me with a smile. “We’re here.”

  “Jack . . .”

  But he’d already leaped out of his seat and was opening the
passenger door for me. He glanced at his watch. “We’re a little late—hurry up. I hate to keep Yvonne waiting.”

  Grabbing my hand, he led me up the familiar staircase and into the building, then up to the familiar reading room, where Jack and I had spent many hours researching various Charleston historic factoids.

  Yvonne was sitting at one of the long wooden tables with several books set out in front of her, little scraps of paper marking spots inside each one. She looked up and smiled before standing, the rhinestones in her cat’s-eye glasses sparkling.

  She stood on tiptoes to kiss Jack on each cheek, then turned to me. “You look lovely as always, Melanie. Are you keeping Jack in line?”

  “Of course,” I said at the same time Jack answered, “Not even close.”

  She winked and then kissed my cheek. “Same ol’ Jack,” she said with a wistful note in her voice, and I thought, not for the first time, that if she were thirty years younger and he were still single, she would have set her cap for him.

  “I like your new glasses,” Jack said, eyeing Yvonne. “They frame your face beautifully.”

  Her cheeks flushed a flattering pink. “Careful, Jack. Flattery will get you everywhere.”

  “And don’t I know it?” he said, squeezing her shoulders and making her flush even more.

  Clearing her throat, she turned our attention to the books on the table. “They’ve moved so many of the archives to the new College of Charleston Library, but happily most of what you were looking for I found here. You might still want to go look there and at the archives at the Charleston Museum for more on the Pinckney family. It’s a very old Charleston family—two signers of the Constitution and a governor. My mother was a Pinckney, you know. Different branch from Button and her brother, Sumter, but our family trees touch somewhere. Their mother, Rosalind, was a cousin—many times removed, of course—but we would spend summers together at our family plantation on Edisto. We were of an age, you see.”

  Jack and I sat down in the hard wooden chairs. “It looks like you’ve been busy,” Jack said. “I know I can always rely on you to find the information I need.”