by Wendy Wax
“Yes.” I hear the dread in my voice and see that Spencer does, too.
“I assume she’s jealous of your success.”
“She’s been working on a manuscript for a long time now. I think it’s safe to say that we have quite a few unresolved issues.” I shrug, but it’s not the casual thing I intend it to be. “The fact that my mother still treats her like a daughter hasn’t really helped.”
“So, the jealousy cuts both ways.” He’s watching my face for reaction and I realize I shouldn’t be surprised at his quick assessment. Spencer creates characters and their motivations, too. “But surely she’ll be glad to have the publicity for the store. And given that Sandcastle Sunrise is set here and written by a local, the anniversary edition will be a big seller for her.”
I wince. “I’d appreciate it if you wouldn’t bring that up. I’ll need to find the right time to tell her.” I say this as if there could possibly be a “right” time for this.
“Why is that?” He’s still watching my face.
“It’s a long story,” I mutter as we come off the bridge. And since it’s a story I have no desire to share at the moment I officially welcome him to the Outer Banks, point out Milepost 1, and give a quick sketch of where we are (Kitty Hawk) and why we’re going to skip the more commercial areas along 158 (aka the North Croatan Highway) in order to drive down NC 12, that locals still call the Beach Road, because, well, it is.
I breathe in the familiar smells and sights of my childhood as we drive south, parallel to the Atlantic, passing through the eastern edge of Kitty Hawk and Kill Devil Hills, where both sides of the narrow two-lane road are lined with stilt houses and cottages.
Spencer rubbernecks. “I had friends whose families used to drive down from New York every summer, but I really had no idea how beautiful it was.”
We pass hotels, stores, and restaurants. As I point out the places that were a part of my childhood, we get occasional glimpses of sea oats bobbing on dunes that frame the vibrant green ocean. At the moment it’s swishing rather genteelly onto shore.
“Wow.” Spencer sits up straighter. “That’s just . . . wow.”
I smile. Even writers have a hard time coming up with adjectives that do this place justice.
“There’ve been a lot of changes since the Outer Banks got ‘discovered.’ It’s way more developed. A lot of the mom-and-pop hotels and small businesses are gone, and there are so many huge rental homes up and down the beach now that it’s hard for regular people to afford to live here. And, of course, between Memorial Day and Labor Day the population quadruples. For locals it’s definitely a love/hate thing. Can’t live with the tourists, can’t live without them.
“Now we’re in Nags Head. That’s Gallery Row.” I point to the collection of shops just south of Milepost 10. “And that”—I gesture to a slightly sagging white clapboard building on the corner of East Bonnett Street just south of the space-themed putter golf that’s been there as long as I can remember. “That’s where my mother first rented a room when we got here. It used to be called Snug Harbor.”
My heart is actually racing as we pass the Nags Head Fishing Pier. I take a deep breath as I slow to turn onto the sand-strewn driveway that leads back toward the beach. “And this is the Sandcastle, where I grew up.”
I’m not even at a complete stop when the front door opens and my mother is outside, smiling and waving from the front porch.
* * *
Kendra
The Sandcastle
Lauren’s at the wheel of some sort of small silver compact and I’m already clattering down the stairs before she pulls to a complete stop. My heart pounds as they open the car doors and climb out. I feel Lauren’s arms go around me and we sway and hug. In that moment I finally let go of the dread and anxiety that have colored my anticipation. In that moment I feel only love and excitement. There isn’t room for anything else.
And then she’s stepping back. “Mom, this is Spencer Harrison. Spencer, my mom, Kendra Jameson.”
Spencer is every bit as good-looking as he is in photos, maybe better, and he has a truly blinding smile. I’m prepared for a bit of snobbery or big-city superiority, but his smile is wide and genuine and I see no judgment in his emerald-green eyes. Rather than putting out his hand he wraps me in a friendly hug. “It’s a pleasure to finally meet you.”
“Ditto.” It’s the only word that comes to mind, but I mean it. I feel a small bit of hope that he will help deflect some of the turbulence that Lauren will feel when I tell her about Jake. And I’m beyond relieved that she won’t be alone when she learns that her father is alive and has been for the last forty years.
I tell myself to stay in the moment and not waste it worrying about what lies ahead, but all I can think about is what that revelation will do to our relationship. The line “So, Mrs. Lincoln, other than that how did you like the play?” runs through my head. I realize that both Spencer and Lauren are looking at me. “I’m sorry, what did you say?”
“I said I can certainly see where Lauren gets her good looks,” he says again.
I am not averse to flattery though in fact I’ve always known that the person Lauren resembles most is Jake’s mother. Just as Jake’s wife deduced. Anxiety flutters back up to the surface at this thought. Once again I tamp it down.
“Thank you.” I turn to Lauren. “He had the good sense to ask you to marry him and he’s flattering his future mother-in-law.” I tap a finger to my forehead. “Smart man.”
“That he is.” My daughter stares at me then turns and presses the key so that the trunk pops open.
“What can I carry?” I ask as Lauren slings an overnight bag over one shoulder.
“Nothing, thanks.” Spencer pulls out two midsize bags, closes the trunk, then follows us upstairs and across the porch.
I see him take in the living room, but there’s nothing but pleasant interest on his face.
“You can put those in here,” I say, showing him to Lauren’s room. “Now that you’re engaged I guess it’s okay if you sleep together.”
Lauren shoots me a look and I know she’s wondering where all this nervous chatter is coming from. But the truth is no matter how many times I tell myself I don’t have to address the Jake issue immediately, I’m unable to push it far enough away to relax. Sometime before Sunday I’m going to have to explain the unexplainable. I feel a little like a condemned man contemplating his last meal. How on earth could he possibly enjoy it given what’s going to happen after dessert?
In the kitchen I pour cold drinks, set out a plate of snickerdoodles, and wonder, as we settle around the table, if there’s some way to ease into the subject that might somehow soften the blow. But even as they munch on the cookies and chat comfortably with me and with each other, I know that no matter how I frame the news, or when I introduce it, there’s going to be an explosion. I just hope there’ll be survivors.
I refill glasses and pass the plate of cookies around again. Soon we’re down to crumbs. “Would you like to take a walk on the beach and then maybe go somewhere sunset-worthy for dinner?” I ask, deciding it’s okay to just enjoy tonight and figure out the best way to bring up the topic tomorrow.
“Yes and yes!” Lauren answers for both of them. “Come on.” She reaches for Spencer’s hand. “I want to grab a pair of flip-flops. Be right back, Mom.”
I busy myself putting the cookie tin away. Then I wipe the counters and the kitchen table. As I do, I imagine some unseen hand tossing a grenade in through the open window. I hear it roll across the floor and finally come to a stop near my feet. But I will not bend over and pick it up. And I’m most definitely not going to pull the pin.
Fourteen
Lauren
I don’t believe shoes should be allowed on the beach so I walk barefoot—flip-flops dangling from my fingers “just in case”—letting my toes curl in the soft, cool sand. If feet could t
alk I’m pretty sure they’d be sighing with pleasure.
My mother doesn’t bother with flip-flops, either. Spencer is wearing his sneakers but I have no doubt he’ll see the light once enough of the beach finds its way inside them.
“My folks have a place in the Hamptons but these dunes are a little different than I’m used to.” Spencer nods to the rounded mounds of sand that edge the beach, formed by wind and waves and time.
My mother smiles.
“You ain’t seen nothin’ yet,” I brag. “Wait till I show you Jockey’s Ridge, which just happens to be the tallest active sand dune system in the eastern United States, and the Wright Brothers National Memorial. The monument sits on top of a ninety-foot hill that began life as a sand dune.”
Spencer laughs but also manages to look suitably impressed.
Although the signs of heavy rain are still apparent, Mother Nature is gifting us with blue skies, pulled taffy clouds, and calm seas. The ocean washes in and out with a friendly, nonthreatening whoosh that nonetheless whittles away at the ground we walk on. Over time it reshapes these islands and spits of land. It makes some larger and others smaller. Sometimes it swallows them completely along with whatever was built on top of them. As any Banker will tell you, it’s best not to forget that even the gentlest nibbling can become a gobble. That the breeze can become a gale that sends the ocean pounding in like an agitated sumo wrestler. More than a thousand ships have gone down along this shoreline. There’s a reason lifesaving stations were so important here, even before they came under the rule of the Coast Guard.
We walk at a leisurely pace that I’m pretty sure is illegal in Manhattan. For a while I just soak in the sun and enjoy the breeze tossing my hair. I listen with half an ear to my mother and Spencer go about the business of getting acquainted. It’s clear they don’t need me to interpret or facilitate.
Always interested in people’s stories, Spencer asks her how we settled on the Outer Banks, and I hear my mother’s account of how shortly after I was born she just got on the road and drove east until she reached the ocean and couldn’t go any farther, an impulsive decision she blames on postpregnancy hormones and lack of sleep. There’s no mention of her grief at becoming a widow so young while she was pregnant with me. Or the horror of losing her parents to a car accident not long after, which is why there are no pictures of them with me. She has always presented her arrival here as the beginning of a great, if unplanned, adventure. (Which is odd given how planned out and organized she’s been since I’ve been aware enough to notice.) But I think, not for the first time, how very alone we were and how frightened she must have been.
I left for New York at the same age she came here and in much more dire straits than I would have faced if Bree hadn’t wussed out on me, but I always knew I could come home if I had to. Plus I had a mother who was my biggest cheerleader just a phone call away.
I tune back in as she explains how her aunt Velda in Charlotte became a mother and grandmother to us. She looks off across the ocean and I admire her all over again for all she lost and all she survived. “She was the keeper of THE DRESS. When she died it came to me.” My mother’s voice breaks and I take Spencer’s hand and give it a warning squeeze. I learned as a child not to ask too many questions about the series of events that brought us here.
“Ahh,” Spencer says. “THE DRESS. Lauren showed me a picture of you in it. It’s beautiful, and I love that it’s been in your family for so long.”
My mother nods but her smile is a careful one.
“From what I’ve seen, Jameson women are not only beautiful and talented but fearless. You picked up and went somewhere completely new with a newborn. Lauren climbed on that bus to New York by herself. I’m not sure I would have had the nerve to do either of those things at twenty-one. I could barely make myself try a different deli or bagel place at that age.”
“Well, New Yorkers are loyal to their favorite restaurants and sports teams to the bitter end and against all logic,” I point out, grateful that he’s introduced a lighter tone. I’ve never told my mother or Spencer how traumatic that first year in New York was and I’m not planning to unburden myself now.
“Too true,” he concedes. “But you both demonstrated a lot of chutzpah. I admire that.”
My mother looks around and draws what looks like a steadying breath. “I still love it here more than any place I’ve ever been, but I wish you could have seen it the way it was when I first arrived. There was a fraction of a fraction of the houses that are here now. And when you became a full-time resident it was like you’d become a member of a club—only it had no rules or membership dues. There was no mold you had to ‘fit into’ unless it was the lack of a mold.” She smiles and something in her loosens. “Things could get a little wild and crazy. But at the same time you could live alone in a house with no neighbors for miles and miles and feel completely safe. The electricity went out at the drop of a hat or the approach of an incoming storm. The roads that were here would get buried in sand or end up underwater. You had to have a pioneer spirit and a willingness to live without a lot of the comforts of ‘civilization.’ It helped you bond with the people around you—and we were there for each other. Kind of like settlers circling the wagons.”
“God, Mom, how did you manage?” I’ve always admired her stamina and positive attitude, but like any child I simply took her strength for granted. So many of the women I met growing up here were also strong and fiercely independent. I just assumed that was a female trait.
“Well, when you have a baby to feed you do whatever you have to,” she says with a shrug. “I waitressed and cleaned houses and hotel rooms. I peeled shrimp. Sold bait. There was almost always work if you were willing to do it. And it was so blissfully casual here—when I couldn’t bring Lauren with me I left her with other mothers I knew. And I kept their kids in turn. But it was my job at the Galleon Esplanade that became the closest to full-time and kept me going.”
We’re getting close to Jennette’s Pier now and I can see the gulls swooping down, no doubt eyeing the fishermen who’ve dropped their lines.
“There were a lot of people around my age on the beach when I got here. Many of them came to surf or work at a hotel or restaurant for the summer. A lot of them never left. It’s a place that can speak to you if you’re listening.”
She’s smiling full out now and her long dark hair with its threads of gray streams out behind her.
“Now, that’s a pier.” Spencer takes in the local landmark and whistles admiringly.
“It’s been rebuilt three times,” she tells him. “The first two times it was made of wood. This one’s concrete and way longer. If you walk all the way to the end you’re a thousand feet out in the Atlantic.”
After that we turn back toward the house and walk in silence for a time until the sun begins to lose some of its intensity.
“What do you think?” my mother asks. “Are you hungry? I thought we could grab dinner at Miller’s. It’s a great place to eat and watch the sunset.”
“I’m game,” I reply. “Except I’m still stuffed from all the snickerdoodles. Maybe we can just do drinks and appetizers?”
“Absolutely,” Mom says.
“Sounds good. Do we need to change or anything?” Spencer asks as we near the house.
Mom and I laugh. When we arrive at Miller’s the downstairs is hopping but there’s no wait because it’s comfortably preseason. Heads turn as we make our way through the main dining room toward the back deck. We return smiles and waves the whole way, but don’t stop until we’re outside and on the dock that sticks out into Roanoke Sound.
“Wow. What a view.” Spencer takes it all in, his eyes roaming over the marsh grass, across the slightly choppy water, and up to the great red ball of sun as we make our way out toward the end of the dock. Shards of reflected light shimmer and dance across the surface. “Did you actually know every person in th
e restaurant or did it just seem that way?”
“Most of them.” My mom smiles. “That won’t be true in season but right now there are a lot of locals.”
As if in confirmation a couple I’ve seen but never met looks up from their table in the cupola as we approach. They get up to hug my mom and congratulate us on our engagement before she makes the introductions.
I see Spencer’s questioning look as we reach the end of the dock and lean out over the railing. “Think of them as theater folk in New York only with flip-flops and an affinity for fishing. I’m guessing word went out by smoke signal five minutes after we called to break the news.”
“There are no secrets here,” my mother says automatically, then adds, “Or at least not many.”
The sun slips a little farther and the brine-scented breeze stiffens. The sea grass sways at the edge of the marsh. We simply stand and breathe it all in for a while. Spencer is beaming and I realize I’m smiling, too. My shoulders are looser, my body more fluid. As if it understands it’s in a place that doesn’t require the same level of readiness.
“The wind’s picking up and the temperature will drop as soon as the sun sets. Let’s go upstairs and grab a table in the bar. We can watch it set from there.” Mom turns and leads us back the way we came, then up the outside staircase and through the doorway to the bar, where we settle at a high top positioned in front of a windowless opening with a stellar view and fresh air.
Before we’re fully settled on our barstools a twentysomething-year-old with blond dreadlocks and a sunny smile comes out from behind the room-length bar. After hugs all around and congratulations on our engagement, he takes our drink orders.
Spencer grins.
“Holden is the son of a good friend of mine,” Mom says by way of explanation. “And an excellent bartender.”
Our margaritas arrive in minutes. We raise plastic glasses emblazoned with the words Peace, Love, and Sunsets and clink them in toast. They’re tart and delicious. We’re all smiling after the first few sips, our eyes pinned on the glowing sun.