Swimming Lessons

by Mary Alice Monroe

  “Come on then, before your lips turn any bluer,” he said.

  “Hey, darlin’,” Cara called out to him. “While you’re at it, I’d like a vodka martini with three olives.” She winked when he glanced back at her with a smirk.

  Toy enjoyed their banter and watched Brett place his big hand against Little Lovie’s back, nudging her toward the door. They were so like what she thought a father and daughter should be. And she felt again a stabbing guilt that somehow she’d failed her daughter because there was no father for her.

  “He’s a pretty remarkable guy,” she said to Cara.

  “Don’t I know it.”

  “He’ll make a great father someday.”

  Cara’s smile slipped. “God willing.”

  Toy caught the sudden shift in emotion and let the topic drop. Miss Lovie used to say that the island breezes softened the bones. In Cara’s case, Toy saw that it was true. Marriage had sweetened Cara. And for sure, no one could have been nicer or more supportive of her and Little Lovie than Cara and Brett. They were like family—the only family Toy and Little Lovie could count on.

  “Let’s get this show rolling,” Cara said in an upbeat voice, wiping sand from her hands. “You’re the boss here. You’ll have to tell me how this is done.”

  “There’s not a whole lot we can do here,” Toy replied, unrolling the hose. “All the medical treatments will be done tomorrow at the Aquarium. But at least we can get all that slime and those leeches off. Even if she doesn’t make it, I reckon she’ll be happier for a bath.”

  “I hear that,” Cara said, walking to the faucet. “Fresh water okay?”

  “Yep. It’s even better than sea water for cleaning her off. Kills those ol’ barnacles.”

  “Well, here’s a nice fresh water shower, baby,” said Cara. Water gurgled from the hose and splashed onto the turtle’s shell.

  While Cara hosed down the turtle, Toy brought over a bucket filled with soft scrub brushes. Her stomach clenched as she knelt by the turtle. It was covered with stubborn barnacles and hundreds of thread-like, wiggly leeches.

  “God, I hate leeches,” she muttered with a shudder.

  “You and me both,” Cara said as she knelt beside her. Her mouth was a tight grimace. Their eyes met, then with a mutual sigh of resignation, they both dove in and began to scrub.

  They scrubbed and picked and rinsed until it seemed to Toy that she’d removed acres of the ocean’s slimy bottom from the turtle. The bigger, gray, crusty barnacles were tenacious but the smaller ones were easily plucked off. Dozens more clung stubbornly to every inch of the turtle like boils. At least the horrible leeches were off and she had to admit the loggerhead did look better. The shell was spongy to the touch, but bits of its rich brown coloring could be seen between the dried, flaky bits.

  The gentle turtle remained still and uncomplaining. She rolled her eyes back to stare at Toy with an almost human expression.

  “Bless her heart. If I didn’t know better, I’d think she was saying thank you.”

  “You’re welcome, baby,” Cara replied, patting her shell.

  “I think we should name her.”

  “I thought you biologists didn’t like to get personal with wild animals.” Cara said the word biologists with a gentle tease.

  Toy made a face, but secretly she thrilled to the title. It was hard earned. “It’s true, but I confess I like to give names to the ones I work with every day. It helps me remember one from the next and it’s more personal. Besides, I have a hard enough time remembering names. Who can remember a number?” She paused to look with scrutiny at the loggerhead. “How about Caretta?”

  Cara barked out a laugh and pretended to squirt Toy with the hose. It had long been a tender point between Cara and her mother that she’d been named after the Latin name for loggerheads, Caretta caretta. She’d spent a lifetime insisting on being called Cara.

  “Don’t even think about it. Besides, doesn’t the Aquarium already have a turtle named Caretta? We have to come up with something more original for this big girl.”

  Toy sat back on her heels. “That’s it! Big Girl.”

  Cara nodded with approval. “Big Girl it is.”

  “Well, Big Girl,” Toy said, tossing her scrub brush in the bucket. “I think that’s about as clean as we can get you tonight. Let’s wrap her up in wet towels, and then all that’s left is to wait until morning.”

  “And pray she makes it.” Cara added. “I don’t know if turtles have expressions, but this poor girl even looks sick.” Night was falling fast and in the dim gray light, the shabbiness of the under-porch area was apparent. “We can’t just leave her out here by herself. What if she wanders off? Or some animal gets her?”

  “No, of course not. I’ll stay with her.”

  “Are you sure?”

  Toy rose and put her hands to her lower back, aching from bending over the kiddie pool for so long. Her khaki pants were soaked and muddied, and her aching knees had dozens of tiny dents in the skin from kneeling on sand and grit.

  “Yeah,” she replied, stifling a yawn. “No problem. I’ll just drag down the lounge chair from the porch. It’ll be like camping.” She snorted. “Kind of.”

  Cara grimaced. “I hate camping.”

  “Me, too.”

  They burst out laughing.

  “I’ll take the second shift,” Cara offered. She stretched her long arms over her head, yawning loudly. “It’s hotter ’n Hades down here. Lord help us.” Then without saying more, she began rolling up the hose.

  Toy began gathering up the brushes and emptying the bucket. They both moved with the silent, slow movements of exhaustion.

  “One thing, though,” Toy said in afterthought. “If I’m down here with the turtle, will you help get Little Lovie to bed?”

  Cara’s eyes lit up. “You don’t have to ask me twice.”

  Later that evening, they all headed for bed. While Cara and Brett settled Lovie, Toy dragged the old wooden lounge chair from the porch down the stairs to the cement slab, then went back up for a sleeping bag, a flashlight, a bottle of insect repellent and a bottle of chilled white wine. She slathered the contents of one bottle on her body and poured the contents of the other into a glass.

  A vine of jasmine as thick as a python snaked in and out of the rickety lattice. Any breeze that might waft in from the ocean was blocked by the heavy foliage, but it provided a heady scent that helped overpower the dank smell of mildew and the fishy odor of turtle. Toy used the last of her energy to set the lounge chair at the edge of the concrete slab where the space opened up to the ocean’s breeze. Then, without removing her clothes, she crawled into the flannel folds of the sleeping bag and lay facing the stars.

  It was a steamy night on the island. From the darkness the insects were singing their lullaby. The moon was rising and from deep in the blackness came the soothing, omnipresent roar of the ocean.

  Not an evening passed that she didn’t give thanks to the Lord for being able to live here with her daughter in this cottage near the beach. Primrose Cottage was the only place in her entire life where she’d felt safe and truly happy.

  The old wood lounge creaked as she shifted her weight. From somewhere a night bird called, and close to her ear she heard the high hum of a mosquito. Slapping her neck with a curse on all mosquitoes, Toy wrapped herself mummy-like in the sleeping bag and lay in her cocoon for several minutes while the heat sweltered.

  It wasn’t long before she couldn’t breathe. “This is ridiculous,” she muttered as she kicked off the sleeping bag. Instantly the breeze cooled her moist skin, and just as quickly, the pesky mosquitoes hummed closer. It was going to be a long night, she thought. She shifted on the creaking lounge chair to grab more repellent. Across the floor, the turtle remained unmoving under the towels. Often these turtles hung on to life by a thin thread. Toy sat very still, waiting for several minutes in the silence to hear a breath. None came.

  Worried, Toy unwrapped herself from the sleeping bag to b
rave the mosquitoes and check on the loggerhead. She removed the towel from over its big head. The turtle was lying perfectly still.

  “How are you doing, Big Girl?” she asked, squinting in the dark. She bent to gently touch the turtle’s eyelids, seeking some response.

  The turtle blinked and released a long exhale.

  Toy exhaled, too, in great relief. “You had me worried there, old girl,” she said, reaching out to place her palm on the turtle’s roughened shell. She felt a strong bond with the mother sea turtle. “We single mothers have to stick together,” she said and, though she had no logical reason for it, she acted on instinct and began to pat the shell.

  She thought again of her recurring dream of the sea turtle. Of how Big Girl had traveled long and far to reach this bit of beach she called home.

  “You made it home,” she crooned softly. “All that way, through all those dangers. How many seasons have you survived out there in the ocean, huh? Are you forty years old? Fifty? More?”

  No one knew for sure how long loggerheads lived. Some thought they lived to one hundred years or more.

  “Don’t you worry, Big Girl. You’re not alone. I’m here for you.”

  Upstairs, Cara closed the storybook and glanced over at the little girl on the bed beside her. Pale lashes rested on cherubic cheeks while soft puffs of air came out evenly through her rosy lips.

  Cara’s heart pumped with affection for the little girl she’d helped raise since she was born. Toy liked to say that the spirit of Miss Lovie came to rest in the heart of this child, and though it was Cara’s nature to pooh-pooh such sentiment, in her heart she believed it was true. She caught glimpses of her mother’s gentle spirit in Little Lovie. And certainly in her love of nature, the sea turtles especially.

  Cara reached up to softly stroke the blond hairs away from Little Lovie’s forehead, still damp from her bath. It was a gesture she remembered her own mother making. A surge of emotion moistened her eyes.

  “You’re thinking of your mother, aren’t you?”

  Cara turned toward the voice at the door. Leaning against the frame she saw the tall, broad form of her husband, his arms crossed at his chest, his eyes soft with concern. Brett’s keen ability to observe even small details was what made him both a great wildlife guide and a great husband.

  She nodded and let her gaze wander. “I always feel her presence keenly here at the beach house.”

  “It’s not surprising. She loved it here more than anywhere else.”

  “Wouldn’t she just love having a turtle under her porch?” She laughed lightly at the thought. “She sure loved the turtles.”

  “She loved you. Are you sure you won’t be happier living in this house? She left it to you, after all. Maybe she wanted you to live here. I wouldn’t mind moving.”

  “Someday, perhaps. But the memories are still too strong. Even after five years, the pain’s too fresh.” She shrugged. “I dunno. Maybe because she died so soon after our reconciliation. For so long we barely ever talked. And then when we finally started, she had to up and die. Hardly seems fair.”

  “At least you cleared the air. You had the chance a lot of other people miss.”

  “I know. I’m grateful for that, I really am.” Cara reached up to tuck the pink sheet under Little Lovie’s chin. “It’s just, there’s still so much I want to tell her. So much I would have liked to share with her. I feel robbed.”

  Cara rose from the bed and wrapped her arms across her chest. She gazed around the room. This was once her bedroom, the room of a girl’s dreams and heartaches.

  “After she died, I tried sleeping in Mama’s bed. The scent of her gardenia perfume hung in the air like a ghost. It was pervasive—in the closet, the curtains. It was like she was everywhere. I know it’s crazy, but I missed her so much, I resorted to wearing her bathrobe to bed. I used to pretend that her arms were wrapped around me while I cried like a baby. Me!” She sniffed. “Pathetic, isn’t it?”

  “You never told me that.”

  Cara leaned back against him. “It’s pretty silly, isn’t it?”

  “Not at all.”

  He slid his arms around her waist. They felt strong and secure, and closing her eyes, she caught the scent of the sea in his clothes. “I’d much rather sleep in our own bed, in our own house and have your arms around me.”

  He bent and she felt his cheek against hers and his muscle move into a grin. “That sounds good to me.”

  “Besides,” she said, straightening. “It’s been good for Toy to live here. She finds comfort in being surrounded by Mama’s things.”

  “She loved her like a mother.”

  “In a lot of ways, she was her mother, the mother Toy never had. Remember the way she cried at Mama’s funeral? Made me look like I didn’t care as much. I got some strange looks, I recall.”

  “It’s not your way to cry.”

  Cara wondered about that statement. It was the kind of thing people said about her and she used to believe it. Growing up, she’d worn her stoicism like armor against the slings and arrows of her father’s anger. It had served her well as an executive in an advertising firm in the chilly north. Yet, she found that iron armor heavy to bear here in the softer air of the islands.

  “Still, it’s strange the way Toy doesn’t want to get rid of anything of Mama’s. I don’t think she’s changed a single thing in this house for the five years she’s lived here. Not so much as a book has been moved from its sacred spot. It’s like this house is a shrine to Mama’s memory.” She gave off a short laugh. “It would be annoying if she weren’t so darn sincere.”

  “And insecure,” he replied.

  “What do you mean? I think she’s doing great.”

  “She is. But all the responsibility of raising Little Lovie falls squarely on her shoulders. Toy’s still pretty young and she doesn’t have a husband to help out. Or family to fall back on.”

  “She has us.”

  “That she does. But I’ll wager she still feels alone.”

  Cara knew what it was like to live alone and not depend on anyone else for financial or emotional support. As empowering as it was, there were many lonely moments. Especially at night.

  She looked around her old room—Little Lovie’s room now. The rest of the house may not have changed since her mother’s death, but Cara had insisted that this room be transformed from a grown-up’s guest room with paintings of marshes and surf to all pink and frills with prints of mermaids on the walls. The only piece of furniture that had remained was the black iron bed that she had slept in as a girl. She’d always thought that one day her own little girl would sleep in it. Cara looked at the little girl in the bed now, and felt deep in her heart that this was the child meant to sleep here.

  “It scares me how much I love this child. I don’t want to be just some aunt in her life. Someone who sends her gifts on her birthday and on Christmas. I want to be someone special to her. The aunt she can talk to when she’s angry with her mother. The one who gives her advice when she has her first crush on a boy, or when she gets her first period, or gets drunk and needs a ride home. I want to be that someone who takes her to special places, to expand her horizons. You know…the fun aunt.”

  “Honey, I’ve no doubt you can fill that bill.”

  Cara set the book on the bedside table and leaned far over to place a kiss on the child’s forehead. She stayed a breath longer as she closed her eyes and inhaled the sweet scent of soap in Little Lovie’s hair.

  When she moved aside, Brett took his turn. His shoulders dwarfed the small girl as he placed a chaste kiss on her forehead. Rising, he smoothed the blanket and put her favorite stuffed sea turtle beside her. Then, placing his hand on the small of his wife’s back, they walked softly from the room.

  “I think God gives children that special smell to protect them,” he said, closing the door behind him. “It’s so sweet it melts you at the knees and you’d do anything for them.”

  “She is pretty special,” Cara said.<
br />
  “Our child will be special.”

  Cara leaned back against him, feeling the weight of that statement heavy in her heart. They had tried so hard for five years to have a child. “Brett, I’m scared to get my hopes up again.”

  “It’ll work this time.”

  “It didn’t the last two times. Let’s face it, Mother Nature isn’t very kind to women in their forties trying to have babies.” She looked up and saw her pain mirrored in his eyes. “I just thought…” She sighed. “You know, that I’d be one of the lucky ones. I still fantasize that this time will be the one. You know, the third time is the charm.” She sighed and turned in his arms to face him. “Besides, we can’t afford to keep doing the in vitros.”

  “Let me worry about that.”

  She patted his chest. “It’s not just the money. I don’t know if I can handle another round emotionally. The doctors might be able to say the embryo isn’t a real baby yet, but for me, every time I lose one I feel that it is.” Her voice hitched as she rested her head against his chest. “It just hurts too much.”

  “I know, I know,” he said softly against her ear. “But remember, we’re in this together. We’ll be fine. Our baby will be fine. You have to have faith.”

  “I do,” she said softly as he squeezed her tight. “In us.”

  3

  Arising coastal sun sent piercing spears of light into Toy’s eyes. She blinked lazily twice, then jerked her head up.

  Her first thought was of Big Girl.

  Clarity washed the cobwebs from her mind as she recalled in a rush all that transpired the night before. She’d stayed with Big Girl until the wee hours of the morning. Cara had crept downstairs to take the second shift, bumping into the clunky wood lounge chair with a loud curse. Toy had been in a fitful sleep, dreaming again of the swimming sea turtle and tangled up in the sweltering sleeping bag. She’d dragged herself upstairs to her bed, stripping off her sweaty clothes and flopping naked onto blissfully cool sheets. Under the gentle whirr of the ceiling fan, she’d fallen instantly into a deep sleep.