The Southern Side of Paradise

by Kristy Woodson Harvey

  As we all sat around the living room of the inn in our shower caps, laughing and reminiscing, I realized that we would be able to get back to this place eventually. My daughters would forgive me one day, because we were stronger than anything life could throw our way.

  I looked over at Emerson, snuggled up beside Mark. They were grinning at each other, and I thought maybe this was the right decision. But we don’t ever truly know, do we? Sometimes the marriages we think were fated in the stars are annulled the next week, and the ones we think won’t last a year end up being the happiest. And I knew that no matter what, whether Emerson’s marriage soared or failed, we would make it through that together, too.

  Emerson had insisted that everyone get treated, symptomatic or not. So Hippie Hal, who was doing some work for Sloane and Adam the day before was there, reminiscing right along with us.

  “My first memory of you two together is when your boat battery died out past the sandbar,” he was saying, “and when I drove past and you flagged me down, you were sunburned and beer-drunk and—”

  “Hey!” I interrupted. “Don’t spread rumors about my perfect Emmy. She would never have been drinking before she was twenty-one.”

  Everyone laughed heartily, because Emerson had not exactly been an easy child. Her behavior was fair at best.

  Hal continued, “But I knew you two were going to make it, because most couples would have been ornery and fighting with each other, but you two took it all in stride.”

  “We have always been good together,” Mark said, kissing the tip of Emerson’s nose.

  “Speaking of rumors . . .” Caroline said.

  “Should Mrs. McClasky be treated for lice, too?” Sloane interjected.

  I glared at them. I had specifically told them not to ask him about that.

  He smiled sneakily. “Oh, I never kiss and tell.”

  My girls burst out laughing.

  All the kids had been asleep for hours that night when I finally insisted that everyone get some rest. I didn’t want this wonderful spell to be broken, but, because Emerson didn’t want a bridesmaid’s luncheon or a shower, my friends had insisted on throwing a party for her the next night with our fifty favorite friends. And before that, James was throwing a birthday brunch for Caroline.

  I didn’t want anyone exhausted or hungover. And fortunately, if the signed guarantee I held from the company was to be believed, we were all lice-free now. I had never had lice to begin with, of course. But I wasn’t one to argue with a nervous bride the week before her wedding.

  I barely slept at all that night, feeling as unsettled about the party that would transpire the next night as I was by the summer storm that had begun brewing after dinner and set in around midnight.

  When I heard a key in my door, I wasn’t even concerned. I looked over at my clock, which read 3:11 a.m. I figured Jack couldn’t sleep, either.

  But when I flipped the bedside lamp on and reached for my glasses, I realized it wasn’t Jack at all. It was Kyle.

  “Um, hi,” I said. “Do you realize this is my room?”

  He sat down in the small upholstered armchair across from my bed and sighed. “She’s really going to do it, isn’t she?” he asked, which was when I realized that Kyle, whom I had never seen with a cocktail, was a little drunk.

  “Kyle, how did you get my room key?”

  “Tim and Mary Lou were asleep, so I made myself one.”

  “Ah,” I said, disturbed that pretty much anyone could figure out how to do that.

  I got up, resigning myself to the fact that I was not going to sleep tonight. Wouldn’t be the first time, wouldn’t be the last.

  As I sat down in the other upholstered club chair, I heard, “Mom, for heaven’s sake. Anyone could walk right into your room,” as Caroline pushed through the doorway, Sloane behind her.

  Caroline stopped so quickly when she saw Kyle that Sloane ran right into her. She looked from Kyle to me and said, “What is going on here?”

  I couldn’t help but laugh. “Kyle and I are having a torrid love affair. Didn’t you know?”

  “I sure as hell didn’t know,” I heard Jack’s voice call from the hardwood-floored vestibule that served as an entrance hall for the suite.

  He sauntered in, in his white undershirt and Johnnie-O pajama pants. He pointed at Kyle. “You’d better keep your hands off my girl.”

  Kyle put his hands up in defense. Sloane and Caroline were already perched in my bed, under the covers. Sloane was crunching on some sort of cracker. Those crumbs were going to feel great—if I ever got to get back in the bed, that is.

  Jack was rustling around the minibar and came back with coffee mugs full of wine for everyone.

  He sat in one of two small chairs that accompanied the tiny dining table on the other side of the bed. Then he said, “So what’s going on?”

  “I think Kyle and I were having a private talk.”

  Kyle shook his head. “There’s no such thing as a private talk with a Murphy. If I tell one, you all know anyway.”

  That was true.

  He took a sip of wine and hiccupped. Oh, God. Now we really were in trouble.

  “I’m sorry,” he mumbled. “Too many Starlite Starlets.”

  “I’m sorry. What?” Caroline inquired.

  “I guess Emerson never told you I named a cocktail after her in LA.”

  Sloane sat straight up. “Back the hell up. You knew Emerson in LA?”

  “Sloane, language,” I said half-heartedly.

  Kyle nodded sadly. “Yeah. She walked into my coffee shop in LA one morning, and I saw her, and I was like, There she is.”

  I think we were all speechless.

  “Not There she is, Emerson Murphy, because no one knew who she was then anyway. I was like, There she is, the girl I’ve been waiting to spend my life with.”

  “And now she’s marrying someone else,” Jack said, nodding. “Yup. Been there, man.”

  I smiled sadly at Jack but immediately turned my gaze back to Kyle. This news had me reeling.

  “So how did you name a drink after her?” Sloane asked.

  “We had drinks, I thought of it, and the bartender put it on the menu. I was so sad, because I had just met her, and I knew that I was moving the next day, but when she mentioned Starlite Island, I knew that fate would somehow bring us back together. When I walked out of Ansley’s guesthouse at the beginning of the summer, and there she was, I knew this was the universe giving me a second chance. Finally.”

  “Only that’s what Mark thought, too,” Sloane said.

  Jack got up and poured more wine into Kyle’s cup.

  “I think he’s had enough,” I said, giving Jack a look.

  Jack shook his head. “That’s what you don’t understand, Ansley. There isn’t enough.”

  “Have you told her how you feel?” Sloane asked.

  Kyle shook his head sadly. “It doesn’t matter. I love her, but she loves Mark.”

  “Wait,” Caroline said, as thunder crashed so loudly it sounded like it was inside the room. “You love her?”

  “Are you sure?” I asked, my heart racing. “Because if you really mean it, that’s a big deal.”

  “Of course I’m sure. Do you think I would be this upset if I weren’t sure?” He smiled off into the distance and said, “As my main man AJ says, she always runs as fast as she can.”

  I laughed. That was so cute. Then I nodded. “She does, doesn’t she?”

  “That’s why I’m here,” Kyle said. “I need your advice.”

  “It’s too late,” Jack said. “You can’t tell her now.”

  “What?” Caroline practically spat.

  “You tell her,” Sloane said, almost frantically. “This is your last chance. This is it. She’s going to be married next week, and she needs to have all the information before she makes that commitment.”

  Everyone turned to look at me. I was the mother, so my vote carried the most weight. The part of me that had paid for a wedding, most of
which was nonrefundable, would rather Kyle not tell Emerson. The part of me that always felt this weird electricity between them, that had always felt like she smiled more when he was around, thought she ought to know. Although, to be honest, I didn’t think it would matter. Her heart seemed pretty set on Mark.

  I shrugged. “All I can say is follow your heart.”

  Kyle shot up.

  “No, no, no!” I shouted.

  He sat back down.

  “Follow your heart when you’re sober. You only get one chance. It better be sincere.”

  “Just please let me be the one to decide,” Kyle said. “Please don’t tell her.”

  Caroline laughed. “I’m pretty sure none of us would touch that with a ten-foot pole.”

  Kyle nodded. “OK,” he said, sighing. “I’m going to go home now and pray your treatment worked and I don’t get lice.”

  Sloane held up two crossed fingers as Kyle left the room.

  “Caroline, you had to have known about Kyle and Emerson,” Sloane said, once the door had shut behind him.

  Her eyes widened. “Hand to God, I had no idea. She never said a word about it.”

  “Why is she so tight-lipped about everything?” I wondered aloud.

  Jack laughed incredulously. “Gosh, what a mystery . . .” He got up from his chair. “I came over here because I couldn’t sleep, but I feel like this might be a Murphy woman kind of thing.”

  “No,” I whined. “Don’t go.”

  “You should stay,” Caroline said. “Honestly.”

  Sloane added quietly, “You’re family, too.”

  Caroline had said that same thing when we were spreading my mother’s ashes on Starlite Island. But now those words carried a totally different weight.

  Jack smiled and sat back down, and I could tell his heart was about to burst in two. So was mine.

  We talked for hours, until the sun began peeking through the curtains, and I crawled back into bed with Sloane and Caroline, and Jack lay down on the couch, all of us hoping for a couple of hours of sleep. That would be enough to get us through.

  If only Emerson were here right now, I thought as I drifted off, everything would be perfect.

  TWENTY-EIGHT

  emerson: fly

  I woke up slowly, Mark beside me, and the first thing I did was frantically ruffle my hair. No itch. No lice. Thank God. And then I remembered. Our first party of our wedding week was happening today! And despite how conflicted I’d been lately, I felt nothing but pure joy. I kissed Mark’s chest and sprang out of bed to look out the window. The thunderstorms of the previous night had burned off into a beautiful, sunny morning.

  I grabbed my phone and sank lazily back into bed, realizing that I had four whole hours to catch up on social media and email until Caroline’s birthday brunch. I didn’t blame her, because James had planned it, but, I mean, really? She always had to have a little bit of the spotlight. Well, I was having a party on her birthday. But whatever. You could really see both sides of that one.

  My first email was from my agent. The subject line said, Entertainment Now is stupid.

  I felt my stomach drop. The Edie Fitzgerald movie was coming out next month, and the first reviews were starting to come in. I opened the review link my agent had sent, scanning the article until I saw my name and then the words that stuck: very little substance.

  My heart sank. Sometimes I felt angry or mad or wanted to throw my phone across the room. Today I felt defeated.

  I closed my eyes and nudged the man sleeping beside me. “Mark,” I said, “I just got the worst review.”

  He opened one eye. “If you would quit, you wouldn’t have to deal with that anymore.” I swear he was snoring heavily again before he’d even finished the sentence. He’d had enough beers the night before that he’d probably be out for a while.

  I fished my bikini and a cover-up out of my bag, now fuming not only about the review but also about the fact that Mark couldn’t be supportive for one damn minute.

  Things had been so bad with my mom lately that I thought I might ask her to come with me. I knew she’d be awake. And I knew she was feeling guilty about everything, so she’d be extra-supportive, too. I got the key to her room out of the pocket of the shorts I’d been wearing the day before. I walked the two doors down, slid the key into the lock, and tiptoed in. Maybe it was because of the review or maybe it was because of what I was seeing, but I felt like I had been punched in the stomach. Mom, Sloane, and Caroline were asleep in her bed, with Jack on the couch beside them. The four of them. The little family.

  I swallowed and closed the door silently behind me.

  A few minutes later, I was sitting on the dock, ruminating. Bad reviews. No family. The mother-in-law from hell. A totally unsupportive fiancé. I was trying to focus on the positive, but I couldn’t help but feel my life was falling apart. I had to wonder if maybe I was making all the wrong decisions, if I shouldn’t scrap the life I had and figure out something else. Maybe Mark was right. Maybe it was time to come back to Peachtree Bluff for good. Although here, every other second was a reminder of Jack and Mom.

  I heard footsteps behind me, and I didn’t turn. If it was Mom, I didn’t want to talk to her. It occurred to me that many of the most important moments of my life had happened on a dock—bad ones like this, sure, but mostly great ones. I learned to swim, learned to smoke a joint, took my first sip of beer, had Mark propose to me.

  I couldn’t see him, but all of a sudden, I knew who was there.

  “They make it look so easy,” I said, looking out at the dozens of birds in front of me. They all clumped together, periodically diving down for fish, and then, in one smooth motion, flying away.

  He sat down beside me, his bare feet trailing in the water. Mine wouldn’t be able to do that until high tide. I looked at him, at the line of sweat around the bottom of his brown hair, which was slightly curled from the humidity. He was wearing an oxford with the sleeves rolled up to the elbows, paper-thin from being washed a million times, so soft that you could only dream about having it to sleep in every night. He pulled it off over his head and threw it behind him on the dock, revealing a tan, toned abdomen. The way he did it was totally unselfconscious.

  I envied that, how sure of himself Kyle was, how he always seemed to know right where he was going.

  “It’s a wonder, isn’t it?” he said. “There’s so little effort there. They just fly.”

  That’s how I’d thought it would be for me, when I first decided to leave Peachtree to become an actress. I know it sounds so naive, but I was eighteen and beautiful and free-spirited, and I thought I would go to LA and become a star and it would be perfect. It would be easy. It was my destiny.

  “I have worked so hard, Kyle,” I said. “I mean, I still am. I feel like I’m begging for every scrap of food they’ll throw me under the table. And yet somehow it doesn’t feel like it amounts to all that much.”

  Kyle studied my face, like he did so often. Again, totally unselfconsciously. I could never hold someone’s stare for that long without looking away, without feeling like I was invading his personal space.

  “What are we really talking about here, Em? Because the woman I’ve watched on that screen is alive. She is in her element. She isn’t clawing or scraping.” We both looked up as another one of those birds took off and flew high into the sky. Kyle pointed. “That. That was you.”

  I bit my lip to keep from smiling. He wasn’t wrong. Acting, becoming someone else, playing a part, was where I felt most alive. It was the other stuff that was hard. But I had to admit that it was exponentially easier than a couple of years ago. And there was no telling where this new part would lead. I knew it would be big. Even so, there was a lot of bad that came along with the good in this job, as there was with most things in life.

  “I got a bad review today, and they always throw me.”

  “Here’s a good one for you,” he said. “I think you are the most amazing woman I have ever known, and I think
you act beautifully.”

  I smiled and bit my lip, looking down at my feet, trying to keep the tears from coming down my cheeks. Why was the wrong person always saying the right words?

  “You can tell me,” he said. He took my hand and put it on his chest, on his heart, making mine beat faster. It was so warm and the tiniest bit damp from the heat. “You have to feel the power in saying your truth out loud.”

  “You were right,” I whispered. “A few weeks ago. You were right. Mark and I will never have what Sloane and Adam have or what Caroline and James have or what Mom and Jack have.” I felt the tears welling up in my eyes. “He wants something I can’t give him,” I said, my voice breaking. “He wants me to be someone I’m not.”

  Kyle scooted close to me and put his arms around me until my tears were mingling with the layer of perspiration on his chest. And though it was hard not to feel attracted to someone so hot holding you so close and resting his head on yours, really, what I felt was safe.

  My heart was pounding, and I realized I wasn’t crying anymore. Instead, I was only thinking about what might happen if I moved my head up an inch, if I put my mouth on Kyle’s. I had done it before. What if I did it again? I knew I was engaged. I knew it was wrong. But I had this feeling deep inside like this kiss would solve all my problems, be the answer to all my prayers. It wouldn’t, of course. But I was a pro at making these mistakes.

  Kyle squirmed, slipping his arm underneath my legs and standing up like I weighed nothing. My arms were around his neck, he was holding me like he was going to carry me over the threshold, and our faces were so close that I knew this was it. This was the moment. I knew it, and he knew it, and I couldn’t hold myself back any longer. I had to kiss him. But as I leaned in, I felt myself flying through the air, and right before I hit the water, I realized it: he had thrown me in, that bastard. The water felt cold and refreshing and just salty enough. I felt a splash beside me, and as we both came up for air, Kyle and I were laughing.

  Laughing like children. Laughing like I hadn’t laughed in a long time.