Return to Sullivan's Island

by Dorothea Benton Frank

  But the next evening brought a pleasant surprise for Beth. Around seven o’clock, just as the day was turning into night, she looked out into the yard and there was Max, getting out of his car with a paper bag brimming with groceries. She stood on her side of the screen door like a mannequin, listening to him talk.

  “You feeling better? I brought the stuff to make chicken soup. It cures everything. It’s the only thing I know how to make beside hamburgers and steaks. Can I come in?”

  He did care after all, and Beth could feel her heart beating in her ears from the excitement of seeing him.

  “Of course! Come in! But I’m fine! I don’t need soup. I mean, if you want to make soup, that’s great, but I’m fine really. I feel perfect! Seriously! Honestly! I don’t want you to go to any—”

  “Beth?”

  “Yes?”

  “Just thank the nice man and pour him a glass of wine.”

  “Thanks, Max. Would you like a glass of wine?”

  “That would be good. Thank you. Now, where’s your biggest pot?”

  “I’ll find it.”

  “Great.”

  Beth watched Max in awe as he began to cook. She could hardly believe that he was cooking for her.

  “You seem surprised to see me,” he said with a grin.

  “Well, yeah, I thought I’d never see you again.”

  “Oh, come on now. What’s a little disaster between friends?”

  “I was worried.”

  He chopped up the white part of three leeks, soaking and rinsing them twice. Then he cleaned and chopped carrots and celery. He juggled them, to her delight tossing them over his shoulder into the pot, and then added the leeks along with a whole chicken cut into eight pieces. He covered the entire contents with water, threw in a handful of parsley, a generous toss of salt, a bay leaf, and put it on the stove, raising the heat to high.

  “That’s all there is to it?” Beth said.

  “Pretty much. Once it boils, you skim it and then let it simmer for an hour and a half. By the way, it’s all organic. What’s on PPV? Want to watch a movie?”

  “Sure.”

  Beth was completely mesmerized by Max. The fact that he was there was a sign from God, she hoped. Everything about him seemed so comfortable, as though they had known each other for years. He had come in acting like he was perfectly at home, and yes, as though she came with the place and therefore he owned her too. Even the manner in which he clicked his way through the four hundred or so channels was done with a kind of proprietary masculine finesse as though the show he wanted to watch was hiding, lurking behind a number on the screen. Any second he, the hunter, would capture it and bring it in to entertain them, like a circus animal. Max was in charge. Beth loved it.

  They settled on a rerun of Law & Order: SVU and Max was so drawn in by the episode that he seemed to hardly know where he was, except that he pulled Beth next to him and put his arm around her shoulder, giving her a squeeze now and then. Beth was so happy she could hardly breathe. She didn’t move one inch in any direction, afraid that if she changed positions in the slightest, he might move away. She thought when she went to sleep that night that at least she would be able to remember what it felt like to have his arm around her.

  “I talked to your cousin Mike today,” he said during a commercial.

  “Oh yeah? What’s up with him?”

  “He’s pitching your Uncle Henry to invest in my deal, but it’s probably a long shot.”

  “Why’s that?”

  “Well, the economy and all. But if he comes through it will make all the difference. Anyway, this project is just a model. I’d like to duplicate something like this all up and down the Atlantic coast. He’ll quadruple his money in no time.”

  “Really?”

  “Oh yeah. Definitely.”

  “So how come your other partner dropped out?”

  “Said he wasn’t liquid enough. Who knows? People are nuts.”

  Beth assumed that liquidity meant that the guy was overinvested. She remembered the term from her economics classes.

  “Oh, so how much money are you looking for?”

  “Oh, wait now, you shouldn’t be bothered with those kinds of things.”

  In spite of her resolve to stay put, she sat up straight.

  “Hold the phone, Mr. Mitchell. Are you saying something sexist like this is man’s business?”

  “No, of course not—”

  “Yes you are!”

  “No I’m not. I just don’t want to put you in the middle. I mean, I don’t want what business I do with your cousin or your uncle to influence our relationship one way or the other,” Max said.

  “Well, that’s stupid.”

  “Really? Why?”

  “Because I hate secrets, that’s why.”

  “Ah, and you see, I think secrets add to the mystery of life. Why don’t we check on that soup?” he said.

  By the time they were seated at the table, it was dark. Beth lit the candles in the clear glass hurricanes that seemed to live in perpetuity on the dining room table and put on some music. All the doors and windows were open and the salty damp smells of the beach at night were all around them. The ocean seemed so close that if you closed your eyes you might have thought you were having dinner among the dunes, sheltered from the elements by huge mounds of sand instead of four walls. A chicken soup dinner just didn’t get any sexier than this, Beth thought.

  They tore the baguette into pieces and put them in a sweet grass basket, resting inside a folded linen napkin. Beth put together a salad from what she could find, dressing it with a simple mixture of olive oil, salt, and lemon juice. Max added a handful of thin soup noodles to cook while he removed the chicken meat from the bones and returned it to the broth. To them dinner looked like something from a professional kitchen.

  “We should take a picture of this,” Beth said. “It all looks amazing, especially your soup.”

  “And I was just thinking the same thing about your salad. And you.”

  Gone was all the sarcasm of the night before. This Max, Beth thought, is the one I like so very much. The nice one. The thoughtful one. The one who wanted to take care of her, who told her to forget the dishes and took her by the hand to the sofa. And then to her grandmother’s bedroom. And later to the guest room where Woody had slept. And finally to her bedroom…

  11

  Afterglow

  Susanthepen@writenow.org

  Maggie, I know this is stupid, but I had the most awful nightmare last night. I dreamed Beth was trying to dig her way out of a hole and it was like not night or day but something like the middle of the night on a full moon and it was raining. She was stuck in this big hole and couldn’t get out and back in the house. What to do? Should I call Cecily?

  Maggiepie2@marthagene.net

  If that was my kid, I’d call my kid. Call Beth! You’ll feel better! xx

  MIDMORNING ON TUESDAY, her bedroom door creaked open inch by inch, like a haunted house in an amusement park, and there stood Cecily. Unfortunately for Beth, she was discovered without a stitch of clothes and barely covered by a sheet.

  “Mmm, mmm, mmm,” Cecily said. “Did I miss the party or what?”

  Beth sat up with a jolt. “Oh gosh! What time is it? Where’s Lola? Where’re my clothes?”

  “It’s nine-fifteen on Tuesday and this is planet Earth. Don’t worry. I walked my furry little niece. She’s in the kitchen, having breakfast.”

  “Breakfast?”

  “Um-hmm. I made her some toast. But honey chile? Your clothes are flung all over the living room, your grandmomma’s room, and the steps. For a minute I thought she came back to kick up a little dirt, but when I saw your panties on the—”

  “Oh no! I gotta get up. Did he leave?”

  “Who?”

  “Max! Who else?”

  “Well, well, well. So, what do you know? Yeah, he’s gone.”

  “He had to go to work. Right. Work.” The world began to come into focus fo
r her. “Okay, thanks for waking me up. I’ll be down in the kitchen in ten minutes.”

  Cecily closed the door slowly and quietly, and as Beth caught her expression, there was no estimating the effort Cecily was exerting to hold back some mighty laughter. Beth didn’t blame her. She was so busted, but strangely, Beth didn’t care one whit. Now if her Aunt Maggie had burst in with steaming hot biscuits on a breakfast tray with a bud vase, Beth would have leapt from the window stark naked and hid in the oleanders. If her mother had knocked briskly and then opened the door without waiting for a response, which was her habit, Beth would’ve had to pick her up from her dead faint on the floor and call EMS, and then put on a robe. But it was Cecily and Cecily could deal with truth.

  Beth decided a hot shower was most definitely in order and turned on the water. She looked at her face in the mirror. Her lips were a little swollen and her mouth tasted pretty funky but these things were no surprise.

  “I think we broke all the records,” she whispered to no one but herself. “I’m a very bad girl. Very.” Adding, “Why am I whispering?”

  She had never felt better in her entire life and her Catholic guilt was nowhere to be found. She stood under the hot water for a full ten minutes reliving the night, and then she scrubbed from one end of herself to the other. While she toweled off and went through her normal routine of applying various products she still couldn’t stop thinking about Max. What a night! What a glorious night! He had raised her up to the maximum thrill via undisclosed locations! And she thought she had certainly fed his flame very well. Remembering the sounds he made and the things he said to her last night caused some gyrations, tingles, and tiny tsunamis in various muscle groups. She would never forget how it was. Making love to a man was very different from making love to a boy. Boys thought every movement beyond straight missionary was a personal victory for them, but men went for broke very differently. If she never slept with Max again, at least she would have the memory. And a new benchmark.

  “So?” Cecily said when Beth came into the kitchen. Cecily was putting their dirty dishes from last night into the dishwasher.

  “So what? You don’t have to do that! I’ll do it!”

  “Whatever. Would you like to tell me what happened here last night?”

  “No. Absolutely not. But basically Max thought I was sick so he came over and made me chicken soup.” Beth poured herself a mug of coffee and pulled out a plastic container from a cabinet to store the rest of the soup, which she hoped wouldn’t give her salmonella from sitting on the stove all night.

  “And why did he think you were sick?”

  “Because I threw up Sunday night from shellfish.”

  “Gross.”

  “You have no idea.”

  “How bad?”

  “Bad. I hurled all over him.” Beth’s eyes twinkled in laughter.

  “Lord have mercy!” Cecily covered her mouth with her hands in revulsion and laughter. “How can you laugh?”

  “Gallows humor. I gave him a clean shirt from Uncle Grant’s stash.”

  “He’ll never miss it. He left a ton of stuff here. Well, heavenly days! How was the soup?”

  “Like a miracle drug.”

  They were giggling, shaking their heads at each other and pointing fingers.

  “Girl? Your momma would beat your behind!”

  “Girl? My momma ain’t here! You had breakfast? I could eat a horse!”

  “Nah, I’m good. I had some yogurt. What does your week look like, I’m afraid to ask?”

  “My week? Who cares? I’m in love, Cecily. Totally and completely in love. I swear, I’m gonna marry this man and have his babies.”

  Cecily gasped and her eyes grew large.

  “Come on! What? Just what are you saying? Oh no. How in the world could you possibly know this?”

  “All kidding aside? Because I feel it here,” Beth said. Her hand over her heart and her dewy eyes left no doubt about her sincerity or conviction. “Aren’t you the one who said when you meet the one, you’ll know? Well, he’s the one! I knew it! Didn’t I tell you?”

  “Yeah, but honey, I’ve met the one about twenty-five times and been wrong about twenty-five times. Maybe more, with all the back-and-forth fool I put up with.”

  “Come on! I’m serious!”

  “I know. So am I! Oh me. Look, Beth, just because he’s, well, really sexy and can make a mean pot of soup doesn’t mean he’d make a good husband. Or a good father. You don’t even know who he is! Don’t go giving your heart away like this. It’s too precious! And it’s too soon!”

  Beth snapped the lid on the plastic tub and opened the refrigerator door, looking for an empty spot.

  “I really have to throw out some stuff,” she said, and jammed the container in between the milk, the juice, and all the beer Mike and his friends had left behind. She closed the door and leaned against it, folding her arms across her chest. “Look, Cecily. You know I appreciate your advice and all, but I’m telling you, Max Mitchell is the man I’ve been dreaming about since I was just a little girl. He’s gorgeous, he’s brilliant, he’s tenderhearted, and I don’t know what else I could want in a man. I mean, he’s perfect. Um, really perfect. I look at him and the rest of the world just fades away. Gone! Poof! Nothing else matters.”

  “Then you’d better get busy finding out absolutely everything about him that you possibly can. That till death do us part thing can be a very long time. Besides, I don’t want to see you get hurt.”

  Beth knew that Cecily was right and she was loath to admit that all she knew about Max could fit in a thimble, if you didn’t count how he was in bed. Anyway, she thought, how would I go about getting information about Max’s history? One of those Internet companies who did background checks for a fee? She thought for a moment and then said to herself, Wait! Wasn’t he trying to get her Uncle Henry to invest in his business? So wouldn’t there be some kind of paperwork that Uncle Henry would have to look at to get the details of the deal—like a prospectus or something? Uncle Henry wouldn’t give a nickel to anyone without knowing every single solitary rotten thing there was to know about them, probably down to their federal income tax returns, their driving record, and even their golf handicap. Brilliant! She would call him. No, she couldn’t do that. That would be too strange and he would ask too many questions. She would call Mike. No, wait! Bad idea. He would blab it all over the world. She would call Woody. Yes! Woody would keep his mouth shut and she really didn’t want the news of her liaison with Max traveling the family wires. Not yet anyway.

  “I gotta go,” Cecily said. “I’m praying for this to be a case of severe infatuation. Love is fatal, you know.”

  “Listen to you! You’re such a Debbie Downer today.”

  “For good reason.”

  As soon as Cecily was gone she finished cleaning the kitchen and dialed Woody’s cell phone. He answered right away.

  “Beth?”

  “Yep! Hey! It’s me.”

  “Wow! How nice to hear your voice! I had such a great time visiting with you. Sullivans Island is really awesome.”

  “Yeah! It was fun for me too! So y’all got back okay, I guess?”

  “I was going to write you a note first thing this morning but I am so swamped here you wouldn’t believe what’s on my desk. Piles of stuff. Mike didn’t call you yet?”

  “No, the miserable dog didn’t call me, but I figured that if you all got creamed in a wreck I would’ve seen it on CNN or something.”

  “Right. Well, we got back fine. Traffic was pretty intense as soon as we got close to the city, but that’s normal. So what’s going on?”

  “What’s going on? Uh, well, let’s see. Well? I sort of need a small favor if it’s not too big of a deal and isn’t going to violate any major laws.”

  She told Woody that she wanted to know if Max had pitched her uncle to invest in his deal. And, would it be possible to find out something about his background? Woody was quiet for a moment, trying to understand why she was a
sking the question.

  “Is that it?” Woody asked. “That’s the whole favor?”

  “That’s it.”

  “Well, that’s no big deal. I don’t know what we’ll discover but I can sure let you know if there’s anything suspicious in his financial affairs. It would be highly unusual for him to disclose anything about his personal life beyond a basic résumé.”

  “Thanks, Woody. You’re the best.”

  “No problem. Glad to help.”

  As soon as Beth hung up, and as if she could smell skunk in the international ethers, the house phone rang and it was Beth’s mother, Susan.

  “Bonjour, ma petite! Ça va?”

  “Hey, Mom! I can’t believe you called me! What’s going on?”

  “Well, if I eat one more pain au chocolat I’m going to explode!”

  “Oh, sure! If I know you, you’re washing them down with French wine!”

  “By the magnum! Not really. Seriously, it’s going great, but I miss you and I just had to hear your voice!”

  “I miss you too! Hey! Are you coming home for Thanksgiving?”

  “Well, you know they don’t celebrate that over here, so it’s not a holiday. I was actually planning to come home for Christmas.”

  “Excellent!”

  “Anyway, I am calling you, and I know you’re going to tell me you think I’m crazy—”

  “Who me? Although I do have the safety of distance…”

  “Smarty-pants! I had this dream last night that you were, well, it wasn’t such a good dream. I just wanted to hear you tell me that you’re okay.”