Saving Ben

by Ashley H. Farley

  All traces of the sunset had disappeared by the time we settled into the four oversize wicker chairs on the porch, the combination of the humid salty air and the beer and pizza in our bellies making us lazy.

  Ben tossed a piece of crust into the empty pizza box on the coffee table in front of us. “Kitty, you’re the closest. Why don’t you send out a smoke signal?”

  I glanced across the creek at the Turners’ house. “The lights are on over there, so I’m guessing they’re home.” I stared back at Ben. “But I’m not moving. I’ve been driving all day. It’s your turn to do something.”

  “Fair enough,” he said, dragging himself from his chair.

  I tilted my head back and smiled at him as he passed behind me. “And get me a beer while you’re up, will you?”

  Thirty seconds later, Van Morrison blasted from the outdoor speakers. Ben let “Moondance” play for a couple of minutes before turning the music off again.

  “Somebody please explain,” Emma said, looking back and forth between Spotty and me.

  “It’s a game we play with our friends George and Abigail Turner, who live across the creek,” I said. “If either of them is home, they’ll respond by playing another song.”

  “So you mean literally?” Emma asked. “A smoke signal like the American Indians used to use?”

  “Exactly.” I nodded. “Just like the Indians. Remember, Ben?”

  He opened the screen door and tossed me a beer. “Why do we have to bring that up?”

  Spotty laughed. “Because who can resist such a great story?” He turned toward Emma. “When Ben was just a Cub Scout, maybe eight or nine, he tried to send out a real smoke signal to the Turners. As only Ben’s luck would have it, he picked the driest summer on record in Virginia. The dumbass caught the grass on fire, burned up half of the front yard before his grandmother got to it with her fire extinguisher.”

  “When we were younger,” Ben said through the screen door, “before the fire, we used to signal George and Abby with a flashlight. One long flash was an invitation to come on over.”

  “And two short flashes meant we were in for the night,” I added.

  When a sudden blast of “Freebird” permeated the peaceful night, we all cheered, and for the next few minutes, we bounced songs back and forth across the water. Every time Ben changed songs, he raised the volume until it reached an obnoxious level.

  “Turn it down, Ben,” I yelled, holding my hands over my ears. “You’re disturbing the peace.”

  Ben lowered our volume, and a few seconds later, the music on the other side of the creek died. Not long afterward, we heard the sound of George and Abby’s outboard motor heading our way. Ben and I wandered out onto the lawn to greet them on their way up from the dock. As was their ritual, Ben hugged Abby tight, spinning her around and around until she was dizzy.

  “Why haven’t y’all been down more this summer?” Abby asked, after she and George had greeted everyone and were settled on the wicker love seat, the only available place to sit.

  “It’s all her fault, Abby.” Ben pointed at me. “Kitty’s been in the hospital all summer.”

  “Wait a minute, what?” she asked me, confused.

  “I’ve been working in the hospital all summer, Abby, shadowing a doctor in the ER, hoping to get some experience before I started nursing school.”

  “Speaking of nursing school,” George said to me, “I was hoping you’d end up at Chapel Hill with me. What happened?”

  Ben shot George a warning look. “Nice of you to bring that up, bro.”

  “I can handle this, Ben. I’m a big girl now.” I shifted in my seat so I could see George. “The truth is, George, UNC was a stretch for me, and my father was a little overconfident about his connections.”

  “Yeah, right,” Ben said under his breath.

  “What?” I asked, locking eyes with my brother. I was growing tired of listening to his sarcasm and innuendo every time the subject of UNC came up.

  Ben’s eyes left mine and drifted to a spider’s web in the eaves at the corner of the porch. “I just never understood your infatuation with UNC when it’s so obvious you belong at UVA.”

  I set my beer down on the coffee table and stood up. “What say you and I go inside and get our guests a cold beverage?” I reached for Ben’s hand, pulling him to a stand.

  “Okay, what gives on the whole UNC deal?” I asked when we were alone in the kitchen. “Every time the subject comes up, you either roll your eyes or throw out some sarcastic remark.”

  “You’re paranoid, Kitty,” Ben said, opening the refrigerator and loading up his arms with Natty Lights.

  “Was it that much of a joke that I applied to Chapel Hill? Is that it? Did Dad decide not to use his connections to save face from potential embarrassment?”

  Ben closed the refrigerator door and faced me. “It’s nothing like that. It’s . . .” He hesitated, and I thought he was about to come clean. “Look, just don’t worry about it. We have thirsty guests to entertain.” He turned and headed toward the porch, leaving me to stare at his back.

  At least he finally admitted there was something to worry about!

  In our absence, George had moved from the love seat to Ben’s vacated chair next to Emma. “That’s my seat, man. Move,” Ben snapped.

  “Sorry, dude. I didn’t hear you call fives,” George said with a self-satisfied smirk on his lips.

  “How old are you anyway? I thought we stopped calling fives years ago.” Ben passed the beers around and then lowered himself to the arm of Emma’s chair, leaning back against her in a territorial kind of way.

  With the two of them fighting for her attention, Emma sat up straighter, crossed her legs, and flipped her hair back over her shoulder in flirt mode.

  “So, George,” Ben said, draping his arm across the back of Emma’s chair. “Thank God, your father finally got the marina to rebuild their fuel dock. Those old pumps were an environmental hazard.”

  “Is your father the mayor?” Emma asked, impressed.

  “No. He’s the commonwealth’s attorney for Lancaster County, but he’s pretty important around here.”

  “As if being important in a town of five hundred means anything,” Ben said.

  Abby rolled her eyes at me. No matter how large or small the prize, Ben and George had always measured their own success against each other. From battling it out over a board game to comparing the size of a catch. Who could make the biggest cannonball splash, or who could climb the tallest tree? Or in this case, whose father was more important. Until now, the nature of their challenges had always been innocent fun, but a new contest had begun with Emma as the ultimate reward.

  “Is that White Stone?” Emma asked, pointing at all the lights on the other side of the creek. “Where we got the pizza earlier?”

  “No, that’s Irvington, where five hundred of the coolest people in the country live,” George said, flipping the bird at Ben. “It’s too dark now, but you’ll be able to see it tomorrow.”

  “Don’t worry, Emma,” Ben said, rubbing her shoulder. “I’ll give you the nickel tour of Carter’s Creek tomorrow, including the Tide’s Inn and the Yacht Club and the haunted boathouse.”

  “A haunted boathouse? For real?” she asked.

  Abby and I locked eyes and smiled at one another, reminded of our first midnight adventure together—the initiation into our secret club. The four of us couldn’t have been much older than eight and ten when we snuck out of the house, and used the light from the full moon to guide us as we paddled our canoes up the creek to the haunted boathouse. We pierced our thumbs with a safety pin, swapped blood, and sealed it with spit. My secret code name was Cat, for obvious reasons, and Ben’s was Mouse, because he loved to watch old reruns of Tom and Jerry. We named Abigail Yabba-Dabba-Abigail but called her Yabba for short; and George was Porgie for “Georgie Porgie Puddin’ Pie,” the nursery rhyme his mother used to read to him over and over again as a child.

  “Shh!” George held h
is finger to his lips. “The legend of the boathouse can only be told on a full moon.” He tilted his chair back so he could see the sky. “Nope, not tonight.”

  “Shut up, Turner. The legend goes—” Ben stopped when he saw Abby and me glaring at him. The story about the old woman who’d lost her waterman husband in a hurricane was legit, but as part of our blood pact, we agreed never to talk about it except under the light of a full moon. “Sorry, Emma,” Ben apologized. “Kitty and Abby are the authorities. You’re gonna have to wait for the next full moon to hear the story.”

  “Have you heard this legend?” Emma asked Spotty.

  “Many times,” he said with a nod.

  “Ugh. Y’all are killing me.” Emma turned to George. “So is this boathouse on this side of the creek or yours?”

  “On our side, way up the creek close to the Irvington Bridge.” George drained the rest of his beer and set the can down beside him on the floor. “Back in those days, in the early 1920s when the boathouse was built, people only lived on the town side of the creek.”

  “Really?” Emma asked. “Why is that?”

  George flashed her his dazzling smile and I knew he was about to tell her a lie. “They were afraid of the crazies who lived over here. This side of the creek was like the mountains of West Virginia. A bunch of hillbillies who got high every night on moonshine and then had sex with their sisters before splitting their brothers’ brains apart with an ax.”

  “That’s bullshit, Turner.” Ben crumpled up his beer can and threw it at George.

  He caught the can and threw it back at Ben. “Are you trying to deny that this side of the creek is the rural side?”

  “Of course not, you dumb fucker. Anyone can see that there’s more land and fewer houses on this side. I’m just saying I’d rather own five acres over here than to have to share your tiny little hill with the most influential people in the world.”

  “Enough already.” Spotty stood and stretched. “You two sound like a bunch of sissy-girls arguing over who has the biggest slice of birthday cake.”

  “I agree, Spotty,” I said. “We should curl their hair and put ribbons in it.”

  I moved over to the love seat next to Abby after that, where we held a private party of our own. We caught up on our lives of the past year and talked about our futures, discussing at length where Abby was planning to apply to college. Under the light from the lantern on the wall, I was able to get a closer look at her. Once streaked golden from the sun, her brown hair was now dull and limp around her skeleton face. She appeared to have lost even more weight since I’d seen her briefly two months earlier over the Fourth of July weekend. A couple of years back, Abby had a head-on collision with a hockey stick during field hockey practice one day. The doctors had to wire her broken jaw shut, and as a result of the liquid diet she was forced to eat, she dropped at least twenty pounds. Although we’d never talked about it, I was worried her sudden weight loss had triggered an even bigger problem. Like anorexia.

  For the rest of the evening, I ignored Ben and George as much as possible, but I couldn’t help but overhear some of their conversation. There seemed to be a point of contention between the two of them in every subject that came up. If they weren’t arguing over football, like whether Mike London would be able to pull UVA out of a five-year rut, they were boasting about which one of them was better at wrestling or lacrosse. At one point, I even heard them bickering about who held the record for catching the biggest rockfish. It was tiresome, so much so that Spotty fell asleep sitting straight up in his chair. Emma, on the other hand, stayed perched between Ben and George, loving it every time one of them insulted the other for her benefit. The more she drank, the more she flirted with George, the more Ben sulked.

  Shortly before midnight, when Abby insisted George take her home, I dragged Emma off to bed with me. She joined me at my window and together we watched brother and sister board their boat.

  “Abby is so shy and quiet,” Emma said. “I can’t believe she shares the same genetics as George. He is so cute, I want to run my fingers through his chestnut curls and lose myself in his smoky gray eyes.”

  “The real George is cute. The George you met tonight is an impostor.”

  “What do you mean?” she asked.

  I exhaled a deep breath. “I haven’t spent any real time with him in the past year, so maybe he’s changed. But my George, the George I grew up with, is kind. Maybe a little full of himself, but not braggy and argumentative like he was tonight.”

  “Your George?” she asked, nudging me.

  “You know what I mean. My friend George.” As I stared out the window, watching the bow light of their boat bob up and down as it made its way across the creek, I could feel Emma watching me, waiting for me to tell her more. “I know what you’re thinking, Emma, but we really are just friends. As much as I think friendship is the best basis for a solid relationship, he’s not the right friend for me.”

  “I agree,” she said without hesitation. “He doesn’t really seem like your type.”

  I studied her face in the dim light streaming from the lamp on my bedside table. Her smug expression made the little hairs on my neck stick up like the fur of a dog in defense mode. Did she think I wasn’t pretty enough for him? Or interesting enough?

  “Funny thing is,” I said, “judging from the way he acted around you tonight, I wouldn’t exactly say you bring out the best in him either.”

  Five

  I found my mother and Emma in the kitchen the following morning, huddled together over the September issue of Vogue.

  “Good morning, darling,” my mother cooed, running her hand down my cheek. “It’s so good to see you. I was just about to whip up some pancakes.” She grabbed a mug from the cabinet and held it out to me. “Are you ready for coffee?”

  She might’ve fooled Emma, but I knew my mother was no Betty Crocker.

  “Not yet.” I waved her away and turned toward Emma. “How long have you been up?”

  “For a couple of hours, since around eight. I swam a few laps in the pool.” Emma glanced over at my mother and smiled. “And I’ve been visiting with your parents on the porch.”

  “Your roommate is charming, Katherine. Just charming,” Mom repeated for emphasis, an annoying habit of hers. “Of course if you’d call every now and then, I would’ve known that already.”

  “That’s just it, Mom. Emma is so charming, she keeps me too busy socializing to call you.”

  “Touché, my dear, touché.” Mom grabbed the magazine off the counter and held it up for me to see. “I’ve discovered that not only is your roommate a lovely little social butterfly she’s also a fashionista. She can teach my sweet girl something about style. Which reminds me—” She dropped the magazine on the counter and disappeared down the hall, returning several seconds later with two shopping bags. “I bought you some things at the Farm.”

  “The Farm?” I asked. “What is that, some kind of tack shop? Did you buy me a pair of riding breeches?”

  “Don’t be ridiculous. I’m talking about that cute shop you love in White Stone.”

  “Oh, that Farm. I’ve only been there one time, Mom. To say I love it is a stretch.”

  Emma took the bags from my mother, set them on the counter, and began digging through them. She removed a long-sleeved gray knit dress from one of the bags and held it up to me. “Doesn’t Katherine’s hair look nice, Mrs. Langley? It took me a week to talk her into getting highlights.”

  My mother raised a perfectly shaped eyebrow. “Mrs. Langley?” she asked.

  “Oops, sorry. I forgot. Adele,” Emma responded.

  The bullshit was getting a little too deep for me. My mother had never asked any of my friends to call her by her first name before. In fact the proper way to address an adult was one of the first things she’d taught us when we learned to speak as toddlers.

  “Since we’re on a first-name basis here, Dell,” I said, using my dad’s nickname for my mom, “I know you’re dying f
or me to admit it, so I might as well get it out of the way. You were right. My hair is mousy, and I should’ve highlighted it a long time ago.”

  “You can call me Mom.” She winked at me, an exaggerated batting of her fake eyelashes. “And for the record, I never said your hair was mousy. Every woman should get highlights. Lighter shades around the face brighten the complexion, regardless of hair color.”

  “What about Spotty?” I asked when he appeared in my line of vision through the french doors. “Do you think highlights would bring out his complexion, make his freckles pop out more?”

  My mother placed her hands on her hips. “Stop trying to be difficult, Katherine. I meant every woman should lighten her hair. And to answer your question, auburn hair is the exception. What a waste to put such ravishing hair on a man.” She ran her hand down the back of her head as if wishing she’d been blessed with such glorious locks.

  For as long as I could remember, my mother had worn her rich mahogany hair in a shoulder-length bob. Even during the darkest of her days, she made certain no gray roots were peeking through along her part. She was all about the show. She wore only designer clothes, fitted to perfection on her toned body. Her nails were always polished, her hair always styled, and her face always smooth and tight from laser treatments and Botox. She’d yet to spring for a facelift, but it was on the horizon. She spoke of it often.

  “Katherine, look at this,” Emma said, holding up a black sequined party dress. “Isn’t it pretty?”

  I glanced at the dress and then did a double take. My mother had never bought anything so sophisticated for me before. “Maybe for you, Emma. I would need to grow a butt and get breast implants to pull that off.”

  “What’re you talking about, honey? You have an adorable little figure. And you will be three inches taller with the shoes I bought you.” Mom disappeared around the corner into the hall again and returned with a pair of black pumps with spiked heels.