You'll Always Have Tara

by Leah Marie Brown

  She ignores the compliment, because she is too humble to let praise puff her up with pride.

  “If Emma Lee’s heart is telling her feet to head to England to be a matchmaker or India to be a Bollywood star, let her go. All you can do is let her go and be ready to cheer her on with loud applause when she succeeds or welcome her home with open arms when she fails.”

  “Even if it is a big mistake?”

  “It’s her mistake to make, Tara. Ultimately, we are the only ones who can decide which way we will go in life, and we are the only ones who can say whether our choice to take one path over the other was a mistake or our destiny.”

  “You’re right.”

  “I usually am.”

  I laugh.

  “Tara?”

  “Yes?”

  “Take a leap. A bold leap.”

  Chapter Six

  I am hungry and cold, lost in a strange place. Wild, unfamiliar rolling hills blanketed in mist as thick and gray as Irish wool. The ominous sort of mist one expects to see in old black-and-white Sherlock Holmes movies, usually when a bloodthirsty hound with eyes as red as the devil sinks his teeth into the neck of a poor, unwitting wanderer.

  I stop walking and strain my ears to hear something, anything, but the world is portentously silent, save for the low, steady tom-tom pounding in my chest.

  Thud, thud. Thud, thud. Thud, thud.

  I begin climbing up a hill of low growing shrubs covered in forlorn, withered purple flowers and long, slender thorns that nip at my ankles. Each step I take the mist grows heavier, thicker, as if it means to smother me. Mist so thick, so densely layered, that not even the most brilliant and slender ray of sunlight is able to penetrate it.

  That is, if it is indeed daytime. It could be night in this netherworld of mist and hunger and cold.

  I climb and climb. The terrain alters. The thorny bushes replaced by fields of scrubby grass littered with lichen infested boulders that look like tumbled tombstones. I want to move closer to the boulders, to study them, but fear seizes me by the throat, pulls me brutally along.

  Is my name etched upon one of those headstones?

  A voice slides through the mist, hissing in my ear.

  “Remember as you pass by,

  As you are now so once was I,

  As I am now, so shall you be,

  Prepare yourself, you will follow me.”

  I climb and climb, my feet sinking into strange, spongy ground, the mist growing thicker, the icy air biting my cheeks, until I am nearly blind, moving through wild country without the benefit of sight or the security of the familiar.

  Hunger gnaws at my insides like the bloodthirsty hound with eyes as red as the devil gnawing on the neck of his wretched victim.

  I am hungry and cold, still lost in this strange place, my hope ebbing, flowing out of me along with my strength.

  I should give in now. Quit. Concede that I will never find my way out of this nightmare, never find my way out of this darkness, never find the place where I feel safe and warm and content—a contentment that invades my being and settles itself deep, down deep in my bones.

  Just when I think I am lost forever, cocooned alive in an icy blanket of mist and despair, I reach the top of the hill. The mist remains at my back, like a hound, nipping at my heels, but ahead the horizon is clear, the skies an enameled cobalt.

  A cobalt so smooth, so beautiful it seems to beckon me.

  “Come. Come closer. Lose yourself in my vastness, in the potential, the promise of what could be. All you have to do is . . .”

  I feel a presence behind me and I know I am not alone on this hill. Not anymore.

  “Do you trust me?” says a deep, masculine voice.

  I turn around, but the mist is too thick. I can’t see his face, can’t determine if the voice is that of friend or foe. Though, I feel my hope and strength returning.

  “Do you trust me?” he says again.

  I do. I do trust him. I trust him in the way a babe instinctively trusts their mother.

  “I trust you.”

  “Then leap, Tara. Leap and I promise I will be waiting for you when you land.”

  Chapter Seven

  I wake up covered in a sheen of perspiration, my cotton nightie plastered to my back and legs, breathless and disoriented, as if still trying to navigate my way through unfamiliar terrain. The nightmare haunts me for weeks. Until finally, I accept that my subconscious is grabbing me about the shoulders and giving me a good shake. Pay attention! I am talking to you. There’s something jacked-up with your wiring and you need to sort it out right quick.

  One morning I am filming a cooking segment showing viewers how to make an iconic Charleston dish, Huguenot Torte, a sludgy cake of caramel, apples, and pecans topped with an airy, crispy meringue that puffs up in the oven before collapsing into the sludge, when I have an epiphany.

  Like the meringue, this illuminating discovery puffs up, takes shape in my mind, an airy notion, that then collapses and settles down in the sludge of my consciousness as something profound and true.

  If I don’t muster the courage to venture beyond the misty borders of my life soon, I will most certainly grow old and gray right here in Charleston, an unhappy, unfulfilled wanderer squinting at the road less traveled and wondering where it might have taken me.

  It was right in that moment—as I was dicing a Granny Smith apple and making sure the carton of buttermilk I would need to make the whipped topping wasn’t blocking my shot—that I decided if my practical big sister could throw caution to the wind and elope with some French guy, I could step off my well traveled road and onto a new one.

  * * *

  I reckon it sounds mighty vain, but sometimes a new wardrobe and a head full of fabulous highlights are all a girl needs to boost her courage.

  After my Huguenot Torte epiphany, I called a property manager to sublet my condo, officially resigned my position as special correspondent for WCSC, and made an appointment at You Glow, Girl. Miss Yolanda is Beulah’s cousin and she’s been styling my hair since I wore it in Dutch braids and ribbons. Most of the women I know get their hair done at a high-class salon on King Street because the owner was a Hollywood stylist for a hot Hollywood minute and offers complimentary head massages and mimosas, but I’ve never been tempted to stray from Miss Yolanda or You Glow, Girl. She might not send embossed appointment reminder cards, but sometimes she calls and says, Girl, when you gonna let me get up in that head of yours? I saw you on TV last night and you lookin’ like a Boo Hag. I’s afraid you were gonna start snatching some skins. You need to get down here so we can style you. She’s pretty much a hair genius.

  Miss Yolanda transformed my flat-iron-tortured hair back to its more natural curly state, adding several layers so the curls are big and bouncy. “Tara girl, you can go on as many starvation diets as you want, but we both know inside that stick figure is a big, bouncy, badass girl just dying to bust out. Be big and bouncy.” She kicked the color up a few notches, taking me from warm cinnamon back to my more natural blazing ginger. In a city filled with born- and bottle-blondes, it feels good to be a redhead.

  I sold most of my clothes to the consignment store down on Meeting Street and then went shopping for a few new outfits, replacing my brightly colored maxi dresses, sweet-as-Southern-tea eyelet lace skirts, and statement necklaces for items that made me feel free when I tried them on in the fitting room. Black denim leggings. Thigh-high suede boots (because I have wanted thigh-high boots since I saw Gigi Hadid wearing a pair in People). A black minidress. Worn-out, beaten soft jeans. Slouchy sweaters. Irreverent slogan tees. And a ridiculously cute oversized flannel shirtdress. I am calling my new look Rebel Without a Cause (yet). It’s edgy and unpretentious, which is more my style than the fussy, frilly, girly-girl staples found in every Southern deb’s wardrobe. I’m not gonna lie, y’all. I didn’t shed a single tear at parting from my pearl earrings and monogrammed sweater sets.

  Some in my circle will probably say (behind my bac
k, of course) that I am acting all crazy, subletting my condo, selling my wardrobe, joining the Ginger Brigade, but in for a penny candy, in for a pound cake, right?

  I don’t know if Ireland is that one spot in the puzzle where I belong, where my unique, jagged edges fit without alteration or force. I just know I won’t find my place if I don’t venture beyond my Southern comfort zone.

  * * *

  You can’t leave Charleston!

  But why?

  Where will you go?

  I met Callie at Pawpaw’s the day after I had the Huguenot Torte epiphany. I told her about my plan to move to Ireland over pulled pork sandwiches and sides of mac and cheese and she cried. Now, over buckets of crispy flounder and baskets of fries at The Shack, I am telling the rest of my friends that at the end of the week I will board an Aer Lingus flight out of Charleston International Airport bound for Dublin.

  “That explains your new . . . style,” Maribelle says, flipping her glossy blonde ponytail over her shoulder. “Is that the way they dress in Ireland?”

  Callie leans close to Maribelle and whispers in her ear, just loud enough for me to hear. “You best be nice tonight, Maribelle Cravath, or I’m gonna jerk a knot in your ponytail. You hear me?”

  “Your hair looks great, Tara,” Grayson says.

  “You think? Not too bold?”

  “Not for you,” he says, chuckling. “I’ve always thought you had the soul of a redhead. You really quit your job?”

  I nod my head.

  “What will you do?”

  I shrug.

  “Why Ireland?” B. Crav asks. “What’s in Ireland besides bogs and booze?”

  “Mary Kate Lanigan,” Tavish says.

  “Louise Byrne,” Truman says.

  “Who?” Maribelle asks.

  “Instagram’s hottest Irish models,” the twins say in unison.

  Maribelle rolls her eyes.

  “Tara isn’t moving to Ireland to hook up with an Instagram model,” Callie says.

  “I never considered Tara hooking up with Louise Byrne, but now that you mention it”—Truman looks at his brother and raises his closed fist—“I think that is a visual I need to take some time pondering.”

  “Yahss, brother,” Tavish says, bumping his knuckles against Truman’s fist. “Nice.”

  “I swear you Barton Boys have more testosterone than sense. If either of you ever had an intelligent thought it would die of loneliness,” Callie says, swatting Truman with her napkin.

  “Seriously, dahlin’,” B. Crav says. “Why Ireland?”

  I take a sip of my wine to stall for time, mindful that Maribelle Cravath is perched on the edge of her stool eager to hear my answer. I can’t very well tell Charleston’s biggest gossip that my aunt thought up some bizarre inheritance scheme that requires me to spend three months living with two men in an isolated castle because I know, I know, she will twist and pervert that story until the entire low country believes I am engaged in some sordid, Fifty Shades-esque mé-nage-a-trois.

  I am about to put my glass back on the table when Grayson answers the question for me.

  “Tara spent every summer in Ireland, remember?” He smiles at me and the warmth of a thousand Carolina days spreads through my body. The kind of warmth that comes from knowing even though the foundation of our friendship was shook, it remains intact. “I always thought she would end up there someday because she loved it so much.”

  “I did?”

  For a minute, the noisy clatter of The Shack fades away, Callie with her sad eyes, Maribelle with her pinched expression, the Barton Boys with their fist-bumping, fall out of focus.

  “Sure you did.” Grayson rests his forearms on the table and leans forward, his eyes sparkling. “Don’t you remember the way you would come home with your hair all wild, wearing ripped jeans and a big fisherman’s sweater, your cheeks slapped pink from all those walks around the lough? You’d speak in an Irish accent and insist your daddy call biscuits scones?”

  I laugh. “Quit it.”

  “Quit nothing.” Grayson laughs. “You would grumble about having to spend the summer away from Charleston, but then you would come back and everything was grand. Ah, Grayson, the sun is shining and the magnolias are blooming. ’Tis a grand day. Just grand.”

  We all laugh.

  “You don’t remember that?” Grayson asks.

  I shake my head.

  “Ireland was your happy place, Tara. It seems only fitting you go there now, what with your daddy being gone and your sisters living in Europe.”

  “First Manderley, then Emma Lee, and now you,” B. Crav says, raising his wine glass. “Charleston might still have her towering magnolias, but she has lost three of her most genteel flowers, and is a sadder, drearier place for it.”

  “Here, here,” Truman says, clinking his beer bottle against B. Crav’s wine glass.

  “To Tara”—Callie lifts her glass—“and her happy place.”

  Chapter Eight

  Text to Emma Lee Maxwell:

  How are things in the Cotswolds?

  Text from Emma Lee Maxwell:

  Different and bloody vexatious. Apparently, the English don’t do fried chicken. I missed Cane’s so much yesterday, I bought a carton of Ultimate Frozen Chicken Nuggets from Tesco, but I couldn’t make Aunt Pattycake’s stove work. It’s a cast iron antique that runs on oil. Oil! I swear Mrs. Patmore used the same stove on Downton Abbey. Good luck in Ireland. I hope things are the way you remember them and without vexations.

  * * *

  The last time I saw Rhys Burroughes he was a painfully shy boy who hid behind his thick thatch of hair, his tortoiseshell spectacles, and his library books to avoid having to interact with others—especially other children. He was Harry Potter, but with a wonky eye and far less confidence.

  Winter Hastings phoned a few days before my departure to let me know Rhys rearranged his schedule so he could pick me up at the airport and drive us both to Tásúildun Castle, so I am looking for that awkward, uncertain little boy as I stride through the Dublin International Airport, pulling my suitcase behind me, feeling badass in my black denim leggings and thigh-high boots.

  I’m not going to lie, y’all. I decided to wear my thigh-high boots and thigh-hugging leggings because they make me feel empowered, and I want Aidan Gallagher and Rhys Sinjin Burroughes to know who they need to bow down to if they hope to win the right to be king of the castle. I don’t know why my aunt put such an unusual proviso in her will, but I do know I need to be shrewd in how I proceed because I don’t want to spend the rest of my life battling for control of my aunt’s home.

  The terms of my aunt’s will were clear: whoever I choose to be my co-beneficiary will share the ownership and maintenance of the castle and grounds. That means Rhys (or Aidan) could be knocking around the castle when I am in my Longhorn shorts and Keep Austin Weird tee, binging on Goo Goo Clusters, and Netflix series. It also means Rhys (or Aidan) might eventually marry and then bring his wife and children to the castle, perhaps to live. I imagine a brood of Bur-rougheses (or Gallaghers) lurking around the castle, peering at me over their thick glasses, and . . .

  Sweet baby Jesus and all the cherubs in Heaven!

  I stop walking. A man is standing near the exit doors staring at me in a mighty familiar way, a hand pressed to his chest, a grin lifting the corners of his mouth. A man as tall, dark, and handsome as Rhett Butler. He’s wearing a dark, expensively tailored suit that makes him look as if he just stepped out of the pages of a Dolce and Gabbana catalog.

  If this is the way they grow them here in Ireland, take my passport, and file my application for citizenship because I’m staying.

  I start walking again, slower, because I know any second now Mister Ireland is going to realize he is amping up the Colgate smile and feigning a swoon for the wrong girl.

  “Tara!”

  I stop and look around for Mister Ireland’s lucky girl—who must also be named Tara—but there’s only an elderly couple trailing be
hind me and an Italian soccer team crashed out on some gray plastic chairs nearby.

  “Tara Maxwell!” Mister Ireland closes the distance between us in two long-legged strides. “You’re here.”

  “Rhys?”

  He leans down and kisses the air near my cheek in a very European greeting and I catch a whiff of his intoxicating cologne. Strong, peppery, and unapologetically masculine. I close my eyes and inhale. Cardamom. Bergamot. For a delicious moment, I am transported to a coastal village in Calabria, the sun hot on my skin, the scent of ripe lemons teasing my nose. When I open my eyes, he is staring at me with a grin on his handsome face.

  “You smell good,” I say, without thinking.

  “Thank you.” He chuckles. “You’re beautiful.”

  My cheeks flush with heat.

  “I am?”

  He nods and a hank of his thick, dark, wavy hair falls onto his forehead. Sweet Baby Jesus in Heaven! It really is Rhys Burroughes. Little old lazy-eyed Rhys.

  “You are so beautiful I thought I was having a heart attack when I first saw you walking toward me.” He reaches around me and grabs my suitcase, lifting it as if it doesn’t contain Aer Lingus’ weight limit in clothes. “Come on. My car is just outside.”

  I reach into my purse and pull out my sunglasses, sliding them onto my face even though a downy blanket of fog is hanging low in the sky and blocking the sunlight. I slide my sunglasses on my face so I can check Rhys out, and you know what?

  Rhys Burroughes is gorgeous, y’all! Just plumb gorgeous. He’s taller than the average man, with the trim, toned body of an athlete. An image of Rhys seated in a long, narrow shell, his arm muscles rippling as he pulls an oar through the Thames flickers in my brain. Who would have thought little old Rhys Burroughes would grow up to be so blazing hot? At least . . . I think this is Rhys.

  “You are Rhys Burroughes?”

  He stops walking and sets my suitcase down. I stop walking. He directs the full force of his gray-eyed gaze on me and my heart trembles like a crape myrtle blossom in the breeze.