Beach House Memories

by Mary Alice Monroe

  I don’t doubt for a moment that you loved me. Love me still. But you have made your decision. As promised, I will respect it.

  But if you should ever change your mind, or if circumstances occur where you ever find your life untenable, I want you to have the freedom to leave—even if you do not choose to come to me.

  You carry my love within you. A day will never dawn nor a sunset slip into the horizon when I will not think of you. I accept that the mind often dictates the heart. Yet I believe that the heart is the truer guide.

  So, if in the course of time, you should want to come to me, do not hesitate. Know that I will be waiting for you. You will always have my heart—my love.

  Always,

  Russell

  Lovie folded the letter slowly, then pressed the paper to her heart. “Russell!” She said his name aloud, knowing she was heard.

  She understood all now. Russell had come to the beach house on March 15. He’d sat in the dark on her back porch, waiting for her. When she didn’t come, he’d written this letter. But where could he leave it? She could imagine him thinking this situation through in his organized manner. He’d paced the porch, searching for possibilities. He knew he couldn’t slip the letter under the door, or leave it propped on the porch table for fear that someone else might discover it and read it. He must have exhausted a litany of possibilities before he settled on his plan. When he’d found this tin box on her porch, when he devised his plan, he must have smiled with the memory of the Point. He would have emptied the shells from the box and placed his letter inside to protect it. Then he would have taken one of the flags from the red bucket and climbed to their dune. There, at a place that held precious memories for them both, he had buried his letter, marking the spot with the flag in such a way that only she would understand. His intent was for her—and only her—to find the treasure.

  And at last, she had.

  Lovie felt the tight string that she’d held herself together with for so many months begin to loosen. She took great, heaving breaths, and at last, the knot was released and she let loose all the anguish and disappointment and heartbreak that had been locked inside her. Lovie howled at the moon, not caring who heard her. She sobbed loud and freely, stretching out on the sand, belly to the earth, clutching his letter to her heart.

  Lovie lay on her and Russell’s dune, her sanctuary, and felt her tears flow as freely as a welcoming rain, nourishing her soul, bringing it back to life. Her heart grew roots to this hallowed ground. Closing her eyes, she heard again Russell’s voice on the surf. Olivia. Smiling, she fell asleep, and in her dreams, he returned to her.

  When she awoke, the night was chilled and intensely quiet. Stars shone cold overhead. She was curled on her side, her knees up, shivering, with Russell’s letter still clutched at her chest. She pulled herself up to sit on the dune, the damp cool of morning waking her further. She saw the letter in her hand and, kissing it, tucked it into her pants pocket. The spark of her self-confidence had been reignited. It glowed as a small ember now, but she would continue to feed it until she felt it blazing inside her.

  She shook the sand from her hair and rubbed her face with her palms. What time it was, she couldn’t guess, but the softening of the darkness told her that dawn was near.

  Looking out at the sea, she stiffened when she caught sight of a hulking, shadowy creature in the surf. It sat at the edge of the beach where water met sand, a great prehistoric beast sniffing the air. It was a loggerhead!

  Her senses went on alert and she crouched lower on the dunes. She’d seen sea turtles on the beach many times before, but never had she witnessed one emerging from the sea. This female turtle had heard the call of her ancestors and journeyed through spirals of swift water and a living broth of plankton and invertebrates. She ignored the hunger in her belly to push on past schools of great fish and solitary sharks, following instincts that had guided mothers of her kind for more than two hundred million years. When at last she reached her home shores, she mingled with the other turtles in the swells. Mating was a tempestuous contest of wills. Then she left the male, to swim alone on her voyage of continuity. Inside her body, she carried the hope of the next generation of sea turtles.

  Now she’d arrived at this border between water and land. This was her moment of reckoning. She would have to leave all she knew, all that was safe, to face the dangers of the unknown. To climb across the vast and dangerous distance to the dunes and nest.

  Yet this powerful female waited. What instincts were coming to play at this moment? Lovie wondered. Did she sense the stealthy movement of a predator in the shadows? Perhaps she sensed Lovie’s presence on the dune.

  “You’re safe, mother,” Lovie whispered to her, tears welling up. “I won’t hurt you.”

  The great turtle slowly turned at the shoreline and lumbered back into the sea. Lovie knew a fierce disappointment, but her breath caught at the sight of a large chunk missing from the turtle’s rear shell. It had to be a shark bite. Poor mother! Magnificent beast, it’s no wonder you are wary. She’d been wounded, but here she was, resilient and determined to continue her destiny. Her return to the sea was not a retreat. She would try again. Perhaps later today at a different beach. Perhaps tomorrow at this same location. The decision she made would be hers alone, guided by her instinct and experience.

  The first pink rays of dawn broke through the darkness and slowly stretched across the horizon to usher in a new day. Lovie felt her soul expand with light to become part of something so much bigger than her mere self. She felt at peace knowing that at the end of her time here on earth, her name would be written not in this sand but in heaven.

  Sea Turtle Journal

  July 3, 1975

  Saw a sea turtle emerge from the sea at 3rd Avenue. She sat in the shallow water of the shoreline for a while, then returned to the sea. What prompted her decision not to come ashore? Must look for nest tomorrow, or the following day.

  This magnificent, wounded sea turtle taught me that life is a series of decisions. My challenge is to endure the consequences of my decisions—come what may. What good was it to sit and mope over what might have been? I am alive and must face another decision today. And yet another the next day. And so on, and so on, stroke after stroke in this crazy current we call life. Like the loggerhead, though bitten by predators, I must persevere. She is a solitary swimmer.

  Aren’t we all in the end? We enter and exit this life alone.

  Twenty-six

  Present Day

  Lovie rocked in her chair on the porch in the hush of twilight, the chill of the night seeping into her tired bones. She reached up to tug her shawl a little closer, but even this effort was too much. The past felt closer to her than the present. When she closed her eyes, she saw the faces of those who had already made the journey to the other side. They clustered around her, pressing close—Stratton, who had died quickly from a massive heart attack at his club; her brother Mickey; her father; her mother. And, of course, Russell. She felt his presence strongly now, much closer than the rest. She listened for his voice. But only the rise and fall of the cicadas and the occasional cry of a night bird disturbed the deep silence.

  Across from her, the calico cat was curled on a cushion in a deep sleep. How Lovie longed to sleep like that! Since the cancer had spread to conquer her frail body, the pain awakened her frequently during the night, so she never felt rested. What would it be like to close her eyes and sleep as she did when she was young, without aches and pains, without tossing and turning? And to dream! Oh, that would be heaven.

  On the table, the candle in the lantern was sputtering. Yet its pale flicker valiantly glowed like the pale moon beginning its ascent in the sky. She remembered a night way back when she identified with the moon on its solitary path across the night sky. That night, so very long ago, shone brighter in her memory tonight.

  Those were sad days, but she no longer felt the painful stabs of the past. Time had mellowed her to a complacent acceptance. She had c
onsented to life, discovered new joys, welcomed grandchildren, and in the end had discovered there was great contentment in the balance.

  She turned her gaze from the ocean to her daughter sitting in the chair beside her. She smiled wistfully. Now, here was the swing of the pendulum to balance, she thought. Her own sweet Caretta . . . After so many years apart, they sat here again, mother and daughter, on the porch of their beloved beach house. She studied Cara’s face, the proud straight nose and dark shining eyes inherited from her father. Her long neck, her full lips so striking now. She smiled. The awkward, brainy duckling had grown up to be a swan. Lovie’s gaze shifted to see their hands entwined. Though they didn’t speak, this bond spoke eloquently of the deep love they shared.

  She felt again the heavy weight of memories on her heart. Love, yes. Love was always there between them. But sadly, there had been discord, too. Disagreement. Distance. Too many years of misunderstandings and cold silences.

  Lovie looked out over the beach and recalled simpler days when she was a young mother and Palmer and Cara were children playing tag with the waves. Everything seemed so much easier then. She gave an order to her children and it was obeyed. She was the source of all that mattered to them—food, shelter and, of course, love. What she needed most in those early days was endurance and physical strength. But she had paid attention to her children. She’d watched them with a keen eye, relishing their achievements, helping them through difficult moments, monitoring their progress with more focus than she’d ever offered the sea turtles. Even so young, they’d given her clues as to who they were going to grow up to become.

  She closed her eyes and chuckled at the memory. Cara and Palmer, the rogue and the rascal.

  “Mama? It’s getting chilly. Would you like to go in?”

  Lovie turned her head. Cara’s eyes were shining with worry. In the spring, her prayer had been for God to send her daughter back home. Cara had come, and stayed, and cared for her. Now the summer was over and winter beckoned. Cara being here now was the answer to her prayer.

  “Caretta?” she began in a raspy voice. There was so much she wanted to say to her, to explain. She felt the minutes of her life slipping away like sand between her fingers.

  “Yes, Mama?”

  Lovie looked into Cara’s eyes, felt her hand in hers. “You’re a good girl.”

  Cara’s smile trembled. “Thank you, Mama. There’s nothing more I ever wanted to hear from you.” She bent to kiss her mother’s cheek. “Lord, you’re as cold as ice. Are you sure you won’t come inside?”

  Lovie gently shook her head and squeezed Cara’s hand. The effort was monumental, but Cara understood.

  “I’ll just go get you a blanket. I’ll be right back.”

  Lovie began a hacking coughing spell that shook her body like a rag doll and left her gasping for breath. It felt like she was drowning in her own body. She felt her heart flutter in a panic like a bird trapped in her chest. She looked out at the ocean, her old friend, seeking comfort while her breathing slowly settled.

  Soon, she heard from the sea.

  When she could, she leaned back in her rocker, breathing heavily. Her gaze fell to the wicker porch table where she and Flo and Miranda had shared so many evenings. On top, her sea turtle journal lay open beside her pen. She had been writing her entry, as she had for so many years. The breeze fluttered the pages, skimming through a lifetime of days and nights in an instant.

  It seemed to her that her life had sped by as quickly. And throughout, the sea turtles had been her constant. They’d been her lifelong source of inspiration and comfort. Russell had understood that about her. Didn’t every woman need a creative source that reflected her alone, and not her husband or her children?

  Over the span of fifty years, Lovie’s simple sea turtle protection efforts had grown from being a local Turtle Lady to being part of a statewide program under the direction of the South Carolina Department of Natural Resources. Other programs now existed in Florida, Georgia, and North Carolina, as well as hospitals for sea turtle rehabilitation. Lovie had proudly held many permits—since that first one had arrived at such a serendipitous moment in 1975. Now when she watched the mother sea turtles return to nest, she gained great satisfaction knowing that these females were hatchlings that she had helped survive the journey from the nest to the sea so long ago.

  It was October, and another nesting season, her last, was over. Her beloved sea turtles had swum off to forage in warmer waters. She missed them already. Each of the many times she had followed a sea turtle as it crawled back into the ocean, Lovie waited until that final moment when the turtle lifted her large head to take a final breath, then slipped under the dark veil of the water. Lovie had always been transfixed by the sight of those powerful flippers propelling her forward into a mysterious world as she jubilantly swam home.

  She sighed heavily. Now her life had come full circle. The season was over. Her children were grown and self-sufficient. Her marriage vows fulfilled. Her duties and responsibilities were finished at last. She had done her best. She could finally let go.

  Olivia!

  She smiled. Russell was calling to her, more impatiently. He was coming for her—and she was ready.

  I’m here, her heart called to him. At the beach house, as I once promised you I would be, so long ago. I’m free to go with you, my love. Come for me!

  Lovie’s hand moved to open the worn black leather Bible on her lap. Miranda’s gift to her had been such a comfort all these years. She pulled out a sheet of paper, as thin and soft with age as spun silk. Russell’s letter. She couldn’t read it in the dim light, but she didn’t need to. Each word was written on her heart.

  Olivia!

  He was closer now; his voice was louder, filling her head. She looked out to the sea and saw a mist rolling in, soft and pearlescent. A foghorn bellowed in a melancholy toll.

  Olivia!

  She clutched the letter to her heart as the first pain struck. It stabbed like a knife, cutting deep. Her breath stilled in her chest as the earthly bonds were severed. At last, she was free to go to him.

  “Russell!” she released on a final breath, and in a sudden burst of light, she was swimming under the waves.

  Beach House Memories

  Mary Alice Monroe

  Reading Group Guide

  * * *

  Introduction

  In the summer of 1974, Olive “Lovie” Rutledge hosts a formal dinner party for her unappreciative husband in their lovely home in a privileged Charleston neighborhood. The following morning she takes her two children to Isle of Palms—a nearby barrier island off the coast of South Carolina where her family has a modest beach cottage. Behind closed doors, and exhausted from keeping up appearances, Lovie finds solace, happiness, and fulfillment at the beach. But when a handsome biologist arrives to research the status of nesting turtles—a project that is Lovie’s passion—she finds herself falling in love over the course of the summer, with devastating consequences.

  This is an unforgettable tale of marriage, resilience, and one woman’s private strength.

  Topics & Questions for Discussion

  1. What are your first impressions of Lovie? Does she seem satisfied with her life and current situation?

  2. Discuss the differences between the expectations of a woman/wife in 1974 when the story takes place, and today. Are there regional differences? How does Lovie’s expectations compare to your own?

  3. Why do you think Lovie is so protective of her daughter when Stratton and Dee Dee both suggest Cara needs to learn better manners and be more ladylike? Have cotillions, debutante balls, etc. disappeared in your area? Or have they seen a renewed interest?

  4. Lovie thinks of the beach house as returning “home,” where things felt, “constant, fixed, and reassuring.” Why does she feel this way about Primrose Cottage as compared to her house in Charleston?

  5. Why do you think Lovie’s friend Flo never married? What is different about Flo and Lovie? How would a wom
an of Florence Prescott’s standards and values measure in today’s world?

  6. Lovie draws parallels between her role as a woman and mother and the mother sea turtles that swim hundreds of miles to crawl onto shore and lay their eggs. What aspects offered Lovie strength and hope in her desperate moments? What other lessons can you point out that Lovie has learned from the sea turtles?

  7. In Chapter Five, the mayor of Isle of Palms says at a community meeting, “There’s always a price to pay for progress...” Do you think that threatening the nests of the sea turtles was a price worth paying on Isle of Palms? What would you do if you were a citizen of such a community? Discuss what programs are in place in your community for conservation, recycling, etc while considering Russell Bennett’s comment that the issue was not local, but global.

  8. Dr. Bennett offends Lovie in their first meeting by unintentionally belittling her interest in the sea turtles. How did his opinion of her change as he read further into her records?

  9. What significance does signing the notebook at The Point have for Lovie, and for Cara?

  10. Compare and contrast the relationship between the novel’s mother-daughter pairs: Cara and Lovie; Lovie and Dee Dee; and Flo and Miranda. What does each mother want for her daughter? What does each daughter want from her mother? Do you think the mothers and daughters, both in Beach House Memories and in your own experience, are doomed to repeat the same patterns in their relationships?

  11. How were the issues of class, women’s rights, and spousal abuse handled in 1974 and how have things changed in modern times? What choices do women today have in cases of abuse? Do you think abuse against women crosses economic lines?

  12. In chapter thirteen, Dr. Bennett says to Lovie: “That’s the magic of youth. They have complete and utter faith. They believe.” Do you think that the ability to have faith fades with age? Explain your answer.

  13. Why does Lovie feel so compelled to continue her work with the sea turtles in years to come? How does her vocation complete, fulfill, and sustain her through the years? What do you think is a deeper meaning for Lovie?