Out on the Sound

by R. E. Bradshaw

  Lizzie wrapped up a half an hour later, right on schedule. “I don’t know how you expect to find a man, when you dress like one.”

  Decky finished the last check and handed it to her mother. “Momma, if I wanted a man, I’d have one. And he would like me in tee-shirts and jeans.”

  Decky stood up and kissed her mother on the cheek. On the way out she said, “I hear Edna is coming down. Dad says he’s going down with you tomorrow and you’re staying till Sunday?” Decky had learned from the best how to get information without appearing to pry.

  Lizzie followed her out to the car. “Yes, we’ll be leaving in the morning. You should come with us. Get out of the house.”

  Decky looked at the crutches and thought to herself, Thank God.

  “I wouldn’t be much fun on these. I’ll catch them next time. Give Edna a kiss for me.”

  Dixie hopped into the passenger seat without being asked.

  Lizzie started up again, “I can’t believe you let that dog sit in that car like that.”

  Dixie looked at Lizzie as if she had heard her and was offended at being called a dog.

  “I told you mom, she’s not a dog, she’s a little girl”

  Laughing she backed out, waved to her father and let out a huge sigh of relief. She and Charlie had at least five days before they had to deal with Lizzie again, if all went as planned. Charlie wouldn’t even have to meet Lizzie at the faculty luncheon. Things looked promising, but in the back of her mind, she kept her guard up. You could just never tell when Lizzie was involved.

  #

  Decky drove into town, about a thirty-minute drive. She gathered supplies, ran some errands and headed back to her house. She rushed around, if one can rush around on crutches, preparing everything for the afternoon. She wanted to surprise Charlie, going about her work almost giddily. She watched the clock and counted the minutes until she would see Charlie again. She had it bad and she knew it and right this minute she loved it.

  At precisely noon, Decky pulled up in Brenda’s driveway. Charlie bounded out of the house, as if she had been watching for her, which she had been. They both beamed when they saw each other. Charlie jumped in the seat beside Decky.

  “I was waiting for you. I thought you’d never get here. Brenda has been asking all sorts of questions. I couldn’t wait to get out of there.”

  “Like what kind of questions?” Decky asked.

  “Like which one of us is the boy?”

  “She didn’t.”

  Charlie laughed, “Yes she did.”

  “Oh my God, I hope Chip didn’t hear her.” Decky was laughing now. “What did you say?”

  “I started to explain that it didn’t work like that, but I just said we were still working that out.” Decky laughed, as Charlie continued, “She’s never asked me anything like that before. She is really having fun with this.”

  Decky headed the car for home. Still listening as Charlie went on, “She even asked me if you were good in bed. I couldn’t believe it!”

  Decky didn’t miss a beat, “So, what did you tell her.”

  “I said you were fucking fantastic!”

  #

  “I thought we were going to get some lunch and go see the cottage,” Charlie said as Decky turned down the road to her house.

  “We are, just taking a different vehicle.”

  Decky parked the car in the garage and pointed with her crutch for Charlie to go around the side of the house. Dixie came bounding down the back stairway as they rounded the corner. The dog led the way as they made their way down to the boathouse.

  They stopped in the boathouse to pick up the picnic basket and cooler Decky had the twins bring down for her. The twins were great. She would call them on the cell phone she had given them, let them know what she needed and they would get it done. No questions asked. Of course, she lined their pockets and let them play with all her cool stuff.

  The boathouse contained room for a Boston Whaler, a small sunfish sailboat and a small sailing skiff. The walls held multiple sailboards and fishing gear, miscellaneous skis and water toys. There was a smaller boat barn near the shore, which contained canoes and jet skies.

  Charlie picked up the cooler and looked around, “Got enough toys?”

  Decky explained that she didn’t want Zack involved in drugs and other teenage pursuits, so she surrounded him with things to keep him outside, active and at home. And she might add, very popular.

  The twins had also pulled the Boston Whaler out of the boathouse earlier. It was gassed up and ready to go, tied to the end of the dock. Charlie loaded the picnic basket and cooler in the boat and helped Decky down from the dock. Dixie jumped up on the seat at the bow, ready for the trip.

  “I wish I had brought my swimsuit,” Charlie said, settling down on one of the seats.

  “Look in the picnic basket,” Decky responded while cranking the boat.

  Charlie looked in the picnic basket. She pulled out a tiny, very sexy bikini. Holding it up she looked at Decky with one eyebrow raised. “You’ve got to be kidding.”

  Decky burst out laughing. “I thought you might say that when I bought it this morning. Look a little deeper; I put a few more conservative choices at the bottom. I was hoping not to need them.”

  Charlie settled on a one-piece black suit. She sat down on the bottom of the boat and gave Decky and Dixie quite the show as she slipped the tight suit over her body. It was all Decky could do to not stop the boat right there and have at it, but she kept going, aiming the boat down the shoreline.

  Charlie opened the picnic basket, removing two plastic champagne flutes and a bowl of strawberries that had been dipped in chocolate. Decky paced the boat for a smooth ride, then opened the cooler and removed a bottle of Champagne. It looked expensive and it was.

  “You must have been a very busy girl this morning, or do you just have expensive champagne and gourmet strawberries lying around.” Charlie was stretched out on her side on the bench seat, propped up on one elbow. Dixie came over and nuzzled her face.

  “She wants the chocolate. My mother spoils her.” Decky pointed Dixie back to the front of the boat and she obeyed, but not without casting one last look at the strawberries.

  “By the way, how was Lizzie?” Charlie said, and then bit the end off a strawberry.

  “She pried a few things out of me, but the good news is she’s leaving for the beach in the morning and won’t be back until Sunday,”

  Charlie lowered her voice, “What kind of things did she pry out of you?”

  “Didn’t you hear what I said? She won’t be at the faculty luncheon. That should be a relief.” Decky really did not want to spoil the mood.

  “That is a relief, but I think you’re holding something back. Come on, spit it out. I can’t exactly run away, we’re in a friggin’ boat.”

  Decky decided to get it out quickly, hoping it would blow over just as fast. “She found out you were an old friend of Brenda and Chips and I’m supposed to arrange a dinner party at Lizzie’s for you and your friends, me included.”

  “Tell her I don’t eat, at least not in public. Tell her I have a real phobia about it.”

  “I can’t do that, then she’d make it her mission in life to cure you.” Decky was being honest.

  “Will that be before or after she finds out I’m sleeping with her daughter. I’m afraid she might poison me.”

  “She doesn’t have to know the details of our friendship.”

  “You keep telling yourself that. The first time she sees us together, she’ll know. From what Brenda says, we have flashing red signs on our foreheads saying, ‘Lesbians in heat, watch out!’ Everybody’s going to know.”

  Decky was happy to see that Charlie was smiling. It took a sense of humor to live with Lizzie. She just hoped Charlie’s would stand up to the challenge.

  “I can hold her off. Tell her you’re getting settled in. She’ll buy that for a while, but she’ll consider it rude if you never come… I know, you should send her a
thank you card for the invitation and ask for a rain check. That will go a long way with her. It’s a very old South thing to do. She’ll think you’re civilized at least.”

  “I am civilized. You’ll find I clean up pretty good. You can dress me up and take me anywhere, just not to your mother’s house. Do you people keep guns?”

  “Of course we have guns.” Decky was teasing her now. “Momma never goes anywhere without one. We live in the south, where we treasure our right to own and bear arms. We are all gun toting rednecks and proud of it. Momma’s a real crack shot too.”

  “I guess that’s not so much different from home, but my mother would never carry a gun. She always has a man around to do that sort of thing. Besides I thought your mother was a certified bi-polar psychiatric patient.”

  “There are some innate rights afforded to all Americans, even the mentally unstable. Besides she doesn’t think there’s anything wrong with her, and that’s exactly what she told the nice policeman that tried to remove it from her pocket book, after she waved it at some tourist who parked a camper in her front yard.”

  “That would have made me mad, too.”

  “Mad, not homicidal. You see with her it’s varying degrees of extremes. What you call a psychotic break down, she would call a slight over reaction.”

  “Do you think you could hide the bullets, pull the firing pin or something?” Charlie ducked down, “She doesn’t have a rifle with a scope does she?”

  “No, she’s more a shoot you between the eyes kind of gal.”

  Charlie fell off the bench. They laughed hard and long. Decky hadn’t laughed this much in years. It felt good. Decky slowed the boat and pulled up next to a dock leading to a small cottage on stilts. It was located in a blind cove. There were other houses around the shoreline, but this cottage sat on a piece of land jutting out into the cove, tall trees isolating it from view.

  A small skiff sat upside down under the decking. The sides of the cottage were covered in old gray shingles, so popular on the outer banks of North Carolina. It was just a box on stilts, more a vacation house than a home. The driveway looked rutted out from old traffic and spring rains. A small aluminum shed sat to one side of the property, near the tall pine trees that lined the back of the lot toward the road. An old bulkhead followed the shoreline, trying to keep the Currituck sound at bay.

  “If you don’t mind, I don’t think I’ll try to make that haul up to the cottage.” She fished around in her pocket, then handed Charlie the key. “I’ll just wait here. Take your time. Oh, the alarm code is BASEHIT.”

  “It has an alarm system. That’s unusual way out here isn’t it?” Charlie started out of the boat. Dixie followed.

  “It just makes noise and calls me on the phone, if someone breaks in. We had a little trouble with some friends of Zack’s having a few parties without permission. I didn’t want the cops coming every time one of them got a little stupid.”

  “Well, at least I would have fair warning before your mother could get through the door.”

  Decky smiled. “Now you’re thinking.”

  Charlie went down the dock and up the steps of the cottage under Decky’s watchful eyes. Dixie found something to sniff under the deck. Decky’s gaze followed Charlie’s shadow on the ceiling of the cottage, as she walked from room to room. She soon reemerged with a big smile and trotted down the dock to where Decky waited. Dixie looked up, and followed suit.

  Charlie and Dixie jumped down into the boat. Charlie went straight to Decky and hugged her neck. Dixie took the opportunity to steal a strawberry and return to the bow.

  “It’s perfect. Just the right size and the view is fantastic.” Charlie sat down again and looked back at the cottage. “You’re right, it’s not a permanent residence, but it would be fine until I find something else. You’re sure you want to do this?”

  “Yes, I do. I want you to be close to me and I figure this is about as close as you’re willing to come right now.” Decky poured them more champagne.

  “How much do you want to lease it? Charge what you would normally ask. No special deals.”

  “You don’t want to be a kept woman? My concubine?” Decky’s dimple was showing.

  Charlie took a sip from her glass. “As much as I would like too, I can’t take advantage of your inability to resist my feminine wiles, decide what you want and I’ll pay it. No arguments.”

  “We’ll talk about it later. Right now, I want to take you somewhere.” Decky started the boat.

  Decky drove the boat across the sound towards Corolla. They stopped just off small Mary’s Island, more of a sandbar with a few trees. Decky anchored the boat and pointed out the Currituck lighthouse over on the main barrier island. They sat and watched sailboats moving along the Intracoastal Waterway that cuts through Currituck Sound, heading north and south.

  Decky told Charlie stories about growing up here in “Sportsman’s Paradise,” as the welcome sign out on the county line called it. She told her of the great flocks of Canadian and Snow geese that used to cover the sound every season. The hunters came every year still, but the flocks of birds didn’t come in large numbers anymore.

  She told her about the time she went hunting with her boyfriend in a freezing duck blind, only to have him accidentally shoot a swan. How they had driven back to shore in the boat and snuck the dead swan into his truck. How they were so scared the game warden or his daddy was going to catch them with the illegal bird, which by the way was a two thousand dollar fine, they rushed home, cooked it and had damn near eaten all the evidence before his momma got home from work.

  Decky told Charlie about the history of Currituck County and the barrier islands that daisy chained down the coast of North Carolina. She talked about the early English settlement on Roanoke Island, further south. How the settlers had come in 1587 long before Jamestown. When the supply ships returned three years later, what had been a thriving settlement had disappeared, leaving only the word “Croatoan” carved in a tree. The vanished settlers became known as the “Lost Colony.” Decky promised to take Charlie to see the outdoor drama depicting the plight of the colonists, at the Waterside Theatre in Manteo.

  There were so many things to show Charlie, so much time to make up. Decky talked about being baptized in the sound, about Easter morning sunrise services over the water, about learning to water ski and surf. She recalled how badly she had wanted out of this little county when she was young, and how she was drawn back to it like a moth to a flame, after college and a broken heart.

  Charlie commented only occasionally, but mostly she just listened. When Decky told of the broken heart, Charlie wanted to hear more.

  “Who broke your heart, your ex-husband?”

  “Oh, good Lord, no! I married him on the rebound from the love of my life. I knew it at the time, but I couldn’t help myself. I call it the dark time, a time when I temporarily lost my mind. I got Zack out of the deal, so it worked out okay.”

  “Then who was the love of your life?” Charlie wasn’t giving up.

  “I started dating William Thomas Dowdy, the third, or Trey, as he was called, my senior year of high school. I had dated a few guys, you know high school dating, the on and off relationships. Trey was a year younger than I was. I had never paid much attention to him until we were in a play together that spring. I had always dated athletes.”

  “Trey was totally different, sensitive and gentle. I fell head over hills, I mean gone. We stayed together, with a few hiccups here and there, all the way through my senior year at Carolina. By then he was there, majoring in theatre too. We didn’t live together. I stayed with some ball friends of mine and he lived in the frat house. With our production schedules, classes, my playing sports and his fraternity we were away from each other a lot. We had separate lives; I guess that’s what I’m trying to say.”

  Decky stopped and took a deep breath. She didn’t like remembering what happened next.

  “That spring, just before graduation and one month after he had give
n me an engagement ring, I was helping Trey move out of the frat house. He had gotten a summer stock job in Greensboro, and we were moving in together for the first time that summer.

  While Trey went to get more boxes, I came across a shoebox in his closet with letters from a recent lover. I read them. I shouldn’t have. They weren’t signed, but it was evident from the content that my rival was a guy in the chorus of the musical Trey was about to star in. A good friend of mine as well, I had been excited that he was coming with Trey and me for the summer. I was devastated. When he came back, he saw me with the letters. He couldn’t lie, I was holding the evidence.”

  “Oh, my God, what did you do?” Charlie’s face was twisted with Decky’s pain.

  “I screamed, I cussed, I cried, I lost my mind. He actually told me he would try to change. It was just a phase, he loved me; he would give it all up if I wouldn’t leave him. I accused him of needing a cover for his family and a surrogate for the precious William Thomas Dowdy, the fourth, he was destined to sire. As it turns out, I was absolutely correct. He now has a wife and two kids and at least one male companion, ‘best friend,’ around all the time, who helps out on the farm and feed store he inherited. I don’t know what bothers me the most, the fact that he’s still lying to everyone, or all that wasted time and emotion loving him.”