I got up and walked quietly down the carpeted steps in my sock feet. Mom was alone in the kitchen, crying into the pancake batter.
“The recipe only calls for a pinch of salt, Mom,” I said, hugging her from behind.
She smiled at me and sniffed. “I’m sorry. I think this is how it’s going to be around here for a while.”
I looked around the kitchen, as clean and pristine as ever, even though we were all here, making a dozen sandwiches a day and three times as many snacks. Somehow, in between helping clients, trying to put time in at the shop, and taking care of Grammy, Mom managed to keep it looking like no one lived here. She was a marvel, really, and I wondered if she had always been this way and I just hadn’t noticed.
Mom poured batter onto her griddle, and it sizzled, filling the air with the scent of many a childhood Saturday morning. I grabbed a pancake off the “done” plate. It was delicious even without syrup.
She pointed with her spatula. “Grammy’s request.”
I nodded. “When do we have to start withholding food? I mean, isn’t that one of the hospice things?”
She shook her head. “She can eat if she wants to. It’s more about giving her a bit of pleasure than sustenance.” Her eyes filled again. “We could feed her all day, every day, though, and she’d never come close to a normal size.”
I walked to the easel that was crammed into the corner of the kitchen. It probably should have been in my room, at the front of the house, where I could overlook the water, but it seemed my mother and sisters gave me just as much inspiration as the water did. And, once the floodgates opened, they hadn’t closed. The paint was pouring out of me now.
The back door opened. Caroline swept in wearing a floor-length white silk robe. “What have I missed?” she said. “Besides carb circles.” She scrunched her nose.
“They’re for Grammy,” Mom said. “Not you.”
“I want in on that action,” Emerson said as she walked into the room. I smiled at her. She seemed less vulnerable when she was awake, vivacious and so full of life.
I picked up the brush in my hand, and the strokes flowed from my heart to the canvas. These past few days I’d done the best painting I ever had, the most raw, the most real. Were these strokes of fear? Pain? Independence? Were they strokes of horror? Exhaustion? Dread? I’ve only ever been able to express what I felt through a brush. The easel was the only place where I could make sense of who I was and what that meant.
Mom was neatly stacking the pancakes, a generous pat of butter between each one, and squeezing syrup on the side, just like Grammy liked.
“Mom,” Caroline said, “Sloane and I are going to come help you out in the shop a little. I’m trying to convince her to sell paintings, too, but I’m not as persuasive as I once was, obviously.”
She gasped and dropped the syrup, and Mrs. Butterworth bounced on the counter. She put her hand to her mouth. “No! You don’t mean it!”
This was not exactly the reaction I had expected, and I wasn’t sure what to make of it. “Yeah. We want to help you in the store. Whatever you need. I just feel like something is missing. Adam, obviously. But something else. Like maybe it’s time for me to have a little time away from the kids.”
“Oh, girls. This means so much to me! It will be so much fun to have you at the store.”
I laughed. I hadn’t expected her to be so excited. “We all talked about it, and Caroline, Emerson, and I are going to take turns staying with Grammy so her care doesn’t fall completely on you.”
“And the boys can go to Mother’s Morning Out at St. James’s,” Caroline said.
“St. James,” Emerson snorted.
Caroline rolled her eyes. “I know. Ironic, isn’t it?”
“He’s kind of being St. James these days,” Mom said. She disappeared down the hall with her pancake plate.
“He really is,” I added. “I would never have imagined he would stay so long in Peachtree Bluff.”
“I know.” Caroline walked to the stove, filled a pot with water, and turned on the burner. “He has to head back to New York, but I think I want to stay the rest of the summer.”
I knew the work James and Caroline had ahead of them was daunting—and far from over. I wondered if being in Peachtree for a little longer might help give them a stronger foundation before they went back to their real lives.
Mom reappeared. “What’s up with Mark, Emerson?” she asked.
Emerson only shrugged. She was being uncharacteristically tight-lipped about him. But there were weeks and weeks left of summer. If I knew anything about the sea, it was that nothing had the power to pull things out of you quite like it did. And, at the same time, nothing had quite the power to fill you back up again.
TWENTY-FOUR
six months
ansley
I was already crying when I woke up. I knew my mother wouldn’t die as long as she had this trip to Starlite Island to look forward to. After that, I wasn’t sure what would happen.
Sandra and Emily were already sitting in my kitchen when I padded in. When I saw them, the waterworks started again, and they both stood to hug me, one on each side.
“She’s going to be gone,” I sobbed. “Then I’m not going to have anyone.”
“Oh, honey, no,” Sandra said. “You have us; you have the girls.”
Biscuit let out a little yip as if to say, “You have me, too!”
But surely they knew what I meant. That had been the hardest thing about losing Carter, the thing I hadn’t expected. When the initial shock and horror of his death had worn off a bit, there were still months and months of realizing how much I depended on him. For far longer than I would like to admit, I would think, “Oh, Carter will do that,” before I would take out the trash or change a lightbulb.
It still crossed my mind to ask my husband for directions, for advice about what to do with the girls, what brand of wine to buy . . . The list went on and on. Not two years later, I went through the same thing with my dad. Now, my mother would be gone. Friends were wonderful and children were terrific, but they were not replacements for your spouse or your parents. A deep sense of vulnerability washed over me, as though, suddenly, I was open to whatever the world wanted to throw at me. I had no one left to protect me, though, frankly, I couldn’t imagine what other horrors we could possibly endure. I tried to take that thought back, as though I was tempting fate.
But Jack was right. My mother was going to die. It was always going to be hard. We would grieve, we would heal, and life would go on. The children were healthy, and while, yes, it would have been great for Adam to come home, for today, we had to be grateful for what we had.
Emily handed me a cup of coffee, and I followed my friends into the living room, to sit down in one of the comfortable, patterned chairs.
“I just can’t believe she’s going to be gone,” I said.
Sandra and Emily still had both of their parents, which was quite a feat at our age. “But she’s not gone now,” Emily said. “And we’re going to give her one hell of a going-away party.”
We all laughed. That was a good way to think of it. A going-away party. Only, it was one thing to give someone a goingaway party when you could hop on a plane to Paris to see her again. But she wasn’t going to be in Paris. And I wasn’t going to see her again.
“You’ll get to be together again one day,” Sandra said.
I rolled my eyes. My two best friends were completely undone by the abdication of my faith. In a town like Peachtree Bluff, or a lot of small Southern towns, really, saying you were ambivalent at best about God was like saying you didn’t believe in sweet tea.
I stood up. “We need to get ready.”
“Is it black tie?” Emily quipped.
“Black suit,” I said. “Bathing suit.”
We all managed a small smile, and I heard AJ’s tiny voice calling, “Gransley.” I saw him at the top of the stairs.
“Hi, my big boy! Come down here and see me!”
&nb
sp; This time I really smiled. I was grateful I had my grandchildren with me during this tough time. They were such a beautiful reminder that life did, indeed, go on. There was more. And it was wonderful.
AJ was wearing green-and-white-striped pajamas, sucking his thumb, and clutching his blankie. Before I turned around he would be twenty-one. I wanted to freeze time and keep him at this sweet and innocent age when life is full of possibility.
He climbed up into my lap as Sandra said, “We’ll see you in a couple hours.”
They made their way out the front door as AJ rested his head on my chest. “You’re the best snuggler I know.”
He looked up at me and smiled. “I love to snuggle.”
“I know you do. Will you still snuggle me when you’re eight?”
He thought for a moment. “No, Gransley. But maybe when I’m six.”
I laughed. “Sounds fair.” It broke my heart that in this short couple of months my grandson had started calling me “Gransley,” not “Gwansley.” He was growing up too quickly. They all did.
I heard voices on the landing. I couldn’t make out what they were saying, but Sloane and Emerson sounded like they were deep in conversation.
The back door flung open, and Caroline called, “Who’s ready to party?” Mom’s weak voice called back, “I am!”
I rushed into her room. It was dark, the blinds were closed, and she seemed so small in the king bed that she was barely detectable. I leaned down and kissed her. “Good morning, Mom. Do you feel like you can get up today?”
“Yes,” she said in her small voice. “I have to get up. I have a party to get ready for, for heaven’s sake.”
Her spirit hadn’t waned. Emerson helped me lead Mom, very slowly, into the bathroom to complete her morning routine.
I knew she would be exhausted by the time we were finished. It would take all the energy she had to simply complete her everyday tasks.
“I’m going to get this hair looking good,” Emerson said.
I looked down at my watch. It was nearly eight thirty. I heard a light rap on the door. I was still in my robe with no makeup and hair pulled back into the squatty ponytail that was all my shoulder-length hair could manage. “Sloane,” I half-yelled, half-whispered. “Get the door and take Jack into the kitchen.”
If he was safely stowed away there, I could sneak upstairs and get presentable.
“Where’s your mom?” I heard Jack ask.
“Oh, she’s hiding in Grammy’s room so you won’t see her without her makeup.”
She would pay for this. I had brought her into this world, and I could take her out of it. Emerson was still with Mom in the bathroom, and Jack peeked his head in. I pretended that I was making the bed, not hiding.
“Hey,” he said, winking.
I threw a pillow at him and put another one up to my face. “I will be ready in ten minutes. I promise.”
“I think you look great now.”
I couldn’t see his face because mine was covered with a pillow. On the one hand, it was silly. The man and I had been through everything together, and he had certainly seen me without my makeup before. But I was young then. Fresh. Wrinkle-free. Now I had to keep up appearances, and as much as I didn’t want to admit it to myself, keep him interested. You know, just in case.
* * *
TWENTY MINUTES LATER, JACK and I were standing on the teak deck of his beautiful boat. It felt so rewarding to see one of my completed projects. “So,” he said, “brought back a lot of memories getting high with you last night. Good times.”
I swatted him playfully. “It was only once, Jack,” I said, remembering as clearly as if it had happened the day before sitting in the cabin of Bobby Franklin’s boat with Jack, Sandra, Emily, Bobby, and their friend Craig, passing around an ill-rolled joint, feeling very, very rebellious.
“Twice,” he said.
“That must have been another girl.” It was silly, but I felt jealous, thinking of Georgia. Her car had been at Jack’s house for quite some time the day before, much longer than your general Realtor check-in. But this was what I deserved. I had told him we couldn’t be together. What did I expect?
“It was not another girl,” he said. “It was you and me over by the lighthouse. And then we . . .” He wiggled his eyebrows.
I put my hand over my mouth and could feel the blush coming up my cheeks. “Jack!” I scolded. But then I said, “How could I have forgotten that night?”
He smiled up at me, and our eyes met for a bit too long. I couldn’t help but think of how something similar had transpired between us in this very boat a couple months earlier. If I was honest with myself, I wanted it to happen again. We were standing so close together, the energy between us so thick you could almost see it. I wondered, briefly, what would happen if I leaned over and kissed him. Just this once. What could it possibly hurt?
Jack clapped his hands as if to snap us both out of it. “OK,” he said, leaning down and picking up the big bag from my store I had dropped on the deck.
“Jack,” I said.
He looked up at me again, and said, “I can’t, Ansley. I can’t even think about the start of this road when I know where it ends.”
The impulsive part of me, the part that still loved that boy as much as I had that night on the beach by the lighthouse, wanted to tell him the road didn’t have to end, that I had been stupid and made a snap decision. But then I thought of all the people getting ready to get on this boat and how much they needed me. My mother was dying, for heaven’s sake. This was not the time to be kissing high school crushes on their beautiful yachts. Before I could say anything, Jack handed me a pillow. I had covered the banquette around the dining table in blue-and-white-striped Sunbrella, and combined with these pillows, it would be a plush and comfy place for Mom to hang out.
I turned around to see them all. My mother, frail and tiny wrapped in a blanket despite the heat, James on one side, Hippie Hal on the other. Coffee Kyle was carrying Preston, which struck me as immensely funny. Sloane was holding Taylor, who was already in his life jacket, and AJ was swinging between Emerson and Mark.
Kimmy ran onto the dock. When she reached us, she stopped, her hands on her knees, panting. “Phew!” she said. “I was afraid I was going to miss the boat.”
“Me too,” Jack said. To everyone else I’m sure it seemed like nothing. But, to me, his words felt heavy, laced with longing and what’s more, anticipation.
“I sure am glad you didn’t,” Hal said. “How would you have ever gotten all the way over to Starlite?”
We all turned our heads and laughed. It was a laughably short distance. With all the preparation, the food, the tents, the lights, the massive amount of planning crammed into a very short window, all of us gathering on this huge boat as though we were off on a grand voyage, we had forgotten this was a journey we could have taken via kayak, or, had we been strong swimmers, no vessel at all.
“More importantly,” Mom said, “who would have brought my pot brownies?”
That set everyone off again. It was a good start. I was afraid this would feel like a funeral, somber and heavy. But it didn’t. It was a party for sure.
Emerson had done wonders with Mom’s hair. She looked lovely in her knit pantsuit. I smiled, but then it hit me what we were here for: her literal going-away party. I was going to wake up one morning, probably soon enough that I could count the days on my fingers and toes, and she was going to be gone. I would never again see her face. Never hear her laughter. Never call her on the phone to ask her opinion.
No, it hadn’t been perfect. I would never fully understand her decision when Carter died, and sometimes she wasn’t as touchy-feely a mother as I really wanted her to be. Still, although she may not always have been what I wanted, I had to consider that she had always, always been what I needed.
I felt the lump in my throat growing, and I knew I wouldn’t be able to control it much longer. As everyone chattered around me like this was another ordinary day on the island
, I turned and walked as quickly as I could without arousing suspicion into the luxurious interior of the boat and into Jack’s room. I closed the door behind me and sat on the end of his unmade bed, the same unmade bed I had not only picked the linens for but also made love to him in. Then I started to cry. I knew I had to get it over with. I would never get through this day without at least a few tears.
When I heard footsteps and a hand on the doorknob, I tried to gather myself and wiped my eyes. But when I saw Jack’s face coming through the door, I lost it again.
As he came closer, I expected him to wrap me in a hug, rub my back, tell me it would be OK or anything soothing that would calm my nerves and dry my tears.
But he didn’t do any of that. Instead, he put his hands on my cheeks and kissed me so passionately that I truly felt like I was living that night by the lighthouse all over again. Only, this time, the only thing making me feel giddy and free was Jack.
We looked at each other for a long moment after that kiss, neither of us daring to speak. “You have six months,” he said. “Six months to get your shit together, to get over your excuses and your fears, whatever they are.”
He’d never spoken to me so firmly or so intensely. “Let’s face it, Ansley. Your life is a disaster zone. No one, and I mean no one, in his right mind would want to get mixed up with you. But I do. I want you.” He paused. “I won’t say it again. Six months from today, a ‘For Sale’ sign will go up in my yard. I will leave. I will wish you well and be on my way. I am too old to play these games.”
He turned and, with his hand on the doorknob, repeated, “Six months.”
I knew I’d never make it that long.
* * *
I WHOLEHEARTEDLY BELIEVE SEEING your husband become a father can only make you love him more. That had certainly been the case with Carter. Bringing Caroline into our world changed him completely, and I was in love with how in love Carter was with baby Caroline.
If seeing Carter with his daughter made me love him more, if watching him change diapers and get up for middle-of-the-night feedings and take her off on errands so I could get some sleep had compounded my love for Carter, then seeing her eyes change into Jack’s, watching the way her lips curled when she smiled and the color of her hair darken into his made it impossible for me to forget about him. That was perhaps the unexpected consequence.
The Secret to Southern Charm Page 16