The Secret to Southern Charm

by Kristy Woodson Harvey

  TWENTY-SIX

  safe passage

  ansley

  I know I’ll never forget that day. I’ll never forget the way my mother smiled, with all the people who loved her most surrounding her. I will never forget the way Jack kissed me, how it was different from any other time I’d ever been kissed. I felt very clearly, in that moment, that the tables had turned in some way. He had the upper hand, and he was serious this time. This was my last chance, and though I wasn’t sure if it was the right decision, I knew it was a chance I needed to take.

  The best part of the day was when a man on a paddleboard floated up to Starlite and, as I was about to ask Mom, “Who is that?” she practically yelled, “Scott!”

  I let him hug her first, but I couldn’t wait to get my hands on my little brother. In true Scott fashion, he had perfectly chiseled abs and was shockingly tan for early June. But when you spend so much time south of the equator, that is bound to happen.

  “Mom,” Scott said breathlessly, her face in his hands. “You look as beautiful as ever.”

  I could tell he was lying. The tears in his eyes gave him away. He knew she was dying. It was written all over his face.

  He squeezed me, lifted me up in the air, kissed my cheek, and said, “How you doing there, big sis?” Then he pulled away, squinted, and said, “Wait. Is that Jack? Like from high school?”

  “It sure is,” Mom said. “He’s standing in for my sorry eldest son. I rather like him. I think I’ll keep him, actually.”

  We all laughed, but Scott and I exchanged glances. I had spoken with John earlier that morning, and he promised he would get here to see Mom early next week. As I looked over at her, so happy but so small in the tall chair made of hammock material that Caroline had covered in flowers, I couldn’t help but wonder if early next week would be too late.

  Scott squeezed Sloane next. “How are you?”

  She shrugged. “Breathing.”

  Scott nodded gravely. “Listen,” he said, turning toward all of us. “You know I’ve spent a decent amount of time reporting in Iraq over the past few years. I have a lot of contacts there. I know how to get deals done, and I think I can get the cash to do it.” He paused. “I’m going over there to look for him.”

  Sloane cocked her head to the side. “Wait. I’m sorry. What?”

  “Adam. I’m going to go look for him,” Scott repeated.

  My heart thudded in my chest. We already had one family member missing in Iraq. Yes, I had to come to terms with the fact that Scott was always going to be on some adventure or another, and if I spent my whole life worrying about his safety, it wasn’t going to be much of a life. But going to Egypt when there’s a travel advisory is one thing. Going into a war zone as a hated American journalist was quite another.

  “Scott!” I said, not sure what to say next.

  Caroline and Emerson were wide-eyed. Mom said, “I’m proud of you, son. I really am.”

  “How would you even begin to look for him?” Sloane asked.

  Scott waved his hand as if this were a minor detail. “I think going over there and trying is better than sitting here waiting.” He paused. “I mean, not for you. You’ve got kids to take care of. Nobody’s counting on me.”

  Me! I wanted to scream. I’m counting on you. But I stayed quiet.

  This was a bridge to cross another day.

  Mark interrupted, saying to Mom, “I got you a little something for your birthday.” Mom put her hand to her mouth in surprise and then ripped the wrapping paper with a frail and shaking hand to reveal a beautiful box of Easter egg–colored macarons from Ladurée. They were Mom’s favorite things in the world.

  “How did you get these?” she gasped, motioning for him.

  She kissed Mark on the cheek as he said, “It doesn’t matter how I got them. It only matters that you get to have them on your birthday.”

  Mom pulled out her favorite green, pistachio macaron. She offered the box halfheartedly to us, but we all knew better than to accept. This was Mom’s treat. It was her day.

  I could tell she was getting tired, so I leaned down to her. “Are you ready?” I asked.

  It nearly broke me in half when the tears came to her eyes. “Good-bye, beautiful beach,” she said. “You have given us so much life here.” Then she swallowed and said, “Don’t take it for granted, Ansley. Come here whenever you get the chance. Feel the sand underneath your feet, run your fingers along the water. Don’t let this life pass you by.” Then she looked up at me and smiled and patted my hand. “I’m ready, darling.”

  Holding Scott’s hand, Mom dozed in between Scott and me on the ride back to the dock.

  As she drifted off and the girls were in the salon finishing the rest of the champagne with Jack, Kimmy, Kyle, Mark, and Hal, I practically hissed at Scott, “You are not going to Iraq!”

  He shrugged. “Ansley, her husband is over there, probably trapped in some god-awful cave.”

  “So what are you going to do about it?” I asked. “Write him to safety? Pen his journey to freedom?”

  “Maybe,” Scott said. “Maybe I will. But all I’ve been able to do since I heard the news is think about that pitiful girl sitting over here worried to death and her poor husband. I know people. I might be able to help, and I’m going to try.”

  I shook my head. “Great. That’s just great. So now I’ll have a husband killed by terrorists, a son-in-law killed by terrorists, and a brother killed by terrorists.”

  He grinned at me. “On the bright side, you don’t have too many different things to hate. Simply saying you hate terrorists pretty much covers it.”

  I couldn’t help but smile. He reached over our tiny mother and squeezed my shoulder. “I won’t die, sis. I didn’t die in that avalanche on Mont Blanc. I didn’t die from that green tree viper bite on Machu Picchu. I didn’t die those nights we played Edward Fortyhands in college. I’m gonna be all right.”

  I smirked. “So what about our brother?”

  “Ans,” he said. “You’ve got to let it go. You can only control you, and John can only control John.”

  It was an inopportune time for our mother to wake up, but with her eyes still closed, she said, “I love all of you unconditionally. If he doesn’t come here to tell me good-bye, I’ve made my peace with that.”

  I believed her because I had no other choice.

  I whispered, “But you love me the best, right, Mom?”

  I winked at Scott. He leaned down too and said, “Mom, just tell her she’s your favorite daughter. That will appease her. Don’t break her heart by admitting I’m your favorite child.”

  We smiled at each other, and though her eyes were closed, our mother smiled too. This was a game we had played with her nearly our entire lives. A game we would likely never play again. It was so small, so simple, so insignificant, but even the insignificant becomes terribly important when you know it’s going to be over. I squeezed Scott’s hand, and I realized it didn’t matter now who won or lost, didn’t matter who Mom’s favorite was. This was a pain Scott and I would share, a pain only we could truly understand. I closed my eyes and took a deep breath. I would worry about that when she was gone. For now, I was going to savor every second we had left.

  TWENTY-SEVEN

  the lifetime movie version

  sloane

  August 5, 2011

  Dear Sloane,

  I know you said you weren’t upset earlier on the phone, but I can’t express to you how much I wish you had gotten pregnant before I left. I’m sorry I couldn’t give you the baby we want so badly. But when I get home, we will try again, and this time it will work. This time, we will get everything we have ever wanted. I already have you, Sloane. This baby will just be the icing on the cake. Wonder if the icing will be pink or blue?

  All my love,

  Adam

  IT WAS ONLY A few months between the time Adam and I had started “trying” for a baby and the time he was deployed again. It wasn’t enough time for us to be worried
—or for him to be suspicious. It was very unlike me, this big lie. I was never one who could keep a big secret, but I had managed to keep this one quite splendidly.

  It wasn’t until Adam was gone that the gravity of what I was doing really set in, that the level to which I was compromising my marriage hit me. My adoring husband who trusted me implicitly believed that when he was making love to me, we were trying to make a baby. Only I knew he was alone in that.

  It was that letter that really did it for me. All I could think was, here is my husband halfway around the world, fighting for my freedom, and I have betrayed him in the worst possible way.

  I thought about writing him a letter, explaining to him my position and that I was sorry. I would try to make him understand my reasons for what I had done, explain that I wanted to make him happy but I did not want children, under any circumstances.

  But I knew this wasn’t something I could write. I couldn’t hide behind a letter. I had to tell him in person. So, for the six months he was gone, I wrote to him under the pretense that I, too, couldn’t wait to have a baby. I reasoned that if, God forbid, something happened to him, he should get to be happy just a little longer. I never told anyone what I had done, how I had lied to my husband, how the secret I kept from him had nearly cost me my marriage and the love of my life.

  Now, sitting on my mom’s screened-in back porch with my two sisters, that seemed a world away. I could hardly remember a time when I didn’t want children, couldn’t imagine I had ever envisioned my life without these little people who, while frustrating at times, made my world go around.

  Earlier that night, for the first time in weeks, I hadn’t rushed through putting my children to bed. I didn’t feel the urge to get back in my pajamas as quickly as possible to get the day over with. Maybe that was the gift in this whole thing. I remembered this was the only life I was going to get, and one day I was going to be gone and wouldn’t get to spend time with my boys. I read to them, snuggled into my side, until Taylor fell asleep and AJ could barely keep his eyes open. Then I sang their favorite songs until AJ drifted off as well. I stared at them, trying to remember them as babies, trying to memorize them now, as though I could tuck this perfect moment somewhere deep inside myself and save it, like Adam’s letters, for a time when I really needed it.

  The screen door squealed open, breaking me out of my thoughts, and as it slammed shut again, Scott appeared, a beer in his hand. “Nothing will make you want to drink quite like your mother dying.”

  I didn’t want it to, but my mouth opened and words flew out: “Try having your husband Missing in Action.”

  Scott grimaced.

  “Scott,” I said, “it was nice what you said earlier, but you aren’t really going to Iraq, are you?”

  “Oh, I assure you I am,” he said, taking a seat and crossing one leg over the other. “I’ll book a flight as soon as . . .”

  He trailed off, and I swallowed away the tears for what that “as soon as” meant.

  “So what will you do when you get there?” Emerson asked, leaning toward him intently. I had a feeling she was picturing this all unfolding on the big screen and what her part would be. Probably me. Because the terrified wife in the Lifetime movie version would most certainly be a tall, blond, thin twenty-six-year-old.

  “Civilians tend to know a lot,” Scott said. “And I have a lot of friends in Iraq now. I’ll do a little digging into where the boys were when they crashed, and I’ll do what I do best: ask questions.”

  “Does that really work?” Caroline asked.

  I sighed.

  “Sorry,” she said. “I’m sorry. Of course it works.” She turned to Scott. “This sounds like a great idea, uncle of ours. I have the utmost faith in you.”

  “Thank you,” he said.

  “I think it’s the craziest damn idea I’ve ever heard,” I said, “and if you’re killed by a land mine or left to die in a prison somewhere, I will blame myself forever.”

  He shook his head. “No, you won’t. I’m doing this for completely selfish reasons.”

  “How is this possibly selfish?” Emerson asked.

  “Because if I go over there, find them, and report on the whole thing, no doubt I’ll win a Pulitzer.”

  He winked at me. “For real, though,” he said. “I’m going of my own accord for my own reasons. Do I want to save Adam and get my niece her family back? Absolutely. But if it all goes awry, that’s on me, not you. I know what it’s like.”

  It was borderline stupid that knowing Scott was going made me feel better. I mean, my husband was God only knows where in that dusty desert land of caves and rock. It wasn’t like my uncle, who was trained in journalism, fly-fishing, and very little else, was going to track down my husband and bring him home safely to me if the world’s finest military hadn’t managed it yet. But, after months of sleepless nights, my teeth ground down, my eyes bagged, my shoulders slumped, the color drained from my face, I needed something, anything, to hold onto. Scott loved me and he loved Adam. And, sometimes, that’s as good a reason as any to believe everything is going to be OK.

  Scott squeezed my knee and said, “OK, girls. Uncle Scott is going to bed.”

  “Yes,” Caroline said firmly. “You’re going to need your strength.” She paused. “Grammy and Mom are on the front porch. Let’s go out there with them.”

  Emerson nodded. “Perfect. My wineglass has been empty for like a half hour.”

  Grammy was snuggled on the couch in a nest of pillows with blankets all around her. Mom was right beside her, as though if she got close enough, she could breathe for her, keep her here.

  There were so many things I could say to Grammy in that moment, but I only squeezed her tightly and said, “I love you so much. I hope you had the best day.”

  “I love you too, sweet girl,” she said. “This was the best day of my life.”

  “Hey!” Mom exclaimed. “What about the day I was born?”

  Grammy laughed. “The best normal day where no one was born or married.”

  The door opened, and Emerson flopped dramatically on the couch, while Caroline spread out on Mom’s new outdoor chaise. It seemed fitting she would get the best seat. Queen Caroline, past, present, and future.

  In that moment, with all the women I loved most in the world crowded around me, it didn’t feel like anything was out of the ordinary. It didn’t feel like anyone was dying. It didn’t feel like life was about to change in ways we couldn’t even imagine.

  And so, when I look back on my life, that moment, just Grammy, Mom, my sisters, and me, sharing stories and laughing until we couldn’t breathe, is one I want to remember. When I think of Grammy now, when I imagine her in heaven, she is having a night just like that.

  TWENTY-EIGHT

  prodigal son

  ansley

  When the girls finally went to sleep that night, I knew Mom had to have been beyond exhausted. I tried to take her to bed, but she refused.

  “Darling,” she asked, instead. “Could I trouble you for a cup of tea?”

  “It’s no trouble at all, Mom,” I said, walking back into the house.

  A few minutes later, I was about to open the door when I heard Jack’s voice on the porch. I stopped, my back pressed against the wall inside. I could just make out Jack saying, “I honestly don’t even know when I would ask her, if we will get to that place. But I can’t bear the thought of marrying Ansley without your blessing.”

  Mom laughed. “Oh, darling, I can’t think of anything much finer than that.” I couldn’t see her, but I could imagine the way her eyebrow rose as she said, “It would be lovely to have your family back together again.”

  I heard Jack choke. My heart was racing. Oh my Lord. She knew. My mother knew. “I’m not sure what you mean,” Jack recovered.

  “Oh, Jack,” Mom said. “Anyone who has ever seen you and Caroline side by side would know you possess a shocking likeness.”

  There was silence, and then I barely heard Jack say, “I th
ought that was only in my mind.”

  I held Mom’s hot cup to my chest and gasped quietly. She knew, and he had corroborated. I was about to burst out the door to confront Jack.

  But then he said, “You have to understand. Ansley needed something, and I gave it to her.” He paused. “I would do anything for that woman, then, now, and forever. I would move heaven and earth for her—”

  Mom cut him off. “You would keep a secret that would eat away at your soul for nearly thirty-five years.”

  It took my breath away to hear her say that, and I felt the tears gathering in my eyes. After everything we had been through, everything we had lost, everything we had shared, Jack had still been there for me. And I couldn’t help but think that maybe it was high time I shared some of myself with him.

  “To be honest,” Jack said, “I wish I could let her go.”

  “But true love lasts a lifetime,” Mom said.

  “Exactly.”

  She said quietly, “And now I’m ready to be reunited with mine,” as I opened the door.

  I smiled brightly at Jack. “Oh, hi,” I said casually, not wanting them to know I had overheard. “What are you doing here?”

  “Just saying good night to your mom,” he said. He stood, leaned over, and kissed Mom on the cheek. She patted his arm. “You’re a darling boy,” she said. “You’ve always been my favorite.”

  “Mom!” I scolded. She was nonplussed. “I’m sorry,” she said. “I love Jack. So what?”

  I shook my head, and Jack laughed as he wrapped one arm around my shoulder and kissed my head. “I’m here if you need me,” he whispered, before walking off the porch.