by Jean Stone
Strolling to the breakfast area, Rita quickly decided this is where she would focus the Martins’ attention. The round alcove was walled with windows: the ocean panorama was right out of a tour book. Thank God, madam had hung no curtains, nothing that would block the view that would bring the big bucks for this otherwise aging, oversized shithole.
Joe appeared beside her. “Your cocktail, my dear.”
She took the cobalt-blue glass—probably something right out of the Tiffany’s catalog—and smiled through her crimson lips. “Thanks.”
“It’s a funny word, isn’t it? Cocktail?” He was leering again, moving his eyes from her breasts to her crotch. “Think about it. Cock. Tail. I give you cock. You give me tail.” He laughed.
Rita didn’t. She ran her finger around the thick rim of the glass, leaned against the glass-top dining table, and braced herself. “You can give me something besides your cock, Joe,” she said, stifling a cringe at the word.
He moved against her, brushing his rock against her thigh. “What do you have in mind?”
She sipped her lemonade. It was too sweet. Sickish. She smiled. “I want this house.”
Joe laughed. “Baby, it’s all yours. Whenever you want. Monday through Friday.” He took a drink. “Except, of course, Tuesdays. Tuesdays are golf days.”
She winced a little, but forced a smile. “Don’t get nervous,” she said, “I’m not planning to move in.” She set her glass on the table and pulled off her top. She stood, naked from the waist up, framed by the wall of windows that overlooked the sea. “Suck my tits, Joe,” she commanded. “Suck them hard and make me come.”
He stepped forward, and set his glass beside hers, his hand trembling, his penis now poking through the opening of his robe.
Rita arched her back again as he bent his mouth to her. The chill of his drink made her nipple stiffen. She moaned, then tried to regain control. If her plan was going to work, she had to keep her senses.
“Two million six,” she whispered as she reached to stroke his throbbing penis.
Joe kept sucking.
“Two million six for this house. What did you pay for it, Joe? A hundred thousand?”
“Ninety-five,” he murmured as he switched breasts. “Back in ’68.”
His cool tongue was getting warmer. Hotter. Firmer.
She stroked him.
“That’s a hell of a profit, Joe. Think of what you could do with two million six.”
“I can’t think of anything but what I’m doing right now.” He reached between her legs and pushed her nylon panties down. No matter how hard she tried to focus, Rita was wet.
Then the IRS notice flashed into her mind. She tightened her grasp around him. “You know you want to sell this place, Joe. Let me do it for you. Let me help.”
“All I want to do is fuck you, baby,” he said as he raised his head and lifted her ass onto the table. He spread her legs and pushed his penis into her. It swiftly tunneled into her waiting heat. “As for this house,” he said as her hips responded to his thrust, “fuck it. I’m not selling. There’s no way I’m leaving this island and giving you up.”
Rita bit her lip and sighed, then let him fuck her good.
Ben stood in the back of the Town Hall meeting room, clutching his blueprints, wishing Carol Ann were there. Sixty or seventy folding chairs were crammed together, all occupied, none by his daughter and her husband and their kids, his grandchildren. Maybe Carol Ann was more concerned about keeping her job than showing support for her father.
Terry Clarkson sat at the long table facing the audience, centered between the American flag and the seal of the State of Massachusetts. He was taking motions on Zac Lambert’s request to designate the ten acres behind his property as wetlands.
“Now, more than ever, we’ve got to protect our environment,” Zac said.
Ben felt his confidence sliding out the door.
“I second the motion,” an old woman in a gray cardigan bellowed.
“Here, here!” another islander shouted.
Terry Clarkson banged his gavel. “Motion passed,” he declared. “Next, Ben Niles. Ben, you here?” Clarkson craned his neck around the room.
Ben hesitated a beat too long and blew his chance to escape.
“Back here,” he called, raising the blueprints of Menemsha House high in the air.
The sixty or seventy heads turned toward the back. He knew the redness that crept up his neck would ease if he saw just one friendly face, one face that didn’t look as though it wanted to run him out of town.
“Come forward, Ben, where we all can see you.”
On watery legs he couldn’t quite believe were his, Ben walked down the aisle. It wasn’t until he reached the front row that he spotted Dave Ashenbach. Ashenbach was not smiling. Men do not always share the same passions, Noepe’s words came into his mind.
Ben averted his eyes and faced Terry Clarkson. “These are my plans to restore my property in Menemsha,” he said.
Clarkson nodded, allowing Ben to continue.
Clearing his throat, Ben unrolled his plans. The crinkle of the paper knifed through the silence. Quickly he glanced at the sheet. Staring back at him was the layout—and the hands-on workshop for the kids. Noepe’s words came again: If you feel you are right … do not relinquish your dream. Ben smiled. His legs grew sturdy; the redness washed from his neck.
“The house is an eyesore,” he began with confidence. “I purchased it that way. Now I want to restore it into something the town—in fact, all of the island—can be proud of.”
Still, silence loomed behind him.
He cleared his throat again. “When I first thought of Menemsha House, I thought what a wonderful place it would be for the children. Island children, not just tourist children. I wanted to create a place for them to come and to learn their heritage.” He glanced around. “It might help if I could hold up the plans, let everyone have a look.”
Clarkson nodded and gestured to two board members. The men rose and walked to the front of the table. Ben stepped to Clarkson’s side and handed the blueprint to the men. They held it up. Ben stepped aside and pointed as he spoke, indicating where the workshop would be and how the features of the Vineyard’s architectural history would be incorporated into the house.
“Menemsha House is a living museum,” he concluded, “that will add value to the property and increased tax revenue to the town.” The tension within him eased. He turned to face the audience. At the back of the room he saw Carol Ann, arms folded, a noncommittal look on her face. Still, she was there. “I’d be happy to answer any questions.”
“Are you going to charge admission?” someone asked.
Ben shifted on one foot. “Yes. But after the taxes, utilities, and maintenance, the profits will go to the town.”
“What about our kids?” asked the woman in the gray cardigan. “It doesn’t seem right that they’d have to pay.”
He hesitated. “Well, that’s something I’d have to look into.”
“Are you going to advertise it?”
“Well, yes. I’d have to. So people would know …” Advertise it? His hopes faded again. Did they think he wouldn’t advertise it?
A man Ben recognized but did not know stood and narrowed his eyes. “I’m not sure about this. It would mean a lot of traffic.”
“There’s plenty of room on the grounds for parking,” Ben answered.
“Menemsha’s a fishing village. We don’t want parking lots.” It was Dave Ashenbach. “If you want this mu-u-u-seum so bad, why not put it in Oak Bluffs, where you live?”
Ben felt his pulse begin to beat inside his fists. “Because the property is in Menemsha. I bought it for the setting, for the view. I thought it was best for a museum of such historic value to be situated away from the crowds.”
“Only going to move the crowds to Menemsha, as I see it,” Ashenbach retorted.
The air in the room tightened.
“It’s for the children,” Ben responde
d.
Murmurs filled the room. The pitch quickly swelled.
Clarkson banged the gavel. “I think you’d better go back to the drawing board, Ben. See if you can give us some options. We can’t grant any variance without more substance.”
Ben turned and looked at Clarkson. Substance? What the hell is that supposed to mean? The redness crawled up his neck again.
Clarkson shifted his gaze to the papers on the table before him. “Next,” he said firmly. “Stan Drake. You want to build a bay to store your boat?”
Ben stood numbly a moment, facing the islanders, facing those people who would never believe he was one of them. Stan Drake moved down the aisle toward the table. Ben pulled the blueprints from the men, quickly rolled them, and headed, chin raised, toward the back of the room, toward Carol Ann.
Outside, Ben tossed the plans into the Buick. “Those sons of bitches blew me off,” he said.
“Dad, I tried to warn you …”
“Give us some substance? We need more options? They knew what they were going to do before I even came tonight. Ashenbach got to them. I should have saved my breath.” He got into the car, slammed the door, and backed away, forgetting to say good-bye to Carol Ann, forgetting to thank her for showing up after all.
Chapter 8
He drove the power saw through the beam, visualizing Dave Ashenbach’s neck. Ben had come to Jill’s house early this morning, set up the sawhorses in the backyard, and didn’t much care if his noise woke them up. This was just a job, another job, a task to be done. It was hardly the work that would fulfill his dreams.
Kyle shouted toward Ben as he came around the corner by the back fence. “Didn’t know we were starting before eight.”
Through the plastic haze of his safety goggles, Ben glanced at Kyle’s clean T-shirt, his open denim vest. Unlike the boy, Ben already had a layer of sweat around the rim of his cap. He shrugged and went back to his work.
Kyle drifted over and stood by the pile of already cut beams. Ben hoisted one on his shoulder to take to the cellar.
“I’ll give you a hand,” Kyle said, stepping forward.
“I got it,” Ben replied, walking toward the bulkhead, wincing at the strain in his shoulder. He’d been hoisting beams for years. When had it become so difficult? Age, he thought, is a bitch.
He angled his way down the concrete steps, into the dim, damp cellar. Setting down the beam, he pulled off his hat and goggles and wiped his forehead, thinking that maybe he’d feel better if he hadn’t stayed up until three. But there had been work to do. When he’d arrived home after the zoning board meeting, Ben had shoved the blueprints into the corner and gone on a manic sweep of his kitchen, cleaning up clutter, heaving out trash, all the while berating himself for the work he’d let slide while wasting his time on that damn Menemsha House. There were dozens of calls he’d yet to return—the congressman who’d purchased an estate in Osterville over on the Cape, the columnist who wanted his Nantucket beach house refurbished, the duchess who wanted God-only-knew-what done to the stables on her Chatham property. His work was wanted, damnit. He was in demand. And people were willing to pay, big time. He kicked himself now for screwing around with a job as small as Jill McPhearson’s house. That’s what he got for thinking that staying on the island in August would pave the way for Menemsha House. That’s what he got for believing in dreams.
He sat down on the beam now and admitted to himself that it had all been a waste of time.
“Ben?” Kyle’s voice called from the bulkhead. “Are you all right?”
The boy’s tall frame moved down the steps, silhouetted against the August sunlight, lean and firm, with a thick head of hair, not unlike what Ben once had, back when he could tote a beam a mile and a half and never have to stop to catch his breath.
“I’m sorry I didn’t get to the meeting last night,” Kyle said.
“You didn’t miss much.”
“They turned you down?”
Ben laughed. “They barely listened. It was bullshit.”
“God. That’s awful.…”
“Hey, you win some, you lose some. We’ve got enough to keep us busy with real work.” He eyed the crumbling brick foundation. “Remind me to call the mason at lunchtime. We’ve got to get him over here to start this repointing.”
“Sure, Ben.”
“This job must be done by Labor Day,” he said, then walked past Kyle, up the stairs, into the bright sun.
“Ben?” Kyle was behind him now. “Isn’t there anything you can do? To save Menemsha House?”
Ben lifted one end of another beam. Kyle quickly bent and raised the other.
“Something tells me no matter what I come up with, it’s a dead issue.” They moved the beam, set it down on the horses.
“But if you don’t restore the house, what are you going to do? Sell it?”
Ben leaned against the horse and rubbed his shoulder. “Jesus,” he said, shaking his head, “Christ. I don’t know yet.” A thought flashed through Ben’s mind that Kyle’s curiosity may be self-serving—that he was once again laying the groundwork for his mother to get the listing, to score the commission. He picked up the saw, crouched, and lined up the position of the blade across the beam. What the hell, he figured, at least Kyle was trying to take care of family—something that too damn few people in the world did anymore. So what if Kyle was interested in finding out if there was anything in it for him.
He adjusted his goggles and flipped the switch on the saw. It revved a second, then Ben began to guide it carefully across the beam, fine chips of wood spewing into the air. Suddenly he knew what the problem had been: nobody felt that Menemsha House had anything “in it for them.”
They hadn’t cared that it would be an educational facility as well as a museum. They hadn’t cared about the increased taxes. Hell, he owned the property and had to pay taxes anyway. The slight increase would hardly be noticed. The promise of profits hadn’t worked, either—probably because they didn’t trust him to be honest about it. Islanders, after all, only trusted their own.
The blade ripped through the end of the beam. Ben turned off the switch and stared at the two pieces of wood, remembering the one woman who had said the island children shouldn’t have to pay. Even if he agreed, he doubted it would be enough to satisfy the people. He had to think of something else … something more.
“You want me to move these beams to the basement?” Kyle asked.
Ben lifted his head. “What? Oh. Yeah. Sure.”
He pulled off his cap and goggles. Why hadn’t he realized it before? He had to think of something to really whet their appetites … something that was in it for them. He rubbed the sweat on his brow and stared off across the backyard, his gaze landing on the ferry … the slow, steady Chappy ferry that provided dependable transportation, year in, year out. Reliable transportation was a necessity, yet a luxury on the Vineyard, where prices were steep and gas even steeper.
Transportation.
The idea came so quickly he couldn’t believe he hadn’t thought of it before.
Transportatio.
Kids.
School.
School bus!
That’s it, he thought with sudden clarity. He’d buy school buses—one for each of the five school districts, one for the regional high school, maybe two. If they didn’t want them, he’d offer something else—computers, maybe—anything to show them he cared, that he was committed to the island, that he was one of them.
Then, there’d be no way they’d turn him down.
He smiled and plunked his cap back on his head, wondering if he could pull it off and thinking that Louise would have been proud.
Jill lay in bed, squinting through the sheer canopy at the ceiling, one arm bent over her forehead, trying to deaden the ache that bored into her brain with the screech of the saw. Apparently, the Ben Niles code of adhering to authenticity precluded power saws. She must have been crazy to think she could stand living here for a month amid all this commot
ion.
Closing her eyes, she realized that this house had probably never heard such noise: except for her mother’s bursts of dementia, it was always so placid, so unchaotic, with George off at the tavern, Florence wordlessly working through her daily chores, and Jill just trying to stay out of the way.
She pulled the covers over her head, knowing she must get up, take a shower, see what the kids were doing. Jeff was probably at his computer, making do until he could get on-line. Amy, however, would be twitching. And though Jill knew she should keep cleaning, keep weeding out her parents’ things, she didn’t think she could stand the noise of the workmen. Maybe she should get out of this house and Edgartown all together, drive Amy to Oak Bluffs and give her a chance to buy something special for the photo shoot.
She closed her eyes again, drew in a long, slow breath, and wished she were back in Boston, back to the fast-paced predictability of her days, where she never had to worry about finding things to do, or if she would have the energy to try.
Amy probably would have preferred to go into Oak Bluffs without her mother, but shopping was shopping, and next to boys, clothes were a major priority at fourteen.
Jill poked through a rack of dresses at one of the nicer shops along Circuit Avenue, the kind of shop where she and Rita used to gaze longingly into the windows, Rita wishing she could afford to buy something, Jill wishing her mother would allow it.
While waiting for Amy to emerge from the small dressing room in the back, Jill noticed that the store was crowded with mothers, daughters, and mothers with daughters. Most were absorbed in the back-to-school selections—jeans and Ivy League tops, long cotton skirts and baggy vests, and, of course, miniskirts, the rack from which Jill had quickly steered Amy away.
“Mom?” Amy stood in front of a makeshift curtain dressed in an outfit that Jill had picked out—pink shorts and a top, trimmed with embroidered butterflies. With her mounds of black hair contrasting with the pastel colors, she looked adorable.
“That’s cute,” Jill said.