Forever Beach

by Shelley Noble

  Karen moaned and flopped back on the lounge chair. “What is wrong with you? You can’t keep yo-yoing him in and out of your life like this.”

  “I’m not.”

  “Of course you are. Both times they sent Leila back to Carmen, you let Wyatt back in, and then you pushed him away when she came back to you. You have room in your heart for a lot of love, girl. It’s not going to run out if you love Wyatt, too. We all need a support group. Even you. Wyatt is ready and willing to be part of that group.”

  “Wyatt rescues people for a living.”

  Karen sat up. “Is that what this is all about? You think he’s hanging around you because he thinks you need rescuing?”

  Sarah smiled. “No, we . . . we get along. It’s just that Leila was so freaked out by him when she first came.”

  “She was afraid of all men and most women and children when she first came. She’s resilient. She’s expanded her horizons.”

  They heard a car door slam. Tammy and Bessie climbed out of the pool. “Daddy, Daddy.” They ran toward the patio.

  Leila watched for a minute, and she climbed out, too, but her legs were so short it was a struggle before her little body wriggled itself onto the grass and followed after the girls.

  A little piece of Sarah’s heart broke.

  Stu came onto the patio still dressed in jeans and his work boots. Tammy and Bessie glommed on to each leg. “Daddy, Daddy.”

  “Hey, girly girls.” Stu leaned over to give them a hug, saw Leila standing close by. “Hey, Leila.”

  Leila dipped her chin, suddenly shy.

  Sarah instinctively leaned forward to go to her.

  Karen stopped her.

  Stu held out one hand. “Gimme five.”

  Leila ran forward, slapped his hand.

  Sarah glared at Karen. “If I didn’t know better, I would think you had planned that timing.”

  Karen shrugged and looked innocent. “No more excuses. All right, girls, go get your towels and get dressed for dinner.”

  Stu came over to kiss his wife, said hello to Sarah.

  “Groceries are on the counter. Let me change, and I’ll start the grill.” He slid the door open. The girls ran into the house and he followed them.

  Karen pushed out of the chair and began gathering the tea things. “Maybe this thing with Wyatt isn’t about Leila at all, Sarah. Maybe it’s about you.”

  REESA PULLED UP to the curb in front of her house and turned off the engine, but instead of getting out, she just sat. What a hell of a day.

  Attacked by a mother, who screeched and fought and had to be restrained while they removed her children, children she had ignored until they were close to death.

  Mary, Mother of God, what was the point?

  She didn’t understand why someone who didn’t bother to take care of her children was so crazed to keep them. Only she did know. They were desperate. It was what they had, what they knew, the only thing that kept them connected to a world spun out of control, what made them feel human.

  Most days Reesa could understand. On the days when good floated to the top of the bad, when she felt like she had more energy, more compassion. That she was actually making a difference.

  But today had been rough. Really rough. And the two families she had helped to reunite earlier this week were nothing but a dim memory, fading fast. She tried to conjure up the image of their smiling faces, the mothers’ tears and words of gratitude, but all she could see was that little boy and his loaf of bread. And the spew of obscenities flung at her by the addict mother.

  She got out of the car and trudged up the embankment to her home.

  Sometimes she hated this job. More and more she hated this job. Maybe she should apply for a job in a school. Help kids who at least had school to look forward to. Where they came to her office and she didn’t have to show up to their homes with a police escort.

  Michael was always griping about the hours she put in, the low pay, the toll it was taking. He needed more attention, especially since he seemed to have parked it on the couch as a way of life.

  Tonight she was so damned tired, so sick of seeing the underbelly of families, the marginalized, the desperate—she felt desperate herself, and that was no way to face life. Or to help others with their lives.

  Reesa stopped with her hand on the doorknob, took a deep breath, let it out slowly, concentrating on driving the resentment out of her thoughts. She needed to lighten up. She was making a difference . . . just not a very big one.

  Another deep breath and she opened the door.

  As soon as she was inside, she slipped out of her shoes, kicked them toward the closet. Then she felt bad that she’d let the day get the best of her. She looked at her shoes lying on their sides, turned her back on them, and walked down the hall in her stocking feet to where Michael sat in the recliner, his broken leg resting on a pillow.

  She stuck her head in the door. “I’m home.”

  Michael grunted, his eyes glued on the television.

  “Did you eat something today?” Reesa asked.

  “Nah, wasn’t hungry.”

  Reesa didn’t comment, argue, or chastise, just went into the kitchen to see what she could make. If it were up to her, she’d open a can of soup and call it a night. But Michael would want a real dinner on his TV tray since they’d stopped eating at the dining room table years ago.

  She found a package of pork chops in the fridge and checked the date. Still good, barely. She slid them on the counter, then reached back into the fridge for a head of lettuce. By pulling off the outer leaves, she managed to salvage enough to make salad for two. Not that Michael liked salad. She’d have to open a can of green beans.

  By the time dinner was ready, Reesa was too tired to eat it. She made Michael a plate and went to shower. She was tempted to just fall into bed, but where she’d been today called for a shower—a hot one—and a shampoo.

  After the shower, she shrugged into her old chenille robe and wrapped a towel around her wet hair, retraced her steps, collected Michael’s plate, and put the rest of the food away. After a long look at the dirty dishes, she washed them, too.

  When she looked into the den, he was asleep in front of the television.

  She tiptoed down the hall to bed and was just drifting off when she remembered that she hadn’t called Sarah Hargreave.

  Tomorrow she’d take the time to look over Sarah’s case, contact Leila’s advocate, talk with the adoption caseworker, see what things were really going on. She was no longer Leila’s official caseworker. Since Leila was in the process of being adopted, she’d been assigned a different permanency caseworker.

  That was good in a way because Reesa and Sarah and Sarah’s friend, Karen, had become friends. Something that was frowned on in the system. Too hard to make professional unbiased decisions about a friend.

  She didn’t know this new caseworker very well, and she didn’t want to step on any toes, but she did want to make sure he was dotting his i’s and crossing his t’s.

  It was crazy. Reesa was up to her eyeballs in cases. She’d pulled the White case because she was the closest one to the emergency call. That meant she’d probably be handed the paperwork on it. The children would most likely go straight to permanent fostering. And their mother and whoever the man was would be serving time, for quite a while.

  She’d probably be called to testify. When all she wanted was to forget. After the ambulance had left and the mother was handcuffed and led away, one officer remained while she took photos of the apartment, the fire hazard that was supposed to be a kitchen, the drugs. The bed and crib where the children had slept. She’d left a written notice that the children had been removed by the Child Protection and Permanency Office.

  On her way to the hospital, she’d had to pull her car to the side of the street to throw up on the pavement.

  Next she had gone to the emergency room, where she walked into a scene of shouting and hitting. Pete was hysterical and lashing out. He believed they
were stealing his brothers; he couldn’t be quieted and they wouldn’t sedate him until they’d done an initial examination. So it fell to Reesa to tell him the truth.

  Truth? What was the truth? That your mother was so strung out that she didn’t bother to take care of you. That she’d let you die before she’d give up her drugs? That was the truth, but she didn’t have the heart to tell him so. She told him everything would be all right. They both knew she was lying.

  Once he and his brothers were admitted, Reesa had gone back to the office to file her report. She would have to justify removing the children without a court order. She was pretty sure she had justification. She certainly wouldn’t lose sleep over her decision.

  She punched her pillow and closed her eyes trying to recreate the wonderful feeling she’d had on Monday seeing Jamie and Joy Valenti reunited to their family. Sometimes the system did work. Mr. Valenti had a new job, and family services had helped them find an affordable apartment. With a little luck . . .

  That’s what she was thinking of when her eyes grew heavy.

  But she fell asleep on the images of that comatose baby, his brother too weak to move as he slowly starved. Pete and his loaf of bread. And the hysterical woman who kept screaming “don’t take my babies.”

  But tomorrow . . . tomorrow she would be back at the office. And tomorrow she would make certain that nothing bad happened to Leila Rodrigues.

  IT WAS ALMOST eight o’clock by the time Sarah stopped the car back at her bungalow. Leila had fallen asleep practically before they were out of the Wolcotts’ driveway.

  It had been a fun evening, and she’d managed to take her mind off her coming battle for a few hours. And now she had clock repairs to do. Hopefully by the time she went to bed, she’d be tired enough to sleep.

  She put Leila to bed, then went onto the back porch that she used as a secondary workshop. It was enclosed but not weatherproofed, which made it pretty hot in the summer and impossible to use during the winter. But since Leila was going to a preschool day-care program five days a week in the summer, Sarah did most of her work in the back of the shop.

  Their schedule worked well; it gave Sarah time for the shop while Leila played catch-up to the other kids, still leaving enough mother-daughter time in the afternoons and evenings. Sarah had been very encouraged by Leila’s last evaluations. Now if they just didn’t have a major setback.

  As soon as she sat down at her workbench, anxiety fell away. Clocks had a way of doing that. Steadying the pulse, driving out the fears with their quiet repetition.

  Tonight she was working on a black mantel clock that had belonged to the parlor of a Victorian house from the neighborhood. The family was cleaning it out to sell and they’d discovered the clock, wrapped in a sheet and tucked away in a closet. When they brought it in, the inner workings had rattled around on the inside.

  Sarah told them she would give it her best shot but didn’t have much hope. She’d persevered, though, and now it was close to running correctly. Close but still not perfect.

  People brought in clocks that were barely recognizable; they found them in attics, or flea markets, or on street curbs. Sometimes they’d tried to fix a clock themselves and couldn’t put it back together, or dropped it and shoved it out of sight until they suddenly discovered it again.

  Some repairs seemed effortless; others like they were hardly worth the trouble. But Sarah always tried her best. Because they deserved a second chance.

  Sometimes she could almost feel Sam’s hands lightly over hers, guiding her movements, steadying her touch. Other times, she was all thumbs with springs popping out in all directions, minuscule screws rolling into oblivion.

  At those times, no amount of patience, cajoling, or cursing would make a timepiece run again. Those were sad times, something Sarah considered a personal failure. Then she would remember all the times Sam had patiently helped her through a repair. Even when she messed up, he would undo what she had done and say “try again.”

  She adjusted the task lamp over her head, put on her loupe magnifiers, and settled down to the minutiae of clock repair. Within minutes she was totally absorbed, her hands steady as she worked.

  When Sarah finally shut down for the night, it was after midnight. And that’s when she realized Reesa hadn’t called back.

  It was too late to call her. Social workers carried heavy caseloads and got little sleep. Sarah tried to be the exemplary foster family and not bother Reesa unnecessarily. She chuckled at herself. Sarah Hargreave trying to be exemplary . . . in a good way. After all these years she was sometimes still surprised at how her life had turned out.

  She was only sorry that Sam hadn’t lived to know Leila. He would have made the perfect grandfather. It seemed like Sarah was always losing someone, someplace, some thing.

  She mentally smacked herself. That was so much bull. She’d been lucky. So lucky. And she was thankful for every day, even when it wasn’t such a great one. Sam had taught her that, too.

  Chapter 4

  Reesa Davis on line one, Ms. Cartwright.”

  Ilona looked at the intercom. A call from Reesa Davis first thing on a Friday morning boded bad news.

  “Shall I tell her you’ll call her back?”

  Ilona waffled. Reesa Davis was known in pro bono circles as the “Warhorse,” which was a misnomer if ever there was one. To Ilona a warhorse was a shiny, black, sleek-muscled thoroughbred. Reesa Davis was more of a bulldog, short, squat, tenacious, five feet of chubby middle-aged Italian with permed hair, ill-fitting suits, and boxy shoes.

  “I’ll take it.” Ilona pressed speaker and picked up the brief she’d been reading. “Reesa,” she said by way of hello and turned the page while she waited for Reesa to work her way through the niceties before getting to the reason she called.

  Ilona picked up a pen and circled a clause in the divorce papers. Over the husband’s dead carcass.

  “. . . already applied for adoption.”

  Ilona scribbled a counterpoint in the margin.

  “. . . talking about reunification.”

  “Rights terminated?” Ilona asked and struck out two more lines. This guy had a lot of nerve, but nerve wouldn’t get him a nickel in the courtroom.

  “. . . But now she’s changed her mind.”

  Ilona paused with the pen poised above the brief. “If the kid’s in the adoption pipeline, what are you doing on the case? Where’s the adoption caseworker?”

  “The foster mother and I have become friends . . . once I was off the case. As a friend, I want to make sure nothing’s left unturned. I’m asking you as a colleague.”

  “You think she should have the kid.”

  “No question.”

  “Fax over her paperwork, and I’ll take a look. I’ve got to tell you I’m pretty busy these days, my pro bono calendar is beyond heavy.”

  “Just talk to her, I think you’ll like this case.”

  “Send her file over and make an appointment. Can I assume you’ll accompany the foster family?”

  “Single mother, but yes.”

  “Fine.”

  “Thanks, Ilona. I appreciate it.”

  “That’s what I’m here for.” Ilona hung up and tapped the pen on the paragraph she’d just circled. Then she tossed it on the desk and buzzed her secretary. “Mona, get Sid Ferrelli on the phone.” She leaned back in her desk chair. Dollars to doughnuts this rat bastard was hiding money somewhere, and she had just the forensic accountant to nail his ass to the wall.

  SOONER OR LATER you met every coffee or tea drinker in town at the Ocean Brew. After Sam died and before Leila came, Sarah looked forward to the morning rush just like the people getting coffee there were her best friends. Truth to tell, Sarah didn’t make friends easily. It was even harder to keep them. She’d been out of the system for more than ten years, but the barriers she’d erected there had been built to last.

  Sarah could be abrasive when she was scared, which these days seemed most of the time; she also could be
standoffish if she was concentrating on something or if she wasn’t sure of herself.

  She stood on the sidewalk outside the Brew and took a couple of deep breaths. She’d walked Leila down to the school bus stop, then had called Danny Noyes, Leila’s adoption caseworker.

  She left a message for him to call her. Same with the advocate ad litem. Sarah knew they were busy. But it was hard not to feel paranoid, like everyone was avoiding her because they didn’t want to give her the bad news. But then Reesa called her, and Sarah was so relieved that she’d agreed to meet her at the Brew before she remembered that everyone she knew would probably be there. Wyatt would be there.

  She needed to apologize to him and she planned to, but she didn’t relish doing it with half the town watching.

  “Coward,” she said and pulled the heavy door open.

  The Brew was a low ceiling L-shaped coffee bar. The floors, walls, and ceiling were dark stained wood and reminded Sarah of the hold in some nineteenth-century sailing ship. Not that she’d ever been in any kind of ship.

  She shivered at the mere thought. Or more likely because it was always overly cold in the coffee bar during the summer, possibly to counteract the steam machines. And the coffee. There was a line at the counter—there usually was in the mornings—but she saw Reesa sitting toward the back, which would give them at least a nod to privacy. Except as soon as Sarah made out Reesa, she saw Wyatt sitting at the table beside her.

  Damn.

  Reesa held up a cup, letting her know she’d already ordered for Sarah, so there was no way out there. She walked toward the table.

  Wyatt stood and picked up his cup. He seemed to fill the space. “Morning, Sarah. I know you and Reesa have business to discuss, so I’ll leave you to it.”

  Sarah opened her mouth, couldn’t think of what she wanted to say. Smiled awkwardly. She knew it was awkward because she felt awkward.

  “Wyatt,” she blurted.

  He hesitated, looked at her.