Barefoot Beach

by Toby Devens

  “Listen to Mother Margo,” my girlfriend had advised. “I know the drill. These people are military. Remember I played Nellie Forbush in South Pacific. Off the field, this bunch doesn’t go for flash and bang. You’re aiming for understated. Pretty, not bowl ’em over. Pearls, not diamonds.” She’d meant more than my wardrobe.

  As for my wardrobe, she had one stipulation and it wasn’t for the fund-raiser but for what she’d named with a wink the après-party party. Access to the essential me had to be via a stripper zipper.

  “It’s a strange phenomenon,” she’d mused. “A man who can repair a car engine and untangle the guts of a computer can’t deal with anything complicated on a woman. Take that as a metaphor if you wish, but I’m talking buttons and hooks and eyes. Trust me, dearest, you don’t want him having to do engineering mid-hard-on.”

  When I started to protest her assumption that Scott and I . . . that we would be . . . she overrode me. “Oh, come on, Little Miss Innocence. Do you want to get laid, or don’t you?”

  “Well, if you put it that way.” I caught a breath. “No, I’d rather make love.”

  She’d flashed me a contemptuous look. “Idiot. Love takes time. Laid is instant gratification. Get ’em while they’re hot.”

  She had a point, but not necessarily mine.

  While the roast beef was being served, Scott excused himself and moved to a platform up front. As if he’d snapped an order for silence, the crowd hushed. He took a breath, then launched into his keynote speech. It was extemporaneous, straight from the heart, and brief. He talked about the plight of unemployed or underemployed veterans and how some families would have broken apart or wound up in shelters without help from the food pantry. He concluded, “This is our tenth year and our work is needed more than ever. So please open your hearts and your checkbooks. We have to take care of our own.”

  After dinner, there was a show billed as a USO tribute featuring entertainment from earlier periods when America was at war. A vaudeville routine from World War I. The VFW Women’s Auxiliary Silver Slippers tapping to “Chattanooga Choo Choo.” A Marine gunner singing a beautiful rendition of “I’ll Be Seeing You.” When he crooned the line, “I’ll be looking at the moon, but I’ll be seeing you,” Scott’s hand, nesting mine, squeezed it. Finally, we all stood to sing “God Bless America.”

  Then, just as everyone thought the party was over, there was a surprise. Max Cassidy, the developer of Upton Abbey, took center stage. He wasn’t going to miss this opportunity to welcome Tuckahoe’s warriors to the resort, he announced. He wanted to personally thank each and every one of us for our service, and that included spouses who kept the home fires burning. He wanted us to know that Upton Abbey would offer priority employment to all veterans and—here, he took a dramatic pause—he was proud to present Lieutenant Colonel Goddard with a check for ten thousand dollars to support the food pantry. Scott strode up to grasp the other end of a large poster-board check. The resort’s official photographer snapped a series of grip-and-grins, one of which would no doubt make the front page of the Coast Post with a headline proclaiming something like “Local Resort Gives Back to the Community. Casino Helps Poor Vets.” And then, good deed accomplished, commercial plug done, Max Cassidy sailed off on a tide of applause. Margo was right. The man had style.

  In the wake of the cheers, Tom Hepburn edged to my side and said, “Now, that was a very nice ending to a very nice evening. Scott’s got to be walking on air, and you, my dear, are a hit. That’s the intel I’m picking up.”

  I thought Tom might have defied doctor’s orders, because now his glass of ginger ale wafted the smoky scent of scotch and for a few seconds the old twinkle returned to his eyes. But it dimmed quickly.

  “While we have a moment alone, I’d like a word.”

  “Of course, Tom.”

  “I’m a man for straight talk and I think you can take it. You know I never had any sons, and Scott’s like a son to me, and he would bayonet me if he knew I was telling tales out of school. I like you very much, Nora, and I can see Scott’s gaga over you. But I don’t want anyone to get hurt here.” He paused for a wheeze. “That man, one in a million, has been through hell.”

  “I know,” I said.

  “What do you know? Or think you know?”

  “I read his medical chart during intake at the studio two years ago. I saw the newspaper stories. He came close to being shipped home in a casket. With his level of injury, it was touch-and-go. He could have bled out before a medic got to him.”

  “He saved a buddy. Did you know that?” Tom poked a finger in my direction. “Dragged him to safety and did it on an almost severed leg. Hence the Silver Star. But that’s one thing. Every soldier is aware of the possibility of death or injury in combat. It’s always lurking out there and Scott’s entire career until Iraq prepared him for it, so it never had a chance of breaking him. It was afterward that almost did that.”

  “PTSD?” That tumbled out of me, from the therapist, not the woman.

  Tom’s smile was indulgent. “Sweetheart, anyone who’s been on the front lines comes out a different person. Anxious, pissed off, at least for a while. You’d have to be crazy not to be changed by what you do and see in combat. But no, from all I know about it and him, the colonel is remarkably free of what they used to call combat fatigue when I was in Vietnam. What he has is a serious case of PTBD.”

  “I never heard—”

  “Post Traumatic Belinda Disorder. That bimbo Bunny? She almost did him in. I’m not going into the gory details, but he came close to losing everything.” Tom inhaled a raspy breath. “So, however you two wind up, for better or worse, I’m asking—no, I’m begging—you to be kind to him.” He took a slug of what I was now sure was scotch, although it wasn’t just the alcohol talking. “Even the strongest man can be undone by a woman. And he cares for you more than you know. You be good to him, y’hear?”

  I was stunned by the fervor of his entreaty. “Copy that,” I said.

  Reassured, Tom nodded, and then he vanished.

  Five minutes later, Scott and I took advantage of the announcement of door prize winners to slip away.

  As we exited into the hall, he said, “I am so ready to put my feet up and taste that champagne I promised you.” He stopped to give me a tentative look. “You up for that? My place?”

  I’d given thought to some version of that question since our first kiss under the streetlamp. And I’d been tugged by an impossible attraction to Scott Goddard long before then. But now impossible had become possible. We were twenty-one-plus, of reasonably sound mind (though the rush of pleasure that bubbled up as I gazed at him made me wonder), and we were both free. There was nothing holding us back. Even I, who’d banked my precious guilt as if it earned interest, knew that. And felt it.

  Beyond Scott, on the brass plaque, I’d have sworn I saw the likeness of Queen Mary wink at me.

  “Sounds good,” I said, and, at least for the evening, I sealed my fate. The way Mary did when she said whatever it took to lose her head.

  We didn’t talk much on the way home. We reviewed the entertainment and replayed Max Cassidy’s presentation of the check and then lapsed into a gentle quiet. That’s when I noticed how hard Scott was gripping the steering wheel, which made me wonder if this was a white-knuckle drive for him. Occasionally, though, he reached over to squeeze my embarrassingly clammy hand. At one point, I felt a rivulet of sweat trickle into my lacy bra. Relax, I told myself. Just go with the flow. It works for the ocean.

  His condo was a villa surrounded by trees and bathed in the glow of a full moon. As he turned the key in the lock, a couple of short yelps greeted us. “That’s Sarge’s welcome-home bark. He knows you’re one of the good guys. Believe me, you don’t want to be one of the bad guys.”

  The shepherd bounded over as we entered. “Hey, boy. You remember Nora. The pretty lady.” Sarge gave me a quick onc
e-over, then swung and butted his head against Scott’s right shin. “Smart dog. He knows he’ll give himself a concussion if he hits the wrong leg,” he joked.

  Sarge had peed, pooped, and played Frisbee from nine to nine thirty, according to the note propped on the hall table by the neighborhood teen who’d been hired to walk him. But now it was past eleven.

  “I need to take him out for a quick walk, but it will be his last outing for the night,” Scott explained. “Then he’ll trot into his crate and we’ll have the place to ourselves.”

  He shot me a significant look. I felt heat splash my cheeks. The shepherd turned questioning eyes on me. I crouched down to hide my giveaway blush and stroked his smooth coat. “Better safe than sorry, right, boy? Ready for a walk?” Sarge whined assent high in his throat.

  “You can come along if you want, Nora.” Scott removed the leash from a hook on the wall. “Or you can stay and make yourself to home, as my mom liked to say. Settle in. Try the chocolates. They’re Swiss. I ordered them online. I hear women like chocolate, and you said at dinner you prefer the dark kind.”

  Now, that was sweet. The gesture as well the truffles from Teuscher. More confirmation that he was just starting out on the dating road and this was as new to him as it was to me. He’d mentioned that his experience with women since the divorce had been limited. And how could he extrapolate from twenty-five years with the wife from hell? Mean, I scolded myself, as the worst part of me snickered silently.

  My feet were killing me. The shoes were not hooker stilettos, but they were higher than my usual sandals or sneakers and not broken in. I wasn’t broken in either, and my official debut evening had exhausted me. The sofa looked plump and soft and the coffee table held a remote tagged “Stereo.” It was too inviting to turn down.

  “I’ll stay in and kick back, thanks.”

  But after the door closed behind him, I didn’t collapse into the cushions. I snatched a cube of dark chocolate for energy and made my way barefoot around the living room, taking advantage of the opportunity to see how Scott Goddard lived and what he surrounded himself with, what brought him pleasure and comfort, picking up clues about the man himself.

  The sofa was tweed, a good choice with a dog that shed. Common sense. Two chairs: one brown leather, probably from his late mother-in-law’s house, old and worn to a glossy patina. Bunny wouldn’t have appreciated its beauty. She would have ceded this chair to him with good riddance. Or maybe it wasn’t from a place they’d lived in together; he may have chosen to leave that marriage with as few reminders as possible.

  I walked over to inspect the contents of his bookshelves. Tom Clancy, of course, and Sun Tzu’s The Art of War, Machiavelli, and Daniel Silva, all expected. But also Jane Austen and Flannery O’Connor. I flipped open the cover to find a bookplate imprinted with Scott’s name. Interesting man. Then. There. No, couldn’t be. Between The Sun Also Rises and The Sea-Wolf. Yes. Yes, with a jolt of heartbeat so strong I had to grab the shelf to steady myself: Wild Mountain. The spine confirmed it. Lon Farrell. I laughed without reason, withdrew the book, and turned to the title page. Beneath the tiny stylized fish, the visual icon of the book, there was my husband’s handwriting. Blurred. Again there was no real reason for my tears, which made a watercolor of a still life. I blinked twice, clearing my vision enough to read, “For Scott, There are fictional heroes and real ones. With admiration for the latter and my personal good wishes,” followed by my husband’s familiar signature.

  The inscription was undated, but I could pinpoint the time. The spring Wild Mountain was released, Lon had done a flurry of signings at bookstores up and down the shore. Scott must have been between deployments that year. Someone stateside could have had the book signed and shipped it to his base, but an eerie tickle told me the two men had met.

  Maybe that should have freaked me out, but it did just the opposite. I like seeing connections. Links. Patterns disguised as coincidences. After the first smack of shock subsided, I replaced Wild Mountain in its slot between two greats, gave the Hemingway a fond pat, and picked up the remote on the way to the sofa.

  I clicked. Rachmaninoff’s Prelude in C-sharp Minor surged through the room. One of Lon’s favorites. Finally weirded out, I moved on. Past Christopher Cross and “Sailing,” Santana and Sheryl Crow. Lon had played “Sailing” ad nauseam the first summer I spent at the beach house and he had a thing for Sheryl Crow. I finally landed on Lady Antebellum’s “Need You Now.” Lon was no longer around when that hit the charts. I leaned back against the cushions and, lids lowered, drifted with the music, rousing only when I heard the rasp of a throat being cleared nearby. I opened my eyes slowly to find Scott grinning down at me. “Got in a snooze, huh? Good for you. Sorry we were out so long. Nature took a while to call. You did okay?”

  “Fine.”

  “Let me get him bedded down. It will be quick.”

  He stopped in the kitchen on his way back. I heard the fridge door slam and he materialized with a dark green bottle and two wine glasses. “It’s California, not French. I try to buy American.”

  “As long as it’s bubbly, it could be from Brooklyn,” I said.

  “You’re from Brooklyn, right?” He set the glasses on the coffee table.

  “Born and raised.”

  “Then Brooklyn champagne would be vintage.”

  He popped the cork and poured. He watched intently as I took my first sip. “Very Flatbush,” I proclaimed. “Assertive and bold with an undertone of bus exhaust and a hint of kosher hot dog in the finish.”

  He laughed. “You’re witty. Besides being beautiful.”

  “Beautiful? Me? Now? My hair is messed up and I’ve got hardly any lipstick left.”

  “You don’t need lipstick. In fact, I think we should get rid of the last of it. And let’s mess your hair a little more.”

  The first kiss was bubbly. The second carried its own fizz, which shot straight to my brain, causing all the unnecessary muscles to relax, but my skin, which he stroked with a look of astonishment, came to life under his touch. I traced a finger along the angle of his jaw and he groaned. He brushed his lips along the inside of my elbow. Who knew that was an erogenous zone? Oh God.

  We made out like the teenagers of our generation. Then we grew up. Scott stood and backed off to unbutton his shirt, removed it and his undershirt, and folded and stacked them neatly at the end of the sofa. I figured that was his military training kicking in.

  He offered me a hand, a lift to my feet, pulled me against him, and went for the stripper zipper on my dress, the one Margo had said was essential for easy entrée. She’d been right about the zipper, wrong about the bra. The man who knew how to load a Beretta M9 didn’t fumble with a Bali 34D.

  He put space between us so we could take each other in. I folded my arms under my chest, supporting what had never, from their first blossoming, been perky. It didn’t seem to matter to him. His pupils fired. “Incredible,” he said with a sexy twist to his smile.

  I nodded, my throat tightening. His arms and upper torso were well muscled, and I was happy to see just enough hair grassing his pecs so he didn’t look airbrushed to glossy like a hero on the cover of a romance novel. He was a real man, and from three feet, then one foot, and up against him—measured any way—Scott was hot. A rhyme that entered my lexicon the moment I thought it.

  As I went for his zipper, he said, “Not here,” and hitched his neck toward the hallway.

  I don’t remember who led as we staggered into the bedroom.

  We faced each other in the moonlight that poured through the window.

  As I moved to unbuckle his belt he murmured, “Damn, I want you,” but then he broke away. He walked across the room and turned off the lamp on one of the night tables. Then he closed the bedroom door. I wondered why; Sarge was crated. Now the door blocked even a sliver of light from the hall. When he came back, he lowered the shades.

&nb
sp; That plunged us into total darkness and me into disappointment. I liked to make love with my eyes open. Seeing the action was another turn-on for me. As I felt around empty space for him, I wanted to assure him that he didn’t need to hide the techno leg, and if he removed it, that was okay too. I’d seen my share of prostheses on and off.

  Not his, though. I remembered how, just before we concluded his intake interview at the dance studio and after we’d gone through his medical history and his objectives for the class, he’d suddenly shifted his gaze from my eyes to his hands, which were capped over his knees. His eyebrows had knitted as he said, “I suppose you want to see the prosthesis. The fit.” But he’d made no move to bend over, to roll up his trouser leg. In fact, he’d tightened the grip on his left knee.

  Body language was my second language. I had no problem reading those gestures. He didn’t want me to see his leg.

  Some do. Proud of the technology that gave them back their mobility, the craftsmanship that fabricated their state-of-the-art prostheses, they want to show them off. Or they’re interested in my professional assessment of the socket fitting. Or they’re just comfortable with how it’s turned out.

  Some don’t. It’s not usually shame that holds them back. They’re just private by nature.

  My sense back then had been that the colonel was private. Of course, I’d respect his boundaries.

  Maybe I should have brought it up then, because I couldn’t now. We were in a different place, and in this place, his bedroom, we didn’t know each other that well. And how ironic was that, considering where we were heading—if I didn’t crash into furniture on the way.

  Suddenly he was next to me. I knew because I heard his breath catch and inhaled the scent of him, not his piney cologne, but a primitive mix of healthy sweat and alcohol that made me reach for his fly. He caught my wrist midway and brought it to his lips; then, hands splayed against my shivering back, he steered me to what I discovered as he laid me down on it was the bed. He sat down on the edge, peeled off his trousers—I heard the belt buckle hit the hardwood floor—and I supposed his jockeys came off too. No folding this time. He was moving fast and we were at a point where rules didn’t apply. I pitched my Victoria’s Secret bikini like a pro. For all I knew, it hooked onto a blade of the ceiling fan, a lacy flag of surrender. Or victory.