The Girls of August

by Anne Rivers Siddons

  * * *

  While Baby and Rachel were busy setting Barbara’s room in order, including by changing the Raid-soaked sheets, Barbara and I sat on the front porch, mulling over our options for the day, which were admittedly limited. The idea of exploring the other side of the island and introducing ourselves to Earl’s family had caught our imaginations, but there was a bobcat on the loose.

  “With our track record, he’d probably eat every single one of us,” I said.

  “Except for Baby,” Barbara said. “He’d probably curl up in her lap.”

  “We’ve got her spic-’n’-span clean, y’all. Not a bug in sight!” Baby trilled, bounding onto the porch, Coca-Cola in hand.

  She flopped into a rocking chair and said, “Ahhhh.”

  “Hallelujah!” Barbara said.

  “Amen,” Rachel said, letting the screen door bang behind her.

  “Now, listen,” Baby said, wiping sweat off the can, “I want to take y’all to where I go. My pretty spot in the woods.”

  “Bobcat,” Rachel said.

  “Was it really a bobcat?” Baby asked.

  “Its eyes glowed in the moonlight and the fucker growled.” Rachel swirled her iced coffee.

  “Well.” Baby smacked her lips. “Whatever it was, it won’t be out in the middle of the day.”

  “Are you sure?” Barbara asked.

  “Absolutely.”

  Then, as if bobcats were no big deal and Baby were trustworthy, Barbara said, “Y’all, let’s do it! I mean, why the hell not?”

  Rachel and I exchanged glances and then looked at Barbara and Baby, who appeared completely at ease with the idea. I threw up my hands. “All right. But if I get mauled, my remains will never forgive you.”

  * * *

  We walked in a ragged line until we reached the thick hammock and were forced to go single file with Baby in the lead.

  “Are you sure we’re not going to get snakebit, Baby?” I asked.

  “Just follow the path.”

  “What path?” Rachel asked.

  “The one we’re on.”

  We’d trudged through the jungle no longer than fifteen or twenty minutes before it opened into a vast sea of pluff mud. A stickier, smellier, more unpleasant substance would be hard to find on this earth, but marsh grass, crabs, and oysters love the stuff. You have to be careful walking in it, though, because you could get sucked down, just as if you were in a bed of wet concrete. A ribbon of sand and grass bisected the pluff mud, and on the other side a lovely glade opened, gleaming like an emerald.

  “Wow! You’re right, Baby. A pretty spot for sure!” I said.

  The glade, complete with wildflowers and butterflies, was ringed with palmettos and old, moss-draped, stately oaks. The morning sun shone through the mottled clouds, sending down shafts of what looked like pure gold.

  “We used to call those holy miracle rays,” Rachel said, surveying the sky, the jungle canopy, the glade.

  “Yep. Just like those Jesus pictures in Sunday school,” Barbara said, her eyes following the slant of sunbeams.

  Baby ran ahead of us and we followed, crossing the grass-and-sand bridge to the other side. Once in the glade, Baby said, “See why I love it! See how sweet it is? Sometimes I just need a break from the ocean.”

  “It really is gorgeous,” Rachel said, “and quiet.”

  “So you sleep out here?” I asked.

  “No, no, not really.” And then she did a cartwheel, which was, I realized, not so much a bid for attention as an evasive move.

  “We should have a picnic here,” Barbara said, studying a blooming cloud bank in the distance.

  “Yes!” Baby said, and before the s was dry on her tongue, we heard a violent rustling in the undergrowth, and Barbara screamed, “Bobcat!”

  We shrieked and ran into each other as we tried to flee, and a herd of squealing, snorting feral hogs burst out of the jungle and charged us. I moved left when I should have moved right. One fleeing hog’s tusk got me along my shin. The pain was immediate. I looked down and saw a long, shallow, bleeding gash. For some reason, perhaps it was my subconscious’s way to ignore the pain, I thought only, Damn it—that’s going to scar.

  “Son of a bitch!” Rachel yelled, spinning around to Baby.

  “Oh, Maddy, I didn’t know! Really, I didn’t!” Baby pleaded. “I mean, I knew the Gullahs kept pigs, but they were fenced in. They’ve always been fenced in. I’ve never seen these wild ones. Never ever!”

  “Kinda hard to miss them,” Rachel said, giving Baby another of her long, heavy-lidded stares.

  “Oh goodness!” Barbara said, and I threw up. Again. And my knees wobbled as if Jell-O had replaced bone. I would have fallen if Rachel hadn’t caught me and lowered me to the grass.

  “I think you need a doctor for that,” she said, whipping her turquoise kerchief from around her neck and stanching the bleeding. “Damn, I wish I could get hold of Hugh, or somebody who knows something about pigs…”

  “I didn’t know Hugh knew anything about pigs,” Baby said in all seriousness.

  Despite my pain and gut hurt and bleeding, I found Baby’s statement hilarious. Through laughter and dry heaves, I sputtered, “God, no, I don’t need Hugh! It was just a damned pig. Not even a feral one, either, if they belong to the Gullahs. There must be a fence…”

  “Hmmm, you’d think so,” Barbara said, and then she went over to where the pigs had burst out, to the high grass that bordered the underbrush. She knelt and examined a torn-up plot of earth. “Well, there was a fence, but it’s broken down. See?” She retrieved an old, rotted fence stake. “The pieces of it are all over the place.” She tossed it on the ground and walked back over to us. “You know, Maddy, I agree with Rachel. All this dizziness and throwing up…something isn’t right.”

  “I swear I didn’t sic the pigs on her,” Baby said, reaching out for Barbara, her protector. “I had no idea there were crazed pigs running around out here.”

  “I know what’s not right,” Rachel said, smiling. “It ain’t pigs and it ain’t the stomach flu and it ain’t you, Baby.”

  “Then what is it?” Baby’s eyes were huge, as if she feared the answer.

  “It’s Mac.”

  We looked at Rachel in disbelief. Baby, who appeared profoundly confused, in fact nearly cross-eyed, cried, “What!”

  “It’s called pregnant. Plain as the nose on your face, you’re pregnant, Maddy.”

  “But I…but we’ve never…,” I started.

  “You still do it, don’t you?” Rachel was laser-locked on me. There was no escape.

  “Well, of course! But in all these years…”

  “Listen, if I don’t know pregnant when I see it, nobody does.” Rachel pushed my hair off my face. “Don’t forget, I’ve got five. Congratulations, Maddy. We’re delighted for you!”

  “Now that you mention it,” Barbara said—a wide smile dispelling the look of terror that had been on her face ever since she yelled “Bobcat!”—“it makes perfect sense!”

  I offered no more bewildered protests, but inside my heart sang. Could it be true? Could it finally, finally be true? After all this time…

  “A baby!” Baby exclaimed, bouncing on her toes, clapping.

  I looked at their three beaming faces and decided I simply would not think about the possibility that I was actually carrying a child until I got home. Nothing was going to seem real until then anyway. Whenever anyone mentioned it, I decided, I would simply hold up my hand and silence her. Those were the last thoughts I had before everything went black.

  * * *

  When I came to, the first thing I saw was a whirring fan and then a nut-brown face, eyes the same shade as Barbara’s, but it wasn’t Barbara.

  “There you are.” She applied a cool compress to my forehead. “Just too much excitement for a pregnant lady on a hot, hot day.” She had a lovely lilting accent.

  For a moment I thought I was dreaming. Or dead. But then there they all were, a circle of concerned
faces hovering over me: Rachel, Barbara, Baby, this woman, and Earl.

  “What happened?” I mumbled, trying to sit up, but the woman pushed me gently back down.

  “You passed out,” Rachel said.

  “And we couldn’t wake you,” Barbara said.

  “So I ran and got Earl,” Baby piped up. “He carried you here to Mama Bonaparte’s house.”

  Mama Bonaparte. The name was strange yet familiar, but before I could begin to place it or form a coherent thought she said, “And you are my little Mac’s wife. I haven’t seen him in so, so long. You tell that child that Mama B misses him and he needs to come see us.”

  “Oh, my,” I said, the fog lifting. “Mac has told me about you, how during his summers out here, you practically raised him.”

  “I did raise him,” she said, pride lighting her voice. “And now look.” She reached over and hugged Earl. “My grandson and his wife lose their first baby—nothing can heal that sadness—but here you come, delivered to me in the arms of my grandson, and you’re bearing my Mac’s child. Such a mysterious world,” she whispered.

  Earl hugged his grandmother, and Baby put her arms around them both. The weight of the loss clouded Earl’s eyes. I wanted to get up and hug him too, but in my condition that wasn’t going to happen. “It’s going to be OK.” Baby said it three times, like an incantation, a hopeful prayer.

  “How do you all know each other?” Barbara asked.

  Baby relaxed her grip on Earl but didn’t let go. Mama Bonaparte tested my skin with the back of her hand, placing it on my forehead, my cheek, and finally my throat.

  “It’s something Mac and I have in common,” Baby said. “I wanted to talk to him about it when we visited you in Charleston, but, I dunno. I got shy or something. Earl, how long have I known you and Sharelle?”

  Earl shook his head. “Baby, it’s got to be, I don’t know…since we could all walk?”

  “I delivered you, child,” Mama Bonaparte said to Baby.

  “Who’s Sharelle?” I asked.

  “My wife. We’re in mourning,” Earl said, stating the obvious. “Our baby…he didn’t even get a chance to see this world.” Earl covered his eyes with the back of his arm and, once more, Baby held him, whispering that it would all be OK.

  “So this is where you’ve been disappearing?” Rachel asked. “You’ve been coming out here to help your friends?”

  Baby nodded yes. Earl slumped down in a chair beside Mama Bonaparte.

  “Well, why didn’t you tell us?”

  “Because,” Baby said, “I didn’t want to ruin your vacation. And Earl and Sharelle are my friends. And you know what? When something like this happens, the last thing you want in this whole world is a bunch of strangers fussing over you.”

  “Oh, Baby,” Rachel said, “we accused you of all manner of crap. I am really sorry.”

  And this time every one of us, even Baby, knew she meant it.

  “Sounds like you all had quite a time,” Mama Bonaparte said, studying my face.

  “You can say that again,” Barbara said.

  “We quit keeping pigs a couple of years ago. Didn’t we, Earl?” Mama Bonaparte said. “The boys do a good job of thinning out the wild ones. Nothing like this has ever happened before, dear. I feel responsible.”

  “Please don’t apologize,” I said, and I wondered how Mac could stay away so long. Mama B, as I would learn everyone called her, was a strong and loving woman. “Maybe it was meant to be. I mean, here we are, meeting you and all.”

  “Perhaps.” She stroked my hair and then said, “Baby, can you go fix Miss Maddy a cup of tea?”

  “Blackberry?”

  “Indeed. And y’all go help her.” She began fussing with the dressing bandage someone—I supposed it was Mama B—had applied to my leg. As the girls and Earl shuffled out, she said, “We don’t want this getting infected. No, ma’am.”

  “I can’t thank you enough,” I said, and for no reason at all, I burst into tears. “It must be the hormones. I mean, if I really am pregnant.”

  “Oh, you’re pregnant, all right.” She got up, walked over to a bureau, and came back with some sort of salve.

  “How can you be so sure?” I asked through tears.

  “Honey, I’ve tended to all the pregnant ladies who have ever come out here, including Mac’s mama.” She removed the bandage and inspected the wound. “I would have delivered your husband had his mama timed it right.” She applied the cool salve to the gash and then taped fresh gauze into place. “Listen to me.” She took my hands in hers and my tears slowed. “I need you to tell Mac something for me. I need you to tell him that we all know he didn’t do it.”

  “Do what?”

  “He never told you?”

  “No. He’s never talked about Tiger. And he wasn’t happy when it was decided we’d come out here.”

  Mama B pursed her lips, stared into space, seemed to find her answer, gazed down at me, and said, “Somebody stole my son-in-law’s boat. This was a long time ago. And James…well, James is a bit of a hothead and he immediately went off, accusing your Mac of being the thief. It wasn’t true. We all knew it wasn’t true. But the accusation cut Mac to the quick. He has his pride, as I’m sure you know.”

  Mac’s pride. I did know. It was a quiet pride but as massive and immovable as a barrier reef. No, Mac wouldn’t have forgiven such an accusation. Nor would he have told me about it.

  “And once it was all settled,” she went on, “once we figured out the boat hadn’t been stolen at all but ‘borrowed’ for a joyride by some trash who came out here camping, Mac was already gone. False accusations have a way of tearing people to bits, you know. And we didn’t have a clue how to find him. Besides, we thought he’d be back. We thought we could set things straight once he came home.” It looked as if Mama B might be the one to cry next. “But he never did. And his family never rebuilt after Hugo. Land’s just sitting there.”

  “What?” I felt as if the whole world were spinning under me. “You mean, we own land out here?”

  “I think so. If your husband sold it, the buyers have made themselves scarce. As in nonexistent.”

  I lay there trying to wrap my mind around this—the second bombshell of the day—when the girls and Earl tumbled back into the room all atwitter. Baby was guffawing and Earl was laughing, and Barbara was exclaiming, “Wait till I tell my kids,” and Rachel, above the din, shouted, “Madison, you are not going to believe this.”

  “What?” I couldn’t think of one other thing that could surprise me on a day that was proving to be full of surprises.

  “Look!” Rachel said.

  The four of them parted, Mama B glanced over her shoulder, and I screamed.

  “Don’t be afraid,” Earl said. “It’s Bunny.”

  Rachel slapped her thigh. “Bunny! What a hysterical name for a …wildcat!”

  “It wasn’t a bobcat last night,” Barbara said. “It was Bunny, Earl’s pet ocelot.”

  I felt my forehead. Surely I was having fever-induced hallucinations. Before I could sit up and take stock of the situation, Bunny loped over to me and began licking my hand.

  “She likes you!” Earl said.

  “Such a good girl!” Mama B cooed. “Aren’t you? Yes, you are. You keep loving on Miss Maddy and she’ll be better in no time.” And then Mama B proceeded to plant a kiss atop Bunny’s tan-and-black-striped head. Bunny began purring like a huge, quiet engine. I was afraid and fascinated and possibly in love. She was beautiful.

  “She goes to the bathroom in the toilet!” Baby crowed, setting my tea on the bedside table.

  That had to be a lie. Crazy Baby.

  “Why did she growl at us?” I asked Earl.

  “From how Barbara and Rachel described it, with y’all throwing bricks, she was probably scared. But she’s not supposed to be over on the beach anyway. I’m sorry. It’s just, with Sharelle so upset and us losing the baby, we haven’t been keeping up with anything. Bunny just decided to wander off fo
r the night.” He looked at Baby. “I guess she wasn’t getting enough attention.”

  “No need to apologize,” I said, gathering the nerve to pet Bunny down the length of her back. I could feel the satiny ripple of muscle all the way down. “We’re really sorry about the baby, Earl.”

  “Yes, we are,” Rachel said.

  “Thank you. I appreciate that.” He looked down at the floor. I could tell that he was trying to keep his composure.

  The whole thing broke my heart. Nobody should lose a baby. This was a good family. Close-knit. Hardworking. Sweet-spirited. Why, Mama B’s love for Mac was written all over her handsome face every time she spoke his name. I sat up and Mama B handed me my tea. As I took it from her I made a silent pledge to make sure the Bonaparte-McCauley fence got mended.

  Mama B tested my forehead again. “You’re going to be just fine,” she said.

  As if the prognosis were the permission she needed, Bunny jumped onto the bed, expertly avoiding my wound, and curled up by my feet.

  “Looks like Bunny has found a new friend,” Earl said.

  “That’s wonderful,” I said, eyeing the beautiful cat. “I think.”

  Mama B turned and said, “Baby, I’ve got some greens on. Can you take Sharelle some? And don’t forget the corn bread.”

  “Yes, ma’am,” Baby said, no sass at all.

  “And Earl, bring in that okra I picked this morning. I left it on the bench outside the shed. I’m going to fix our guests okra-and-tomato stew.” Her smile deepened. I had a hunch this woman was quite a cook.

  “I’m sorry, ladies,” Earl said before he and Baby set out on their chores. “I’d love for you to meet Sharelle, but she just isn’t up for visitors. Next time. You’ll really like her.”

  “Does your wife need medical attention?” Rachel asked.

  “Rachel here is a nurse,” Barbara explained.

  Earl shook his head. “No, no…Sharelle is, um…” He trailed off.

  “She’s just sad,” Mama B finished his sentence for him. “Just real sad.”