Beach House for Rent

by Mary Alice Monroe

  “How did you sleep last night?” Cara asked over her shoulder as she rummaged through the closet.

  “Not great at first,” she admitted.

  “What a shame. Did you open the windows like I suggested?”

  Heather looked at her feet. “I, uh, tried. But I was pretty . . . jumpy at every bump in the night.” She blushed when Cara laughed at her response. Heather couldn’t imagine someone like Cara being afraid to leave the windows open. Heather turned and idly looked at the framed photographs hanging on the hallway wall. They were all from the early days of Isle of Palms. There was a sepia-toned photo of a big Ferris wheel near a low-roofed wooden hotel. Another of a trolley car parked at a depot. One of a narrow road leading into a maritime forest. What was most amazing to Heather was how bare the island was. There were very few buildings. Just lots of sand.

  She came to a stop before a photograph of a lovely, fair-haired woman, tanned and smiling, with her arms around two young children. They were the same children painted in the portrait over the bed—one dark-haired girl and a towheaded boy. Heather leaned forward, squinting, and looked more closely at the woman in the photograph. She jerked back and covered her mouth with a gasp.

  Cara came from the bedroom carrying a box. “Got it. Thanks.” Then, seeing Heather’s expression, she took a few steps closer and asked, “What’s the matter?”

  Heather pointed to the woman in the picture. “Who is that woman?”

  “That’s my mother. Lovie Rutledge.”

  Heather turned to Cara. “That’s the woman from my dream,” she stammered, her voice shaking.

  Cara’s face immediately sharpened with interest. “What dream?”

  Heather licked her lips. She didn’t want Cara to think she was crazy. She looked again at the photograph—at the woman in the photo. Her smiling face once again was both reassuring and comforting.

  “Oh, it’s nothing. I’m just being silly.”

  “No, I’d like to hear.”

  “Well,” Heather began feeling embarrassed. “Last night. I had this dream. It . . . it was very real, you know the kind?” she asked, glancing at Cara. When Cara nodded, Heather continued, “A woman was in it. She was very kind. She made me feel welcome. Not so afraid.” Heather put her hand to her forehead. “I remember her stroking my hair.”

  Cara suddenly seemed extremely interested. “She stroked your hair? The woman from the photograph?”

  Heather nodded.

  Cara looked at the photograph, and her face revealed an indescribable longing. “My mother used to stroke my hair when I couldn’t sleep.” She shrugged. “You probably just saw the photograph during the walk-through yesterday and it stuck in your subsconscious.”

  “Yes, I’m sure you’re right, that must be it. She just seemed so real, and she smelled like jasmine.” Heather looked at Cara. “It was so strong, it filled up the room.”

  Cara’s face went very still. “That was my mother’s scent.”

  Chapter Six

  WHAT A DAY, Cara thought when she finally arrived back on the Isle of Palms. She felt hot and sticky in her work attire and couldn’t wait to take a shower and relax. Maybe have a glass of wine to ease the tension after what she’d learned at the bank. Pulling into her driveway, she was surprised to see Brett’s truck already parked. She glanced at the clock in her car. It was only two o’clock. He didn’t usually get home until four or five, depending on the tour schedule. It was a beautiful May afternoon, sunny and without too much wind. There wasn’t a cloud in the sky. She would have thought he’d be busy with the tour boats.

  “Honey?” she called out upon entering the house. She set down her purse on the front table and removed her stifling blazer, rolling her shoulders with a satisfied moan.

  Brett came around the corner from the kitchen. He was wearing his running pants and a T-shirt and carrying a bottle of Gatorade. His trim, muscular body looked fit and healthy.

  “Hey, there you are,” he said. “Where were you?”

  “The bank,” she said, dropping her blazer on the back of a chair. “First I went to the beach house to check on Heather—”

  “Oh, yeah,” he interrupted in the manner that revealed he’d forgotten all about it. “How did meeting her go? I never had a minute to ask you yesterday. Is everything squared away?”

  “Yeah,” she replied absently. Yesterday seemed like ages ago after the busy day she’d had today.

  Usually they sat together at dinner and discussed all that had happened in the day, sparing no details. But the night before had been a late night. Their tour services included catering for special events, and last night they’d catered a charity event on Goat Island. They’d hired extra staff for the large group, but still neither she nor Brett had had a moment to sit and catch their breath all evening. By the time they’d cleaned and packed up the supplies and arrived home, they were utterly exhausted and collapsed into bed without any of their usual conversing. Then it was the usual rise and shine early in the morning.

  Cara ran her hands through her hair, giving her head a vigorous scratch as she crossed the room toward him.

  “Heather’s a very nice young woman, neat and tidy.” She dropped her hands. “But a bit strange.”

  Brett propped himself against the counter. “Strange?” he asked with a mock face of horror. “I knew it was too good to be true.”

  “No, not weird strange,” Cara said. “More quirky. She’s shy. Really shy. In fact, she barely uttered a word. I don’t know how we would have gotten through the ordeal if not for her father. David Wyatt’s a really good man. Good-looking, too,” she added. “Polished. Considerate. He adores his daughter, you can tell. Oh, Brett,” she said as a new thought sprang to mind. “You should have seen Heather’s eyes light up when she saw the sunroom. You’d have been so proud of all your work.”

  “Really?” Brett replied, a delighted smile stretching across his face. “That’s nice.”

  Cara nodded. “It’s going to make the perfect home for Heather’s birds, which is a good thing. She seems to open up around them, really loves them. Very attached.”

  “How many birds are there?” he asked, unscrewing the top of his Gatorade.

  “Not too many, thank heavens. Three. Oh, and this is interesting. She’s spending the summer painting shorebirds for”—her eyes sparkled with amusement—“wait for it . . . postage stamps!”

  Brett was bringing his drink to his lips, but his hand stilled midair. “You’re kidding. Postage stamps?” He took a sip. “You know, I’ve always wondered how the government selected the images for those things.”

  “Apparently it’s very competitive. They choose who to give the commission to from a pool of applicants. And she got it. Shy little Heather Wyatt. Rather cool, isn’t it? I’ll have to buy loads of them when they come out and tell everyone I know the artist.”

  “What does she look like?” Brett asked.

  “She’s very waiflike. Pale with long blond hair and big blue eyes. Luminous, really. She could be a model for Faerie magazine. Or Vogue,” she added on further thought. “She’s gorgeous in her own way. Different. Tiny-boned and slender. Actually,” Cara said with a chuckle, “she’s rather like her canaries.”

  “People are often compared to their pets.”

  “Right. Except those birds are so spirited and curious. And Heather seems so reticent. Cautious.” Cara shook her head and added in a wry tone, “I don’t expect we’ll have any trouble with wild parties with her, at least.”

  “Thank God.”

  Cara thought again of the young woman in the beach house, her lack of confidence, her youth, her vulnerability. She’d been trying to figure out who Heather reminded her of all day, and suddenly it struck her. When she’d moved home to the beach house ten years earlier, she’d discovered, to her dismay, that her mother had taken in a woman as a caretaker. The woman was young and blond, like Heather. “She reminds me of Toy when I first met her. Without the attitude.” She smirked. “Or the heav
y eyeliner.”

  “Our Toy?”

  “Is there another? She has that same nervous reticence. And lack of confidence. For all her impressive artwork, I get the sense that Heather is still a young woman trying to find herself. Like Toy used to be.”

  “And she certainly blossomed.”

  Cara’s face eased into a smile as she recalled the young woman she now considered both a friend and the daughter she’d never had. The beach house—and her mother—had worked its magic on Toy as it had on her.

  Cara froze, remembering Heather’s dream. Something about what she’d told Cara had raised the hairs on the back of her neck. Usually she second-guessed anything she considered the slightest bit woo-woo, but she couldn’t deny what she’d felt.

  “Heather told me the strangest thing today.” She stood with her fingers tapping her crossed arms, lost in thought. “Very unsettling. It stuck with me.”

  “I’m all ears.”

  “Well,” she said, warming to the story, “remember I told you I went back to see her this morning? I had to pick up some paperwork I’d left at the beach house. I brought her some flowers, to welcome her. Oh,” she said by way of an aside, “Bo was there, by the way. He was helping her build birdcages.”

  “Birdcages? That wasn’t on his to-do list.”

  Cara chuckled. “No. He’s such a sweet guy. I’m sure he couldn’t stand by and watch Heather struggle with them. They’re enormous, by the way. Not your grandmother’s birdcages.”

  “So, what happened?” Brett asked, bringing her back to the story.

  “Oh, yes. Anyway, when I asked her how she’d slept, she pointed to the photograph of my mother on the wall in the back hall. You know the one with me and Palmer?”

  Brett nodded.

  “She asked me who it was, and when I told her, she said she’d had this vivid dream. I almost rolled my eyes—you know how I hate to hear people tell me about their dreams.”

  He laughed. “Yes, babe, I’m familiar.”

  “But I was polite and listened. Then she tells me that my mother was the woman in her dream! That she stroked Heather’s hair.” Cara’s eyes widened. “That’s what my mother used to do for me when I was sad or sick and had trouble sleeping.”

  “A lot of mothers do that.”

  “That’s what I told her. But then she said . . .” Cara paused to rub the sudden chill she felt down her arms. “She said the room was filled with the scent of jasmine.”

  Brett pushed away from the counter. “Jasmine? That was your mother’s scent.”

  Cara nodded.

  Brett stepped close and put his hands on her arms and gently rubbed. “I can see this has you worked up.”

  Cara felt a flush of embarrassment. “I’m not the type of woman who gets worked up about dreams and all that voodoo.”

  “I didn’t know there was a type.”

  “But I have to admit it was unnerving. You know, I’ve always felt my mother’s presence in the beach house.”

  “That’s only natural. It was her house. It’s still filled with her things.”

  “True,” Cara said doubtfully. “But it’s more than that. I really feel her. But she’s never come to me in a dream. I’ve certainly never smelled her perfume. So when Heather said she’d seen Mama in her dream, it just made me wonder. What if ?” She looked at Brett beseechingly.

  “And maybe you’re a little jealous, too?”

  “Jealous? Of what?”

  “That your mother came to this new girl instead of you? Maybe that’s what made you compare her to Toy. You used to be jealous of your mother’s affection for her, too.”

  Cara felt a niggling of discomfort at the truth in that. She and her mother had had such a difficult relationship that when she’d returned home to mend fences, she had been incensed to find this arrogant, needy young woman taking her mother’s time and attention away from her. Yes, Brett was right. She’d been jealous of Toy. And now . . . was she jealous that her mother had come to yet another lost young woman—instead of her?

  Cara’s practical side pushed the notion far back into the nether regions of her mind. She had other, more important issues to discuss with Brett today. She exhaled the last of her angst over the matter and slipped from Brett’s arms.

  “Anyway, what’s up? You’re home early,” she called out to Brett as she entered the kitchen.

  She always felt pleasure stepping into this room. She’d knocked out a wall and created a big kitchen space, outfitted with modern appliances and new tile. An island now separated the kitchen from the eating area and offered the kitchen the same grand views of the wetlands. As with the kitchen, she’d not only changed the house architecturally, but also had redone all the floors and light fixtures and had designed an efficient, sleek office space from the third bedroom. She’d poured so much of herself into this house, all her hopes and dreams as a bride. It was why she loved it, in some ways just as much as Primrose. While the ocean and beach had their own magnificence, as far as she was concerned, the real action with change of seasons, birds, and tides happened on the back side of the island.

  Brett followed her into the kitchen. “I cut out. I was feeling off. Probably tired from last night. Robert was there and we weren’t that busy, so I decided to come home for a run.”

  “Careful, old man,” she said. “It’s pretty hot out there today. You should start running in the evenings. I don’t want you to get overheated.”

  He came closer to kiss her forehead. “My little mama hen.” Then he swatted her behind. “And who’re you calling an old man?”

  She scoffed, slipping under his outstretched arm. She was already mentally preparing for the meaty discussion that was coming up. She opened the fridge and pulled out a can of flavored seltzer water. Flipping open the can, she turned to face him. Her face and tone were serious.

  “Brett. We need to talk.”

  His face immediately grew equally sober. “Okay. About what?”

  “About today. I went to the bank.”

  He took a drink from his bottle. “Oh, yeah?” he asked in a casual tone, but his eyes appeared hunted. “What did they have to say?”

  Cara had promised herself she wasn’t going to get into an argument with Brett about what she’d learned at the bank, but she could feel the anger and resentment she’d managed to quell during the car ride home bubble up again.

  “Maybe we should sit down.”

  “Babe, I was about to go for a run.” Brett looked longingly at the door.

  Cara knew how much he hated to discuss finances. The subject of profits and losses always put him on edge. But she couldn’t avoid this one.

  “This is really important. It won’t take long, but we have to discuss it. Now.”

  She went to sit on the leather sofa, then looked up at him expectantly.

  Brett reluctantly followed and plopped down on the opposite side of the sofa with obvious pique and stretched his long arm along its back.

  “So, what’s this all about?”

  Cara skewered him with a cool gaze. “Want to take a guess?”

  He leaned back against the cushions and looked at the ceiling. When he lowered his head again, his face looked wan. “The boat,” he said with a sigh. It wasn’t really an answer but a statement of fact.

  “The boat,” she affirmed. “That enormous, ridiculous, going-to-drown-us-financially boat!” She felt her self-control slipping and struggled to rein in her frustration. “Brett, it’s not good.”

  Brett’s tanned face paled and his brows drew together. “Okay.”

  Cara licked her lips. “You recall that when you wanted to buy that new tour boat, we had to take out a home equity loan?”

  Brett nodded warily.

  “Well, the loan just adjusted upward.”

  “It what?” he asked, leaning forward. His eyes flashed, indignation mixed with confusion that the bank could do such a thing.

  Cara swallowed an irritated sigh. For all that Brett was a very intelligent
man, his knowledge of business and finance was virtually nonexistent. More because he didn’t care to learn than that he lacked the ability to grasp concepts. When she’d married him, he’d been skating merrily along, happy to make enough money to get by and still be able to fish and surf and live the lifestyle he enjoyed. That was all well and good for a man in his twenties. A bit doubtful for a man in his thirties, but bordering on ridiculous for a man hitting forty. Yet Brett was an original. He took great pride in the tour boat company he’d established and felt honor-bound to educate children and adults about the wonder of the ocean. It was more than a job to him. It was a mission. And if it wasn’t wildly profitable, so what?

  She loved that about him. Admired him. Married him for it. Yet Cara was savvy enough to know that Brett was reaching the point when he had to begin being realistic about the issues that arose in the latter half of life. When they married and she’d taken over the business side of the tour company, she’d had to convince him he needed to be smart and plan health-care benefits, start setting money aside for his retirement—an ongoing battle for a man who still believed death was a long way off—and, for a time, to plan for children.

  “Brett,” she said, trying to keep exasperation out of her voice. They’d discussed this before. “It was an adjustable loan. Of course it was going to change. I just didn’t realize how much.” She licked her lips again and took a breath. “We went through the numbers.” She waved her hand and reached for her drink.

  Brett dropped his arm from the back of the sofa and sat straight. “Explain it to me in a nutshell.”

  She sat back and her eyes met his, flashing with emotion. “We’re screwed.”

  He stared at her. “What do you mean, we’re screwed?”