Summer Beach Reads

by Thayer, Nancy

  “Oh, that’s just like you, Helen!” Grace snapped, losing her cool. “I’m trying to create a historical record of Nona’s dynasty, and you’re turning it into a comic routine.”

  Nona watched and listened, munching away at her cheese crackers and sipping her Scotch, thinking Grace could use a hearty slam shot of alcohol herself right now. The matter was finally decided when Glorious arrived to help Nona dress for the evening. Oliver and Owen assured Grace they could race to their inn, change clothes, and be back in time for the photo if they left now. And they ran out the door. Through the open window, their hearty male laughter floated, and then came the sound of their rental car peeling away down the drive.

  “It’s not funny!” Grace declared, hands on hips.

  Oh, the poor responsible child, Nona thought. “I know it’s not funny,” she said soothingly. “And Grace, I do appreciate all your thoughtfulness and preparations. I know how much work has gone into this, and I’m very grateful. Now I’d better get dressed so I can attend this magnificent occasion.”

  Grace, appeased, kissed Nona on the cheek and marched off down the hall to help Mandy dress the babies. Helen waved at Nona from the hallway and went off to change. Glorious, already garbed for the evening in red satin, shut the bedroom door. “All right, Mrs. Nona, let’s get you beauteous.”

  Nona had been in her seventies when she first realized that simply taking a bath and arranging her hair took energy and stamina. She had expected, as the years passed, that she would have less ability for such things as charity committees and sailing, but it never occurred to her that some days she might feel just too tired and weak to brush her own hair. In her eighties, she had considered cutting it, but when she finally seated herself in the hairdresser’s chair, an emotion like fear swept through her, as if her hair were life itself and she did not want it cut short. She had always considered the expense of having one’s hair done a waste, especially for simple daily life, but that day, instead of a cut and style, she had a simple wash and blow-dry, and after that she had what the salon called a “standing” appointment.

  Nona soon came to enjoy the luxury of lying back in a chair with her neck braced on the cool porcelain as Brad’s capable hands caressed her scalp. And she looked forward to the hour of gossip at the salon and seeing other people, people whom she didn’t know: young girls getting ready for proms or bridal parties, growly-voiced men having their heads shaved as they raved about the deer on the island. It opened the world up to her a bit, and she came away looking much better than she did when she washed her own hair. It was something about a product they used that made her fine white hair look silky.

  Brad had begged to be able to do her hair in some fancy style for this birthday party, but the thought secretly terrified Nona. She didn’t want to show up in front of everyone who knew her with her hair all puffed out or curled, and she hated hair spray. For thirty years at least she had worn her hair the same way, pulled back from her face and fastened in a chignon at the back of her head. She’d worn it this way for so long she was surprised she still needed to use hairpins, surprised the hair didn’t just go into its little snail roll and stay there of its own accord.

  But of course it didn’t. She needed Glorious’s help to make it neat. But first she had to bathe, which she did with Glorious sitting outside the closed bathroom door, ready to rush in to Nona’s aid if she slipped or simply didn’t possess the power to step out of the tub. And getting out of the tub did take muscle and determination. After her bath, Nona sat for a few moments on a little stool, catching her breath. Glorious had seen her naked, of course. There had been the occasional sickness, when Nona was really too weak to get in and out of the tub herself. Glorious was patient, kind, even affectionate, but Nona still preferred her privacy as she pulled on and fastened her various undergarments. Afterward, she considered herself in the mirror. She appeared rather Germanic, girded for battle. Her braid still hung over her shoulder. All she needed was a shield, and she could be a Valkyrie. There her heavy breasts were, pooling into their cups like a pair of vanilla puddings. What pleasure they had given her all her life! She patted them gratefully. “Good girls,” she said.

  Then she opened the door and hobbled back into her bedroom. She sat on the bed and held up her arms like a little girl while Glorious slipped her floor-length navy-blue dress over her head.

  “I can’t remember when I wore this last,” Nona told Glorious. “It’s been at least a year. I wonder if I’ve shrunk some more. I hope the gown hasn’t gotten too long, I don’t want to step on the hem.”

  “Stand up and let’s see.”

  Glorious held out her wonderful strong arms. Nona put her own hands on them and used Glorious for support as she heaved herself up off the bed.

  “Oh, dear. Far too long. I’ve become a midget!”

  Glorious laughed wonderfully. “You don’t have your shoes on yet!”

  Nona held on to the bedpost while Glorious went to the closet and returned with Nona’s black court shoes. Glorious slipped one knee-high stocking and then the other over Nona’s legs, while Nona observed that her legs were not bad at all, for her age. But her feet were a disgrace. Her nails were cracking and yellow, and she had bunions, and everything was crooked. After wearing nothing but comfortable sneakers, the leather shoes felt like little prisons to her feet.

  “Oh, dear, Glorious. I don’t know if I can wear these. Do you suppose anyone would notice if I wore sneakers?”

  “Oh, Mrs. Nona, I almost forgot! I have a present for you.” Glorious reached into the pocket of her skirt and pulled out a package of foot inserts filled with turquoise bubbles. She maneuvered them into Nona’s shoes. “Now try.”

  Nona stood. “Glorious, it’s miraculous!” It was like standing on cushions. “How can something so thin feel so soft?”

  “It is a wonderful world we live in,” Glorious told her. “Now, look. Your dress is the perfect length.”

  “It is.”

  On her pillowed feet, Nona walked to her vanity and settled onto the stool. Her face was mirrored back to her in three different panes. She was ninety years old in each one. Glorious unbraided Nona’s white hair and brushed it—Nona closed her eyes and was a girl again—and coiled it into a crescent at the back of her head. When Glorious had finished, Nona patted her face with white powder and covered her thin lips with a bright red lipstick. She opened the vanity drawer and brought out a handsome black box, opened it, and lifted out her grandmother’s diamond brooch and matching earrings.

  “A young girl should wear these,” Nona said, as she screwed on the earrings.

  Glorious bent to pin on the brooch. “No, no, this is serious jewelry. Young girls are too frivolous. These are like medals of honor.”

  “Interesting perspective,” Nona said. She shook her head impatiently. “All right, I’m not going to get any younger staring at myself Help me up, Glorious, I think it’s time I got myself downstairs.”

  The hall was silent as Glorious and Nona processed toward the stairway. Nona knew she was late and everyone else was waiting for her, but that was as it should be. It was her birthday. Her family should be in attendance.

  “You look beautiful in that red dress,” Nona told Glorious.

  Glorious smiled shyly. “Thank you. I like wearing it.”

  “You know, I think we’re going to enjoy this evening,” Nona confided, leaning on Glorious’s arm.

  “I think we are,” Glorious agreed.

  Suddenly, before Nona had reached the bottom of the stairs, an explosion of noise swept through the house, as if every one of her family were talking at the same time as loudly as they could.

  Nona clutched Glorious’s arm more tightly. “I wonder what’s happened.”

  “Perhaps some flowers have arrived for you?” Glorious suggested.

  They walked as swiftly as Nona could into the living room. Everyone was there, and it was not flowers that had arrived but Nona’s youngest grandchild, Teddy.

 
“Teddy!” Nona gasped.

  Teddy wore shabby jeans, filthy sneakers, a wrinkled cotton shirt in yellow covered with dancing martini glasses, and a camel’s hair blazer Nona remembered he’d had back in boarding school. His long caramel-colored hair hung over his shirt collar, and his shirt hem hung over his sagging low-slung jeans. But his eyes were clear and his smile was contagious as always. “Nona, you look like a queen!” he said.

  Then Teddy took a slender young girl by the wrist and tugged her forward. “Nona, this is Suzette. Suzette, Nona.”

  Nona managed to keep what she hoped was a welcoming expression on her face as she extended her hand. “Hello, Suzette.”

  Suzette ducked her head shyly. She was petite and short and extremely thin. Her hair was as multicolored as a tabby cat and stuck out strangely, as if bits of paintbrushes had been glued on. Her eyes were a lovely blue, and her face was heart-shaped, but her nose was pierced with a little gold ring, a number of earrings sparkled from the rims of her ears, and she wore a tattoo of wings on her upper arm.

  Her outfit was strange. Riding low on her hips, a skirt swirling with shades of green fell to her feet. A white cotton off-the-shoulder gypsy blouse ended at her midriff. Between the two garments, Suzette’s round belly protruded nakedly. Nona could see the girl’s belly button, also pierced and sporting a gold ring. And she couldn’t miss the fact, so proudly displayed, that Suzette was exceedingly pregnant.

  Nine

  Charlotte was trying not to meet Oliver’s eye, because every time she did, they began to snicker, and they didn’t want their younger brother to feel they were conspiring against him. Although they often had, in their childhood. Charlotte and Oliver, older than Teddy by eight and six years, had been not really distant to Teddy as much as close to each other. Charlotte had always been a good girl, hating disorder and mess, and Oliver, though flamboyant and theatrical, had always wanted to please. Their younger brother’s continual rebellious antics were funny, or shocking, and often even irritating, in a salt-in-the-sugar-bowl kind of way.

  But this, even in Charlotte’s amused opinion, was going a little too far. It was probably to be expected that Teddy would show up for this occasion ill-dressed and late enough to make everyone one else late, too. Adding a pregnant girl was over the top. The poor little thing was making the parents and even the Ms nervous. Mellie, who had draped her own belly like a piano in winter storage, had taken one look at Suzette’s basketball and collapsed into a chair. Charlotte’s father was red in the face; Charlotte was afraid he might have a heart attack. Auntie Grace and Uncle Kellogg both looked smug, exchanging glances and quirked eyebrows that telegraphed clearly their pleasure that once again it was Worth’s child who was causing trouble.

  But Nona was cool, as she clasped Suzette’s hand. “Lovely to meet you, Suzette. And Teddy, come let me hug you.”

  Teddy loped forward to embrace Nona, and for a moment Nona’s face softened with pleasure as she patted her youngest grandchild’s back, and everyone else in the room could see Nona remembering how she had once held this man when he was a baby boy, how she had loved him then and loved him now.

  Aunt Grace trumpeted, “We’ll be late!” Shoving her way past her cluster of daughters, she reached Nona. “Nona. We need to take the photographs now.”

  Nona released her grandson and turned to her daughter. “Yes, dear, of course.”

  Grace went into directorial mode. “Nona, you sit here.” She gestured to a dining room chair she’d had Kellogg carry in. “Worth, you and Helen stand on Nona’s left, with your children in front of you, and Kellogg, you and I will stand on Nona’s right, with our family here and here.” She handed Glorious her digital camera. “You remember how to take the pictures?”

  “I do.” Glorious leaned against the wall, focusing the camera as everyone took his place.

  Grace ranged up and down the little assembly, checking and rechecking to be sure they were perfectly grouped. She bent to arrange Nona’s full skirts.

  Charlotte stood just behind Nona, with her mother just behind her, and Oliver on her left.

  “Owen, come stand next to Oliver,” Worth told his son’s partner.

  Grace bridled. “Worth. Is that appropriate? Sorry, Owen, I don’t mean to offend but it’s not as if you and Oliver are actually—um, married.”

  “They’ll be married this summer,” Nona reminded Grace smoothly. “I’d like Owen in the picture.”

  “Down, Daddee,” Christian whined, squirming impatiently in Claus’s arms. Next to him stood Mandy, holding baby Zoe, and on Mandy’s other side was pregnant Mellie with Douglas close to her, supporting her with his arm, and Mee had squeezed in close to Douglas, pouting at being alone.

  “For pity’s sake, try to look happy, Mee!” Grace commanded her youngest daughter. “Everyone, let’s have your best smile!”

  “Teddy,” Worth said, “you stand next to Owen.”

  Teddy stepped into the arrangement. “Suzette, you’ll be here, kind of in front of me,” he said.

  “Oh, really!” Grace turned red. “Teddy, this is a family photograph. A family record. This is your grandmother’s ninetieth birthday.” She approached Suzette, put a controlling hand on the girl’s arm, and tried to pull her out of the family group. “Suzette, it is lovely to meet you, but I’m sure you understand: only family members just for now.”

  “Auntie Grace,” Teddy said, with his sweet smile, “Suzette and I are married.”

  “Married!” Everyone in the room cried out the word simultaneously.

  Charlotte couldn’t help it. She looked at Oliver, and Oliver widened his eyes, and they both burst out laughing.

  “Married?” Worth was not amused. “Teddy, are you serious?”

  Helen left her place in the group and went to her son. “Teddy. Why didn’t you tell us? Why didn’t you invite us to the wedding? We didn’t even know you were—seeing someone.” She put a hand, not controlling but gentle and soothing, on Suzette’s arm. “My dear.” She studied the pregnant woman’s face. “You are having Teddy’s child.”

  Staring at the floor, Suzette said, “Well, maybe.”

  Another informational bomb. “Maybe?” everyone said.

  Charlotte struggled to contain herself. She collapsed in helpless hysteria against Oliver, who whispered into her ear, “Steady on.” The babble of voices filled the room.

  Grace said, “I need a drink.”

  Nona said, loudly, “I think we should get this picture taken or we’ll be late for my party. Grace, stop pacing around and come stand next to Kellogg, here on my left. Glorious, are you focused?”

  Glorious took several shots and showed them to Grace, who found something wrong with each one but finally threw up her hands and cried that they had to leave for the yacht club now. She insisted that Nona ride with her and Kellogg in the old Chrysler, and Nona objected, saying she wouldn’t ride with the top down, so Grace put the top up and Kellogg helped Nona fold her body into the front seat, then held the door for Glorious to squeeze into the backseat with him. Helen and Worth crowded with all the Ms into the Yukon and the Volvo. Charlotte told her brothers she was driving the Jeep and she thought she could fit everyone in—Oliver, Owen, Teddy and Suzette—if Suzette sat on Teddy’s lap, but to her immense surprise Teddy said thank you, no, he had rented a car and he’d prefer to drive Suzette in that, it would be safer, and they would have the use of seat belts. Charlotte looked at the vehicle parked on the white gravel and saw that it was a Taurus sedan.

  With much slamming of doors and rumbling of engines, the family set off, white gravel crackling and spewing up from the tires. Charlotte’s Jeep was at the end of the convoy. All around them the summer evening fell in gentle swaths of muted light and warmth, and for just a moment the peace of the island drifted by.

  Then Oliver leaned forward from the backseat and said, “Teddy has really outdone himself now. A wife! And a baby!”

  “And a Taurus!” Charlotte cried. “I thought I was going to faint.�
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  “I can’t wait to get Teddy alone,” Oliver said. “I can’t imagine why, of all the females our handsome Teddy could have chosen, he picked Suzette. I would never say this to Teddy, but Suzette is—”

  “Weird,” Owen suggested.

  “Yes, but more than that. I don’t want to be catty—”

  “Oh, please, Oliver, you’re with me.” Charlotte urged him on.

  “Well, folks, she’s so sallow.” Oliver sat back in his seat. “I’m sorry. I’m being a bitch.”

  “She looks as if she hasn’t had the best medical care in her life,” Charlotte pointed out, and the mood in the car plummeted.

  “You’re thinking drugs, aren’t you?” Oliver’s voice was serious now, too.

  “Oh, Oliver,” Charlotte said. “Drugs and a baby? I’ve read such terrible things about what babies have to endure when their mothers are on drugs.”

  No one spoke. Charlotte drove rapidly and carefully through the small town of Nantucket and out along Madaket Road toward the yacht club.

  Into the glum silence, Owen suggested, “Is it possible that Teddy is—well, tricking you all? That he’s hired this young woman to help him play a kind of practical joke?”

  “Oh, Owen, you’re a genius!” Charlotte leaned across to the passenger seat and kissed his cheek. “That is exactly the sort of thing Teddy would do.”

  “I’m not so sure,” Oliver said, from where he’d subsided into a corner of the backseat. “I mean, he’s always ready to torment Mom and Dad, but Nona? He adores Nona. He wouldn’t want to ruin her birthday.”

  “Nona didn’t look particularly tormented,” Charlotte remarked. She turned into the yacht club parking lot. “Look at all the cars! It’s going to be a fabulous mob for Nona’s party!”

  Owen said, “Charlotte, let me get in the driver’s seat and find a parking space. You and Oliver go on in.”