Dark Beach

by Ash, Lauren

  “We should do this again sometime.” Kurt leaned over the counter to look at her.

  She was a mess. Her hair was frizzy, her makeup washed off, and she was still wearing an ugly pale green hospital gown and matching robe. Kurt had at least requested that his buddy bring him a change of clothes.

  “You look great. Look at those tan grippy socks—don’t you just love grippy socks?”

  “Stop it. I know what I look like, and what I feel like. And there is no way in hell you’re going to see me again.”

  “Oh, come on now. It was a good day. We’re here. We got to know each other.” He coughed and winked at her. “Very well.”

  Jenny stood up and leaned on the counter. Pushing her nose right up to his, she said, “I’m going to say thank you. I know you risked your life to save me, but I’m never EVER going to see you again.” She leaned down, snatched up the white plastic hospital bag from Kurt’s dirty floor and rifled through it for her car keys. Eventually finding them stuck in a pocket somewhere, she said, “I hope this key still works.”

  “Salt water can be harsh, especially on batteries. Don’t worry. I’ll take you home if it doesn’t.”

  “Like I said: it better work.”

  “Come on. I’ll see you out.”

  The button felt stiff, but Jenny kept pressing it. “This thing…”

  “Here, let me look at it.” Kurt put out an open hand. “Take the fob off your key ring.”

  He fidgeted with the fob until he got the back off, and then took the battery out, wiped it on his pants, and put it back in. He pressed the button. Nothing. “Looks like you need a ride home.”

  “But my purse is in my car,” Jenny said, exasperated. She put her face up to the tinted glass and checked the front seats, then the back. “Wait. I don’t see it in here.” She scratched her head.

  “You sure you didn’t bring it on the Retty?”

  “Maybe. I don’t remember.”

  “Here, take a seat in my truck and get warmed up.” Kurt opened the passenger door of his worn orange Ford, turned the ignition on, and flipped on the heat. “Just give it a minute. I’ll go down there real quick and look. What’s it look like?”

  “It’s black, shiny, small, one long over-the-shoulder strap.”

  “Sit tight.”

  “I really need to get home.”

  “Just a minute.” Closing the car door, he then ran off down the pier.

  Jenny waited until he was out of sight. Then she scooted over into the driver’s seat, released the hand brake, and put the truck into reverse. “This thing is heavy.”

  The truck was slow to accelerate, but once it got going she felt as though she could plow down anything in sight. She rolled down her window for some air; it felt fantastic.

  There was not a light on in the beach house. “Kip!” She hurried up the rickety steps and unlocked the front door.

  “Hello? Molly? Anyone here?”

  “Shhh.”

  “Kip?” Jenny whispered.

  Molly Coggington pointed to the small shape curled up in the rocking chair in the living room, rocking gently back and forth.

  “Oh, my God. Are you two okay?”

  Mrs. Coggington nodded and smiled.

  “She’s sleeping—my Kip?”

  “She’s fine.”

  “I’m sorry. I had an accident. I couldn’t come back and I don’t have my cell phone.”

  “It’s on the counter.” She pointed.

  “It is? I couldn’t find it earlier. I don’t know what to say. You’ve been here all day. I can’t thank you enough.”

  “Don’t worry.” Molly tilted her head at Jenny’s gown. “I meant to tell you. You need to ring Ron.”

  “Thanks. I did. It was a bad day. I … I … don’t know where to begin.” Jenny started fidgeting, wringing her hands.

  “It’s fine. You look exhausted, poor dear.”

  “I’ll get her to bed, Molly. Thank you.”

  Jenny carried her little girl steadily up the stairs. “My little angel baby, I love you,” she whispered, holding the child close and relishing the soft scent of no-tears shampoo and talc. Kip murmured in her sleep. “And you love me.” She placed the precious bundle down on her bed and tucked the sheets in over her. “There, there. Mamma won’t leave you again. It’s just the two of us now … well maybe the three of us.” Jenny patted her belly under the hospital gown. “Go to sleep. Tomorrow is a new day.”

  * * *

  Kurt stood outside the shop, clutching Jenny’s purse in hand. “I need a beer.”

  One cold beer later, and his feet up on the counter in the back of the shop, Kurt tried to tune out. He tossed the empty can across the room, missing the trashcan, and then pulled another from his twelve-pack carton and downed it as quickly as the first.

  The last woman had been a local—hot though. It had ended very badly. He had tried to stay away from her afterward. Of course, the locals had mostly taken her side. Could he really blame them? He had been a bit of a rogue. Still, the dirty looks got old.

  “Women!” He shook his head and snapped open another beer. At the back of his mind, a voice nagged, I’m just no good. Even my mother left me.

  Once a good buzz set in, Kurt stumbled down the back stairs to the Retty. He downed a fourth can on the way and chucked the empty into the bushes.

  “Thar she is, my pirate ship. I have no maiden, for am I laden.” He burped loudly and stumbled over onto the bow. “She’s no whore and certainly not a bore … and I’m no poet, that’s for sure.” He raised his beer can in the air and hollered. “Jenny—to you—you stole my truck, and my heart, but not my ship!”

  And you’re married and you’re pregnant, he thought. What the hell?

  He leaned over the side, gazing down into the oily water. There was not a fish in sight. “Whoa there, buddy. Hold on.” He slid on the slippery deck and then tried to regain balance, but his feet gave way, dropping him hard to the deck. His head knocked with a thump against the wooden railing as he went down.

  * * *

  “Charlie? Charlie!”

  “Charlie. Charlie.”

  “Where’s our doggie, Kip?” Jenny and Kip, both bundled in layers of warm grey sweatshirts, had searched the entire beach house, from top to bottom. Out on the lower back patio, they watched the wind whip at the tall grass and felt its salty lick from the corner of the patio, welcoming them to the morning.

  There was no sign of Charlie anywhere. Jenny had put his food and water out inside the night before, thinking maybe he had just been hiding somewhere, afraid of the commotion from the police visit, but he’d touched none of it. Perhaps he escaped outside? She placed the food on the back doorstep, and called his name again.

  “Come sit by me.” Jenny sat and patted a white plastic beach chair next to her, identical to her own. “We’ll wait here and see if he comes.”

  “Charlie.”

  “Do you like the beach?”

  “Ya.”

  “It’s pretty here. Daddy wants to buy this house. Do you think we should?”

  “Ya.”

  Too worried to sit, Jenny stood again and paced the edge of the concrete patio, back and forth, calling out sporadically.

  “Maybe we should call your daddy and see what he thinks?”

  Kip nodded, her curls bouncing with the force of her exaggeration.

  Jenny held down the number one on her cell phone.

  “Honey, good morning,” Ron answered. “I miss you so much.”

  “I miss you, too.” She meant it.

  “So what’s going on? How come you couldn’t talk yesterday? Are you okay?”

  “I’m fine. I feel great. I slept great last night. I just had a strange day yesterday.”

  Silence.

  “Well?” he asked, finally. “Tell me.”

  “I fell. I had to go to the hospital.”

  “What?”

  “I was in the ER when I called you. There were people around, listening. I coul
dn’t talk.”

  Ron moved back, away from the sooty dry dock doors and the racket of drilling and hammering. He pressed two fingers against his other ear and huddled into a quiet, but just as filthy, corner. “You fell? Another blackout?”

  “Yes, another episode. But I’m fine now. I’m back here, at the beach house.”

  “I think you should just try to rest today. Don’t go out.”

  “I will. I’ll stay here.”

  “And put your feet up, and make sure you eat well.”

  “I will … don’t worry.” Jenny continued pacing.

  “And the cops?”

  “They saw boot prints in the sand, but whoever it was had gone. The prints washed away farther down the beach. They asked me if I had a gun?”

  “Do you?”

  “I said I didn’t have one. By the way, I still can’t find Charlie. I’ve been looking all morning.”

  “When did you last see him?” Ron sounded worried.

  “Maybe before the guy with the lantern.”

  “Two nights ago? Keep looking for him. You know he does this all the time. He’s probably outside. Maybe he’s in the car?”

  “He’s not in the car.”

  “The garage?”

  “I checked there.”

  “Have you tried his special treats—the pepperoni ones?”

  “Yes.”

  Ron waved away a welder who was hovering nearby to ask a question. “Have you been anywhere else, anywhere you can think of?”

  “Maybe.”

  The welder wouldn’t leave.

  “I’m sorry, I have to go. Keep looking. He’ll turn up. He’s like that. He takes off and comes back sometimes. You know that.”

  “I know. But we’re in a new place. He only does that at home. It just doesn’t make any sense.”

  “He’s around. Now go rest. I’ll call you later. I love you.”

  “I love you, too.”

  Jenny hung up and plopped back down on the cold plastic chair. Kip grinned at her, happy to have company.

  “DOG!” Jenny called. “Where are you?” She turned to Kip and extended her hand. “Let’s go down the beach path, see if we can see anything. Come on, follow me.” Stopping at the entrance to the dune, she examined the ground for footprints. Prints from the officers and deeper, larger prints from the unknown man jumbled together. She followed them, pushing through the grass, but there was no sign of the dachshund’s trail.

  “He didn’t come down here.” She stood before the dune drop-off. “I don’t see anything. Where could he be?”

  Kip shrugged.

  “Let’s go back.”

  When they reached the house, Kip ran back over to the chairs and sat, but Jenny shook her head. “Come on inside while I look.” She settled Kip on the couch with a biscuit and a glass of milk and went to search the back of the beach house again. No joy. She searched the patio, the deck of the master bedroom, and even the deck up on the hex room, scanning from side to side. No sign.

  The basement.

  She stopped at the basement door.

  The door was unlocked, the room dark as ever. The old red chest sat by the wall untouched. The shelves stacked with home-preserved goods and all the corroded tools looked the same.

  “Charlie?”

  Silence.

  “You in here, doggie?” She heard a noise behind her and turned to find Kip. “Kip, go back and sit. I don’t want you in here. There’s too many things to trip over, okay honey. Charlie?”

  Nothing.

  She searched the cramped space, bumping into just about everything and getting her hair caught on God-only-knows what.

  This place needs to be gutted. “Ugh … spider webs! Ugh! Get them off me!”

  She whirled around, patting at her hair and face, and then heard a faint whine. A little black paw poked out from behind the grey shelves. “Charlie!” Kneeling down, she touched him. “Oh my God, Charlie. Oh, my poor puppy.”

  A dark smear of blood trailed behind him as Jenny slid him out of the corner—his back left paw caught in a rusty old mousetrap.

  “Oh, Charlie.” Tears stung her eyes. Carefully, she picked him up. The dog’s eyes were closed, his breathing shallow.

  “You followed me down here that night, you poor thing. I didn’t know. I’m so sorry. It’s all my fault, you poor little thing.”

  “Mamma?” Kip still stood at the basement door.

  “Don’t come in here! It’s dangerous. Back up, back up,” Jenny yelled, swiping at a tear and knowing she was unable to show the composure necessary to deal with Kip just now.

  “Charlie?”

  “I’ve got him, honey.” Jenny squeezed past the junk and out, pulling the basement door shut behind her. “Charlie’s hurt, honey. We must go inside, come.”

  “Charlie hurt. Uh-oh.”

  Jenny piled some kitchen towel down on the counter and placed the dachshund on top. “I don’t know what to do.”

  The metal teeth of the trap were clamped down firmly on the dog’s paw, cutting to the bone. Taking a dishtowel, she wrapped it delicately around the dog’s paw. Charlie didn’t even wince at the pain.

  “Mamma, hungry.”

  “Not now.” Jenny ran her hands through her hair, thinking. Then she frantically fumbled through every cupboard and pulled open every drawer, hunting for a telephone directory or address book.

  “There’s got to be a vet in town.” Snatching her cell phone up off the bench, she dialed Molly Coggington’s number and explained the problem.

  “Poor Charlie,” the old woman clucked. “And of course I’ll watch Kip for you; just drop her around. The veterinarian is down on Shore Street, right near the supermarket.”

  “Thank you. You’re a lifesaver,” Jenny said. “Be there in five.”

  Wrapping Charlie in a blanket, she carried him out to Kurt’s truck.

  Shit! “I don’t have your car seat,” she told Kip. “You’ll just have to sit in the middle, by me, until we get to Mrs. Coggington’s.” The thought gnawed at her. Drive carefully, Jenny, she thought, gently placing Charlie on the floor in the back.

  * * *

  The day was slow, very slow. Jean sat staring at the computer screen—solitaire. “Close early?” she asked, more a suggestion than a question.

  “No. You never know when there’s going to be an emergency.” Just as the words left the veterinarian’s mouth, Jenny burst through the front doors.

  “My dog—he’s dying.”

  Their eyes widened at the sight of her. Jenny’s blonde hair was frizzled in all directions. Blood stained her grey sweatshirt, and the look on her face said only one thing—something was dreadfully wrong.

  “Bring him out back. I’m Doctor Shooner.”

  The vet’s office was cleaner, brighter, and way more organized than the ER Jenny had been in the day before. “Place him here.” The vet patted the stainless steel table.

  Jenny carefully placed Charlie on it. The vet took a look.

  “The mousetrap,” he said, examining Charlie’s paw. “How long?”

  “Two days.”

  “I’ll take care of him. First, we need to get this thing off.”

  Jenny rubbed Charlie’s velvety black head. “It’ll be okay, boy.” She watched the veterinarian gather supplies. “What do I do?”

  “You can stay here and watch, or Jean will see to you up front. I need to set up a sterile field and get some fluids in him.”

  “I don’t want to leave him.”

  “It may be unpleasant. You probably don’t want to be here for what I have to do.”

  “What? What is it?”

  “His leg looks infected,” he said, giving the dog a shot of something. “He’s lost a lot of blood. I may have to amputate. And he may need a transfusion. He may not make it.”

  Jenny’s look of concern turned to horror. “He’s going to—”

  “I don’t know. I will do everything I can. We may have to put him down.”

  Jenn
y burst into tears. Shocked, she rubbed her face, accidentally smearing herself with Charlie’s blood. “No. No, don’t put him down. Do everything—everything you can.”

  Jean, looking incongruous in her tight black skirt and high black heels, entered. “You can come with me if you like?”

  “Yes. I don’t think I can watch this.” She followed the receptionist to the front desk.

  “I’ll need you to fill out some paperwork.”

  Jenny shook her head. “Paperwork! I can’t think about that right now.” Jenny leaned over, head in hands on the grey marble counter. The young receptionist frowned, pulled a wad of sterile wipes from a caddy on the wall and wiped at a smear of blood near Jenny’s elbow, causing Jenny to step back.

  “It’s okay. Don’t worry, I got it. Here...” The nurse handed her a wipe. “Do you have pet insurance?”

  “Yes.” Jenny tried to wipe the congealing blood off her hands.

  “May I see your card please, and your ID?”

  “My ID?”

  “Yes please.”

  “I don’t have it with me.”

  “I need to see it to process the paperwork.” The secretary’s tone became officious.

  Jenny scowled. “I can’t believe you’re speaking to me like that. Look at me.” She held up her hands, indicating her hair and the bloodstains. “My dog may die.” Taking another step back, she said loudly, “I’m going through hell, and you’re bugging me about paperwork?”

  “I know. And I apologize, but I still need your ID and insurance card.” The receptionist sighed and rubbed her forehead. A huge diamond ring—three carats at least—sparkled on her hand.

  “You’re married to him, aren’t you?”

  “Excuse me?”

  “The vet—he’s your husband.”

  The secretary stood, flipping her long, jet hair over her shoulder. “I am.”

  “I’ll be back.” Just as she had burst in, Jenny turned and burst out through the glass doors, which slammed shut behind her.

  Stabbing the key into the ignition, she wrenched the wheel left and headed into town. When she got there, she pulled to a screeching halt, hard and fast, spraying dirt up into the main road.

  The tackle shop was empty.