One Sweet Day

by Elle Tyler

  I smiled. She looked a bit like Everly when she squinted. “I’m Callum Andrew Trovatto. Everly is my girlfriend.”

  “So why aren’t you asking Everly about all this stuff?”

  “Dr. Brighton is not a fan of her being in love. I guess I’m interested in knowing why.”

  “Hmm.” She nodded. “He moved her away from you, too, did he?”

  “He made me move away from her.”

  “Well,” she said with a laugh, “Callum Andrew, he is a ruthless man who cares about nothing except that little girl. So quit while you’re ahead.”

  “Sorry?”

  “I said quit—”

  “No,” I began, “what did you say about Everly?”

  “He adores that child beyond all sense. Do you not know this?”

  “It’s a little hard to tell, honestly. He makes her life miserable.”

  “No.” She shook her head. “He makes her life possible. You know how many times that kid nearly killed herself with that... whatever the heck it was called... falling down all the time, sunburns from the pool that needed hospitalization. Fevers, oh the fevers! It was nonstop. Did she ever go brain dead?”

  “No, ma’am. Everly is fine. Smart. Vibrant.”

  “Well then, I guess her daddy did a good thing taking her to New York. I guess he was right—they have better doctors and hospitals there. Even though it killed my poor brother, Wiley, taking that last bit of Merriam away from him. He talked about that little girl until his last breath. I reckon, somewhere in the middle of Webster’s cemetery, there is a ghost wandering around talking about his granddaughter and all the other ghosts are looking at him like he’s crazy, running off at the mouth about some little girl named Peach.”

  Sparks ignited inside of my chest as soon as she said her name. “He called her that?”

  “Of course he called her that. She was a little Georgia girl.” She laughed.

  “Will you tell me more about him?”

  She sighed. “Boy, you are handsome as the devil. Why would you ever get involved with the troubles of this family? Go find yourself a nice girl who doesn’t have a daddy that’ll kill you. They make plenty of those these days. ‘Specially round Atlanta.”

  I smiled. “I don’t want a nice girl with a daddy that won’t kill me. I want to die loving this one impossible girl who I might not ever see again.”

  “Hmm.” She measured me. “No wonder he doesn’t like you... You’re just like him. It’s why my brother didn’t like Timothy. The fool never backed down, no matter what.”

  I picked up her basket full of tomatoes. “I’ll work here with you all day for free, doing whatever you need done, as long as you’ll tell me about this.”

  “Why?” She sighed. “Why does it matter so much?”

  “Because...” I searched for Everly... there..., under my ribs... That’s where she had been hiding. “I need hope.”

  The woman stared pitifully at me and then waved for me to follow her to another bright cluster of tomatoes. “Your hands are too clean to be a farmer,” she commented. “Don’t tell me you’re a tax collector or lawyer or something foul.”

  “More foul.” I laughed. “I’m a doctor.”

  She crossed herself.

  I laughed harder.

  “Well, I have two rules in this garden, Callum Andrew. One, my name is Pearl, not ma’am. I’m aging, not old. Two, you best be careful with my tomatoes. They are my pride and joy.”

  “I will, Miss Pearl. I promise.”

  “With both pinkie fingers?”

  My hand paused, mid-reach for a tomato. Ah, there she was again.

  ***

  Pearl cooked fried chicken, corn pudding, and a cucumber-and-tomato salad for supper. We drank iced tea that was sweet enough to kill a diabetic just by looking at the glass. I asked her for three servings. I didn’t want to leave her house. She didn’t have air conditioning, didn’t want any, and her couch smelled like every cat that had ever lived there, but she showed me pictures of Everly Anne as a kid with her grandpa. Pearl smiled honestly when she spooned food onto my plate, and she had a heart that reminded me of the one I was missing.

  “Ah,” she said, nodding, “yes, this was Merriam.” She handed me an article clipped from an old newspaper. “Wiley was so proud, seeing his little girl in the paper.”

  I stared at the picture of a blonde-haired woman on the arm of a tall, wide-shouldered man. A second glance showed a third person, hidden beneath a floral-print dress.

  “She was pregnant with Everly here?” I tipped my glass toward the paper. “That’s her?”

  “Mm,” Pearl hummed. “That was her all right. One big happy family.”

  “She does look like her,” I said. “It’s pretty incredible, actually.”

  “You have a picture of Everly all grown up?” Pearl asked.

  “Um, yeah.” I pulled my cell out and scrolled back to the weekend in Montauk. “That’s my Everly Anne.” I showed her the phone. “Beautiful, right?”

  “Mm, sure is. Definitely Merriam’s kid.”

  I admired Everly’s face before I tucked the phone back into my pocket. Pearl got up and went into the kitchen as I flipped through photos inside a shoebox. When she came back, she had two heaping slices of apple pie with vanilla ice cream.

  “You’re spoiling me tonight.” I laughed. “And possibly giving me diabetes.”

  “Hush with that. Eat your pie.”

  As I took a bite, she collected the photos from the table and then looked at me. “She ever tell you about how her daddy got Wiley to surrender?”

  I shook my head. “Everly doesn’t know much about Merriam. Timothy doesn’t talk about her.”

  “She must’ve forgot Wiley telling her, then.” Pearl took a deep breath as she thought. “Let’s see. He was a doctor already, I recall that part, and I think Merriam was about to graduate high school. But they dated for so long. That was why Wiley had such a problem with Timothy—his age. He was scared of his girl being taken advantage of by an older man. But Merriam was head-over-heels for that man. They got into so much trouble sneaking around. Anyhow.” She sighed. “Timothy had a good practice going for himself, and then he did something with a study, and they wrote about him in this magazine or something... And after that, he was someone to know. They had him flying all around the country just for his opinion!” She barked out a laugh and then took a bite of pie. “He was in New York for a while, and then when he came back, it was like he was on fire. He marched right up to Wiley in the middle of church—Church, I tell you!—and told him, ‘Mr. Ottaline, I am here to marry your daughter, sir.’ Can you believe that? In church?”

  I smiled. “I can, actually. But what did Wiley say to him?”

  “Well...” She wiped her mouth. “Wiley didn’t tell him anything in church, but when they got home and found Timothy waiting on the porch? Wiley’s shotgun had a whole lot to say.”

  “They got married somehow, though. He must have said something right.”

  “No,” Pearl replied. “It wasn’t him, it was Merriam. See, Wiley had a transportation business. Mostly trucks, but he had a small railway, too. The company was going broke, and Wiley was about to lose everything, including his house, but Merriam went to Timothy and begged him to help her daddy—and you know what?”

  “Timothy saved his business,” I said. “He gave him the money.”

  “In a roundabout sort of way, yeah, he gave him the money. Wiley got all the business he needed from all the fancy places that just loved Doctor Brighton. Of course, he never told Wiley about helping him out, but then Merriam had to go running her mouth off when Wiley wouldn’t let Tim come get her one night, and she was yelling at her daddy about how much he owed Tim and all he had done to save him. It was a nasty fight, but it was the last. Wiley gave up after that.”

  “I guess he didn’t have much of a choice.”

  “No, I reckon he didn’t.” Pearl looked at my empty plate. “You want more pie?”

  �
��No.” I smiled. “But I do have another question.”

  She smiled back with a heavy sigh. “’Course you do.”

  “Do you know what happened to the train?”

  “Most likely rusted to scrap. In a heap somewhere out in the yard.”

  I sat forward. “It’s here?”

  “Somewhere out there, sure.”

  I stood up, overly excited by her news. “Show me, please. I want to see.”

  Pearl laughed at me. “Callum Andrew, you know how many acres there are on this property? The darn thing is probably buried under years of growth. It’d take a miracle to find that train. And even if you did, what in the world would you ever do with the thing?”

  I paused for a moment. “Those are all very good questions, Pearl.” She smiled at me, and then my phone started beeping. “Duty calls.”

  “Typical man,” she huffed. “Eat and run.”

  I put out my hand for hers. “It was a pleasure, Miss Pearl. Honest to God.”

  She shook my hand. “You better always be.” And then she hugged me far too tightly for a woman so slight. “You come back any time you want. Don’t get too many handsome young men knocking on my door these days.”

  I smiled at her. “You? No. I bet that’s why the door is so worn out.”

  “The only thing worn out round here, Callum Andrew, is my feet.” As Pearl walked me to the door, she added, “But if that man Peter Everdeen ever came around, well, I might be able to say something a bit more scandalous.”

  I turned to her once I reached the porch. “Who is Peter Everdeen?”

  “Oh, you don’t know him? He’s got a sick kid up at Atlanta. Figured that’s where you were a doc.”

  “I am, but it’s also a big hospital, and I don’t work in pediatrics.”

  “His boy doesn’t stay in the hospital, but he sure is in and out of one quite a lot. Figured that you might have seen him because of that.”

  “If I have, I don’t remember him, Miss Pearl.”

  Her eyes brightened. “Oh, you’d remember Peter Everdeen. He’s quite something to behold.”

  I smiled. “Well, if I see him, I’ll be sure to put in a good word on your behalf. Tell him where to find the best apple pie and company in Red Pine.”

  “No wonder Everly loves you.” She blushed.

  My chest ached. “I have to get going. Thank you again.”

  “Hey,” she called. “Peter Everdeen is also a rather handy fellow. If you really want to find that old train, he’d be the man up for the task.”

  “Miss Pearl?”

  “Yeah, boy?”

  “Next Sunday, you better make enough pie to feed two grown men.”

  ***

  It took Peter Everdeen—a tall, bristly-faced man with a permanent “no bullshit” expression—six Sundays, eight pies, and half of the summer to finally unearth the remains of a train car. We crossed over thirty acres of Pearl’s land, unloading two dump trunks full of dirt, grass, and strangled weeds.

  I collected a box from Pearl filled with hundreds of pictures and articles. I found myself surrounded by numbers and stories and inklings of the heartbeat I had searched so hard to find, and yet I still hadn’t collected enough to ease the aching inside of my chest.

  TO REMEMBER

  28.

  “AN ASSASSIN,” NICK SAID.

  “No.”

  He tried again. “A Chinese spy.”

  “She’s American, idiot. Blonde hair, green eyes.”

  “Human trafficking. Brighton smuggled her in and married her at age fifteen.”

  I sighed as we watched the ocean waves roll. “I thought you were good at conspiracy theories, Nick. Who the hell is going to believe any of those?”

  “I thought the last one seemed pretty legit, given the shit you’ve told me about her dad.” He shrugged, swallowing down the last sip of his beer.

  “It should be something positive. I don’t want Everly remembered as a damn traitor or child bride.”

  “So, an assassin, then?”

  “Be-leave-A-bull.”

  He laughed, sinking down into the sand. “I’m no good with fairy tales, brother.”

  Tatum found us on the beach and took a seat on Nick’s lap, handing him another beer. He took a sip and passed it back, but she shook her head.

  “What’s with you tonight?” he asked. “You’re sober as a... Callum. You’re as sober as him.”

  She smiled. “Just don’t wanna get all sleepy.”

  “You’re a liar,” he said before he took a long sip. “What’s with you? Tell me.”

  She glanced between us and then said, “Pregnant women can’t drink.”

  “Yeah, so, what does that have to do—? Oh holy Christ.”

  I smiled but looked away, feeling too much like I was spying on a secret.

  “Sorry,” she said. “I didn’t want to say anything this weekend.”

  I shook my head, knowing what she meant. “I’m happy for you, Tater.”

  “Yeah?”

  “Of course. You’re my best friend.”

  I glanced to Nick, but he was still as a statue.

  “Think he’s going into shock?” She laughed.

  But before I could reply, he pulled her against him so fiercely, I was almost afraid he would crush her from his hold. They spoke in hushed Greek as I watched the waves. And dreamed.

  And dreamed.

  And dreamed.

  And dreamed.

  ***

  When I reached the top of the lighthouse, I pulled one of the pictures Pearl had given me from my pocket. I showed it to the sun and allowed the wind to dance across her innocent face. Then, with one flick of my fingers, I gave her back to the sky, as I allowed the picture to fly away, answering her question from the last Fourth of July.

  “That’s what a bird would feel like, Everly Anne,” I said to myself. “That’s what it would feel like to fly in Montauk.”

  The picture disappeared too quickly for my eyes to follow. I wondered what someone might think if they ever found it on the beach. Would they keep it? Would they stuff it into a bottle and send it out into the ocean with a note, hoping that it would find its rightful home?

  There was a group of children playing on the beach below, running to and from the water, screaming and laughing. So young. So free. Their stories unwritten. I wondered what they would think of her picture if it washed up on the shore. What would they say about a mysterious little girl trapped inside of a bottle?

  ***

  On the Fourth of July, before the firework show, the shore was lined with endless red balloons. A little girl ran up to me, eyes wide, as she admired my work.

  “Can I pretty please have a balloon?” she begged.

  “What’s your name?”

  “Shannon Elizabeth Patterson!” She proudly smiled.

  “You know you shouldn’t talk to strangers, don’t you, Shannon Elizabeth Patterson?”

  The girl stepped closer, cupping her hands around her mouth. “My mom knows you. It’s okay if you know my name, she knows your name. Says it all the time in her sleep. At least my daddy says she does.”

  I glanced to her mother who sat ten feet away, cuddling another child. “I haven’t ever met her, Shannon.”

  Still whispering her secret to me, she added, “She said you’re the most handsome doctor in Montauk.”

  I laughed. “Yeah? To who?”

  “Aunt Margo. Then my dad heard. Then they got into a big fight.”

  “Well, sweetheart, I’m not a doctor in Montauk. I live in Georgia.”

  “Then why are you here with all these balloons?” she asked.

  “I’m visiting my family for the weekend. It’s been our tradition ever since I was little like you.”

  “Why?”

  I took a breath. “Because I had a friend who had a daddy in the military, and one year his daddy never came home, and he got really sad. So my daddy promised him every year he’d stay with us at the beach and we’d all be togethe
r. And when my friend grew up, he joined the military, too, and that made my other friend, a girl, really sad because she loved him, so I promised her I’d always be here on the Fourth with her, even if someday he didn’t come home.”

  “You mean if he died,” she said.

  I smiled sadly at her. “Yes, if he died.”

  “Are the balloons for him? Did he die?”

  “No, the balloons are for someone else.”

  Her eyes lit up. “So can I have one?”

  “Well.” I sighed. “I certainly won’t mind if you take one, but be warned, it’s at your own risk. I’m leaving them here for Topolina. She might not take too kindly to another girl stealing her rubies.”

  “I’m not stealing anything!” she exclaimed. “And it’s a balloon! Not a ruby!”

  I smiled, drawing a balloon down with me to the girl’s eye-level. “Topolina believes they are rubies. I’m trying to get her to come ashore.”

  “Who is Topolina?” she whispered.

  “A mermaid,” I whispered back. “The most beautiful mermaid in the entire ocean, with eyes like emeralds and a heart made of gold.”

  I had her. “You’ve seen a mermaid?”

  “I have kissed a mermaid.”

  “And she didn’t kill you?”

  I laughed. “Topolina is a very sweet mermaid. Sweet as a peach.”

  “So why can’t I have a balloon then?” the little girl whined.

  “Topolina made me promise to always be waiting for her, and if she sees me giving away her rubies, then she might think I don’t love her as much as I do.”

  “Why does she think they’re rubies?”

  “Because Topolina has a very good imagination, and when she sees the shore lined in red balloons, she won’t see balloons, she’ll see treasure. To her, these balloons will be like rubies.”

  The little girl thought for a moment. “Okay. But if she doesn’t come, can I have a balloon then? Err, ruby?”