Sand dollar

by Hollye Davis

  “Sorry, you weren’t answering my knock,” he explained as he took a tentative step toward her, his gaze on the knife in her hand. She glanced at the knife still gripped tightly and carefully placed it on the counter. She stepped around him to turn the stereo down.

  “Sorry,” she mumbled with her head down. “Don’t apologize, I enjoyed the show,” his voice was laced with humor.

  She bet he found it amusing and the spectacle she presented. Embarrassed, she avoided his eyes and expression until he put his hand on her arm. She peered up quickly, questioningly. “That’s better you shouldn’t keep your head down so much,” he said softly, his hand still on her arm.

  As a reflex she apologized, “Sorry.”

  He sighed as if her apology bothered him and let go of her arm.

  She stepped around him again to finish the meal. The task before her became nearly impossible as she felt his eyes following her. Fortunately, this was one of her favorite recipes and hard to mess up. Delivering it to the table without dumping it on her, him, or the ground was a whole different challenge. Not especially coordinated to begin with but then add a hunky guy in the equation and she was positively challenged.

  Once the meal was completed she knocked over the saltshaker, but other than that she was able to place the food on the table without any major catastrophe.

  Thankfully, Edwin didn’t say much while they ate because she pretty sure intellectual conversation was beyond her. What was it about him that made her stupid?

  When he finished, he sighed, “Delicious,” patting his lean stomach. He pushed his chair back to rise and put his dish in the sink.

  “Let’s go for another walk, shall we?” he suggested.

  She didn’t answer, nor did she think, she simply followed, and in truth, she would have followed him anywhere which scared her witless.

  They walked in silence watching a set of dolphins play and a boat bob in the distance. Edwin would break the silence every once in a while to tell her about what was further down the beach or how the beach was different from his homeland, England.

  Somehow in the midst of all the small talk she realized she was falling hard for him. It was ridiculous since didn’t have a chance with him but somehow her silly girlish heart refused to listen.

  As soon as the realization of her feelings hit her, fear nearly suffocated her to the point of choking. She forcefully thrust her feelings aside and focused solely on their budding friendship which she was beginning to realize was the most important event in her small pathetic life.

  After their walk, Edwin left and the afternoon was empty. The only thing she could think to do was take a nap in preparation for the late night near the fire. When she couldn’t force her body to rest unnecessarily, she finally got dressed, spending extra time on her hair, then got mad for making the effort.

  With nothing left to do, she made her way out to the back deck to watch the sun set. As usual it was glorious. When black surrounded her, her heart began to pound with anticipation.

  It wasn’t long when she noticed that both Christoph and Edwin came to escort her to the fire. It was obvious they were having an argument but by the time they got close enough for her to hear they stopped.

  Beautiful Christoph with all his charm smiled at her but it was Edwin’s brooding good looks that made her heart sing. She scolded herself. They were both her friends. Setting her shoulders, determined not to show her favoritism, she smiled at both said jokingly, “Are you afraid I would try to escape and run off the other direction?”

  Christoph laughed, then bowed elegantly as if she was a princess, “My lady.”

  “Oh geez, whatever Christoph,” she grinned playfully hit his arm with her hand. He made her feel comfortable but that was it. With a grin still on her lips she turned to Edwin, but he did not return a smile, in fact he seemed almost unpleasant, borderline angry. Her heart sunk to her stomach sending sharp pains through her body.

  Edwin’s bad mood continued at the campfire, his tension was palpable. She could see it roll through him. Everyone said hi but she was too distracted and worried to converse tonight. Sitting quietly next to Christoph, she snuck covert glances in Edwin’s direction, but all he did was send dark glances at Christoph.

  Finally after a few one word answers from her Christoph said exasperated, “You don’t seem to be having a good time tonight Cloe, is something wrong?”

  She blinked a couple of times clearing her thoughts and answered, “I’m fine, maybe a bit tired.” Searching her brain she tried hard to come up with some sort of conversation to get away from her insecure feelings. “Umm,” she started dumbly, “it sure was a beautiful day.” Christoph smiled sympathetically, too polite to call out her lame efforts.

  Duke, bless his heart, broke through the awkward conversation effectively changing her ridiculous attempt at small talk. He spoke about a “totally awesome” surf spot that people come from all over to surf. She nodded and pasted a smile on as Duke continued, but her mind wasn’t on surf or any other subject except Edwin. Her eyes felt scratchy from the smoke as the fire died down, it was time to leave again. She hated being the first to leave but her friends had conditioned themselves to stay out longer than what she was used to.

  When she said her goodbyes Christoph began to get up but before he could fully rise Edwin walked by and pushed him back into the sand. Christoph laughed but Edwin ignored him. She gaped at Christoph on the ground and at Edwin as he gestured toward the cottage and said, “Shall we.”

  After a few steps she told him, “You really don’t have to feel obligated to escort me to my house. I’m perfectly capable of making it there on my own. It’s the thing about oceanfront living, the houses are in a straight row.” She gestured toward the perfectly lined cottages, “No way for me to get lost.” She grinned which earned her his return smile. It was the first smile all evening.

  She stared at him, his smiling doing strange things to heart rate, her body. His smile was as bright as a million watt light bulb, you couldn’t help to look in its direction but you couldn’t look at it for long before it would hurt. She broke his eye contact looking at her hands.

  “You seem upset about something tonight,” the words just flew off her tongue and she slapped her hand over her mouth to stop them. She tried to justify that it was not a question but just pointing out an observation but it didn’t work. She was terrified of his reaction.

  “No not upset per se, more like perturbed.”

  When he didn’t say anything more she relaxed. She supposed tonight wasn’t a good night for conversation. Edwin seemed to be suffering from “Cloe can’t talk syndrome.”

  She took no more than two more steps when Edwin surprised her by asking, “What do you think about everyone?”

  She swallowed looking wide eyed up at him, “Everyone meaning your friends?” Again she wanted to take the words back. What a stupid question. Who else would he mean?

  “Yes,” he said sweetly returning her gaze. She melted at the warm look and thought about the question for a moment even though the answer would come easily.

  “Sandra is cool, she reminds me of sunshine and sweet candy. I like her even though she loves to talk about shopping.” Edwin snorted out a laugh but waved her on to continue, “Christine can be standoffish, almost icy but it is only a facade. She is beautiful and I think she has been all her life. When you have that kind of beauty it is hard not to be conscious of it and she must protect herself. Duke is a hoot, he reminds me of a puppy dog, yet he has this serious side that you can only catch glimpses of. Christoph is a flirt and I imagine he has lots of female attention. He has a big laugh and a large presence. Peneolope is interesting. She is very intelligent which with her sultry looks is hard to find.” She didn’t say anything about Edwin. It would give away all her feelings toward him and send him running the other direction.

  “You are very astute,” he stated with a smile, “Would you mind a warning?”

  “Okay,” she answered but silently
wondered if it was a warning not to be such an idiot. No need to warn her that as she did it all by herself practically every single day.

  “Christoph is a player. Don’t get too attached.” She stared at him as if he was insane, because he was, wasn’t he? Where in the world did that come from? He had to be joking right? She laughed nervously, “I don’t know why you feel you need to warn me.”

  “It is no consequence, just be careful.”

  How cryptic. It didn’t matter, even if Christoph was interested, which was so ludicrous it was laughable, she was not at all interested in him. Getting “attached” was not even a possibility. Her problems lay at the feet of the person who was escorting her to the cottage. They departed as usual and she went straight to bed.

  My body felt glorious in the warm sheets. I stretched languidly and my muscles rejoiced. It was a glorious day and it hadn’t even started yet.

  -Cloe’s Diary

  Chapter 9

  The meeting of Friends The smell of coffee filled her nostrils causing her to jump out of the bed and rush into the living room. She smiled, her suspicion was correct, and she was joyful. Her aunt was home sitting at the kitchen table drinking a cup of coffee.

  “Good morning,” Cloe called out cheerfully prompting her aunt to look up from the papers she was reading.

  “Good morning, have a cup of coffee if you want,” she held up her coffee cup.

  “No thank you. Not a coffee person. In fact not a vice-in-general person,” Cloe plopped down next to her.

  Her aunt watched her quizzing, “You are in a good mood this morning.”

  Cloe grinned, “I suppose I am.” Then she didn’t know what came over her but she got up and awkwardly hugged her aunt’s neck, “I just wanted to thank you for your kindness.”

  Suddenly embarrassed by the tears threatening to spill from her eyes, Cloe went to the kitchen to try to be busy. She picked up a dish in the sink and scrubbed it. When she glanced back her aunt she found her gazing at the ocean wiping a tear from her cheek. More tears threatened and Cloe quickly went back to washing the clean dish.

  After a few minutes of silence, her aunt informed her, “I have the day off.” Cloe smiled.

  So, with mutual consensus they decided they would hang out in the cottage reading or whatever. The only thing Cloe knew was that she didn’t want to go shopping!

  When lunch arrived, Cloe excused herself from the couch and began preparing a meal. After awhile her aunt joined her, the smells enticing her out of the living room.

  “That smells divine,” she said and sat at the table to watch. It wasn’t much longer when Edwin came strolling in the kitchen. He gave her a grin but stopped cold upon seeing her aunt.

  He looked nervous and posed to run, “Oh, I do beg your pardon.” He waited a moment gauging her aunt’s reaction as much as her aunt seemed to be gauging his. Cloe watched how tense he was, almost as if expecting her aunt to do something like scream. When he realized she wasn’t going to react in some irrational manner he introduced himself, “I’m Edwin Corbin.”

  Her aunt, stunned for a moment, looked from Edwin to her, and then smiled.

  Stretching her hand out in front of her, her aunt said, “Nice to meet you, did you say Edwin Corbin? How do you know my niece?” The words were said in such a predatory manner Cloe stopped what she was doing to glare at her.

  Edwin rushed to answer, “We met the other night. She has made her a couple of lunches and it was so good I wanted to repeat the pleasure.” He winked at Cloe.

  Cloe sighed…he was so smooth and wow, just wow.

  However, her aunt wasn’t as easily charmed and she waved a hand at an empty chair, “Have a seat,” she commanded. At that point her aunt became all business. All her warmth from earlier dissipated like a thin vapor. Cloe watched her shrewd aunt assess Edwin and Edwin patiently waited as she did.

  “How old are you Edwin?”

  He paused looking at Cloe then answered, “19.”

  “Where do you go to college?”

  “I take correspondence courses,” he answered quickly.

  “I am sure you do,” her aunt mumbled so low she barely made it out.

  A crease appeared between Edwin’s eyebrows. He was uncomfortable with the rapid fire of questions prompting Cloe to intervene. She understood the aversion to questions.

  “Aunt, enough! Leave the poor guy alone for a moment. He just wants something to eat and he is a good guy. I have been hanging out with him and his friends for a couple of nights now and I promise they are good people. Not troublemakers.”

  Aunt had the good grace to look a little ashamed by her inquisition and therefore reframed from the twenty thousand questions she probably had posed on the tip of her tongue. Cloe sat the plates down in front of everyone and there wasn’t another word spoken.

  When they were winding down on what she must say was the best lunch she had prepared yet, Edwin pushed the plate in front of him and gave a contented sigh. He patted his belly and looked admiringly at her, “I don’t know how I can go back to eating fast food ever again Cloe. I am ruined.”

  Aunt got up gathering the plates when she said, “Oh Cloe, you are magnificent in the kitchen. I think I could actually have a party for once that wasn’t catered!” Then shot her a sheepish look and added, “Of course you would be compensated and only if you wanted to do it.”

  Cloe could only assume that her aunt added the last part because of all the work she had done on the farm. But the strange thing was she hadn’t told her about it. She wondered again how much her aunt knew about her prior life. Pushing the thought aside, she began cleaning the dishes from the table. However halfway through toting the dishes to the sink the phone shrilled jolting her.

  Quickly depositing the plates in the sink, she grabbed the corded phone and answered. Then she promptly rolled her eyes when she realized it was gross Earl from the grocery store. His rapid breathing was a dead give-away. She shifted as the visions of his unpleasant obese body gave her stomach a turn. He wheezed out that they got a new order of spice that she had asked for on her last visit, which would be fine if he hadn’t seemed too overzealous as to when she would be stopping by again. Trying hard at being evasive and polite since she hadn’t a lot of options of grocery shopping within the community, she was able to convince Earl that she would be in soon. She hung up the phone with a long sigh and twirled around to find everyone gone. Odd.

  She stepped back to the table to gather up the remaining dishes when she noticed her aunt and Edwin were down at the beach. She walked toward the glass doors watching as they had a heavy conversation.

  Oh Good Grief.

  She should’ve have expected it from her aunt to be protective but she hadn’t. Lifting her right hand she touched the glass, it was strangely nice but foreign feeling to have someone care enough to be protective. She smiled, she didn’t even mind her aunt was questioning, probably more like interrogating Edwin. She sighed, turned away from the glass, and proceeded to clean the dishes and put everything away.

  By the time she finished, Aunt and Edwin had made it back inside. Aunt grabbed her purse and said, “Well children, I am going to do a few errands.” She walked over to Cloe and kissed her on the cheek, “Cloe, the lunch was wonderful. I will have to try to be home for lunch more often,” then she sent a warning glance to Edwin, as to say “without warning.” She turned and then left the cottage.

  “You have a very lovely and understanding aunt,” Edwin commented as he walked closer to her. She liked the way Edwin said aunt, he actually pronounced it with the u where she pronounced it like the insect - ant.

  “Yes, she is definitely a change,” she commented offhandedly, “I am sorry if she gave you the third degree. I am finding she is protective of me.”

  He smiled, “No, don’t apologize, she is within her right. I think she is very understanding of you and she wants to make sure you are protected. She loves you very much.”

  Such simple words but they shocked her.
No one has ever loved her. Her expression must have looked as incredulous as she felt because Edwin reached out and touched her cheek tenderly, “I am surprised you haven’t realized that yet.” But she hadn’t realized it, she still didn’t. They stood and watched each other for a moment until he dropped his hand and cleared his throat. He walked over to the sink and began washing the dishes. With his backed turned she reached up and touched her cheek softly, still feeling his sweet lingering touch.

  Edwin spent longer than usual with her that day. They talked about little things, about her experiences with school, how she liked to read. She even showed him her stash of old books. He left shortly after two and the rest the afternoon she alternated from taking a nap and reading. When night fell Edwin showed back up to escort her back to the fire where she met her friends to laugh and talk about more little insignificant things. It was wonderful.

  An entire week went by and their routine stayed the same. She saw Edwin for an hour or so at lunch and then he would leave and she would stay busy with whatever project she had. He would always return after dark to escort her to the fire.

  She never had a best friend like him. A person she could rely on and she was growing to almost too dependent on their visits.

  For the first time since arriving in California rain fell steadily from the sky pattering on the roof in a methodical beat. I cracked my eyelid open to peer outside. Everything looked gray and fierce. Where the ocean met the sky was indistinguishable. The water seemed to swirl angrily up into the tumultuous clouds. The violence gave me a twinge of anxiety. I rolled over and went back to sleep.