Portion of the Sea (30 page)

I didn’t know how to explain to him that Abigail’s sad times no longer followed a seasonal pattern and that she had been down in early November, then back up again in December, and now, like this weather, there was no predicting what might happen next. She needed me by her side to care for her, bathe her, and feed her when she was down.

“Look,” Jaden said, taking hold of my hands in his and resting them on his chest. “I’m not going to talk you into anything. I shouldn’t have to talk any girl into marrying me. But if you want us to marry, then let’s do it. We can keep it simple. We don’t need much. Look around us. Everything we love is right here. We don’t even need time to plan. Why should we? We know we love each other, so why make it all harder than it has to be? Meet me here at the lighthouse tomorrow around dusk. I’ll have the minister here. If you’re not there, I’ll accept that you’ve chosen to leave the island
for good with your parents.”

“If I’m not there,” I said, “I’ll leave you a letter.”

“A letter?” he said, releasing my hands while laughing and frowning at the same time. He turned and walked toward the lighthouse. “Like a piece of paper is going to sit around waiting for me to find it? Surely it’ll blow away, Ava. It’s been kind of windy, you know.”

“I’ll bury it,” I said, hurrying after him.

“Oh, that’s a great idea,” he said sarcastically. “So I spend the rest of my life digging around in search of a buried rejection letter?”

“It won’t be a rejection letter,” I said. “And you won’t have to search. I’ll place the Junonia you gave me atop the mound where I bury it. Look for the Junonia.”

“Sounds like you’re plotting your escape.”

“That’s ridiculous,” I said. “I’m just making provisions.”

He had it all wrong, I thought as I stepped up to him and touched my hands to his red, icy cheeks. I pressed my lips to his, and with my kiss I told him I could live happily ever after with him. And soon he loosened the blanket I had wrapped around me and tucked into the neckline of my nightgown, and he spread it over top of us, and there we stood in a warm, private world that I never wanted to leave. But then he reached down and slid his hands over my thighs and up toward my hips and over my waist—all of which I didn’t mind—and up toward my breasts. It took me a moment to come to my senses and wonder why he’d dare such a thing if we were to be married tomorrow. I also thought why he’d dare such a thing if we were to part forever tomorrow. Regardless of what the outcome would be, he ought not to have done such a thing at a moment like this, I realized minutes later, and so I yanked the blanket off the two of us and slapped him across the face.

“How dare you assume a lady wants to do such things?” I asked.

“Ava Witherton, you’re not a lady.”

“Not a lady?” I could feel my mouth drop open and the cold mist shooting out like fire from a dragon. “Then what am I to you?”

“A woman.”

“Oh,” I thought, as I bent down and picked the blanket up off the
ground.

No one had ever called me a woman before. I took it as a compliment. He had a point. A lady wouldn’t like what he was doing, but a woman probably would, I assumed. I didn’t know the definition of a woman. Mama had only taught me the ways of a lady, and despite my rebelling against those, I always considered myself a girl, but not a typical girl, more of a boyish-type girl. Now, at eighteen years old, I felt for the first time in my life a woman. But I was a stupid woman, for there is nothing I wanted more than for Jaden to touch me there again.

“Did you like what you touched?” I asked sweetly.

He raised an eyebrow at me. “I’ll tell you after we’re married,” he said.

“That is, if you decide to show.”

“I love you,” I said, then turned and let a gust of wind push me in the direction of my home. I looked back once, and he was watching me, so I blew him a quick kiss. I didn’t turn again. My tear ducts had thawed, and I didn’t want any man seeing me cry.

I wanted to be a woman, a strong woman.

XXVIII

LYDIA

“THEN BE THAT STRONG
woman, Ava,” I said under my breath as I tucked the journal into my bag and stood up. “This is your chance to exercise your right to make a choice for yourself. It’s what strong women do.”

I walked slowly around the base of the lighthouse, keeping an eye out for an ancient Junonia shell and wondering at the same time if vows were ever exchanged on the ground where I was standing.

I had to find out, I decided, as I left the area and headed toward Marlena’s. I had to know whether Ava showed up at dusk or dropped off a shell and left on a boat forever. I had to know all these things because maybe I still had choices of my own to make. I was flying out soon and had lots of things planned for myself, but reservations and plans can be cancelled. Just as a woman has the right to make her own choices, she also has the right to change her mind.

“Let me guess,” Marlena said as she opened the door. “You’re here for the wedding, aren’t you?”

“So there was one!” I exclaimed.

“I didn’t say that. I just asked if you were here for it.”

I walked past her into the great room and laughed. “Of course I am. I’d probably be maid-of-honor, don’t you think?”

“Yes,” she said. “In all honesty, I do think you and she would have been close friends. I think she could have used a friend like you. She really didn’t have a lot of girls she could relate to.”

“Well, I’m here, and I’m relating to her, all right. Mind if I get reading? I’m already nearly sixty years late for the wedding.”

“Take your seat,” Marlena said, ushering me down the hall and into the yellow room where, outside the windows, the birds were performing music fit for a wedding. She sat down as well, and we chatted a minute.

“I’m dying to know,” she said. “What’s happening with you and Josh?”

“Nothing,” I said. “For now, absolutely nothing.”

“You look uneasy about that.”

“I am.”

She stood up and patted me on the knee. “I’ll be in the kitchen making you a nice warm drink, one my own mother, grandmother, and even great-grandmother once enjoyed. It’s one of those family comfort recipes that I think you’ll like.” She left the room and I could hear her walking down the hall.

I could hardly wait to hear Ava’s footsteps walking down the aisle, ready to join Jaden so their tracks would become one. I picked up the pages and began to read.

Ava

There should have been blue-winged teal, red-breasted mergansers and white pelicans there to give us their blessings, but there weren’t any. Probably the cold got in their way, but that’s okay, I told myself. “I’m not going to let something like that ruin my day.”

“It’s a beautiful day,” my mother said to me, sensing my nerves. “Wouldn’t you know it? Of all days, today is turning out to be one of the most beautiful days I have ever seen.”

“I know it is,” I said. “Now take your seat, Mama.” I looked at the lighthouse, tall and regal as any cathedral steeple might be. “It’s time everyone takes a seat. You too, Grandmalia.” I took hold of her hand and steadied her down, and
then I looked around for both my father and Jaden, but neither were anywhere to be seen. I wondered whether my father would show at all, but I knew Jaden would. We all make our choices in life, and we all have to live with the lives we’ve created, I thought as I stood nervously watching to see whether my father would choose to say good-bye to me or not.

He had made a big choice yesterday, one he had announced to me as I walked in the front door after returning from my chilly morning with Jaden.

“Key West,” Stewart had said, his feet up on the table and his hair a wild mess as always after he’s run his fingers through it during a decision-making process. “We’re going to Key West to manufacture cigars.”

“What did you say, Daddy?”

“Financially, it makes best sense for us to move to Key West, coconut. I hear that wages paid to the cigar makers alone amount to three hundred thousand dollars in a single year. You know what that means?”

I shook my head.

“Sit down, and I’ll tell you,” he started. “It means I’d buy you everything you ever wanted. Hey, Abby,” he called out, turning toward the kitchen. “Abby, our little Ava has grown into a beautiful young lady. She’d look good in a few new dresses, fashionable ones, don’t you think?”

My mother stormed out of the kitchen and slammed a teacup down on the table in front of me. “Here, Ava, this is for you.” Then she bent down and pointed her finger at my father. “I am not moving my daughter to a place where cigar manufacturing is the chief commercial enterprise.”

I sipped the tea, wondering whether brandy had become a permanent ingredient in our family’s favorite comfort recipe. Warm milk, honey, butter … I took another sip … yep, I think I tasted hints of brandy like I had the night before. Heading into the third generation, the family comfort recipe had indeed evolved to now include brandy, I decided. It was history in the making. And the brandy, I think, replaced the cinnamon. I couldn’t detect any cinnamon. “How far is Key West from here?” I asked, not believing that any of my father’s talk would ever turn into action.

“This discussion is between your father and me,” Abigail said, not
looking at me. Instead she cast a smoldering look back at Stewart; so, I sipped more of the comfort drink and watched my mother and father communicate with their eyes. It annoyed me when they did that because they thought I didn’t know the eyeball language and that it was only for married couples, of which club I was not a member.

When my mother walked away, my father pulled his feet off the table and scooted closer toward me and then whispered, “Key West isn’t too far from here. It’ll take a week by sailboat to get there.”

“I heard that, Stewart Witherton,” Abigail said, returning with her own cup, some of it pouring over the rim as she walked. “Key West is out of the question.” She sipped, and I wondered whether her cup, with its amount of brandy, would have any lasting impact on our family recipe. She shook her hand to dry the spillage. “Did you forget we don’t speak Spanish?” She gulped and slurped from her cup and I could tell she was desperate for comfort. “I’ll tell you exactly what you’re going to do,” she said, setting her empty cup on the table. “Stop dreaming and take us home to Kentucky where they at least speak our own language.”

“What about the winters there?” Stewart asked.

“Never mind the winters. I’ll be fine.”

Dahlia came out of the bedroom and sat down beside me. “I’ve got an idea,” she said. “What about Hollywood? I heard men on the dock the other day talking about it as a place people are moving to.”

Stewart shifted in his chair and gave her a face. “Did all that cold weather out there freeze parts of your brain because you’re scaring me now?” he said.

“Be nice,” Abigail warned. “My mother’s idea isn’t all that ludicrous. I’ve heard people talking about Hollywood, too, but it’s for wealthy mid-westerners, which we certainly are not. They’re buying up residential lots there to build homes, so they can winter in California.”

“Then if Key West doesn’t pan out, we’ll head for California,” Stewart said.

“No, no, we won’t,” said Abigail. “We’re going home to Kentucky. The discussion ends here.”

“Wait a minute,” I said, standing up. “How could it end here when I
haven’t even had a chance to say anything?” Standing made me feel taller then when I sat, and more powerful, and if I didn’t want to be a writer, I’d probably want to be a speech giver, for I liked giving speeches when I had something good to say. “We’d be fools to leave this area,” I began. “This is a good place to live. People are pouring in from all over the world.”

“For what? Fishing over at Punta Rassa?” Stewart asked. “Those tourists aren’t helping our farming any.”

“I’ll answer questions when I’m done. Please don’t interrupt,” I said. “It doesn’t matter why people are moving here, just that once they get a taste of it, they’re smitten and want to move their families here.” I stopped for a moment, sipped some tea and prepared to tell them that I had fallen in love here as well, and his name was Jaden, and if they tried forcing me to leave, I’d be getting married tomorrow at dusk. “I myself am madly in love with this area,” I continued. “I couldn’t possibly imagine living anywhere but here, and I’m also in love with …”