Sullivans Island-Lowcountry 1 (27 page)

time I didn’t think about what I was putting on. We made our

way downstairs to find the living room lit with twenty candles,

using every candleholder I owned. A bottle of white wine was

on a tray with two glasses and a bowl of salted nuts.

“I’m going to bed,” Beth said, kissing me on the cheek and

then Tom.“Call me if the house falls down.”

We watched her follow the light of her flashlight up the

stairs, not saying a word. It was a powerful demonstration of her

love for both of us.

“Now what?” I said.

“Would you like a glass of wine?”

“Sure.”

He poured the wine and handed me the glass, looking into

my face. His eyes told me everything I wanted to know but still

I needed to hear the words.

“It appears that our daughter has plans for us,” he said.

“Yes. Apparently she does.”

“You’re nervous, aren’t you?”

“Yes, I am.”

“Well, if it makes you feel any better, so am I.”

We were still standing, not knowing what to do, where to

sit, whether to launch the long overdue discussion, or to let the

past slide and just come together again. “Tom, we have to talk,”

I began.

“I know we do. I’m a no-good bastard.”

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175

I was the injured party and the injuries still stung. “That’s

good for openers, but that’s not really what I want to hear.”

“I’ve done a lot of thinking, Susan. I was a fool, a complete

fool to leave you. I got swept away with a young woman and I

made the biggest mistake of my life.”

“It’s common.”

“So they tell me. But now I see what an idiot I was and I’m

begging you to forgive me and take me back. I want to come

home.”

“Oh, God,” I said and immediately choked up.

He put his glass down and took mine, placing it next to his on

the coffee table. He took my arms and draped them around his

neck, putting his arms around my waist. I didn’t know what to say.

Tears began to slide down my face.Then he was kissing me, wip-

ing my face with his fingers, pushing back my hair. I needed to be

kissed. I realized how much desire I had and how many eons it

had been since I’d been held. I returned every kiss, gesture, and

touch with a surprising, growing passion. I began to grow hot,

perspiring a little. He pulled me to the couch and I did not resist.

Who was this? It wasn’t the Tom I remembered, the one

who groped for me in the dark and then before I could spell my

last name was in the bathroom washing up. No, this man, this

slow, tender Casanova, was all new to me.

We began the slow waltz of serious lovemaking. He undressed

me and took a long look at me, saying I was beautiful. He was

beautiful too. But unfamiliar. We were new partners, breathing

together, moving together, following the lead of the other’s

pleasure. I could feel the quickened beat of his heart against my

chest as he held me tighter. Over and over, he said he loved me

in a pleading whisper that begged me to love him too. I could

feel it. He thrilled me, as I never had been thrilled in all our

years of marriage. He had obviously learned more than a thing

or two in his absence, and while that was a stunning reminder of

his infidelity, he made me want him like I never had. At last, we

rested. We were too tired to move.

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“Damn!” he said.“So I really do love you, you know.”

“Really, really?” I said, feeling more than a little wicked.

“Yeah, really really. A lot.” I could feel him smiling against

my shoulder.

“I love you too,” I whispered into his neck and kissed him

there, ever so softly, branding him with a kind of tenderness that

I hoped he’d never forget.

Nine

The Aftermath

}

1963

HE Lowcountry had been trampled. I knew it even

before I opened my eyes. My father’s cries from the

T yard and the cries of our neighbors reached up

through our bedroom windows.“Oh, my God! Look at this! . . .

You got power? Lights went out last night about seven and that

was all she wrote, bubba! In all my days . . . How’d this boat get

in my yard? . . . Can’t find my dog! . . . Where’d the porch go?”

I listened to them as sleep dissolved into morning light. I

squeezed my eyes tight. I remembered the night before as if it

were a terrifying nightmare. I wasn’t getting out of bed. I never

wanted to see my father or my aunt again. I thought about my

mother lying in the maternity ward and wondered if she had any

inkling of what my father was up to. My heart was splitting for

her. She deserved a parade in her honor for delivering twins, but

I knew that she would return home to more lies and deception.

Momma would be in the hospital for a week and I was glad

of that. She needed the rest. In the meantime, I would organize

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my brothers, Maggie and myself to help her.When we were in

school, Livvie would be in charge of the twins. When we got

home, we would rotate their care.Then Momma could rest, lose

some weight, regain her sense of humor, make herself pretty and

Daddy would fall in love with her all over again.

I rolled over to my night table and picked up the photo-

graph of Momma and Daddy taken on the day of their engage-

ment. My mother had been a beautiful woman when she was

young. Her chestnut hair was carefully curled, her lips full,

turned up in a smile of mischief, and those fabulous Bermuda

blue eyes were filled with a love for anything life would throw

her way. She was fine-boned and graceful, like a Dresden fig-

urine, but quick and lively, like a sprite.

I ran my finger around the photograph, staring at her young

face. She had wanted to go to college, but it was right after the

Depression and there was only enough money to educate Uncle

Louis.To this very day my grandparents thought it was a waste of

money to educate women.That was not what women did.They

made a good marriage and had a pack of children and settled

down.
As God intended they should,
Grandpa Tipa would say, like

the refrain of an old song. It was obvious to me that they had dis-

couraged my mother from college because she might have left

them, moved to Philadelphia or someplace, and married a Yan-

kee. She had become their caretaker, and they were not grateful

in the least. They were entitled to her servitude, or so they

thought.

That would never happen to me. Somehow I would get to

college. But, before that, I would try to help her dig her way

back to life.

From my bed I could hear Daddy moving planks of wood. I

couldn’t imagine why but at that moment I didn’t care. The

sounds of dragging branches across the yard, interspersed with

my father’s obscenities, drifted up to my window. Finally, I heard

the brakes of Livvie’s bus. I heard her voice from the yard and I

jumped up, ran to the window and had a look down.

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179

The boards I had heard were laid across concrete cinder

blocks to form a bridge over the small lake in our yard. Daddy

was wearing waders and he sloshed through the water to help

Livvie.We would have frogs in the millions. Normally I would’ve

run to Timmy and Henry’s room, dragged them out of bed, gone

and jumped in the water. No doubt Daddy would’ve lost his

temper and screamed at us to quit goofing off, get into dry

clothes and help him. But today everything that had been nor-

mal was falling away by what I had seen the night before. I won-

dered if Daddy knew that I knew. Maybe I would use it against

him. No, I wasn’t that brave.There would be nothing on my face

that he would be able to identify or trace. I felt sick inside, faint.

I had to gather myself and go downstairs to face everyone.

I dressed and went to the kitchen. Livvie was there, pouring

out cereal for everyone.Aunt Carol was having a glass of juice. She

had spent the night in our house because the storm had started to

kick up something terrible and Uncle Louis had thought it would

be better for her to be with us, Momma being gone and all.

“So I said to Louis, I said, ‘Louis? Don’t forget to feed the

babies,’ that’s what I call my dogs,‘and let them in the bed with

you because they’re gonna miss their momma.’ Do you know

what he said?”

“No’m,” Livvie said. Livvie was staring at her so funny that

I thought for a moment that she knew.

“Morning,” I said.

“Morning, Susan. Well, he said, ‘Carol, honey? Your babies

can stand one night away from you, but what am I gonna do?’

Isn’t that just like a man? Can’t live without us! I swear, he loves

me so! Well, I guess I’d better end this tea party and get on home

to my Louis.”

“Yes’m, you do that. I imagine he’s missing you something

terrible.”

Then Aunt Carol picked up her pocketbook to leave and

turned to us to say good-bye, and there was Livvie drinking a

Coke from Momma’s best crystal goblet. No one was allowed to

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use her crystal, especially a colored woman. Momma saved that

crystal in case President Kennedy decided to come for dinner.

Aunt Carol turned purple, puffed up like a blowfish and stormed

out of the back door. I was stunned, but I didn’t say a word.

The morning gathering of our tribe was getting under way at

the same moment of Aunt Carol’s departure. First came Maggie

in shorts and a T-shirt and her hair up in a ponytail. She looked

more like she was going out to a beach party than getting ready to

clean a yard. She always looked like that. Perfect.

One by one, they swung into action, doing their parts to

help. Maggie stirred powdered juice into a pitcher and the boys

set the table with paper plates. I kept my face straight, hiding

under the mask of just waking up. They expected me to be

crabby in the morning. But I was just plain shocked and, I

thought, hiding it pretty well.

“Can’t be wasting no water washing dishes, y’all ’eah me?”

Livvie was giving orders and handing out paper cups. “Yemoja

done dump all the water in the sky on us yesterday.”

“Who?” I said.

“Yemoja, Obatala and Oya.Yes, sir, they done they worst to

Charleston. Nearly blow us all to kingdom come.”

She was talking about her African gods again. I decided they

must have something to do with storms. We knew that when

there was a big storm we had to wait a day or two to be sure the

water came back on and was all right to drink.We’d fill the sinks

and tubs before a storm to drink, wash dishes or flush the toilets.

Naturally, my brothers and my father would use the occasion as

an excuse to use the yard as a toilet. Maggie and I would hold it

until we turned blue. On Sullivan’s Island, we were proud to

have our own water supply—a combination of deep wells from

which blended water was pumped by electricity. But when the

lights went out, drinking water went with it. Truth told, the

water reeked of sulfur but made the creamiest grits.Anyway, in a

day or so we would have water and lights again. In the mean-

while we would put orange juice on cereal and laugh about it.

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181

We were professionals in the aftermath business. At least no one

would have to fight about taking baths tonight. Until the power

came back on we had a holiday from all that.

“No electricity. Sophie’s going to have a fit that she can’t

have her toast and egg,” Grandpa Tipa said, coming in the

kitchen.“Can’t you children say good morning?”

We were busy stuffing our mouths with Frosted Flakes and

Tang at this point.

“Good morning, Grandpa,” I said.“Did you sleep okay?”

“Of course I did. Said the rosary, you know. It’s what good

Catholics do when we need protection,” he said.“Mrs. Singleton,

I nearly ran myself ragged protecting my property yesterday!

Thank you for clearing the porch for us.We certainly have a lot of

electrical plugs in this house. I must’ve unplugged one hundred

things.”

“Think his Hail Marys saved the Island?” I whispered to

Maggie.

“No, it was the plugs,” she replied.

“Well, I’d better go deal with Sophie,” he said. “Oh!

Mrs. Singleton! I forgot to ask, how did you and all the Africans

make out last night?”

“Me and
the Africans
made out just fine, thank you, sir. Just

fine,” Livvie said, narrowing her eyes at him.

I could see she wasn’t pleased but she decided to let the

remark pass. He had to let her know that she came from a tribal

world of dark skin. He was such a big pain in the butt. He

embarrassed me all the time when he said things like that.

Tipa fixed a plate of bread and a bowl of cereal and carried it

off to Sophie’s room.A few minutes later we heard a plate crash.

Everybody stopped moving, waiting for the screaming to start.

Either it was dropped by accident, or old Sophie had thrown it