Sullivans Island-Lowcountry 1 (65 page)

“So you made it to paradise and you found Nelson! I’m so

happy for you!” I couldn’t think of what to say so I said, “Seen

Momma lately?” Tears flowed down my cheeks in spite of my

attempts to stop them.

Livvie shook her head, smiling.
“Don’t fret about your

momma. She fine.”

“Well, when you see her, tell her I asked about her, okay?

Tell her that I understand now. God, I miss you, Livvie, I love

you, you know.”

She smiled and nodded her head. In my mind I could hear

her say,
“Me too, chile, me too! But I got my Nelson.What about you?

You gone finally give your heart to Simon?”

“Livvie,Tom’s had cancer. Simon’s back in Atlanta for now.

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Things have been pretty complicated! If you were ’eah with me,

it would be so much easier! You’d tell me what to do.”

“But, chile, ain’t I ’eah now? Ain’t I ’eah? Did you think I ever

gone leave you? And don’t you know what to do?”

“Yes, I know what to do. Give my trouble to the Lord,

right?”

“That’s right.And use that brain of yours!”

“What’s gonna happen to Tom, Livvie? What can I do?”

“Say your prayers, girl. Prayers work miracles; don’t you see that

much yet?”

“You know, Livvie, I think I was as smart at thirteen as I was

ever going to be. Seems like I haven’t learned much at all.”

“Now, why was you so smart at thirteen? ’Cause you had a situa-

tion to rise above! Ain’t you back there again?”

“You mean the time’s come to rise?”

“The time has come to rise up and take your place again. I love

you, baby. Don’t be afraid to love. Iffin you love Simon, don’t be afraid.

And don’t worry about Tom.”

“Buck up, right? Just go for it?” She nodded her head to me.

I was laughing now through my tears, tears of joy, tears of relief.

I could feel her starting to leave and I concentrated with all my

might to hold her with me a moment longer.“I love you, Livvie,

forever.”

I was whispering to her. Love. It mystically transcended

death. It healed hearts. It changed thoughts. And when you met

it head-on, it gave you courage in return. I put my hand up to

the mirror and she held hers to meet mine. The mirror was

warm. I would have given anything to hold her hand, but the

warmth was there. She faded away until she and Nelson were

visible no more. Finally I saw just my own reflection.

Maybe the scent of roses, the bright light and the alleged

vision of the Blessed Mother at Stella Maris had been a mass hal-

lucination of some kind. I wasn’t sure. Maybe seeing Livvie now

had been some kind of desperate act of my unconscious. How

could I judge? There was no question that Livvie had visited me

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in my dream. If she could come to me in a dream, then why

couldn’t she visit me through the mirror?

I had this sudden urge to turn and look all around me—to

take it all in. The tree coming down, the table of photographs,

the old armoire Tom and I had salvaged. Salvage. That was the

order of the day for me—my cosmic marching orders.

I threw myself on the couch and lit a Marlboro Light, then

put it out after the first puff, knowing I didn’t need them any-

more. Okay, I’d go to the drugstore and get the patch to help, just

in case I felt weak. I couldn’t help but laugh at myself and what

had just occurred with Livvie’s visit. I would pray like mad for

Tom and get the whole family to do the same. Better yet, I’d get

the whole congregation of Stella Maris to pray. And what of

Simon? I already knew the answer to that. The energy I felt

made me euphoric with hope. I knew everything was going to

be all right.Yeah, even I—cynical Susan Hamilton Hayes—had

to admit that just about anything was possible.At last, at long last,

I could rest in the sweet arms of peace.

Author’s Note

could tell you real stories about my family and all the

good people of Sullivan’s Island and Charleston and

I go on and on. I could tell you about how, on the

Island, from the last day of school in spring until the first day of

school in fall, I knew no kids who wore shoes, just flip-flops

that we bought at Miss Buddy’s or Bert’s for twenty-nine cents.

And that any kid who owned Keds, especially if they were

clean, was immediately branded an intruder from the outside

world.

I could wax on about the summer days spent running free

with my cousins—filling an empty coffee can with blackberries,

wild plums and chainey briar (wild asparagus) and climbing

the water towers—and how anyone with a bicycle of their own

was obliged to tow kids who didn’t have one. How we spied

through the windows of summer renters and smoked stolen ciga-

rettes under their houses in the winter and that our specialty was

digging holes to China.

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Once we did that at my Uncle Teddy’s and then somebody—

one of my Blanchard cousins, I think—got the brilliant idea to fill

it up with water and make a swimming pool. The hose was

devoured by the hole so, knowing Uncle Teddy would tell our

father, we covered the whole mess with some planks of wood.

Well, he must’ve gotten suspicious about the hose being pulled

from across the yard to under the house. He went down there

after supper. It was dark, he moved the boards, fell in the hole and

got covered in mud. He beat our behinds with his brown leather

slipper and told us to never tell Daddy. His version of a beating

resembled the way Ella Wright—a.k.a. Miss Fuzz—who was my

Livvie, plumped pillows.We hollered our heads off to make sure

he thought it was enough and then we laughed about it for a mil-

lion years.

If you ever meet my cousin Michael McInerny, he’ll tell you

the story about how he and his friends—I guess they must have

been nine or ten—caught the biggest crabs on Sullivan’s Island

and sold them to all the mothers in his neighborhood. In later

years he found out the reason the crabs were so large was that he

was crabbing at the Island sewage pipe! What could the family

do but give him full credit for pioneering recycling?

And what about the ghost stories? People would tell them

at night on dark porches and scare themselves half to death. Of

course, I would listen to them and snicker, thinking they should

have a big mirror like ours.They would sleep with a light on for

the rest of their lives! Yes, that part about the mirror is actually

all true.

In the old days, there were lemonade stands and there still

are today, and ball games of “half rubber,” which is a Lowcoun-

try version of stickball played with a broomstick and, you

guessed it, a rubber ball cut in half.There were shag contests at

Folly Pier, before it fell in the ocean, and sneaking into Big

John’s and the Merchant Seamen’s Club with fake IDs to drink

Singapore slings and beer when it was sweltering outside.

There were friends who went to Vietnam and others who

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fled to Canada. We burned our bras for women’s rights in the

same fires that made ashes of our brothers’ draft cards.We argued

civil rights until we were exhausted and then started over the

next day.We rebelled against everything we thought was wrong.

Good old boys grew long hair and traded beer drinking for pot

smoking and Weejuns for sandals. And then, eventually, we

buried our parents and became them, clinging to Lowcountry

life with all the fervor of an Evangelical Revival, rather satisfied.

So many stories, too many to tell here. We don’t live there

now, but maybe someday that will change. Someday I’ll have a

home for my family on the Island.

Another time, we will shag, I’ll teach you a little Gullah

poem and we’ll argue on how to make use of an entire ham.We

will stroll down to the Sullivan’s Island beach at dawn, talking

hurricanes, tide tables and sand castles.You will spread your arms

in the eastern wind and feel the sun rise in every one of your

bones. Once the sand of Sullivan’s Island gets in your shoes, your

heart will ache to return. And return you will.You will be one

of us.You won’t mind being a little bit Geechee.

As the heat and light of day begin to rise and glow, I’ll feed

you a Lowcountry breakfast of warm salted air and, smiling, you

will tell all these stories to your friends until you think they’re

your own.You will hum this music of so much magic forever.

Yes, you will. ’Eah?