Sweetgrass (24 page)

Mama June lay on the cool sheets in the deep darkness and closed her eyes. She would sleep now, she knew. Her journey was nearing its end, but was not over yet.

Mary June Clark drove from college back to Mount Pleasant with Adele for Tripp’s funeral. It was so unlike their first journey together the May before. Then the highways had
been lined with the spring green of promise. Now the earth was dressed for sorrow in muted colors of gold, rust and the dying brown of fragile, crumbling leaves that littered the roadside. They spoke very little. Music blared mercifully from the speaker, allowing them consolation in their own private thoughts. The trip to the coast was the first leg of their separation, though neither of them realized it at the time.

Blame and guilt sat side by side, stoic and silent, each bound by a loyalty that, rather than unite them as it should have, divided the two as cleanly as the yellow line that coursed through the hard cement of the highway home.

Christ Church was filled with mourners that overflowed the small stone house of worship and onto the green grass that surrounded it. A tragedy, especially one to a family as beloved and respected as the Blakelys, is felt by a community. Yet when the victim is one as striking and young as Hamlin Blakely III, the outpouring of grief is like the bursting of a dam.

The Blakely family had ties that traveled back to the early days of historical Charleston, and to a one, the complex, extended branches of the family tree gathered at the family seat to mourn the loss of this favorite son. Several Episcopal priests presided over the mass, one of them an uncle. Even the bishop participated.

Mary June remained in the background, as was fitting the occasion and her position. She was neither Tripp’s widow nor his fiancée. Indeed, no one outside the immediate family even knew of their whirlwind affair. It was better this way, she thought, sitting in the back pew between two strangers, one of whom wept piteously during the sermon. In contrast, Mary June sat erect and dry-eyed, with her hands clasped over her belly.

After the service, guests were invited back to Sweetgrass
for a grand luncheon in the Southern tradition. The comfort food of fried chicken, barbecue, slow-cooked greens, corn bread, biscuits and banana pudding helped to sustain the family and friends through their grief.

Mary June drifted away from the clusters of people toward the creek, to a wooden swing that hung from long, blackened ropes tied to an enormous, ancient live oak. The cragged branch arched over the glassy waters of the creek like an arthritic finger. During the past summer that seemed a lifetime ago, Mary June and Adele had sat squished together on the rough-hewn wooden seat like peas in a pod, their legs synchronized as they pumped, laughing and talking, one hand holding a side of the rope, the other wrapped around her friend’s waist.

She sat alone on the seat now and rocked aimlessly. Her gaze followed the direction that the branch pointed to like some wizened old crone foretelling her future, for it directed her gaze to the creek that had claimed Tripp’s life.

She stared out to sea while the family ate and reminisced. Some time later, she heard the crunch of a footfall behind her. Soon after, she felt the presence of someone at her side. Reluctantly she turned her head and lifted her gaze.

She hadn’t spoken to Preston since she’d arrived the day before, though she’d seen him, of course. He was a pallbearer and spoke eloquently at the funeral. She thought he looked haggard though composed. Like most of the gentlemen, he’d removed his dark jacket and tie and rolled up his sleeves in the heat of the Indian summer day. He looked older, too, she thought, noting the crow’s feet that cut into his deeply tanned face. There was something else changed that she couldn’t put a word to. It was as if someone had snuffed out the incandescent spark of boyish innocence and youthful hope that once shone in his eyes. Death had stolen that from him, and she felt certain her own eyes were as smoky with grief.

“How are you?” he asked.

“Fine,” she replied.

He looked at his polished black shoes as though he could read something in them, and asked, “I mean, really. How are you?”

Mary June looked at him more carefully, trying to read any innuendo in his tone.

“I’m fine,” she replied, more emphatically.

Preston sighed and looked out into the creek. He had a strong profile, thinner, more defined than Tripp’s had been. She saw a muscle twitch in his cheek and her hand tightened around the swing’s rope.

“We have to talk,” he said.

“About what?” Anxious, she kicked off from the ground, gaining some swing.

He reached out to still the swing. When she turned her head, they locked gazes.

“I know about the baby,” he began.

Mary June’s eyes widened. Her first reaction was to deny it. Then the shock of hearing the words
the baby
spoken reverberated through her, shaking her loose. The tears swelled in her eyes as she stared in disbelief. She’d held her emotions in check, yet she couldn’t be strong a moment longer. She collapsed in his arms, weeping.

“Don’t cry, Mary June. He loved you,” he said earnestly, holding her tight. “I know he did. He loved you and would have married you. He’d have been a good husband to you and a good father to your baby. You have to believe me.”

“He told you.” It was more a confirmation than a question.

“Not outright. I found out on my own.”

She hadn’t thought of this. She felt an enormous relief to be able to talk to someone about the great secret she was holding inside of her. That it was Preston, someone she could trust, gave her strength.

“How?” she asked, needing to know.

“Your letter.” When she startled, he went on quickly. “I went out to Blakely’s Bluff for one reason or another, I can’t even recall now. Tripp was out so I waited. The house was a mess. I mean, worse than usual. There were empty beer bottles everywhere and ashtrays filled with cigarette butts. The whole place reeked of a seedy bar. I was pretty damn disgusted with him, I can tell you. He was letting himself go. It was just such a waste.”

He ran his hand through his hair, rubbing the back of his neck with an old man’s weariness.

“So I started cleaning up,” he said. “I just grabbed the trash can and commenced dumping garbage off from every surface. When I got to the table, there were all these papers spread across it. I was careful. I don’t know if he told you, but he was writing a novel.”

She realized it was just one more part of Tripp she was unaware of. “No.”

“I just threw away those papers that were crumpled in a ball. I was sifting through the rest when I noticed some pink stationery. And I recognized your handwriting.”

Mary June put her hand over her lips. “You read them?”

“No. Tripp came back and saw your letter in my hand. He was madder than hell and didn’t believe me when I told him I hadn’t read it. He started yelling and it just came out. Then I got mad that he got you…that he wasn’t careful. I mean—” His face colored and he blurted out, “Hell, Mary June. Tripp was a lot older than you. He’s had a lot of experience. He should’ve known better than to take advantage of a girl like you.”

“Oh, Press, it wasn’t like that. He didn’t—”

“He did,” he interrupted angrily. “There are things a guy can do—should do—to keep a girl from getting pregnant, Mary June.”

She took a shuddering breath, exhaling slowly. It was too late to cast blame.
It takes two to tango,
as her mother would say.

He reached into his pocket and pulled out a packet of letters tied together with string. She recognized them as her own.

“I thought you’d want these back,” he said, placing the letters in her hand. “I didn’t want anyone else to see them and I couldn’t just throw them out. They belong to you.”

She gathered the letters in her hand and stared at the ragged edges where they’d been torn open with Tripp’s finger. She wondered if he’d been excited to receive them, if he’d torn them open still standing. Or if he’d been amused by the gushing of a young girl so desperately in love and carelessly set the letters aside.

Looking at the petal-pink stationery festooned with magnolias and her swirling script, it all appeared so childish to her now. When she thought of Tripp’s drinking, the wild despair…Tripp had told her he wanted freedom. How could she have been so blind?

Preston sensed her turmoil and took a step closer, grabbing hold of the swing rope. “Mary June… He loved you. He would have married you.”

His face was crumpled with anguish and she sought to relieve him of the burden he’d obviously been carrying for days. He was the noble boy again who beat back snakes and spiders in the dark woods, and he was hell-bent to beat back this sad specter from her path as well.

She reached up to place her fingers over his lips. “Thank you for telling me that,” she said. “Now you can tell me the truth.”

He looked at her cautiously.

“Tripp was not going to marry me. That’s what the fight was really about.”

He searched her face for clues as to what she might know or suspect. Whatever he saw there tore away the final veil be
tween them. Preston exhaled, resigned to the truth. He moved to sit on the ground and rested his elbows over his knees.

“The war changed him,” Preston said, choosing his words. “It was like something was dead inside and he knew it. But he fought it. He traveled around the country when he first got back. That’s where he was when you came to visit in May. I’d thought he seemed better when he came home. We all did. We didn’t realize just how deep the hurt was, or that he could change so quickly. He was like the tides he loved so much.

“At times he’d seem swelled up with life, flooded from bank to bank—and man, we loved being with him then. At other times, though, the pain drained the life right out of him, leaving him dry and laid bare to the countless demons gnawing him to the bone.” He paused, plucking the grass.

“I had to learn to read the tides, to look for the dark water and shallow shoals. When he came back to Bluff House that day, the minute I saw him I knew it was bad. It was like he’d already hit that oyster bed and was cut up and bleeding.”

“Oh God,” she uttered, bringing her hand to her mouth. “My letter.”

Preston nodded. “He was torn up about it. He loved you, he told me that.” He took a breath. “But he couldn’t face getting married and settling down. I think he felt he wasn’t fit. He knew what was the right thing to do. What was expected of him as a gentleman. As a Blakely. But somehow, he couldn’t do it.”

She felt humiliated. “So you told him to marry me.”

Preston nodded.

Her cheeks burned with wounded pride yet she was grateful for his honesty.

He lowered his head and squeezed his eyes shut. “We fought about that.”

They both knew that was a grave understatement of the bloody struggle they’d waged. Their last words had been in
anger, and she knew then that after Tripp’s death he’d run away in despair because he could not take them back.

“I’m sorry,” she said.

“Why are you sorry?”

“I never meant to come between you two. I never meant for this to happen.”

He paused, then said, “There’s one more thing you should see.”

He gave her one sheet of yellow lined paper. On it was Tripp’s trailing scrawl.

“He wrote this on lots of the papers. Over and over. I saved this one for you. I think, well…I can only think it was what he wanted to say.”

She brought the paper closer to read. Mary June recognized the words. On this paper, through the words of Jack Kerouac, Tripp had given her his answer.

She pulled herself up from the swing to leave.

Preston rose to his knees to grab her hand.

“Mary June, wait. Marry me,” he blurted out.

She swung her head around, unsure she’d heard right. “What?”

“Marry me,” he repeated.

Her face crumpled in disbelief. “You don’t mean that.”

“I do. Please, wait. Hear me out. Have you given thought to what you’re going to do now? With the baby?” When she shook her head he pressed on. “I have. And this is the only answer.”

“I can’t ask you to offer your future to me.”

“You’re not asking me! I’m asking you.”

“No. I’m not letting you do this. You don’t want to marry me. I don’t want to ruin another person’s life.”

He shook her shoulders gently. “Mary June, don’t you know that I’ve been in love with you since the day you tripped over that root and fell into my arms? Only when it was clear your affections lay elsewhere did I step aside. But things are different now and I don’t have time to court you.”

“I can’t do this. It’s too soon.”

“Think, Mary June! This child’s going to come without mind to when you’re ready. You know what will happen if you have this baby out of wedlock. Even if the baby is recognized as having Blakely blood, it’ll be labeled a bastard. I know that’s a cold, hard word,” he said when he heard her intake of breath. “But they’ll say it. The secret of the baby’s birth will be whispered behind raised palms every time that child enters a room. Not to mention your reputation. Simply put, it would be destroyed.”

“They’ll find out, anyway. They always do.”

“No, they won’t. We’ll need to tell Mama and Daddy.”

“No, Press. I’m so ashamed. They’ll hate me all the more.”

“No, they’ll be comforted by knowing that a part of Tripp is still alive. Plus, they’ll want to keep it hushed more than we will and they can help. No one will ever guess the baby isn’t mine.”

“Adele will.”

His face tightened. “She’ll wonder.”

“She’ll know.”

“But we won’t confirm it. Adele would never say anything to hurt us or the family name. Mary June, we can’t breathe a word, not even in confession. If we do, people will find out. The truth will slip from a tongue without intention, but it will get out. We won’t even think it.”

“Do you really think that others won’t figure it out?”

“You were here as a guest for the summer and dated Tripp in a whirlwind. No one really knew you were even a couple. We’ll get married right away, and when the baby comes early, the worst they’ll think is that you and I jumped the gun a little. Hell, Mary June, we won’t be the first ones in this county to do that.”