The Summer Wind (7 page)

Delphine came to rest again in front of Carson. They gazed eye to eye for several minutes in companionable silence. The sun was hot on Carson’s back. The water rocked gently with Delphine’s movements. From somewhere in the distance, gulls cried.

Carson closed her eyes and felt the first peace she’d known in what felt like a long while. It would take time to work through the harsh truths revealed in the past month: how her mother had died in the house fire, her parents’ alcoholism, and the likelihood that she, too, suffered from the disease.

But looking into Delphine’s eyes, and seeing the unconditional forgiveness and love there, Carson felt the hardness of her heart soften and the process of absolving herself of her past mistakes begin.

Harper stood outside the library door and peeked in the dimly lit room. Inside, Nate was sitting cross-legged on the floor in front of the television set. He was a slight, pale boy, his fair hair badly in need of a haircut. He sat motionless except for his nimble fingers rapidly working the remote control of the game he was playing. His concentration was intense; he was utterly unaware that she was watching him.

Seeing Nate in this room, small and alone, absorbed in his own world, reminded Harper of herself at that age. Harper had often squirreled herself away in this very room, only she wasn’t into games back then. She escaped to her books. She still treasured the books of her youth, counted them as friends:
A Wrinkle in Time; The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe
; and
anything by Judy Blume. So many books, so many hours . . . She remembered being engulfed in stories, completely engaged in the enchanted worlds. During those times she hadn’t felt lonely.

Like Nate, she had spent much of her childhood alone. Harper had been raised as generations of James children were raised before her. The upper-class British family subscribed to the
children are best seen and not heard
school of child rearing. James parents did not kiss or coddle their children. Emotional displays were frowned upon. No one could say that Georgiana neglected Harper’s physical needs. Quite the contrary. Harper was always well dressed, well fed, well tended by a fleet of nannies. Neglect took many forms, however.

Her mother schlepped her between their homes in Manhattan, the Hamptons, and England, leaving her in the care of a nanny, a woman who usually sat and watched Harper play alone while her mother conducted endless business meetings or engaged in the whirlwind of her social life.

When Harper was six, she was deemed old enough to visit Sea Breeze during the summer break. Her mother never liked the idea of sending her daughter to the Muir family in the South for an extended stay, but the summer sojourn away did prove convenient, so she’d agreed to Mamaw’s invitation.

Only here, at Sea Breeze, did Harper’s pattern of isolation finally break. When she’d first arrived, everything on Sullivan’s Island had felt so strange—so foreign. The enormous oak trees dripping with moss, the pounding surf, the lack of routine. Mamaw did not allow nannies at Sea Breeze and let the girls run wild on the island, requiring them only to show up washed and tidy for meals.

At first, Harper had felt like a boat adrift without a rigid schedule to follow or a nanny to tell her what to do. The freedom was frightening to a lonely six-year-old. She also felt shy and awkward with her two older sisters. Carson and Dora were closer in age to each other—and five and eight years older than Harper. They knew the house, the landscape, the culture. Sea Breeze was
their
place and Harper felt like an interloper. The first few weeks of that first summer, she spent huge amounts of time hiding in her room, reading.

Until Mamaw intervened. “Child, you must play outdoors!” Mamaw would say. Her grandmother shared Harper’s love of books, but under her tutelage, Mamaw shared with Harper her other loves—fishing, boating, swimming, and the magic of the lowcountry. Mamaw took it upon herself to be the girls’ pied piper. She packed lunches and took them out exploring the island and the waterways while telling tales of their infamous ancestor, the dashing Captain Muir, a fearsome pirate. She inspired the adventurous spirit that lay dormant in their blood and seeded in their young hearts the dream of finding the buried treasure that was, she claimed, rightfully theirs.

Dora was transitioning to her teens that summer and had set her sights on local boys. Carson, in need of a summer friend, turned to Harper. They soon discovered that they were kindred spirits, both creatures forged of imagination and dreams. The five-year difference in age evaporated in light of Harper’s intelligence and Carson’s love of adventure. Harper’s love of reading often was the creative fodder for exciting new ideas to act out in their world of play.

Her summers at Sea Breeze had been a saving grace for her as a young girl. She wasn’t alone with her books. With Carson,
she had brought her imagination to life. She’d had a friend to play with.

Harper peeked in once again at the little boy sitting alone in front of the console. She quietly backed away from the door, a smile playing at her lips. She knew what she had to do next.

D
ora awoke in a strange room. She blinked slowly as it dawned on her where she was and how she had gotten here. She remembered the pain in her chest, the shortness of breath, Cal helping her to his car and driving her to the hospital. The mattress was thin and the sheets starchy, like the green and white hospital gown bunching at her hips. She felt woozy as she continued to blink in the light.

“Hi,” Cal said at her side. “Glad you’re awake.”

She mustered a weak smile. “Hi.” She looked blearily around the room, allowing her eyes to adjust. In the corner, she saw Mamaw sitting upright in a metal chair. She looked smart in her usual tunic—an aqua blue today—and tan linen pants. Mamaw smiled with encouragement when their gazes met.

A voice rang out from across the room. “Lord, you had us so worried! I was fixing to have a heart attack myself!”

Dora saw Mamaw’s eyes roll before she turned her head in
the other direction to see her mother hurrying to her bedside. Winifred Smythe wore a sparkly white top that clung to her ample curves over black stretch pants, like snow on a mountaintop.

“Mama?”

Winifred rushed to Dora’s side. Her once blond hair was now mostly gray and worn in the utilitarian bob and bangs style that Cal referred to as “the helmet.” Under her blue eyes, a string of pearls graced her neck and dangled from her ears in delicate drops.

“Yes, it’s me, darling. I’m here!” she said, clutching Dora’s hand.

“When did you get here?”

“I dropped everything and drove straight here the moment Cal called. Bless his heart, he was so upset about you, he forgot to tell me what hospital he’d taken you to.”

Dora tried to imagine Cal being that worried about her.

“Honey, you gave us such a scare,” Winifred continued, squeezing her hand. “When I got to thinking my baby girl had a heart attack. I cried all the way from Charlotte. I am a wreck!”

Mamaw spoke up. “Don’t get your knickers in a knot, Winnie. We don’t know it was a heart attack.”

“Well, of course it was,” Winifred replied dismissively. She released Dora’s hand with a pat. “A mild one, I’m sure . . .” she added to Dora in a consoling tone.

Cal stepped closer to the other side of her bed. Dora shifted her head on the pillow to focus on his face. Deep circles darkened his eyes and his usually neatly combed hair was disheveled. His expression was worry filled, even penitent.

“Dora,” he said in a low, broken voice. “I never meant for
anything like this to happen. When I saw you hit the floor . . .” He shook his head in misery.

Winifred clucked her tongue in sympathy.

“I . . . I was thinking . . .” He hesitated. “Maybe we should talk about this whole divorce thing a little more. Maybe we’re moving too quickly.”

Dora heard her mother suck in her breath.

Mamaw suddenly appeared at his right. “Cal, you look exhausted. You went through a scare and haven’t left Dora’s side. The doctor isn’t going to be in for a while. Why don’t you take a minute to go down to the cafeteria for some coffee. Winnie and I are both here. We’ll call you if the doctor comes.”

Cal looked at Dora and she nodded in agreement.

“Okay,” he said. “I could use a minute. I’ll be back soon.”

No sooner had the door closed behind him than Winifred clasped Dora’s hand again and squeezed it with enthusiasm.

“Did you hear that, honey?” she said with a gush. Her eyes gleamed. “Cal doesn’t want a divorce!”

Dora looked back with apathy. She didn’t feel the same giddy rush her mother did. She didn’t feel much at all. It was as though all the pent-up emotion that had roiled inside of her had expelled itself through whatever had happened to her in the house.

“He didn’t say that, Mama,” she said impassively. “At least not exactly.”

Winifred waved her hand. “He’s opened the door and you should rush back in. It’s time to mend those fences.”

Dora’s head was swimming in her mother’s overuse of mixed metaphors. Winifred loved pat sayings and used them excessively.

When Dora didn’t reply, Winifred said with shock, “You don’t want a divorce, do you?”

“And why not?” Mamaw asked her in an imperious tone.

Winifred turned to face Mamaw with a pinched expression. No love was lost between the two women, and the last thing Dora needed now was a showdown. She’d always felt that her mother unfairly blamed Mamaw for Parker’s faults. Mamaw had done all she could to support Winifred during her marriage to Parker and throughout the divorce. After all, Mamaw had introduced the couple, and they’d been so young when they’d married. With Parker having just graduated from college and Winifred a sophomore-year dropout, never to receive a degree, Mamaw had purchased a lovely house for the young couple in the fashionable Colonial Lake area of Charleston. Edward got Parker a job in his bank. Dora had always thought no parents could have been more generous. Two years later, after it was discovered that Parker was having an affair with Dora’s nanny, Mamaw had rallied in support of Winifred, threatening to cut Parker off if he didn’t end the affair with eighteen-year-old Sophie. The whole mess was a big disgrace that took Winifred years to get past. Memories were long in Charleston. But it certainly wasn’t Mamaw’s doing.

“Divorce is painful to bear,” Winifred said pointedly. “I should know. Not to mention the scandal of it all. If Cal is willing to reconsider, Dora should do whatever she can to save her marriage.”

Dora felt a twinge at her heart.

“Winnie,” Mamaw said, stepping closer. Her tone had shifted to conciliatory. “I realize your divorce from Parker was difficult. It broke my heart. You were both so young and you with a baby.”
She shook her head remorsefully. “It was all very sad. But Parker never changed, did he? He would have broken your heart over and over again if you had stayed together. You were set free by the divorce. If you’d stayed in that marriage, you never would have met Henry. And you’ve been happy with him, haven’t you?”

“True,” Winifred said, mollified. “But Cal isn’t Parker. He’s much more stable, reliable. He’s not an alcoholic,” she finished, her tone slightly smug, as though she knew the sting of those words would cut Mamaw deep.

Mamaw let the dig slide. “But does he love our Dora? That is the only criterion she should consider. Dora deserves more than a life filled with resentment and regrets. Both of us know too many women who are desperately unhappy because they stayed in a loveless marriage.”

“Marriage is not just about love,” Winifred countered, raising her voice sharply. “Love is merely passion and infatuation. Marriage is duty. Obligation. Commitment. It’s hard work.”

Mamaw scoffed. “You make it sound like a prison term. And I daresay, if those are the only reasons one chooses to live with a man, it will be.”

Dora felt this battle of wills stir her heart. She cringed, her body reacting to what she was hearing, like nails scraping a blackboard. Her mother’s position was clear. Dora should not get a divorce. Dora looked at her mother standing as erect as a soldier, glaring at Mamaw, ready to do battle with a formidable foe. Her mother used the word
should
a lot, she realized. She didn’t care if the marriage was happy or even content. Winnie had never invested in relationships. It had always been about maintaining the social conventions, about doing what one
should.

Dora was about to remind them that she was in the room when the door opened and the subject of their conversation entered carrying a cup of coffee. Immediately the two women stopped talking and tight smiles appeared on their faces as they welcomed him back. Dora said nothing, but realized that it hadn’t occurred to Cal to ask the older women if they’d wanted coffee, tea, or even a donut. They’d been pulling equally long hours at the hospital. But he’d never been thoughtful in that way. Dora tried to brush off the thought. After all, Cal was here and he was trying. That had to be enough.