Just thinking about her mother makes Shannon feel like crying, and she doesn"t know why. She breathes in quickly, short little breaths that make her feel slightly dizzy, so that she"s not quite certain what she"s seeing when a figure appears on the road. She stays real quiet, and when he draws a little closer she recognizes him as the boy she saw at the Dumpster. She feels a little fluttery, as if maybe he"s the sign she"s been waiting for, and without stopping to think, she walks out to meet him.
The boy is startled when he sees her; he takes several steps backward, just the way the deer in her yard used to.
"Are you running away?" Shannon asks.
The boy stares at her, then nods his head."I"m thinking about it, too," Shannon says, because right now that"s exactly the way it feels to her.
The boy takes one last step back. He should have dodged her before she opened her mouth to speak. Just because she"s stupid enough to hesitate doesn"t mean he has to do that too.
"I can"t make up my mind," Shannon admits.
"I think I have and then it turns out I haven"t. I feel like I"m driving myself crazy."
The boy can feel the momentum begin to drain out of his fingers and toes.
"Where"s your little sister?" Shannon asks. "The baby I saw you with?"
If the boy could speak, he would tell her that the baby is asleep in a crib, beneath an old cotton blanket, almost five miles down the road.
He would say that she"s too young to know she"s been abandoned. She won"t understand, even after she wakes to find that he"s gone. But nothing comes out of his mouth. All he can do is scowl and wish this girl would disappear. She"s a complete stranger; he doesn"t have to feel the doubts she has, he doesn"t even have to consider them. He can be on his own in two minutes flat, he can do it and not look back.
What does he owe anyone? Absolutely nothing. What does he feel on this road, so far from home? Nothing at all.
A car appears out of the darkness and pa.s.ses nearby, and as its headlights sweep across the road, Shannon and the boy step closer to each other. It"s the moment the boy"s been dreading, the instant when he hesitates. As soon as the car has gone by, the boy looks at Shannon as though he were frightened by everything-the dark, the car"s headlights, the sweet smell of lemons in the air-then he takes off running, back the way he"s come.
"Wait," Shannon calls after him, since it"s too soon to tell whether or not he"s the sign she"s been waiting for.
The boy is amazingly fast, running down the road until the night closes in behind him. You would think he"d never been there at all, unless you had been close enough to feel his warm breath, because he"s gone now, without ever having said a word. Shannon fans herself with one hand and holds her long hair up off her neck with the other. She"s used to hot weather and mosquitoes; she"s seen those white moths appear each May all her life, then disappear again in June. She hears Fred and Maury head out to their cars. She hears her mother calling from the back steps, the way she used to when Shannon was a little girl and woke early, so she could go outside and wait for the deer. It never occurred to Shannon to leave the back porch and walk over to the woods where her father kept a block of salt, just as it hasn"t yet occurred to her that she"s already made her decision. Standing in the road, listening to her mother call to her, she"s already left home.
Julian Cash sleeps in the car, just as he has for the past two nights, hunched up in the front, so that Loretta can sprawl across the backseaI .
The only difference is that now Lucy is sleeping less than two hundred yards away, in the guest room of her ex-husband"s house, and that just a few hours ago, while the sky was still inky and everyone else on the block was asleep, what Julian wanted to happen did, and it"s driving him crazy.
Since she"s gone inside the house, he hasn"t been able to sleep more than an hour at a time.
Every time he wakes he"s startled by the moon above him, as if it were a piece of Lucy"s dress, which tore when he touched it, so that his hands seemed filled with light. He thought she would be angry with him when she first got into the car, but she wasn"t. She leaned against the door and pulled her legs up beneath her. She had a way of looking at him that made him think she might bolt and run at any second.
"Are you here because you think I can"t do this by myself?" she had asked him.
"No," Julian had said, and it was the truth. He had been parked outside the country club for hours, with Loretta curled up in the backseat, listening to people enjoying themselves, because he couldn"t not be there. When the guy with the Porsche leaned down and kissed Lucy, Julian went to the glove compartment for his gun. It was just a reflex, he didn"t act on it. But he wanted to, and he knew what that meant. He had lost the ability to focus; if somebody didn"t stop him soon, he wasn"t going to be able to stop himself.
"I can get the name of this woman on my own," Lucy had told him. The white dress was so short it moved halfway up her thighs and she had to tug at it. "Whether you think I can or not."
"I think it"s a good thing you didn"t go home with him," Julian had said, as he steered the Mustang down the country club driveway. He actually said that; he heard the words come out of his mouth.
never know, will we?" Lucy had said.
"Since I didn"t."
"Oh, we know," Julian had said.
He was certain then that the madness had followed them. It had seeped into their bones, and even a thousand miles between them and Verity didn"t make a difference. He wanted her all the way back to her ex-husband"s house, but he never would have done anything about it if she hadn"t leaned toward him, suddenly, and looped her arms around him.
It had happened with so little warning, as soon as he"d parked in front of the house, that neither of them could think straight.
But before Lucy could change her mind, or even take another breath, he slid his hand between her legs, and when he felt how hot she was, he knew it wasn"t over yet. He couldn"t stop kissing her. He held her to him, so that her spine was pressed up against the steering wheel, and the most amazing thing was that she didn"t stop him.She wanted him to pull her dress down. She must have, because when he did she arched her back and let him go on kissing her. She didn"t run away when he jammed his seat back, or when he pulled down the zipper of his jeans, or even when he moved on top of and then inside her. She didn"t even close her eyes.
He could have sworn she told him not to stop. Somebody told him that.
Parked beneath the streetlight, he could hear her whispering to him.
Even if this never happened again, he didn"t care, and he wouldn"t let her go, not until the sky turned milky and gray and they heard The New York Times delivery truck turn the corner. And now his mouth is sore, and his head throbs, and he feels her all over him, as if she were still with him. He wants more than he promised himself he would, and because he doesn"t dare hope for anything, he finds himself hating New York and everything about it. He can barely breathe here.
It shouldn"t matter one bit that her ex-husband"s house is so big, or that there were thirty-one Jaguars parked at the country club last night. It shouldn"t matter that he had to show ID to get past the guard at the gate, when he noticed that no one else was being stopped.
Lucy told him, as she got out of the car, clutching her dress around her, not to follow her anymore. You I make people nervous, she told him. He"s thought about what she said and he knows it"s true. He"s been making people nervous all his life. He does it to her; he could tell from the way she backed away from the car. Sooner or later someone on Easterbrook Lane will pad out across a green lawn to pick up The New York Times, spot him, and call the police, and then he"ll have to report to the New York State police for permission to carry a gun.
He"s never given a d.a.m.n about cars or houses before, and he sure as h.e.l.l isn"t going to start caring now, but he thinks he may have a virus, or maybe it"s just that something"s wrong with the air up here.
Loretta, snoring in the backseat of the Mustang, doesn"t seem to notice the difference between New York and Florida, but she must because you can smell it, you can feel it on your skin, like pollen.
When Lucy finally comes out of the house, at a little after eight, Julian slouches down behind the wheel. She and her ex-husband are in the middle of an argument, probably about the boy.
Julian had felt he"d done the right thing in giving the boy his freedom; now he"s not so sure. A boy who grew up here on Easterbrook Lane couldn"t possibly know the difference between a daddy longlegs and a scorpion; he wouldn"t know enough to look out for ferrets and homed owls; he"d never manage to find his way in the dark. A boy from here wouldn"t think to avoid drainage ditches after a rainfall, or make certain to wear shoes, even on the hottest days, because of the fire ants. If Lucy knew her son was walking the roads by himself at night, putting his hands into Arrow"s feed gate, she"d probably be arguing with Julian instead of her ex-husband.
If she knew how much he wanted her, still, she might actually slap him.He wouldn"t blame her if she did. Lucy and her ex-husband argue until a white Volvo pulls up to the curb and honks. The ex-husband grins at the driver and waves, then walks over, although before he opens the door he turns to watch as Lucy backs the Celica out of the driveway.
Julian lets her get a good distance ahead of him before he pulls away from the curb. He follows her through the town of Great Neck, into the village of Kings Point, where the houses are bigger than most of the motels Julian has stayed in. They probably have better service and clean white sheets, ironed so well there"s not one wrinkie. He"s never going to mention what happened between them if she doesn"t." He"s already decided that. He"ll keep his mouth shut and stop wanting things, and when he gets back home he"ll just go on with his life, the same way he always has. He"ll be out of New York before he knows it, and he never has to come back.
Still, when Lucy drives through the iron gates leading to a house hidden behind weeping beeches, Julian finds himself wishing he had come here at a different time of year. Maybe then he would have seen snow.
He has pulled over onto the shoulder of the road, and from where he"s parked he can see the blue outline of the Throgs Neck Bridge. He gets out and lets Loretta run for a while, making sure to whistle when she strays too far onto someone"s lawn. He imagines that snow must be a lot like the mock orange petals that fell to the ground when he turned his wheel a little too hard and sideswiped the bushes on the shoulder of the road. A shower of pure, cool white; walking in it would be like walking through a cloud. He would have preferred winter; maybe then he wouldn"t still be hearing bees, like the ones that hover in the perennial garden behind those iron gates. When he wasn"t more than five years old, Julian stumbled into a bees" nest hidden within the roots of one of Miss Giles"s old willow trees. The bees swarmed around him, so many that the air was pure yellow, and that"s the way Miss Giles found him. She washed him in a bath of oatmeal soap, but she didn"t find one sting, and that made perfect sense to Julian, even then. Miss Giles thought it was some sort of miracle, but that wasn"t it at all. If he"d reached out and plucked a single bee from midair, its wings would have stopped beating beneath his gaze.
Past the beeches, and the gate, not much has changed since Lucy first came here. On that day, she was wearing a pleated skirt and a blue blouse with a round collar. She had two suitcases with her, and her long hair was pulled into a ponytail.
As soon as she walked through the door and stood in the marble foyer, she felt sick. She barely made it to the powder room, where she threw up in the pink-veined sink with its gold-plated handles.
And although that was more than twenty years ago, Lucy feels queasy again when she rings the doorbell. She decided to come here sometime near dawn; it is the sort of decision that seems shakier when considered in the bright light of morning.
When she"d left Julian, she went up to the guest bathroom and ran the shower as hot as she could, and still she couldn"t stop shivering.
After she folded her white dress into the wicker trash basket, she ran her hand over her throat, where he"d left a line of raised lovebites.
Since then, Lucy has thought, again and again, of her parents" final embrace in their car. She can almost taste their last kiss. A kiss so sweet and deep it could turn you inside out. They seemed so ridiculous to her, the way they couldn"t keep their hands off each other, the way they"d reach for each other in the morning, at the kitchen table, still sleepy from being out so late. At sixteen, when she came to this house, and locked herself in her bedroom for nearly a whole summer, she"d had no idea why her mother had always seemed so fl.u.s.tered when Scout grabbed for her hand instead of the coffee she set before him on the table. A silly woman, so careless she hadn"t heard the train headed straight for them.
And now, standing here, at her aunt and uncle"s door, Lucy finally understands how this might have been possible; she herself had not heard the news vendor"s truck this morning until Julian quickly threw the torn dress around them so they wouldn"t be seen.
When she rings the doorbell a second time, Lucy expects a housekeeper to answer, but instead it"s her Aunt Naomi. For just the slightest instant, Naomi doesn"t seem to know who Lucy is; she has that put-upon look she always had when Lucy didn"t come down to dinner on time.
"You should have phoned," Naomi says. She quickly embraces Lucy, then draws her into the foyer. "I could have canceled some of the appointments I have today."
Naomi has always been able to make Lucy feel guilty; during dinner she would stare at Lucy across the table just at the moment when Lucy happened to knock over a goblet of water or drop her b.u.t.ter knife on the floor.
"I saw Andrea last night," Lucy says. "Didn"t she tell you?"
"Actually, she did," Naomi says.
Naomi is nearing sixty, but she looks very much the way she did when Lucy first moved in. Her hair is a little blonder, her jewelry smaller and more expensive. "But I know you never come to visit us," she says.
"G.o.d forbid."
They go into the airy dining room, with its arched windows that overlook the gardens and the pool, and Naomi pours them both hot coffee.
Lucy reaches for her cup and immediately spills some coffee on the white linen tablecoth.
"That"s all right," Naomi says smoothly, but her forehead puckers as she frowns.
Lucy looks out to the garden. There is the pool house she remembers so well, and the stone path bordered by rhododendrons and lilies. Someone is already swimming laps in the pool. Her Uncle Jack.
"His heart," Naomi says. "There"s nothing wrong with it," she adds quickly. "We just want to keep it that way." She takes a sip of hercoffee, then adds some low-fat miik. "What did you think of Andrea?"
she asks casually.
"A big success," Lucy says.
"Well, she deserves every bit of it," Naomi says.
"Her reaction to you was our fault." She has clearly been wanting to say this for a long time. "Actually Jack"s."
Out by the pool, Lucy"s uncle rises from the water and grabs a thick towel.
"He had so much d.a.m.n guilt about your father that you instantly became his favorite, and that wasn"t easy on Andrea."
"I wasn"t his favorite," Lucy protests.
"You were, for all the good it did him. Did you know he turned sixty last month? Did you consider sending a card?"
Lucy puts down her coffee cup. She remembers that her mother often wore a bathrobe until noon and sang along with every song that came on the radio. Lucy could hear her mother"s deep, sweet voice, even when she tried not to, when she fled into her room and slammed the door shut. She could hear her father slide back his kitchen chair and applaud at the end of each song.
"Pardon me for being honest," Naomi says. "He idolized your father.
Did you know that? But he did what his parents told him and cut Scout off, and he"s had to live with that."
Lucy looks down at the linen tablecloth. There is a vase of pink roses in the center of the table.
Naomi has always preferred pink to red, which she thinks of as vulgar.
"You never knew Grandma and Grandpa, but everyone did what they said, or else. Except for Scout, of course, who never listened to anyone."
"So what"s your point, Naomi? My father"s dead.
Is there some further punishment you"d like to dole out to him?"
They stare at each other over the roses. Unless Lucy"s mistaken, Scout once bought her mother a chiffon scarf that was exactly the same shade of pink; she wound it around her hair on windy evenings and let Lucy borrow it to wear with a burgundy jumper.
"No," Naomi says thoughtfully. "I just wish he"d never existed in the first place."
The gla.s.s doors slide open and Jack comes in, wearing a long terry-cloth robe.
"I don"t believe my eyes," he says. "Lucy?"
Lucy rises and goes to kiss his cheek. He tastes like chlorine andsuntan lotion.
"I saw Andrea last night," she tells him.
"Ah," Jack says proudly. "My attorney."
That"s when Lucy knows her Aunt Naomi is wrong. She was never his favorite, though he might have tried to make himself believe it.
"Did she tell you she was pregnant?" Jack asks.
"It took them forever trying."
"Jack!" Naomi says.
"It"s good news," Jack says. "Good n I ws should be told. Of course, she"s still too skinny."
Jack sits down and accepts the coffee Naomi pours him out of a separate pot.
"Decaf," she tells Lucy.
If Scout were alive today, Lucy doubts that he"d be drinking decaffeinated coffee, but you never know. He wasn"t yet forty when he died. He didn"t have to think about decaffeinated coffee and life insurance and what staying out all night could do to you, let alone what it meant to be out on a raft when you entered middle age.
"Where"s the boy?" Jack asks as he breaks apart an onion roll.
"Where"s Keith?"
"No fats," Naomi tells him when he reaches for the b.u.t.ter.
"He"s back in Florida," Lucy says. It"s true; she doesn"t have to feel guilty about saying that.
"Still as smart as he always was?" Jack asks.
"Will you stop?" he says to Naomi, who has pushed a tub of b.u.t.ter subst.i.tute toward him.
"This woman is my health consultant all of a sudden," he tells Lucy.
"Did you get your M.D. while I wasn"t looking?" he asks Naomi.