“Naw, he won’t be no bother. He
“He wouldn’t be a house dog if he wasn’t.”
“Well, then, he’ll be just fine. Ladybelle’ll let him know if he gets out of line with her.”
“Thanks, Daddy,” I said, standing on tiptoe to kiss his wrinkled cheek. “Dwight and Cal should be back Wednesday and they’ll be over to pick him up then. I’ll get home on Thursday. Maidie has our phone numbers if anything comes up.”
Daddy’s aversion to telephones was formed back when long-distance phone calls cost real money, and no matter how cheap they are these days, he’s never going to change.
“Ain’t nothing gonna come up worth a phone call,” he told me firmly.
Minutes later I was meandering through a maze of back-country roads that would take me over to I-40. Despite all the new developments that had obliterated so many of the county’s small farms, there were still fields of tobacco along the way. Here in the middle of June, few of the tops were showing any pink tuberoses yet. I passed a four- or five-acre stand of corn where a red tractor was giving the plants a side-dressing of soda. And there were still parcels of unsold fallow land where tall oaks and maples were in full leaf, where honeysuckle competed with deep green curtains of kudzu that fell in graceful loops from power wires to drape all the weaker trees. Goldenrod, daisies, and bright orange daylilies brightened the ditch banks.
Once I hit I-40, heading southeast, the wide green dividers bloomed with beds of delicate pink poppies and eye-popping red cannas. Grass and trees and bushes were so lush and green that the line about being “knee-deep in June” kept looping through my head. Robert Frost? Eugene Field? I often wish I had paid more attention to poetry in my college lit courses. Someone once described poetry committed to memory as “a jewel in the pocket.”
My pockets have holes in them and most of the jewels have fallen out.
I-40 came to an end about ninety miles later where the highway splits. To the right is the town of Wilmington proper with its meandering boardwalk along the Cape Fear River, its many seafood restaurants, the courthouse, and street after street lined with live oaks and antebellum mansions with black-and-gold historical plaques affixed to the front.
The left fork of the highway leads over to Wrightsville Beach, past a dozen or more strip malls, shopping centers, and upscale gated communities until you reach the high-rise hotels and densely packed beach houses that line the wide beaches of sugar-soft sand.
I turned in at the conference hotel and maneuvered past the cars loading and unloading to park near the entrance.
As I pulled my roller bag across the polished marble floor to the reception desk, I heard someone call, “Well, hey there, girl!”
I turned to see Chelsea Ann Pierce, a colleague based in Raleigh, and her sister, Rosemary Emerson, who’s married to a Durham judge. Chelsea Ann’s a generously built easygoing blonde with an infectious laugh. Rosemary’s the older prototype, with darker hair and a cynical sense of humor that cracks us all up.
I get my share of gooey, inspirational God-loves-you-and-so-do-all-the-women-you-know emails from various friends and relatives and those I usually delete without reading, but I never automatically delete the jokes and funny pictures or off-the-wall news items that Rosemary sends. She’s never yet duplicated anything that’s been circling through the ether for years, and it’s always something that makes me laugh out loud and then forward to a PI friend in California with a similarly warped outlook on life.
“Three minds with the same thought?” I asked, even though they were in clam diggers and bright cotton shirts. “Ya’ll figure to get a little beach time in first, too?”
Chelsea Ann shook her head. “Nope, we’re off to check out the consignment shops.” She recently sold the big suburban house that was part of her divorce settlement and bought a condo in Raleigh’s Cameron Village. “I need a narrow table for my new entry hall and the Ivy Cottage is supposed to have the best selection of used furniture around. Want to come? We’ll wait for you to check in.”
I shook my head and gestured toward the nearly deserted beach that lay beyond the clear glass walls. “Y’all go ahead. I haven’t been in salt water all season and I’m dying to get out there. I’m free for supper though. Want to meet at Jonah’s? Six-thirty?”
My hotel room on the fifth floor came with the standard king-sized bed, a decent-sized desk for my laptop, and a mirrored alcove that surrounded a Jacuzzi big enough for two. French doors opened onto a minuscule balcony that held two of those ubiquitous white plastic club chairs that seem to have taken over the world. It overlooked the beach and pool area, and my view of turquoise water was spectacular.
I immediately opened the glass doors and stepped outside. The ocean’s warm briny fragrance carried with it a faint whiff of chlorine from the pool and three hot tubs directly in front of the terrace that lay below my balcony. Too hot to sit out today though. Not when I could be down there. I didn’t bother to unpack anything except my bathing suit, beach jacket, floppy hat, and flip-flops. After slathering myself with sunscreen till I felt like a turkey getting ready for the roasting pan, I took the elevator down to the pool level. There were piles of thick white towels by the door and I grabbed a couple as I went past. The heat hit me in the face again as soon as I opened the outer door but a light breeze was blowing off the water and gulls were kiting on the currents overhead. A line of pelicans swooped past so low that they almost skimmed the tops of the waves. Although the pool was drawing a fair crowd, the beach was practically empty, and the lifeguard appeared to be playing a game on his cell phone. I saw no one I knew on my stretch of creamy beige sand as I spread out the towels, took off my jacket, and lay down on my back with my hat over my face to let the sun bake my body.
“
Until I felt the tension draining out of my joints and muscles, I didn’t realize how much stress I’d been under these last five months, adjusting both to marriage and to having Cal with us full-time. This would be the longest I’d been away from both of them since January, but there on the hot sand, I finally admitted to myself just how much I had been looking forward to this week.
No personal demands, no stepmother tightropes to walk. Only the give and take of professional life, and I wasn’t going to feel guilty about enjoying it or let my anger with Dwight ruin it for me.
Or so I told myself, because lying on my towel, I was beginning to feel thoroughly miserable.
“
