“No, I’d have to say my mother would be last on my list of suspects,” he said.
“Oh, I know,” Mrs. Wheeler said hurriedly.
“And you’re probably right.
But your mother and I had a lot of conversations back in the old days.
She was very upset that she’d had a Mongoloid child and she’d been terribly worried when she got pregnant with you. She was afraid you might turn out to be slow, too, especially since she was even older when you were born than when your sister came. She told me how relieved she was when you were born normal. ” Mrs. Wheeler ran her fingertip over the sweaty handle of the pitcher. ” I always wondered if maybe she had gotten pregnant again. Maybe she was so afraid that she’d have another retarded child that she”-Mrs. Wheeler shrugged ” —left the baby to the sea, thinking that was the best and kindest thing to do. ”” Do you really think that was a possibility? ” Rory was incredulous.
“I guess I thought she was just as likely as anybody else on the street.”
Why not his mother? he thought. He’d considered nearly every other woman on the cul-de-sac. But this was one direction his thinking refused to take him.
He took a last swallow of the too-sweet tea.
“Well,” he said, standing up, “I should get back to Poll-Rory.”
“Watch out for Bemadette,” Mr. Wheeler said.
“Cindy’s last name was Delaney, you said?” Rory asked.
Mr. and Mrs. Wheeler got to their feet as well.
“That’s right,” Mrs.
Wheeler said.
“And wait till you see her. She hasn’t changed a bit.”
1 think evacuation is inevitable,” Daria said. She was sitting next to Rory on the widow’s walk.
“They said there’s a high-pressure system that’s going to pull Bemadette straight toward us.”
“It’s hard to believe there’s a storm out there,” Rory said.
They were both sitting on the west side of the widow’s walk, facing the sea, and the water was calm, the glassy waves rolling toward shore with an easy, uniform rhythm. Daria had seen enough storms on the Outer Banks to know that this tranquillity was deceptive. It was difficult to worry when the air and the sea were this quiet, and she could understand how someone not familiar with the area could convince themselves the storm would veer off course and miss them. But she didn’t need the weather to tell her what was coming. She felt it in her gut, that churning apprehension she always had when a storm was heading their way. It could miss them. They might receive no more than a few sprinkles and some harmless wind. Or, the water could cover Kill Devil Hills, destroying the beaches and pulling the cottages out to sea. It was the not knowing that made her stomach chum. She needed to prepare for the worst scenario. She needed to think about lowering the storm windows, closing the storm shutters, bringing the tools up from the workshop, and most important, keeping Shelly as calm and occupied as she could.
n
“I can already feel Shelly tensing up,” Daria said.
“I don’t think she’s eaten anything all day.”
“Did you give her a hard time about letting Zack and Kara use her room?” Rory asked.
“Not too hard,” Daria said.
“By the time she got home last night, she was already getting nervous about the storm. I didn’t have the heart to upset her more.”
“Where do we go if we have to evacuate?” Rory asked. “Where do you usually go?”
“We’ll go to a motel in Greenville,” Daria said.
“As a matter of fact, I’d better make reservations now, just in case we need them. Would you like me to make reservations for you and Zack, too?” She hoped he said yes. She wanted him close by.
“That would be great,” he said.
“I guess I should get some plywood, huh? I’ve never done this before. I remember my father nailing wood over the windows, though.”
“Yes, you should. And take down the Poll-Rory sign so it doesn’t blow away. Move the porch and deck furniture inside.” She looked across the cul-de-sac at his cottage. “Put your garbage can inside, too, and anything else that might turn into a missile in the wind.”
“You’re starting to make me nervous now,” Rory said.
“I know.” She laughed.
“My stomach hurts just thinking about it.”
They were quiet for a few minutes. She could see Zack and some of the other kids playing volleyball on the beach. Rory finally broke the silence.
“I had a talk with the Wheelers today,” he said.
“Oh. About Kara?”
“Well, I skirted the issue of Kara and Zack,” he said.
“They think my son is a great guy. I’d best leave it at that.”
