Читать книгу Stranger at the Door - Laura Abbot - Страница 11

Springbranch, Louisiana

August, 1957

TWINK AND I WERE TOGETHER every day of what was to be our last Springbranch summer. In mid-August Twink’s parents abruptly put their house on the market under suspicious circumstances. Twink acted unfazed. “After all,” she said with a toss of her head, “I’ll be back East at college. What do I care where they live?”

But she did care. A great deal. She’d told me once that Springbranch was the only place her family had lived for more than two years. The town represented roots, and poignantly, so did my family and I.

Not that Mother ever fully accepted Twink’s eccentricities, but Grandmama relished another rapt listener for her stories, and Daddy enjoyed it when we girls sprawled on the Oriental rug in his study and read while he worked.

Although Twink may have appeared undaunted by change, I couldn’t even pretend to be unaffected. We were attending different colleges—she, a prestigious women’s college and I, the state university on an academic scholarship. Knowing we’d be apart even during vacations made this transition all the more unsettling. The last night before Twink left for school, Mother allowed me to sleep over at the Montgomerys’ house.

Twink’s belongings had been boxed up, ready for the family’s move to Baltimore, and open suitcases awaited last-minute additions. Her stripped room was symbolic of change. Gentle breezes stirred the ruffled curtains at the window, and our voices echoed off the bare walls. Twink seemed determined to get through the night without sadness, but I barely held myself together. Determinedly cheerful, she recalled our meeting, high school escapades and secret crushes. It was after two when we finally turned out the light. I lay in the twin bed, staring at the leafy branches of the huge oak outside the window, choking back my pain and loss and wondering when I would ever see my friend again.

Just as I was about to drift off, Twink spoke. “Are you awake?”

“Yes.”

“You’ll be all right, you know.”

It was as if she’d read my mind, knew how apprehensive I was about going to Louisiana State University and understood how much I was going to miss her friendship. A lone tear trickled down my cheek. “It won’t be the same without you.”

“I know.” I detected a hitch in her voice. “Here’s the thing, Izzy. Things can’t always stay the same, even if we’d like them to. Look at it this way. We’re ready for new adventures in that wonderful world out there.”

That alien world terrified me. Yet in that moment I found myself wanting to comfort Twink, whose voice betrayed her bravado. Oddly, that made me feel better. I wasn’t the only one uncertain about the future.

“A whole new world…but, Twink, I can’t do this unless I know we’ll always be friends, no matter what.”

“Till we die,” she whispered.

I echoed her words. “Till we die.”

We were such innocents, little dreaming what changes and upheavals life would bring. But we understood the solemnity of our pledge, and we honor it still.

Baton Rouge

1957-1958

COLLEGE. THE HALCYON years between adolescence and adulthood. Or so they say. First semester of my freshman year, from the frenzy of sorority rush to the rigor of final exams, I felt overwhelmed. So many people. Unfamiliar surroundings. Sharing a room for the first time. And the crushing weight of my mother’s expectations.

Before I left for the university, I’d been unaware that a coed’s true purpose in attending college was snagging a husband. But in Mother’s weekly phone calls, she made that abundantly clear. “Have you met anyone yet?” Anyone, of course, was code for Mr. Right. I was meeting some college men at fraternity mixers, but they weren’t lining up to escort me to parties.

Gradually, I settled into a niche. I enjoyed sorority life, and once or twice a month one of my sisters arranged a blind date for me, but none of them progressed beyond friendship. Women today have choices, but back then, college, for most, was a marital hunting ground. We gave lip service to majoring in education, nursing or home economics, but few of us expected to be employed beyond our first pregnancy.

Meanwhile, Twink regaled me in letters and phone calls with accounts of wild house parties, weekends in New York City and the “divine” men she was meeting. I wasn’t exactly jealous because I knew such glamorous experiences weren’t for me, and yet….

My sophomore year was easier. Living in the sorority house gave me a comforting sense of home, I knew my place and began to understand the usefulness of my English lit studies. Yet I was no closer to satisfying my mother’s ambitions. The fact of the matter was that I was in no hurry. Marriage was a distant goal. College men either terrified me with their drinking exploits and masculine swagger or bored me with their immaturity.

Throughout my first two years at LSU, the billiken sat on the dresser in my cubbyhole of a room, mocking me with its silence.

Baton Rouge

1959-60

HONESTLY, I’D EXPECTED my college experience to be like the glossy color photos in the school catalog, where I’d be happily waving a purple and gold pennant in the student cheering section or strolling hand-in-hand with a handsome fellow sporting a letter jacket.

Amazingly, in my junior year that’s exactly what happened. Drew Mayfield came into my life. If Mother had ordered him from a husband catalog, he couldn’t have more neatly fit her mold. His résumé was impeccable: honor student, captain of the golf team, treasurer of the top fraternity, a pre-law major. From Mother’s viewpoint his most important credential lay in the fact his father was a federal judge.

Drew was handsome and innately kind. All Southern gentlemen model courtesy, but many practice it in chauvinistic, self-aggrandizing ways. Not Drew. He treated me like a lady, even a cherished one. Therein lay the problem. He was perfect…on paper. We walked hand-in-hand down azalea-lined sidewalks, he bought me a chrysanthemum corsage for homecoming and nominated me for sweetheart of his fraternity. We became a couple. At the end of that year, beneath a full Southern moon, he gave me his fraternity pin.

When I went home for the summer, Mother was ecstatic. For once, I was convinced I’d pleased her. She pored over photographs of Drew and me, and couldn’t hear enough about our courtship. Yet the more I repeated the story, the more removed I felt, as if I were observing a film entitled the The Good Daughter.

Drew drove up from New Orleans twice that summer and succeeded in charming my mother and grandmother. Daddy was his usual chivalrous but inscrutable self. Drew seemed maddeningly at home in Springbranch. I say maddeningly, because I caught myself trying to discover a flaw in him. Surely he would be out of place in our small town. But he wasn’t. Even Eunice Culpepper, our nosy neighbor, fell under his spell.

I liked him. I really did. And I’m reasonably certain he believed himself in love with me. By the beginning of our senior year, we had a tacit understanding that we would marry following graduation. Mother was already considering the guest list and the seasonal flowers that would adorn the church. I was swept away in a tidal wave of others’ expectations.

It took Twink to ask the question. “Do you love him so madly your body quakes with excitement?”

I clenched the phone and swallowed the lump in my throat.

“Izzy?” The compassion in my friend’s voice undid me.

“I…uh, I…”

“The answer’s no, isn’t it?”

How desperately I wanted to tell Twink that Drew was the most exciting man in the world, that he did, indeed, make me limp with desire. That all the pictures in the book we had read in that gazebo years ago had taken on glorious new meaning.

You might logically assume I broke off with Drew. But I didn’t. He was safe. Predictable. I liked him. Best of all, he pleased my mother. I could learn to love him, I told myself. We could have a nice life together.

Oh, what a weak word “nice” is.

Springbranch

1960

IN EARLY NOVEMBER OF that year, I was called home from school. Grandmama, who had grown increasingly frail, was in the hospital. Seeing her pale, shrunken body on the bed, I faced mortality for the first time. When I picked up her hand, the paperlike, wrinkled skin felt warm, but her breath came in labored gasps. Her white hair, usually perfectly coiffed, hung lankly. Nurses came and went, but I felt compelled to stay. From the hall I heard whispered consultations. Congestive heart failure. Not long now. Words that pierced my soul.

Daddy sat in the waiting room, a volume of Wordsworth his only company. Mother bustled. Straightening pillows. Filling the water carafe. Adjusting the blinds.

But I sat, willing each new inhalation and realizing how much I loved Grandmama and depended on her. I had never had to work to please her. Even if I’d told her the truth years ago about the cotillion disaster, she would have hugged me and said, “There, there, Bel.”

Later that night after Mother left the room, I found myself humming “I’ll Fly Away” and blinking back tears. Then I felt Grandmama’s thumb caressing the back of my hand. When I looked up, her eyes were open, her mouth curved in the trace of a smile. “Bel,” she murmured.

“I’m here.”

With surprising strength, she drew me closer. I leaned over the bed. “That boy,” she whispered.

“Drew?”

She nodded. “Passion.” The word had the force of an imperative.

I had no answer.

Then came the last words I ever heard my grandmother utter. “Things as they ought to be, ma petite.”

Then she closed her eyes, gave a long sigh and left me.

Baton Rouge

1961

EVEN THOUGH I KNEW in my heart I was betraying both myself and Grandmama, I agreed to marry Drew. Of all the men I had met at college, he was by far the best match. We had much in common. Our families approved. We discussed names for the two children we intended to have. Besides, marriage was the “done” thing. With few exceptions, my sorority sisters either were already married or in the throes of planning their weddings.

Drew’s kisses didn’t send me to the moon, but they were pleasant enough. Heavy petting, while arousing, seemed a bit clinical, but so had the photographs in the book. Back then, though, I didn’t know anything different.

St. John’s was reserved for September 8, the women’s auxiliary scheduled to cater the reception and the Springbranch Country Club booked for the rehearsal dinner. Twink was to be my maid of honor. Mother was in her element. Things were proceeding precisely according to her plan. Daddy spent even more time in his study.

I don’t know if it was born out of a subconscious need for self-preservation or a desire to escape, but I asked my parents for only one thing for a college graduation present. A trip to Atlanta, where the Montgomerys were living, to visit Twink, before plunging into final bridal preparations.

And that, as they say, made all the difference.

Atlanta, Georgia

Summer 1961

TWINK MET ME AT the Atlanta terminal, her smile as infectious as always, her freckles giving her a Doris Day insouciance. We shrieked, we hugged, we jumped up and down and then repeated the process. She loaded my bags into a Lincoln Continental convertible and swooped out of the parking lot, red curls lifting in the breeze. Above the roar of wind and traffic, she pointed out landmarks. Finally we entered an old neighborhood of lovely Southern and Greek Revival homes, with well-tended formal gardens shaded by century-old trees. “Pretty impressive, huh?” She winked. “Wait until you see Tara.”

She slowed, pulling through wrought-iron gates, and we began a gradual climb, past a fish pond, a gazebo and a caretaker’s home. At the crest of the hill, I saw it—the massive three-story white house with Greek columns. Twink stopped the car and leaned back, arms folded across her chest. “The parents are on the upswing again.”

An understatement, particularly by Springbranch standards. Speechless, I realized I was far out of my element. My thoughts flew to the clothes I had packed—store-bought, gauche. Before I could focus on my discomfort, Twink leaped from the car, grabbed my suitcase and put her arm around me. Leaning close, she said, “It’s just me, Izzy. You’ll be fine. All you have to do is pretend you’re in a movie.” Once again she’d read my mind.

Later that night, settled on the four-poster in her spacious bedroom, decorated in a pink-and-white magnolia motif, we shared the six-pack of beer she’d liberated from the restaurant-sized kitchen. “Okay,” she commenced. “I want to hear everything about Drew, and please tell me you’re not choosing fussy organdy bridesmaid dresses.”

She didn’t immediately probe my carefully suppressed reservations, but shocked me by the question she asked after I’d waxed eloquent about Drew’s stellar qualities. “Is he good in bed?”

“Twink!” The sultry Southern night echoed my dismay.

She threw herself dramatically across the bed. “Isabel Irene, surely you’re not marrying before trying him out.”

My fire-engine red face gave me away.

“Oh, God.” She sat up and took both my hands in hers. “Honey, it’s no big deal.” She smiled impishly. “Mostly it’s a lot of fun.”

My stomach soured. “You mean, you’ve done it?”

“Me and most of your lah-de-dah sorority sisters.”

“You think?” I couldn’t process the images bombarding my brain.

“Is it Drew? You don’t think he’s…?” She waggled her fingers back and forth in a this-way, that-way fashion.

I was horrified. “What a thing to say! And no, I’m sure he’s not.”

“Well, my advice, sugar, is to try the merchandise before buying.”

Deep in the pit of my stomach, I knew she was right. I wanted fireworks and shooting stars. I’d experienced none with Drew. Before Twink’s question, I’d successfully buried my doubts, but her honesty forced them to the surface.

Sensing my discomfort, she reached for the church key and opened another beer, thrusting it into my hands. “Drink up. You don’t have to decide anything this very minute. Anyway, I want to tell you about the garden party we’re throwing in your honor tomorrow night, not to mention the country club dance on Saturday. We’re going to have so much fun.” She flopped over onto her stomach. “You will not believe the dreamy men in this town. Why, chile, I just flit from one to another like a bee sippin’ honey.” Her low laugh had a distinctly seductive sound.

I studied the diamond on my ring finger, incapable of imagining how she handled multiple suitors. I took a swig of beer, suddenly missing Drew. All this talk of sex, parties and glamorous men made me long for the mundane, the dull, the safe. For my fiancé.

I REMEMBER THE MOMENT as if it happened yesterday. There is no way I can adequately describe the impact. Let me set the scene.

Chinese lanterns strung from tree to tree illuminated the flagstone patio leading to the Olympic-size pool in which colorful blossoms floated. A white tent stretched over the manicured lawn; inside, a quintet played romantic dance music. Jacketed waiters manned the buffet table and fully stocked bar. Our hostess, Honey Montgomery, was stunning in a silver-lamé evening gown. Mr. Montgomery, a cigar in one hand, mingled with groups of tuxedo-clad gentlemen. Twink had given me good advice when she told me to pretend I was in a movie. I fully expected Elizabeth Taylor to make a grand entrance. Twink had been accurate about the young men of Atlanta—tall, well-groomed, mannerly and utterly gorgeous in their white dinner jackets. Not to mention a trio of handsome young lieutenants from Bainbridge Air Force Base.

To my utter horror, before we sat down for dinner, Honey stepped to the top of the stairs leading to the pool, signaled for quiet and introduced little ole me from Springbranch, Louisiana, to the assembled partygoers. Clutching the skirt of my pale blue chiffon gown, I felt frumpy and exposed.

As soon after dinner as I could politely excuse myself, I escaped to the seclusion of a garden bench nestled in a bower of roses beyond the tent. I knew I couldn’t remain cowering there, but I needed to gather myself. I had always known that Twink’s world was vastly different from my own. I just hadn’t realized how different. She took the opulence and sophistication in stride. I was totally intimidated, a pond fish washed up on a tropical beach. I had no idea how I would endure the rest of the evening.

Wallowing in my social ineptitude, I didn’t hear him approach. I only know that when I raised my head, the handsomest young man I had ever seen was standing over me, hands in the pockets of his air force dress uniform pants. His head was slightly cocked to one side, a mischievous grin played on his lips, and he was studying me with the deepest cobalt-blue eyes I had ever seen. My heart stopped. I was in a movie.

“Running away?” His voice was like warm brandy. He didn’t wait for my answer. “Mind if I join you?”

“A-are you sure?” I stammered.

“Never surer of anything in my life,” he said, sitting beside me. “I’ve been looking for you.”

“For me?” The words came out as a squeak.

“I haven’t been able to keep my eyes off you all evening.”

My breath caught. I couldn’t have written a better script myself. “Me?” I was speechless.

He slipped an arm around my bare shoulder and turned me toward him. “What I’d really like to do is kiss you.”

And he did. No fireworks or starbursts in the world could match the thrill and power of that kiss. When we broke apart, he framed my face, brushed one finger across my cheek and with a lazy smile added, “And now I’m going to do it again.”

It never occurred to me to deny him. I was helpless, but in some small part of my brain I understood that, until that moment, I had known nothing of the kind of love a man and woman are born to share.

He pulled me to my feet. “Isabel Ashmore.” His mouth caressed the words. “Izzy. I’m Sam Lambert and, if you don’t mind, I’m claiming you for the rest of the evening.”

Mind? I couldn’t believe this was happening to me. Yet everything—the night sky, the distant strains of “Deep Purple,” the fragrance of roses—whispered, Do this thing.

“Why did you call me Izzy?”

He held my hands firmly. “Isabel sounds formal, public. I want our private name. It sounds good, don’t you think? Sam and Izzy. Izzy and Sam.”

I couldn’t help smiling. “Aren’t you being a wee bit presumptuous?”

He circled my waist as we strolled up the path toward the tent. “Not at all. I’ve been waiting for you all my life. When you were introduced this evening, I knew I had to get to know you. I’ll be damned if I’ll let you get away.”

With a sinking sensation, I realized that with my thumb I was fingering my engagement ring. I needed to tell him. To put an end to whatever this was. But at that moment he stopped walking and tilted my chin so that I was looking straight into those sexy eyes, so full of promise. “Tell me you feel it, too.”

Grandmama’s advice came flooding back to me. Passion. Right then I understood that I was caught up in something beyond my control. “I do,” I whispered, “and it’s scary.”

“And wonderful.”

“And wonderful.”

I know this all sounds corny and clichéd, even melodramatic. But it happened just like that. In an instant, the planets halted in their orbit and my heart knew love.

For the rest of that evening and the days and nights that followed, Sam and I were inseparable. I’m not proud to say it, but I took off my engagement ring and stored it in my jewelry case. Twink gloated like an approving mother cat.

Because Sam was on a weekend pass from the air base where he was stationed for pilot training, time took on urgency. We lounged by the pool, soaking up the sun, oblivious to anyone else. We enjoyed a lopsided game of tennis and left the country club dance Saturday night to lie on a blanket near the eighteenth green, sharing hot kisses in the glimmering, magical moonlight. It was an awakening for me. I had not known my body could quiver with need or that instinct could drive me to abandon.

And we talked. And talked. I had never met anyone who had nurtured an ambition—in his case to be a pilot—and then pursued it with such intensity. A three-sport athlete in high school, he’d been awarded a scholarship to the University of Nebraska, where he’d played varsity basketball and had joined the air force ROTC. When he spoke about his pilot training and his service buddies, his face lit up. This was no boy; this was a man who had embraced his purpose in life. His maturity stirred something deep within me.

Our last night together Sam held me close. “You’re my girl. My Southern hothouse flower.” He nuzzled my cheek. “My Izzy.”

I was besotted. Twink was merciless. “Isabel Irene, you’re in love. Why would you settle for anything less? You march right home and cancel that wedding.”

“I’ve had a wonderful time, but, Twink, this isn’t reality. It’s a fairy tale, and the clock is about to strike midnight. Chances are, I’ll never see Sam Lambert again.” Even as I said those words, my throat closed in panic.

“Maybe not, but you don’t know that. What you do know is that you’re not in love with Drew Mayfield. I’m not going to stand by and let you…” she fussed, searching for words “…settle for mediocrity.”

It was tempting to follow her advice, but I rationalized that my time with Sam was probably nothing more than one of those heady—but fleeting—summer romances I’d heard other girls talk about. Sure, he’d said he’d call, write. Finally, I decided I’d be a fool to count on anything, given the miles separating us.

Besides, was I willing to scuttle my future because of one gloriously romantic weekend? How could I disappoint Drew? Shatter my mother’s hopes? Act so irresponsibly and uncharacteristically?

And yet, how could I not?