Page 21 of That Last Carolina Summer

“To be better adapted to flying, many of the bones in a bird’s body are hollow, and their feathers help to balance and steer in flight.

In contrast, we humans are forced to learn what tools we need to survive.

We might struggle for years before we learn what we really need, and some of us never do.

It’s funny to think that humans are considered the smartest of all the beasts on earth.

I’ve met sparrows with a keener sense of survival than most people I know. ”

Excerpt from the blog The Thing with Feathers

Celeste

THE SKY SHOOK with thunder, the rain pelting the metal roof with fury.

I peeked into the dining room where Ophelia and Will were playing gin rummy at the table.

Annie slept peacefully on the floor between them, her growing deafness a blessing during a storm.

I’d taught Will how to play gin rummy, and he was now a bit of a card shark and rarely lost. When he got a little older, I’d teach him blackjack, mostly because his mother wouldn’t approve.

While waiting for the women to return from the doctor’s appointment, I made myself useful by tidying up without being intrusive. In the kitchen I returned the scattered contents of the drawers to their proper place and then ran a vacuum and dust rag over the entire downstairs.

My motives were not wholly altruistic, although I was glad I could help where it was so badly needed.

Helping others was one of the reasons I’d become a nurse.

But the truth was that I was apprehensive about seeing Phoebe after the appointment, after she learned that I hadn’t been completely straightforward with her.

I hoped that Phoebe’s appreciation might soften any anger over my omission.

A car door slammed outside. Instead of seeing the tow truck I’d been told was on its way an hour before, I saw a small white sedan backing down the driveway and Addie running through the rain toward the front porch.

I met her at the front door. “Is everything all right? Where are your mother and sister?”

She brushed past me without a word before spinning around to glare at me. “Why are you still here? And why are you here at all?”

“I was passing by this morning—”

“Passing by? By accident? Like you weren’t hoping to run into my sister?”

I closed the door behind me. “Partly,” I said, guessing that being straightforward with Addie might be the only way to defuse her anger.

“I did want to see Phoebe, and when I saw your mother’s car parked erratically on the front yard, I came up to the porch and knocked on the door to make sure everyone was all right. ”

“We’re all fine. So you can leave now.”

I thought of how Ophelia had opened the door to a stranger that morning while Addie slept and Elizabeth ransacked the kitchen looking for her car keys, and I felt my own ire stir.

“I can’t,” I said, keeping my voice calm.

“They have my car, and it’s storming outside so I can’t walk.

I’m sorry that I withheld my connection to your family.

I will apologize to Phoebe when I see her and explain—”

“No. I want you out of here before they return.” She began marching toward the stairs.

“I will wait until I speak with Phoebe before I leave. Because someone needs to be here for Ophelia.”

She turned on me with fury. “Ophelia is not your responsibility, and we do not need you interfering where you’re neither wanted nor needed.”

I knew better than to argue with her, her fury so out of proportion to my crime that I knew there was something else fueling her anger, something that had nothing to do with her assumptions of why I’d befriended her sister.

The grandfather clock chimed. “Shit! I need to get to work. What am I supposed to do now?” She pressed her hands against the sides of her head. “Why is this happening to me?”

I restrained myself from answering what I was sure was a rhetorical question. “Why don’t you take an Uber?”

She shook her head, her wet hair flinging around and splattering my face. “I can’t. My credit card is maxed out because Mother hasn’t paid the bill, and I just gave the last of my cash to the taxi to get me home. So now what am I supposed to do?”

There were so many things I wanted to suggest, the first being to lower her voice so that Ophelia and Will couldn’t overhear her.

Instead I said, “I would be happy to drop you off at work on my way home after I get my car back if Phoebe gets home soon. And I have some cash you can borrow if you want to call another taxi.”

She glared at me again, her running mascara and wet hair giving her a wild beauty.

“I know what you’re doing. You’re being nice so I won’t insist that Phoebe stay away from you.

Because you and I know why you want to be her friend, don’t we?

But I won’t allow my sister to be taken advantage of by you or anybody else.

Besides, just in case you haven’t already asked, she doesn’t have her dreams anymore, so she can’t help you.

So why don’t you go ahead and leave? A little rain isn’t going to kill you.

I’ll tell Phoebe you had to go, and then she doesn’t have to hear from you again. You can pick up your car tomorrow.”

I took a deep breath. “To be clear, I like your sister. Her curiosity of the natural world and her eagerness to make others happy, despite how she might be treated, reminds me a lot of my granddaughter, which is probably why I enjoy being with her. I also think she could use a friend right now, and I’m happy to oblige.

If you object to my presence, maybe you could try to be more of a sister to her so Phoebe won’t need me as much.

It seems as if the two of you might need each other now more than ever. ”

She narrowed her eyes. If I hadn’t felt so sorry for her, I might have felt alarm.

But I’d seen a glimmer of fear that I found more confusing than alarming.

Maybe she really was afraid that I was trying to take advantage of Phoebe’s strange gift, but I doubted Addie had matured past being concerned only about herself.

Maybe she was afraid that I understood her family’s dynamics better than she did.

Either way, nothing justified her antagonism toward me.

I was determined to kill her with kindness until she understood that I wasn’t a threat.

“Just wait until I tell my mother who you are. Over the years I know she’s tried to forget that stupid lawsuit ever happened, and I know your presence—or that of your grandson—will not be welcome.

Speaking of which, I’m going to find another neurologist for my mother.

Because I’m sure you would have no problem using your grandson to further interfere in my family’s business. ”

She turned on her heel and headed for the stairs. I didn’t have the heart to remind her that my family had been the victim of the lawsuit or that her mother wouldn’t recall it or, if she did, wouldn’t remember to be offended that I had reinserted myself into her life.

I called out to her. “Addie, I was about to ask the children if they’d like a snack, and I’d be happy to fix something for you, too, if you’re hungry.”

She continued up the stairs, her response the slamming of her door.

By the time Phoebe and her mother returned, Elizabeth’s car had been towed, and Addie had left in a taxi.

I didn’t want to make her ask for money, so I’d left cash tucked in between the framed photographs on the hallway table.

When I’d emerged from the kitchen after preparing a shopping list for easy-to-prepare meals and other essentials I thought Elizabeth might need, the cash and Addie were gone.

The rain had stopped by the time I heard their footsteps slowly climbing up to the porch, and when I opened the door, they both looked exhausted.

Elizabeth glowered at me. “Who are you?”

“Mother,” Phoebe began, her voice vibrating with her last nerve.

“I’m Celeste. Welcome home,” I said cheerfully, throwing the door wide. “Elizabeth, I can’t think of anybody else better to show me the correct way to set a table, and I know you’d like to eat in the dining room tonight with Phoebe and Ophelia.”

Mollified, Elizabeth allowed herself to be ushered inside as Phoebe raised her eyebrows in question.

Turning to Phoebe, I said, “Will showed me how to use an app on his phone to order a nice dinner for the three of you, and it should be here in about half an hour.”

She looked like she might cry, so I continued, “Go ahead and get a beer from the fridge and put your feet up. The children can help your mother set the table to give you a few minutes to gather yourself.”

By the time I had the children and Elizabeth situated in the dining room practicing various napkin folds with antique Belgian lace squares, Phoebe had already polished off a bottle of beer, the nearly empty bottle sitting on the kitchen table in front of her. “Can I get you another?” I asked.

She stared at me with eyes bleary from exhaustion. “Why didn’t you tell me who you were? Or mention that the chances of the neurologist I was taking my mother to just might be your grandson? There aren’t many in Mount Pleasant, so the odds were pretty high that it would be him.”

I pulled up a chair and sat down. “You’re absolutely right.

I should have said something the moment I realized who you were.

Although a part of me was confident that your knowledge of the legal wrangling was most likely secondhand and that you wouldn’t recognize our last name since it had been changed. That doesn’t excuse me, of course.”

“No, it doesn’t. So why didn’t you just tell me? Your silence makes it seem like you’ve been harboring this grudge all these years and finally found an opportunity to seek revenge on my family.”

We stared at each other in silence, and then before I could stop myself, I began laughing, not just at the ridiculous thing she’d just said but at her earnestness while saying it.