The Hideaway

I held the photo a moment longer, then put it back in its place at the back of the drawer and turned off the light. I could feel the storm brewing—my throat burned and my eyes stung. I’d held myself together all day, but with the room dark and quiet, the tension in my chest and sadness welling in my heart overflowed. Tears spilled over my cheeks unchecked and made damp spots on my pillow.

While my chest heaved with quiet sobs, I had a fleeting memory of my grief after my parents’ death. It was different back then—not better or worse, just different. A twelve-year-old with a grandmother and four live-in “grandparents” grieves much differently than an adult who knows she’s now alone in the world, regardless of how she’s tried to tell herself she doesn’t really need anyone else.

I rode out the storm until it ended. Exhausted and shaky, I reached over and pulled the photo out again. I propped it up against a book on the table and took a deep breath. The murky yellow glow from a streetlight outside my window illuminated Mags’s face in the photo. I sank farther into the pillows and closed my eyes, content to know that Mags, wherever she was, was sending that half smile my way.

4

MAGS

JANUARY 1960

I was going to leave him, but he beat me to it. My bags were packed, stuffed into the upstairs closet ready to go when the right moment presented itself, but then I found his note. I couldn’t believe he left a note.

Margaret, I have business in Tennessee. I’ll be gone a while.

Robert

As if I didn’t know what his “business” was. Mother kept telling me to ignore everything. Of course she did. She said if I kept busy at home, doing what I was supposed to do, my husband would end up back under our roof where he belonged. I took her advice through gritted teeth for most of the three years Robert and I had been married, but I just couldn’t do it anymore. And I didn’t even get the satisfaction of leaving him, because he was already gone.

Once everyone found out he’d gone out of town on “business” again, they’d surely think I left to escape the embarrassment, eyes rimmed in red, hair a mess, vowing to do better, to be the wife who would keep him home. But I wasn’t worried. No one in that town knew me very well anyway.

After I read the note, I took a pencil from the drawer in the kitchen and poured myself a gin and tonic from the stash Robert never bothered to hide because he never thought I’d want to drink it. I took the drink, pencil, and note into our tidy backyard. I sipped the cocktail, thinking, massaging Robert’s note in my fingers. When the glass was empty, I took the pencil and wrote “Good riddance” underneath his words. Then I grabbed a box of matches from next to the grill and lit one. I held the note over the fire until the flames licked the bottom edge of the paper and engulfed it.

I was just about to pull out of the driveway when Daddy careened down the street in his silver Chrysler, landing like a pinball in front of our house, one tire up on the grass. When he climbed out of the car, he was red-faced and out of breath, as if he’d run the whole two blocks from their house instead of driven.

“Margaret, I’m so glad you haven’t left.”

I hadn’t told anyone I was leaving.

“I know you, my dear,” he said, as if he’d heard my thoughts. “I knew what you’d do as soon as Robert told me he was going away.”

“You talked to him?”

“I was supposed to have a meeting with him at the bank today, but he called and canceled. I saw through the lie right away. If he had business in Tennessee, I would have known about it.”

When I opened my mouth to speak, he did instead. “I’m not here to talk you out of it. I just wanted to give you this.” He handed me an envelope. “For whatever you need.”

“I don’t even know where I’m going.”

He nodded. “You’ll find the right place. When you come back, everything will have straightened itself out. You’ll see. Some time away will be good for you.”

So he didn’t know me that well after all, but I appreciated the effort. I took the envelope. I didn’t need to open it to know what was inside. “Yes, the next time you see me, things will be much different.”

For one thing, I wouldn’t be wearing my wedding ring, although I hadn’t had the nerve to take it off just yet.

He took a step closer to me—still too far away to put his arms around me, but close enough to warrant some sort of physical touch. In the end, he patted my shoulder awkwardly. We stood there, two statues full of emotion, neither able to make the first move. I was always more my father’s daughter than I cared to admit. Better than being my mother’s daughter though.

After all, it was Daddy standing there in front of me, concerned about me. Mother was probably at home trying to come up with a reason to call me. A new recipe I needed to try for Robert since he was so tired of my tuna casseroles. (“I bet a good juicy Steak Diane would bring him home from the office earlier.”) Or maybe she found out I skipped my Camellia Ball dress fitting with Mrs. Trammel, and she wanted to call and chide me. Forget the fact that I was a twenty-two-year-old adult with my own home and husband, and I could make my own dress-fitting appointment if I needed one. Which I didn’t.

I opened the car door, tossed my bags in the backseat, and turned back to face Daddy.

“I’ll see you soon?” he asked.

I shrugged. Smiled.

“What should I tell your mother?”

I thought for a moment. “Tell her the truth.” His version of the truth was all she needed to know.

“Good-bye, Daddy.” I lowered myself into the car. He put a hand on the door and helped me close it. It always stuck, something Robert promised many times to fix. The door shut with a dull thud.

Finally.

“I’m gone,” I said out loud.

I rolled my windows down when I reached Mobile Bay. Warm air laced with the scent of just-caught fish and soft muddy banks whipped around my face. I ripped out my hair band and let the wind have its way with me.

Along the edges of the Causeway, old men stood in clusters, each holding a cane pole with the line dropped into the marshy waters along the shore. A shrimp boat bearing the name Miss Carolina in sweet cursive pulled away from a dock while a deckhand threw nets over the side.

I pushed the gas down a little farther, even though Robert always cautioned me to stay below the speed limits. “There’s no need to draw attention to yourself, Margaret.”

Funny, he never wanted his wife to be the center of attention.

On the other side of the bay, I drove through the familiar towns—Daphne, Montrose, Fairhope—until I reached a deserted road lined with pecan trees and open fields. I’d gone over the bay many times with Mother, shopping for clothes or getting a bite to eat at Central Café. Robert and I stayed a long weekend at the Grand Hotel in the first year of our marriage, back when things were mostly peaceful and I could still close my eyes to his indiscretions. But I’d never been off the main roads and thoroughfares of the quiet “over the bay” communities. This was unfamiliar territory.

The last marker I remembered seeing was one for Sweet Bay. I needed to pee (“Oh, don’t be crass,” Mother would say) so I began looking for a place to stop. A faded sign directed me to “The Hideaway—the South’s Best-Kept Secret.” The driveway was long and curved. I assumed there was a house at the end of it, but I couldn’t see it through the trees. My heart beat faster the farther I went down the driveway.