The Hideaway

What Glory said was true—my child looked nothing like me. She was the spitting image of her father. She had William’s fair coloring, wheat-colored hair, and full eyelashes. She also had my daddy’s tall forehead and Mother’s strong nose. She deserved to know the truth about her father and her family, but not at the tender age of nine.

“He sure was, sugar.” I patted Jenny’s hand, my eyes turned out the window, looking at nothing in particular.

We arrived at the park to discover there had been a mix-up, and only one cabin was available for rent. Several had been damaged in the storm, and it seemed lots of other people had the same idea we did—it was the weekend before Labor Day, after all.

“It’s a fine cabin,” the woman at the front desk told me. “It’s one of our larger units, so you won’t feel too cramped.” She eyed our ragtag group as if she didn’t believe the words she was saying.

“Cramped? Seven people in a two-room cabin will be more than cramped.”

“Major, don’t make a scene,” Eugene said. “We drove all the way here. We can’t turn around and go home now.”

“Home is thirty minutes away. We’d be back before Columbo starts.”

Before Major and Eugene could continue arguing—or worse, compare the merits of Columbo with those of Hawaii Five-O, a favorite pastime at The Hideaway—I spoke up.

“Enough. We already live together, so what’s the problem with sharing tighter quarters for a few days? We won’t be in the cabin much anyway. Mark it down,” I said to the clerk. “We’re staying.”

Once the decision was made, everyone got into the spirit of the vacation. Bert emptied the coolers of food supplies he’d brought for the weekend and set out ingredients for a feast, Glory retrieved her suitcase of board games and beach toys, and everyone relaxed enough to enjoy the last real weekend of summer.

At some point during our stay, I took a notebook and a plastic lounge chair to the edge of the shoreline. I nestled the chair down in the sand, pushed my toes under the thin layer of seashells, and started to write. A little later—fifteen minutes or an hour, I couldn’t be sure—Dot appeared and sat in a chair next to me. Baby oil glistened on her shins and she smelled like a coconut. She’d bought her bathing suit—a perfect yellow polka-dot bikini—especially for this trip, and she’d hardly taken it off since we’d arrived. She felt good in it, and it showed.

“Does that have anything to do with Jenny?” she asked.

I looked at her. “It’s a letter. How’d you know?”

“I knew that conversation in the van got to you. Then here you are writing away in your little notebook—I just put two and two together. When are you going to give it to her?”

I shrugged. “One day. When the time is right.” I could feel her stare, but I kept my eyes on the water. “She’s the best part of us. He would have loved her so much.”

“You sure about that? Why hasn’t he come back?”

“I don’t know, but he must have a good reason.” Dot didn’t believe me—I could see the pity in her eyes despite the oversize sunglasses. I knew what she was going to say before she said it.

“What if he met—?”

I cut her off quick. “Don’t say it. You didn’t know him. You didn’t know us.”

“Okay, fair enough.” She took a breath as if to speak but paused. “What if he’s dead?”

“He can’t be. I’d feel it.”

Dot held her hands up in surrender. “I’m just trying to help you figure this out. You say the two of you were in love, but I still see a man who abandoned you for no good reason.”

I sighed. “And I still say it wasn’t totally his fault.”

“Right, your parents and all that. Then where is he?”

Who knows? I shrugged again.

“Do you regret loving him?”

“No.” My voice was firm. “The only thing I regret is that I never actually told him I loved him. I never said those words. If I had, maybe he would have stayed and fought for me.”

That was the truest thing I’d said about William since he left, and the admission left me sore in my chest and a little angry.

“Regardless, it’s been more than ten years.” I slapped my notebook closed. “Whatever the reason, he hasn’t come back and I have no way of knowing if or when he’ll return. I have to make sure Jenny doesn’t go through her whole life thinking her dad was a fine chap who just happened to die of a heart attack.”

“Are you going to tell her about AnnaBelle?”

“No, there’s no reason. Robert’s actions don’t affect her—he wasn’t her dad, and at this point, she hardly remembers anything about him. Her real father was—is—kind and good. That’s what she needs to know. He never would’ve wanted to do anything to hurt his family.”

But he did. He hurt me.

I pushed that thought away, just out of arm’s reach.

The water lapped farther and farther up our ankles each time it rolled in. To our left, a cluster of gray-and-white sandpipers nibbled at tiny clams as they burrowed into the soft, wet sand. The sun had inched down in the sky while I’d been writing, and only a few brightly colored umbrellas dotted the beach. Dot leaned her head back on the chair and stretched out her legs. She was long and lean and brown as a berry.

“So when are you going to let Bert get you pregnant?”

Dot let out a half laugh, half snort. “You don’t beat around the bush, do you?”

“Sounds like someone else I know.” I flicked a few grains of sand at her with my fingers. “Anyway, it’s about time. You’ve been married a while, and we could use some more little ones running around the house again.”

“What? And ruin my figure?” Dot wiggled her hips. Grains of sand stuck to the baby oil shimmering on her skin. I laughed and handed her a towel.

“What about you?” She brushed sand off her legs and repositioned herself on the chair. “You could quit with those crazy hats and outfits and men would line up out the door for you. You know they would.”

“Yes, those Sweet Bay men really ring my bell.”

“It’s a big world out there, that’s all I’m saying.”

“If there’s more outside Sweet Bay, I don’t need it. And I’m done with men. I gave it a go twice, and you see how far that got me. At thirty-three, I’m long past the age of letting myself get swept up by a man, no matter how handsome or charming he may be.”

The words sounded believable—even to me—but I knew my heart. If William had walked onto that beach right then and there, I would have run to him and thrown my arms around him, no questions asked. I probably would have hit him too, but where my heart was concerned, it would always belong to him.

I leaned my head back on the chair. The sun, still strong even in the late afternoon, baked my legs. The searing heat felt good and cleansing. I gave in to the pull of sleep until the rising tide skimmed the backs of my legs. At the same time, Bert’s voice drifted to us from farther up the beach.

“We’re going to have to toss out life preservers if y’all don’t move back,” he called. Jenny trailed behind him, a sand bucket in one hand and a stringy clump of seaweed in the other.