The Summer House Read online

  Hopefully, tonight would be one of those nights.

  Trundling down the moonlit path, Liz thought she must surely have lost her mind. It was bad enough she’d almost lost her leg when she’d crawled out onto the ledge of her second-floor bedroom then shimmied down the oak tree, scraping the inside of her thigh and turning her ankle a bit when she thumped onto the ground. But sneaking out with Mother and Father right there in the house?

  Yes, Liz thought as the path stopped at the cove that led to the beach, this was certainly not proper behavior for a young lady from a ridiculously expensive Boston girl’s school.

  She smiled in the moonlight.

  And then she heard panting and running—the sounds of a dog—followed by a splash into water.

  “Snuffy!” she called out without thinking and then put her hand to her mouth. She listened. For a few moments all she heard was the dog happily panting as he swam.

  Then, from a row of pine trees that curled around the water, she heard: “Liz? Is that you?”

  Her heart began beating so hard she thought she might faint. She pulled the sleeves of her sweatshirt down over her hands and bit her lip, suddenly realizing what she had done, suddenly realizing that she was here.

  “Liz?” he asked in a half whisper that floated in the near darkness.

  She took a deep breath. “Josh?”

  And then she saw him. He emerged a few feet from her, silhouetted in a sliver of moonlight, Adonis under the stars—the twinkling, broad blanket of silver Vineyard stars.

  “Liz?” he whispered again into the warm night air, the sound of his voice melding with the gentle lap-lap of low-tide waves on the shore.

  “Josh,” she repeated. “Yes, it’s me.” She swallowed with difficulty. Her breaths became small. She wondered if he would sweep her into his arms …

  “Hey,” he said, moving toward her. “What are you doing out so late?” He spoke with candor, clearly and directly. He did not sweep her into his arms.

  “Walking. It’s a beautiful night.”

  He studied her a minute, then turned toward the water. “You’ve never met Snuffy, have you?” He clapped his hands. “Come here, Snuffy. Come on, girl.”

  The dog bounded out of the water, wagging and dripping. She raced up to Liz and shook herself all over, spraying Liz with water.

  “Oh, shit,” Josh said. “Oh, I’m so sorry.”

  “It’s okay. It’s okay.” Liz laughed and brushed at her sweatshirt.

  “Snuffy, come over here. Sit. Stay.”

  The dog did neither, but jumped back into the water and resumed having fun.

  Josh ran his hand through his hair. “I’m sorry. God, I’m such an idiot.”

  Liz smiled. “Don’t say that. Snuffy was just being friendly.”

  “But you’re all wet. Your family will think you’ve been swimming …”

  “My family will think nothing,” Liz said. “They don’t know I’m not home.”

  He frowned.

  “I sneaked out of the house.”

  He smiled. “Why?”

  She shrugged and walked toward toward the water, clapping her hands softly. “Snuffy,” she called. “Come here, girl.” Snuffy bounded from the water again, shaking and wagging and soaking Liz further. Liz petted the top of her head. “Good girl. You’re such a good girl.” She slipped off her sandals. The wet sand between her toes was still warm from the day.

  “Are you in college?” Josh asked.

  Snuffy ran back into the water. Liz picked up her sandals. “No. Two more years.”

  “Snuffy loves you. You should be a vet.”

  “You said Snuffy loves everyone.”

  “Yeah, I guess I did. But if not a vet, what will you be?”

  She almost told him she was going to be a teacher. But that was what Father wanted her to be. Or, at least, it was what he expected her to say she wanted to be. What he really wanted was that she “marry well,” well as in Michael Barton of the Bartons of Lynnfield, which was hardly something she would tell Josh. “I don’t know what I want to do tomorrow, let alone for the rest of my life.”

  Suddenly, he was holding her hand. “I’d like to see you, Liz. I mean, on a real date. Could we do that? Would you like to?”

  Would she like to? Was he crazy? Then she thought about Father. He’d kill you, BeBe had said.

  Well, maybe BeBe was wrong. Maybe Father really wouldn’t mind. Just because he and BeBe always clashed …

  “If you don’t answer me in five seconds,” Josh said, “I’ll take that as a no.”

  Liz shook her head. “No. I mean, yes. Yes, I’ll go out with you. Of course I will.”

  “Tomorrow night?”

  “Sure.”

  “Shall I pick you up at seven?”

  She lowered her eyes to the sand. “Maybe we should meet somewhere …”

  “What’s wrong?”

  Her mind raced. Tomorrow was Sunday. Perfect. Her parents always spent Sunday evenings at the Burnses, where they had supper and played whist as if they lived in the nineteenth century and sipped lemonade instead of single malt scotch. She raised her eyes to Josh’s. “Nothing, nothing at all. I want to see you. It’s just that Father has some funny ideas about dating …”

  He studied her face a moment, his eyes lingering on her in the dark. “And I might as well tell you up front. I’m Jewish.”

  She hoped he didn’t see the skip of her pulse.

  “Will that be a problem?”

  “No,” she answered, perhaps a little too quickly. “I don’t think so. It’s dating in general …” She hated sounding so childish. God, she thought, I’m sixteen! “Seven will be fine,” she blurted out. “I’ll meet you on the road at the end of my driveway.”

  Before she knew what was happening, Josh had leaned down and kissed her on the cheek. Her knees grew weak. “You’d better get home,” he said. “Before you get caught.”

  She crept up to the porch, her hand touching the spot where he had kissed her, her smile stopping just short of joy, stunted by the reality that Father might, indeed, kill her. Or Josh. Or both of them.

  “Nice night for a walk.”

  Liz froze—as if moving would make her crumble, Lot’s wife turned to a pillar of salt. Then her brain cells began to work. The voice was not Father’s. The voice belonged to Daniel.

  “What are you doing out here?” she asked.

  He laughed. “I was about to ask you that.”

  “I … I couldn’t sleep.” She wondered if he was outside because he, too, had a midnight rendezvous, with a girl who was not good enough for Father.

  Daniel leaned back against the railing. “It’s a bit late to be off wandering, Lizzie.”

  She bit her lip. She had never, ever lied to Daniel, and did not want to start now. But she could no more let Daniel down than she could disappoint Father …

  “I won’t always be around to look after my kid sister,” he said, sounding uncharacteristically somber.

  “Sure you will. Who will do it if not you?” They both knew better than to mention Roger. Or BeBe.

  “Lizzie. I need you to promise me something.”

  She wove her fingers together and stared at the ground, feeling certain that Daniel knew she had been bad. And that she intended to be bad again. “Cross my heart?” she asked.

  “Cross your heart.”

  She did so.

  He looked at her for a moment, then looked off toward the stars. “Lizzie-girl, I need you to promise me that you’ll listen to Father. He may seem stern sometimes, but he has all our best interests at heart. And, believe it or not, he knows what he’s doing.”

  She felt as if she were being reprimanded, the four-year-old caught stealing cookies. She thought of Michael, then thought of Josh. “I like Michael,” she said, “really I do. But …”

  Daniel laughed, then put his hand on her head and tousled her hair. “I’m not talking about Michael. I know you like him.”

  She swallowed her guilt l
ike a wad of gum.

  “I need you to promise me you’ll listen to Father because I’m not going to be here for a while.”

  Suddenly, his words began to seep in. While she had selfishly been thinking of her own wants and needs, something else had been happening, something …

  And then she knew. “Your orders,” she said quickly. “You got your orders.”

  Daniel nodded. “Yeah, kid, I did. You’re now talking to First Lieutenant Daniel Adams, battalion commander for Unit 112 of the United States Army.”

  She felt a slow numbness start at her toes and work its way to her heart. “Daniel?” she asked, wanting but not wanting to know.

  He dropped his hand to her shoulder and pulled her close to him. “Yeah, kid,” he whispered. “I’m going over. Uncle Sam is sending me to Vietnam.”

  Chapter 7

  The wail that came from outside woke BeBe and had her rushing out the door of her bedroom before she was fully alert. At the top of the stairs she collided with Father.

  “What the Sam Hill is that?” he barked, as if the commotion were her fault, her scheme to shake everyone from their beds in the middle of the damn night.

  She ignored him and ran down the stairs toward the sound, Father right behind, neither of them acknowledging that the wail sounded an awful lot like Lizzie and that Lizzie might be hurt.

  Out on the porch, Lizzie was there, and she was crying into Daniel’s chest.

  The adrenaline that had propelled BeBe from her room now slowed to an uneasy crawl.

  “She’ll be okay, Dad,” Daniel said quietly.

  Father took a deep breath. “It’s for the best, Lizzie. You’ll see.”

  Bebe scowled; the screen door banged shut. Roger stood there in his pajamas, his hair askew. Behind him was Mother. “What’s going on?” BeBe asked.

  They were all looking at Daniel. Daniel looked at Father. “I think it’s time I made some hot chocolate.”

  When they were kids, hot chocolate was the fix-it, the cure-all for scraped knees or neighborhood bullies. Daniel was always the one to make it: Daniel, the eldest, Daniel the comforter, Daniel, who was always there when Father was too brash and Mother too busy.

  BeBe looked down at her nightshirt and her bare feet, then around at her family in various stages of dress and undress. “Hot chocolate sounds great,” she replied, since no one else had. “But only if it means someone will tell us what the hell’s going on.”

  They sat around the big table—the long trestle table—in the knotty-pine kitchen with the lobster buoys on the walls. It was rare that they gathered here for something other than dinner on evenings when the rain drove them in off the porch. It was not raining now, and it was after midnight, and there was not a full meal but hot chocolate and vanilla wafers.

  BeBe shifted uncomfortably on the wooden bench.

  “It’s about me,” Daniel spoke at last. “Liz was upset because of me.”

  The sink faucet dripped. Mother blew her nose. Roger stirred his hot chocolate too loudly. BeBe wondered if she was the only one here who had no clue what was happening, then she wondered where Michael Barton had gone.

  “I got my orders today,” Daniel said. “Looks like I’ll be going to Vietnam.”

  BeBe blinked. The faucet dripped again. No one was speaking. Why wasn’t anyone speaking? She tapped her mug on the table.

  Father did not answer.

  She looked at Father. “You’re going to stop it, right?”

  But still no one spoke. No one else even looked at Father; they stared at their mugs or their hands or the top of the long trestle table.

  Father looked steadily back at BeBe. “I can’t, Barbara Beth. Some things are beyond my control.”

  “Oh, come on, Father. Surely your friend Congressman Carter can do something. Why else did Daniel have to take his hideous granddaughter to the cotillion?”

  “Evelyn Carter has nothing to do with this. Besides, her grandfather and I have discussed it, and he thinks Vietnam will be our greatest victory of all.”

  She might have thought Father was joking, except that he so rarely joked. “Congressman Carter is next to dead,” she said.

  “He’s been a powerful man for many years, Barbara Beth. He knows what he’s doing.”

  She did not—could not—answer. She held her mug with two hands to steady it. “So Daniel is going to Vietnam and it seems I’m the last one to know.”

  “We planned to tell you girls in the morning,” Mother said, “so there would be less time for …” BeBe suspected Mother wanted to say there would be less time for tears, but her words were cut short by a small crack in her voice.

  “It will be okay, Beebs,” Daniel said. “Besides, it’s better for my future. This country would never elect someone who had not served his time, especially during wartime.”

  BeBe scowled. “This is not wartime, Daniel. Vietnam is a stupid mess that’s killing everyone it touches.”

  “You should be proud of your brother for serving his country,” Father said, then added, “Besides, not that many are dying anymore.”

  Heat rushed into BeBe’s cheeks. “How many are too many, Father? What makes you think Daniel won’t be one of them? Because he’s Daniel? Because you won’t allow it? Well, I’ve got news for you. Vietnam is wrong. And I, for one, will not be proud to have my brother serve in that hellhole.” She slammed her mug down, ignoring the splash of hot chocolate that splattered onto the table. She jumped up, stomped over to the back door, and turned when she reached it. “By the way, Daniel, where’s your fellow soldier?”

  Her brother met her eyes. “Michael? He left on the last ferry. He thought the family should be alone until …”

  “Until you leave,” BeBe finished. “And when will that be?”

  He played with his mug a second, then said, “Tomorrow. I have to be at Fort Dix Monday morning.”

  BeBe grabbed the car keys from the hook by the door and stormed out.

  When Lizzie was six Father had taken the whole family to Washington. It was cherry blossom time, spring vacation from school, and the air in the capital was thick and sweet and cotton-candy pink against blue sky. In fact, Lizzie thought Washington looked like a coloring book, with perfect colors of pink and blue and green for the grass and white for the monuments and big hollow buildings. (She later learned they were called hallowed, not hollow, buildings, even though the rotundas and the hallways did seem too big and too empty.)

  Liz sat on the bed where she had sat not that long ago, watching the clock, wishing for time to pass quickly so everyone would go to bed and she could sneak out and meet Josh. Now, she only wanted the ticking to slow down long enough for her feelings to catch up with her brain, for her to grasp what Daniel’s leaving really meant—for him, for her, for their family, and for this country where, in one of those hallowed buildings, someone had decided to send Daniel off to war.

  BeBe did not believe in Vietnam.

  Father said Daniel must go, that there was nothing he could do to stop it.

  Daniel said a war hero makes the best presidential candidate.

  Mother had nodded and Roger had said nothing and Liz had finished her hot chocolate in silence, feeling scared as a little girl and not at all like the daring woman who had just met a perfect stranger in the darkness of night.

  Instead, she was feeling more the way Madelyn Reynolds—a girl from school—must have felt when her brother, Ronald, was sent to Vietnam and six days later was killed in a minefield. He came home in a body bag minus a few parts.

  For weeks, Madelyn could be seen darting into the girls’ room, gripping the porcelain sink, sobbing into the metal-framed mirror until her legs buckled beneath her and she sat down on the floor. No one had known what to say or do, Liz included.

  She picked at the white knots on the bedspread now and wondered if she might end up the one on the cold, tile floor, and Daniel in the big, zippered bag.

  BeBe drove to Menemsha, the quiet little fishing village that w
as so small it was hardly a village at all. She turned off her headlights so as not to awaken the neighbors, then drove down the narrow, cottage-clustered road until she reached Tuna’s. Tuna was the island boy nicknamed for his prowess with yellowfin, the boy she’d known for many years, the one she’d depended on for a good screw every summer since she was fourteen and he, twenty-one.

  This would be the first time she’d seen him this summer. She pulled onto the small lawn and parked next to Tuna’s “rusted but ready,” as he called it, pickup truck. Just being here made BeBe feel better already. She got out of the car and made her way up the flagstone walk that she’d walked up countless times, eager to see him, for he would distract her and nothing else would matter, not even the war.

  She knocked on the peeling blue-painted door. A moment later a lamp was lit inside, then the door opened. But it was not Tuna who stood there; it was a young woman with long black hair, a quite pregnant belly, and a very traditional wedding band on the third finger of her left hand.

  “Ah,” BeBe, who was not used to stammering, now stammered. “I have a little car trouble. I know it’s late, but I wondered if I might use your telephone.” Peering into the room, BeBe saw the familiar homemade coffee table and the overstuffed, slightly torn plaid sofa.

  “Sorry,” the young woman replied with a sleep-weary smile. “We don’t have one.”

  No, BeBe thought, of course they did not have one. This was only the seventies, after all, and the pay phone at the Texaco station on the pier worked just fine.

  “I could wake up my husband,” the mother-to-be continued. “Maybe he could help with your car. Is that a good idea?”

  “No thanks,” BeBe said. Definitely not a good idea. Then she apologized for disturbing her and pretended to walk toward the station, a bit sorry she would never see Tuna’s penis again, for it was a good one and knew what to do.

  Down at the harbor, BeBe sat on a rock and pulled up her knees, wrapped her arms around them, and rested her face there. Dammit, she thought. Dammit, dammit.