brush of a saturated breeze and the occasional slash of headlights crossing the far wall—and let her fictional world blur into an imagining of what Brooke was doing at that moment. And in those imaginings, Jennifer Garrison was nowhere present and not even Stuart Garrison but men—men, not boys—always properly dressed in Victorian wool suits and leaning over and whispering—yes, whispering in her mind, an imagining of what it was like to hear, of the sense of sound that somehow matched in texture and feel the wisp of salt-laden air, the brush of a feather, the crumple of a tissue—and following that whisper with a chaste kiss on the cheek, a solicitous smile, a fathomless stare that was nonetheless known. These were Brooke’s adventures out of sight that became her adventures, lying there in the dark bed.
Then Brooke would arrive back at the cottage—always faithfully at 11:29 on the dresser clock’s digital face, exactly twenty-nine minutes past her curfew, just short of raising Momma’s ire—and sneak in the never locked side door. Leah felt the vibration of Brooke’s footsteps on the side landing, across the kitchen, up the stairs and down the hall. With her head cushioned in the pillow and one eye open, she’d see her sister slip into the bedroom, carefully close the door, then slide out of her clothes and into her pajamas, sometimes holding onto the bedposts for support. Then Brooke would disappear from sight as the bunks rocked ever so slightly from side to side. And at that moment Leah’s imagining of Brooke’s experiences out of sight would transition from the idealized vision of Victorian courtship and heartbreak to the rough-edged reality of wine-tainted breath and the faint scent of someone not of this house. Her mind wouldn’t build outward from those stimuli—not that it couldn’t but it chose not to. Sleep proved a welcome refuge then. And the next morning, after swinging down from the upper bunk, she’d leave a stick of gum beside Brooke’s sleeping head before scurrying off to the bathroom then the sandbars unmarred by human or dog print.
The Garrisons left after the first week and Brooke seemed relieved. The only direct reference she made to her time away was on their first walk together along the incoming tide that hazy Saturday morning as the Garrisons were packing to leave and Brooke made a point of being as far away as the close confines of Bogue Beach would allow. When they were to the end of walkable beach, where a wide creek of inrushing seawater blocked their way, Brooke paused before turning and said simply, “He was more fun to look at than spend time with.” Leah had tilted her head and waited for further explanation on both points, as she didn’t think of Stuart as even sort of “fun” to look at—all gangly and with a shock of dark hair permanently across his right eye—and couldn’t imagine spending time with the dour, withdrawn soul. But Brooke met her question with a light-hearted giggle and a piece of seaweed pulled off the jetty and trailing out behind her like a pennant as she ran prancing through the shallow water shouting something that Leah finally recognized as “I�