Body Surfing

  “I’m substituting art for math.” With a long breath, Sydney eases herself back in the deck chair. She clutches her hands together. “She has an uncanny ability to focus on one task at a time.”

  “She must get it from Dad,” Jeff says, nodding to himself.

  “I know nothing about art,” Sydney says. “I was hired to help her with English and math.”

  “Doesn’t matter,” Jeff says.

  “I told your father.”

  Now it is Jeff who misses a beat. “About that Saturday night?”

  “I felt he should know. I told him alone. Your mother wasn’t there. He seemed sad.”

  Jeff whistles. “I’ll bet he was sad.”

  “I think he talked to Julie. I saw him coming out of her room the next night. He looked upset.”

  “Julie’s said nothing?”

  “Not to me.”

  Jeff looks away into the distance as if trying to picture the scene with Julie and his father.

  “Is it someone’s birthday?” Sydney asks.

  “My father’s.”

  Sydney lets her hands go slack in her lap. “When?”

  “Tomorrow. But we’re celebrating it tonight.”

  “I wish someone had told me,” Sydney says.

  Jeff tilts his head. “You aren’t expected to give a gift.”

  “But I want to. I like him so much.”

  Jeff smiles. “I know you do,” he says.

  He puts his hands on his knees. “I think I’ll get the kayaks out,” he says. “Want to come?”

  She tries to answer him, but can’t.

  “I’ve upset you,” he says.

  “I’m. . .”

  He waits. “You’re. . .?”

  She studies Jeff, a man she hardly knows. He leans forward and kisses her again, and this time his aim is perfect. Sydney feels herself growing lighter and lighter, so light that it seems she might fly.

  Sydney remains in the deck chair gazing out to sea. Jeff, in life vest and then in kayak, crosses her field of vision. She doesn’t follow him with her eyes. She thinks there will be time, a luxury of time.

  She replays the touch along her thigh. The first kiss. And then the second. A small sensation—a tiny flip inside her abdomen, familiar and not entirely forgotten—makes her smile.

  Occasional rents in the cloud cover, blue silk, cannot promise a fine weekend. The meteorologists have spoken. It will rain until Monday.

  Sydney wonders if Julie knows yet about Victoria. Sydney doubts the girl will be sad. Mr. Edwards, Sydney guesses, has retreated to his garden, not because he has taken the news of Jeff’s breakup so hard, but because his wife has. If Mr. Edwards remains in the house, he will have to bear the brunt of her dismay.

  A slant of sunlight falls on a diagonal across the water. Sydney can see, in the slice, particles and bits, the stuff of atmosphere. For a brief moment, the sea has vibrant color. A gull, giddy and soaring, takes on a coral hue. Sydney sits up straight—anyone would—marveling at this trick of light. She longs for it to linger, knows that it won’t. She wishes Jeff would slip into the band of color. He will not. He is long gone, already behind the distant rocks.

  Rain against an upstairs window. Sydney pens her name to a birthday card and tucks it into a small brown paper bag she has used to wrap Mr. Edwards’s birthday present: several packages of red Gummy Lobsters, a candy so sweet it hurts her teeth, but one she knows the man to be immensely fond of. It is a small gift, but it is something.

  With her thumbnail, she traces the precise line Jeff made on her thigh with his finger.

  She will have a bath, and she will do her nails. She will wear a long voile skirt and a black silk blouse she’s been saving for a special occasion—clothes fit for a birthday celebration.

  But Jeff will know why she has dressed with care. Ben will know. Mrs. Edwards will know.

  Footsteps on the porch can be felt throughout the house. Metal on metal as a sauté pan hits a burner. Sydney cannot tell if there is anger in the sound or not. Mrs. Edwards is cooking blackened scallops tonight, her husband’s favorite. Tomorrow there was to be another dinner party, not for the patriarch, but to celebrate a son and his girlfriend. What will happen to that party now?

  As Sydney descends the stairs, she hears voices at the front door, strangers’ voices, for which she is glad. Other people are buffers. First there is Ben’s greeting (when did he arrive?) and then the genuine welcome of the host. You shouldn’t have. From the kitchen, the decidedly aggressive whir of the mixer. Mrs. Edwards is concocting a cake out of Kahlúa liqueur and semisweet chocolate chips.

  Sydney divests herself of the brown paper bag, setting it beside a chair. She adjusts her posture. Jeff opens the screen door and passes through the living room on his way upstairs to the shower. He is late, moving briskly. He looks like a man who has just had a vigorous encounter with the weather—his cheeks reddened, his hair matted, his feet still wet. He stops when he encounters Sydney and says, in a normal voice, as if he were merely a son of the household complimenting a friend, “You look nice.” He skirts Sydney’s body as he takes the stairs two at a time.

  There will be no rules, Sydney realizes. No rules and possibly many surprises.

  Mrs. Edwards’s mouth is a straight line that barely moves. She is still wearing her apron, a startling clue to her emotional state. The guests, old friends, must sense that something is amiss, but they appear to be only mildly bothered by the frost. Perhaps, within the circle of the Edwardses’ friends, spouses often do not speak at parties.

  Because drinks cannot be had on the porch in the weather, the guests and the Edwardses arrange themselves on the white sofas. The couches are designed for two sitting positions—sinking back or perching forward. Tonight, everyone is perched forward, even Ben, who usually makes a show of achieving comfort. Sydney sits at the edge of a wooden chair, not entitled, this particular evening, to any comfort whatsoever. She cannot remember the guests’ names. Julie is sitting on a hassock, knees up, drinking a Diet Coke. At odd moments, she smiles, then glances shyly at Sydney.

  An artist in rapture, Sydney thinks. A kind of ecstasy.

  When Jeff comes down, he is wearing a striped navy polo shirt and khaki shorts. He makes himself a gin and tonic and sits beside his mother, a conscious appeasement.

  Ben, eyeing Sydney over the rim of his drink, appears to have noticed Sydney’s deliberate glancing away from Jeff. But who can tell what Ben notices or does not? His look might simply be one of admiration, for Sydney has taken more care than usual tonight. The skirt. The blouse. Her hair pulled back into a loose knot.

  Julie cries, “Open your presents!”

  “Oh, you shouldn’t have,” Mr. Edwards says again.

  Sydney is glad for the distraction and takes her first full breath of the evening. She has a long sip of her drink, startled to realize she is drinking gin as well. Who handed her this drink? She cannot remember. Has she picked up someone else’s glass?

  Mr. Edwards, either nervous or eager, accidentally tears the cover of an oversized book about maritime painters as he rips the wrapping off. He says, Oooof, and apologizes profusely. The book is a gift from his wife, who stares at the ceiling. Mr. Edwards smooths the edges of the torn cover together and says he can tape it from the back. No, he can do better than that, he can graft it so that no one will ever notice. He adds that this is a book he’s had his eye on for some time and gives his wife a quick peck on the cheek. She smiles for the sake of the company.

  Julie, not surprisingly, gives her father a drawing of pears. He either truly admires it or pretends convincingly to. “I’ll have it framed,” he says.

  Julie stands and embraces her father. She holds on tightly, and for a moment Mr. Edwards shuts his eyes, clearly moved.

  Ben and Jeff have together given their father an updated navigational device for the Whaler. Ben offers to refill the empty glasses. Mrs. Edwards notices her apron and slides it from her waist. She cranes her neck to look at the cl
ock. Julie lurches forward from her hassock to dip a shrimp into the cocktail sauce. The configuration of the room is such that the appetizers can be close to one sofa only. Sydney, unaccountably, is ravenous, but she doesn’t trust her legs.

  “This is just a little something,” she says, handing the paper bag to Mr. Edwards.

  Mrs. Edwards makes a quick frown with her eyebrows, a commentary either on the packaging or on Sydney’s presuming to give a gift. Mr. Edwards holds aloft the lobster Gummys.

  “Oh, she knows my weakness,” he says with a grin.

  Ben announces at dinner that he has made a big sale: a block of six condos to a large insurance company that will use them for visiting executives. Ben declares his good fortune the same way Sydney imagines the boy announcing that he made the varsity football team. Sydney wonders if Jeff ever made similar pronouncements. An A in pre-calc? Elected president of the debate club?

  Life for the Edwardses, Sydney has come to understand, centers around the dinner table. It is where triumphs are praised, politics aired, lies told, the truth occasionally released.

  Sydney glances over at Jeff, and perhaps noticing the quick movement of her head, he looks up at her. He smiles, producing in Sydney a sensation close to panic. Did anyone see his smile? Mrs. Edwards? Ben?

  “We had hoped Victoria Beacon would be joining us for dinner,” Mrs. Edwards says.

  Jeff’s fork pauses on its way to his mouth. He waits for more. Sydney waits for more.

  Ben, ever helpful, explains to the guests that Jeff and Vicki Beacon were once together and now aren’t. There is something in his tone—not exactly sarcasm—that momentarily piques Sydney’s interest.

  “We know Vicki,” the female guest says, and Sydney recalls that Victoria has been coming to the beach community for years. “Such a sweet girl,” the woman adds.

  Ben nods and smiles. Sydney wonders if he’s contemplating giving Vicki a call.

  Once the matter of Victoria Beacon has been dispensed with, Mrs. Edwards tries to rise to the occasion. She teases her husband about his age and tells him she has made his favorite dessert. Mr. Edwards flushes with anticipatory pleasure.

  Sydney thinks of capitalizing on Mrs. Edwards’s rare moment of cheer and suggesting that she one day accompany the woman on one of her forays to the much-touted Emporia. But Mrs. Edwards is no fool. She will see the transparent gesture precisely for what it is.

  The cake, when Mrs. Edwards emerges with it, is lopsided, suggesting an oven with a tilt. An effort has been made to cover the gap with solidified ganache. Mr. Edwards shuts his eyes, a child making a wish. Everyone claps when he blows out the candles in one go. The smoke from sixty-eight wicks wafts across the table. Sydney wonders what Mr. Edwards wished for. Good health for all of his family? A safe berth for Julie? A relaxed year of marital goodwill?

  The dessert is unexpectedly delicious, the texture moist, the ganache tasting of expensive dark chocolate. Sydney compliments Mrs. Edwards and devours her piece. When seconds are offered, Sydney holds out her plate. Jeff, across the table, smiles.

  “A girl with an appetite,” he says admiringly.

  After Sydney has washed the dishes with Mr. Edwards and Ben (Ben, who never offers to do the dishes), she lifts her navy slicker from a hook. She takes a flashlight with her.

  She walks fast along the beach, her wet skirt sticking to her legs. The hood of the slicker, too big for her, shields her face from the rain. She sees that the cottages are up to their old tricks again, having moved away from the shore as they seem to do each night.

  Water on one side, seawall on the other. She reminds herself that she cannot get lost.

  On the horizon, there is a light. A barge? A cruise ship? Was that thunder she just heard? Sydney has always been afraid of lightning, for no particular reason other than that her mother was. (Sitting in the exact center of the apartment hallway with her mother during a storm, the woman insisting Sydney remain with her. Safest place in the house, her mother would say, smoking two, three cigarettes before Sydney was allowed to leave.

  Her father would be out on the stoop, watching the show.)

  Jeff is upon her without a sound. When she turns, gasping, he puts his hands inside her hood. His own hair is wet and matted. He has been running.

  “This might be a mistake,” she says.

  He kisses her, his mouth wet with rain.

  She manages his name.

  He finds the clasp of the zipper under her chin and lowers it. His hands are cold, and she shivers.

  Jeff is decisive. Sensations Sydney hasn’t experienced in over two years surprise and then astonish her. Both memory and desire are triggered, each competing with the other, so that it seems a kind of grief for Daniel reaches a crescendo even as her body responds to Jeff. And then Jeff is inside her, and the sexual feelings overwhelm the past. There is some relief in this: Sydney aware of leaving Daniel behind; Jeff becoming all there is. Becoming everything.

  They find shelter on the floor of an abandoned gazebo and lie in its direct center to avoid the spitting rain. Minutes pass. Hours. Intermittently, Sydney is aware of the sea just beyond them.

  “What time is it?” she asks.

  Jeff peers at his watch but cannot read the dial. Sydney finds the flashlight and switches it on so that he can see the face. “Four-forty-five,” he says.

  “No one will be up yet. I could make you eggs.”

  Sydney imagines herself and Jeff in the kitchen, Jeff sitting at the table, Sydney with a spatula and frying pan. One small light will be on, and there will be shadows. In better weather, if it ever comes again, they will go out onto the porch. They will take walks and watch the sun rise. In the afternoons, when everyone is elsewhere, they will nap in her bed.

  A hot bath, she thinks, would be divine.

  For warmth, they have left most of their clothes on. Her black silk blouse has ridden over her breasts. Jeff, with his free hand, adjusts it.

  “Losing your husband must have been brutal,” he says in a gentle voice.

  “It was.”

  He smooths the hair out of her face. “I’m sorry,” he says.

  “It’s better now.”

  “Time?”

  “Yes,” Sydney says.

  “What was he like?” Jeff asks.

  She is surprised by the question. “He was smart and funny. And patient. I think he would have made a good teacher. You know, at the hospital.”

  Jeff glances to one side. “Good-looking?” he asks after a moment.

  “Yes,” Sydney answers honestly.

  Jeff seems to ponder her reply. “Do you have a picture?” he asks.

  “I do. In my room. Do you want to see it?”

  Jeff thinks. “I don’t know,” he says. “Maybe not.”

  He runs his finger along Sydney’s arm.

  “Your mother doesn’t like me,” she says.

  “I know.”

  “She’ll believe I’m responsible for you and Victoria.”

  “You are.” Jeff lays his hand on her waist and kisses her.

  “She’s never liked it that I’m half Jewish. Now that I’m involved with her son, she’ll hate it.”

  Jeff is silent.

  “That doesn’t bother you?” Sydney asks.

  He kisses her shoulder, and Sydney thinks of the photograph in the Edwardses’ bedroom.

  “It bothers me, but more in the abstract than in reality. I’d like to think my mother wasn’t like that, but there’s not a lot I can do about it. Years ago, she and I had all the arguments a boy and his mother can have. I realized after a while that I’d never change her.”

  “I should probably leave the house.”

  “If you go, I’ll follow you. And where will we be then? In my squalid apartment in Cambridge?” He puts his arm around her and pulls her to him.

  “I’ll love your squalid apartment in Cambridge.”

  “Don’t be so sure about that.”

  Afterwards, Jeff helps her to her feet. Away f
rom his skin and his warmth, she feels the cold penetrating. He brings the zipper of her slicker to her chin. He takes her hand and leads her onto the sand. In bare feet, carrying their shoes, they head in the direction of the house.

  Sydney is surprised to see, as they draw closer, a light still on. As she climbs the porch steps, her mouth feels frozen. She cannot make it work properly. There is something she wants to say to Jeff, something that will convey to him the significance of what they have just done on the beach, but her thoughts are nearly as rigid as her mouth.

  Once inside the front door, Jeff hesitates. The light is from the kitchen. Around Jeff and through the passageway, Sydney can see Ben sitting at the table. He has moved from gin to bourbon, a bottle of Maker’s Mark half empty beside him.

  Jeff and Sydney enter the kitchen, even the one light making them squint. There is a sense of having been caught and called to task. Of impending interrogation. Ben is silent, staring at them both. Sydney can see that he is very drunk. It’s in his face, the loosening of the features.

  “Julie’s gone,” he says.

  Chapter 7

  Julie has left, in an upright rounded hand, a note. Ben, seething with frustration, his handsome features corrupted, pushes the torn piece of notebook paper across the table to Jeff, who has to wipe the salty rain from his brow and eyes to read it.

  Sorry but I’m fine. I’ve I’m gone going on a little trip with some someone who you don’t who you haven’t. It’s just a little trip vacation for a couple of days. I’ll call you soon. Don’t worry and I’m fine okay I’M OK. (Thankyou Sidney.)

  “She left? She’s gone?”

  Jeff, pale under the best of circumstances, seems drained of all life force, earlier in great abundance.

  “Apparently.”

  “Where’s Dad? Where’s Mom?”

  “The police station.”

  “Without the note?”