Saving Ben (4 page)

I shrugged. “Money doesn’t matter that much to me.”

“Ha! That’s because you already have plenty of it.”

“Don’t get me wrong. Having money definitely comes in handy at times, when you need it, like when your car breaks down or—”

“Or when your computer crashes on the day before you leave for college and your parents can’t afford to get it fixed or buy you a new one,” she said, chewing on her bottom lip.

I sobered a little as another piece of the puzzle that made up my roommate fell into place. “Why didn’t you say something?” I leaned into her a little. “It’s not the same as having your own, but we can work out a schedule for you to use mine.”

“That’d be great. Thanks,” she said, exhaling a thin stream of smoke. “My family is not rich like yours. You already know my father is a professor, but my mother is . . . well . . .”

I could see the tears glistening in Emma’s eyes. “Well what?” I grabbed her elbow and squeezed it. “Come on, I’m your roommate. You can tell me anything.”

“My mother is a cafeteria worker at a local nursing home.” Emma took the final drag off her cigarette and ground it out on the bottom of one of her pumps. “But no one knows about this, so can we please keep it between us?”

“Of course, Emma, but earning an honest living is nothing to be ashamed about.”

“It might be honest, but I’d hardly call it a living. Neither of them makes much money and collectively they can barely pay the bills. There’s no room for extras like shopping or visits to the salon. Hell, they can barely afford a texting plan for our cell phones. I’m on a full academic scholarship. Otherwise, I wouldn’t even be here. So it’s easy for you to say money doesn’t mean that much to you when you’ve never been poor.”

“I can’t argue with that,” I said, sucking in my breath as though she’d punched me in the gut. No doubt I was
that
girl, the one who would’ve run out to the Apple Store and bought a new computer the minute mine crashed.

We were quiet for a minute, both of us lost in thought. “So what
is
important to you, Katherine?” She grabbed a hunk of my hair and yanked on it playfully. “If not the finer things in life?”

“Helping people in crisis. That’s why I want to become a nurse.”

“Why not a doctor?”

“Because I can’t imagine spending the next decade of my life in school. The doctor may be the one who finds the cure, but the nurse is the one who can make or break the patient’s recovery. I want to work in the ICU, where the patients and their families are truly in need.”

Emma stood and offered me a hand. “You know, Emma, you’re a really smart girl,” I said when I was on my feet, face-to-face with my roommate. “You don’t have to settle for some guy you don’t love just because he’s wealthy. If you choose the right career, you can make plenty of money on your own.”

“Why would I want a career when I can have money without having to work?” She looped her arm through mine and dragged me toward our dorm. “And don’t worry. I plan to be plenty in love with the man I marry.”

***

Emma and I were so tied up with our new freshman friends, two weeks passed before we saw Ben and Spotty again. It was the Saturday of Labor Day weekend, the first UVA football game of the season. We were all leaving the stadium at the same time, in the middle of the third quarter, not only because our team was losing but because it was steaming hot in the stands.

“How much have you had to drink today?” Ben asked me.

“Nice to see you too,” I said, looking first at him and then at Spotty.

“So we’re going to play it that way,” Ben said, crossing his arms. “Are you having a nice day, Kitty? Is it hot enough for you, Kitty? How much have you had to drink today, Kitty?”

I swatted at him but missed. “Actually, I haven’t had anything to drink. It’s so hot the thought of it makes me sick. Why do you ask?”

“Because we’re going on a road trip and you’re driving.” Ben hooked one arm through mine and one arm through Emma’s and began dragging us toward the gate.

“Ooh, a road trip,” Emma said, skipping alongside Ben. “I’m in.”

“But we don’t even know where he’s going,” I said to her, and then to Ben, “Exactly where
are
you going?”

“To the river, of course.” He quickened his pace. “But we need to hurry if we want to beat the game traffic.”

“Wait a minute, damnit.” I stopped walking and jerked my arm away from him. “I haven’t said I’d go yet. What about Mom and Dad? Are they down there?”

“I just got off the phone with Dad. They’re going to a party tonight, but he said they’d see us in the morning.”

“Where’s Reed? Is he going too?” I held up my hand. “Wait a minute. Let me guess. He’s at the beach.”

Spotty nodded. “Surfing the waves as we speak.”

I looked back and forth between Ben and Spotty as I considered their invitation. “I don’t know about this. I have a lot of work to do this weekend.”

“And what better place to do it than sitting around the pool or out on the dock,” Ben said. “According to Dad, the weather’s nice down there, a lot cooler than here.”

“Just where is this river, and how long is the driver?” Emma asked.

“The Northern Neck of Virginia, which is on the western side of the Chesapeake Bay. It’ll take two and a quarter, probably two and a half with Kitty driving,” Ben answered. “And if we leave now, we can make it in time to get pizza from the River Market before it closes.”

“Okay, that’s it.” I stomped my foot. “No fair tempting me with my favorite pizza.”

“Think about it, Kitty,” Spotty said. “We can spend the whole day tomorrow out in the boat.”

Emma clasped her hands together. “Please . . . it sounds like so much fun.” 

“Alright, already. What choice do I have anyway with the three of y’all ganging up on me like this?”

“Yes!” Ben pumped the air with his fist. “Hurry up and get your stuff. We’ll meet you at my car in the lot behind the house in twenty minutes.”

By the time I reached the interstate, thirty minutes later, everyone in the car had already surrendered to their afternoon buzzes. Ben slept in the back with his head resting on Spotty’s shoulder, and Emma sat in the passenger seat next to me, a thin stream of drool dangling from her mouth onto
my
silk halter top she was wearing.

I cranked the tunes and set the cruise control and allowed my thoughts to drift to the river. My fondest memories traced back to our cottage, not the modernized version my parents created after my grandparents died but the 1920s Arts and Crafts style house in its original form. I appreciated the amenities the renovations offered—new bathrooms and kitchen, central air conditioning—but I missed the creaking boards in the random-width oak floors and the smell of sea grass wafting through the open windows. What I really missed were my grandparents, Herbert and Mabel Langley, a small-town doctor and his country wife. From Memorial Day to Labor Day, Ben and I spent every summer of our youth with Dock and MayMay while our parents were off somewhere, finding themselves on one of their many pre-midlife crisis adventures. Every day we made explorations of our own. If we weren’t traveling by boat or picnicking on one of the many area islands, we were working in MayMay’s garden, staking tomatoes and picking butterbeans. We set our pots for peeler crabs and dug in the mud for clams. We cast our nets for minnows to use as bait for fishing in the rivers and at the mouth of the bay. Every day we worked like watermen and farmers, and every night we feasted from the land.

All three of my passengers stirred, as if on cue, when I turned on my blinker and made a left-hand turn onto Highway 3. As we headed toward the Rappahannock River Bridge, Ben and Spotty moaned about their hangovers and begged me to stop for more beer, but once we were on top of the bridge, they grew quiet while we watched the orange ball of sun begin to set.

“Emma, if you look to your right,” Ben said, “you can see past Stingray Point where the Rappahannock River meets the Chesapeake Bay.”

Taking it all in, Emma pointed out my window. “What’s down that way?”

“The mouth of our creek, Carter’s Creek, is at ten o’clock,” Ben explained. “And further past that, on the same side, is the Corrotoman River. On the opposite side, at about seven o’clock, is the little town of Urbanna where the famous Oyster Festival is held every year.”

“Yuck,” Emma exclaimed, curling her lip. “I’ve never been a big fan of oysters.”

Spotty stared at the back of her head. “That kind of talk is not allowed in this car We were all raised on oysters. Our mothers use to grind them up in a blender and feed them to us in our bottles.”

“Ooh, Spotty,” I said, catching his eye in the rearview mirror. “That’s just gross.”

“Oysters
are
gross,” Emma said, sticking out her tongue. “They’re so slimy, like boogers.”

Spotty laughed. “Now who’s being gross?”

I winked at Emma. “Give her a break. She’s just never had an oyster fried, à la Ben.”

“Wait a minute,” Emma said, shifting in her seat to face Ben. “You can cook?”

I caught Ben’s eye in the rearview mirror and he glared at me. The subject was off limits. Despite the fact that he’d learned all his culinary skills from our grandfather, whom he considered the most masculine of men, in Ben’s mind cooking was a sissy task.

“He’s a really good cook, actually,” I said to Emma. “Our grandfather taught him how to prepare everything from frying soft shell crabs to smoking shark meat. Except lately his cooking has been limited to burgers or steaks on the grill.”

“That’s because it’s no fun to cook it if you’re not the one who caught it,” Ben said to me in the mirror. “Unlike Dock, Dad’s answer to a seafood dinner is buying a dozen crabs, already steamed, from the Yellow Umbrella Seafood Market in Richmond and bringing them down here to eat.”

“True,” I agreed. “He’s neither the cook nor the waterman that Dock was.”

“Okay, so who the hell is Dock?” Emma asked.

We all laughed, and for the rest of the way into White Stone to pick up the pizza and then back to the house, we told Emma all about our summers on the creek with our grandparents.

Carter’s Creek isn’t narrow like a brook or stream, the way most people might think. It’s a branch of the Rappahannock, a tributary, more than a quarter of a mile across in some places. Situated up high on a peninsula, our property is surrounded by 270 degrees of water.

The house stands four stories tall with large airy rooms and twelve-foot ceilings. A game room takes up the basement space with a walk-out terraced area that leads to the summer kitchen. The main floor houses the living room, kitchen, and two guest rooms. Ben’s and my bedrooms are on the third floor with our parents’ on the fourth. At the corner of the house, off the dining room on the main floor, is a large unscreened porch—our tree fort. With wide-open views of the creek in both directions, we spend all our time here, drinking coffee in the morning and eating candlelit suppers in the evening. There’s no better place to watch a storm roll in or fireworks on the Fourth of July.

All traces of the sunset had disappeared by the time we settled into the four oversize wicker chairs on the porch, the combination of the humid salty air and the beer and pizza in our bellies making us lazy.

Ben tossed a piece of crust into the empty pizza box on the coffee table in front of us. “Kitty, you’re the closest. Why don’t you send out a smoke signal?”

I glanced across the creek at the Turners’ house. “The lights are on over there, so I’m guessing they’re home.” I stared back at Ben. “But I’m not moving. I’ve been driving all day. It’s your turn to do something.”

“Fair enough,” he said, dragging himself from his chair.

I tilted my head back and smiled at him as he passed behind me. “And get me a beer while you’re up, will you?”

Thirty seconds later, Van Morrison blasted from the outdoor speakers. Ben let “Moondance” play for a couple of minutes before turning the music off again.

“Somebody please explain,” Emma said, looking back and forth between Spotty and me.

“It’s a game we play with our friends George and Abigail Turner, who live across the creek,” I said. “If either of them is home, they’ll respond by playing another song.”

“So you mean literally?” Emma asked. “A smoke signal like the American Indians used to use?”

“Exactly.” I nodded. “Just like the Indians. Remember, Ben?”

He opened the screen door and tossed me a beer. “Why do we have to bring that up?”

Spotty laughed. “Because who can resist such a great story?” He turned toward Emma. “When Ben was just a Cub Scout, maybe eight or nine, he tried to send out a real smoke signal to the Turners. As only Ben’s luck would have it, he picked the driest summer on record in Virginia. The dumbass caught the grass on fire, burned up half of the front yard before his grandmother got to it with her fire extinguisher.”

“When we were younger,” Ben said through the screen door, “before the fire, we used to signal George and Abby with a flashlight. One long flash was an invitation to come on over.”

“And two short flashes meant we were in for the night,” I added.

When a sudden blast of “Freebird” permeated the peaceful night, we all cheered, and for the next few minutes, we bounced songs back and forth across the water. Every time Ben changed songs, he raised the volume until it reached an obnoxious level.

“Turn it down, Ben,” I yelled, holding my hands over my ears. “You’re disturbing the peace.”

Ben lowered our volume, and a few seconds later, the music on the other side of the creek died. Not long afterward, we heard the sound of George and Abby’s outboard motor heading our way. Ben and I wandered out onto the lawn to greet them on their way up from the dock. As was their ritual, Ben hugged Abby tight, spinning her around and around until she was dizzy.

“Why haven’t y’all been down more this summer?” Abby asked, after she and George had greeted everyone and were settled on the wicker love seat, the only available place to sit.

“It’s all her fault, Abby.” Ben pointed at me. “Kitty’s been in the hospital all summer.”

“Wait a minute, what?” she asked me, confused.

“I’ve been
working
in the hospital all summer, Abby, shadowing a doctor in the ER, hoping to get some experience before I started nursing school.”

“Speaking of nursing school,” George said to me, “I was hoping you’d end up at Chapel Hill with me. What happened?”

Ben shot George a warning look. “Nice of you to bring that up, bro.”

“I can handle this, Ben. I’m a big girl now.” I shifted in my seat so I could see George. “The truth is, George, UNC was a stretch for me, and my father was a little overconfident about his connections.”