Sullivans Island-Lowcountry 1 (3 page)

had a professional cut in six months. Needless to say, I was

twenty pounds overweight.

I looked hard at Tom. He was tan and fit. He stood quietly

in the doorway to the kitchen. His teeth were perfect, his stom-

ach was as flat and hard as Formica and his loafers were shining

from diligent polish. He pulled off his tie and began to roll it

around his hand.

8

D o r o t h e a B e n t o n F r a n k

“We need to talk,” he said.

“Yeah, I guess so.”

“I’m sorry you found us, Susan,” he said.

“Wait a minute.You’re sorry
I found you?
Shouldn’t the first

thing you apologize for be that you betrayed me?” I began to

panic all over again.

“Of course I’m sorry I betrayed you,” he said quietly, look-

ing at the floor.“We had it good together for a long time.”

“What are you saying,Tom?” My breath was uneven.

“I’m saying I think we should try living apart for a while,”

he said.

There it was.The hideous truth. He wanted out.

“Why? Tom, why? Look, I know things haven’t been great

between us lately. I mean, I know we haven’t been as close as we

used to be, but I can change. I can try harder.” I was pleading and

I could see from his expression that he was embarrassed by it.

“Please, Susan, don’t make this any harder than it is,” he said.

“Don’t make it harder? What does that mean?”

“I just need some space, some time to think,” he said.“It has

to be this way.”

“Why?” I began to cry.“What about Beth? What about our

family,Tom? What about me?”

“Look, I just came back to get some things.You know I’ll

take care of you and Beth. I’ll talk to her. I just have to have

some time, Susan.”

“Look at me,Tom. Look at me in the face and tell me why

this is happening, because I don’t understand.”

When he looked at me I knew all at once why it was

happening. He didn’t love me anymore. He didn’t even look

guilty. He looked relieved. He cleared his throat.

“Where is my black hanging bag?” he said.

“Find it yourself,” I said. It began to sink in that he was really

leaving. Nothing I could say or do would change that. “And

while you’re finding your black hanging bag that I worked over-

time to buy you for Father’s Day last year . . . oh, God. It’s on the

S u l l i v a n ’ s I s l a n d

9

third floor in the hall closet.” I was going to tell him to go to hell

but I couldn’t get the words out of my throat. What difference

would it have made? Father’s Day. I watched him leave the room

and listened to his quiet footsteps on the stairs. I heard him walk

overhead and up the steps again to the third floor. I couldn’t

move. I felt like someone had died and it was such a shock that I

couldn’t absorb it. Suddenly I started thinking about seeing him

in bed with that woman and then I started getting mad again.

I went upstairs and found him lifting stacks of shirts from his

drawer and putting them on the bed. His hanging bag was

spread open and held several suits. I sat on the other side of the

bed and tucked my feet under me.

“What’s her name, Tom?” No answer. “Come on, Tom, she

must have a name.”

He opened his sock drawer and stopped.“Karen,” he said.

“How old is she? I mean, she’s obviously younger than I am.

Just out of curiosity . . .”

“I don’t know,” he said.

“Nineteen? Twenty?” I was being a bitch but, hey, I figured,

why not? “So, do you think she loves you for yourself ?”

“Susan, she’s twenty-three and yes, she loves me for myself.”

“And you love her too. Is that right?”

“Yes, I think so,” he said in a whisper.

“What was that? I couldn’t hear you,Tom. Did you say she’s

closer to Beth’s age than to yours and that you are in love with

her?”

“Yes,” he said.

“I see. Well, we may as well be civilized about this, to the

extent that’s possible for me anyway.” I got up from the bed and

went to the bathroom. He closed the drawer to let me pass

without touching him.That act of avoidance infuriated me fur-

ther.“No sense in prolonging the misery,” I said, “I’ll pack your

shaving kit for you.”

“Thanks,” he said.

I closed the bathroom door behind me, locked it and

10

D o r o t h e a B e n t o n F r a n k

looked in the mirror. I had never been so furious in my life. I

ran the cold water, took off my glasses and washed my face.

When had I stopped wearing contact lenses? Ten years ago?

When had my teeth started turning yellow? Five years ago? I

pulled his leather bag from the cabinet under the sink and

opened it. Condoms? How old were they? I took his razor

from his medicine cabinet and dropped it in the bag, along

with his shaving cream and the Colgate. Reaching for his

toothbrush, I looked at it and realized he’d been brushing his

teeth for somebody else for a long time. I don’t know what

possessed me to do it but I dunked it in the toilet.That pleased

me so much that I rubbed it around the inside rim. That

seemed so pleasant I then scrubbed up under the rim, good and

hard, where no toilet brush could’ve reached in weeks.

“Tom, do you want a hair dryer?” My heart was pounding

as I put the toothbrush in its holder and dropped it in the bag.

“No, that’s okay,” he said.

“I’ll be out in a minute,” I said. I pulled off my pantyhose

and threw them in the wastebasket. I took his aftershave and

cologne out of the medicine cabinet. It occurred to me that he’d

been wearing these for Karen. I peed in the bathroom glass,

drained the Aramis and poured urine into two of his cologne

bottles. “Up yours,” I said quietly. I dropped the bottles in his

bag and zipped it closed. Once more I looked in the mirror. I

wondered what had become of the nice girl I once was.

When I went back to the bedroom, his suitcase was gone. I

took the shaving kit downstairs and met him at the door.

“Where can I reach you?” I said, handing it to him.

“I’ll call you,” he said.

We just stood there looking at each other.

“I’m sorry, Susan, it’s not you, it’s me,” he said. He turned

and left.

“Yeah,” I said. I watched him go to his car, the same way I

had a million other times.

One

The Porch

}

1999

began putting my life back together at the feet of my

older sister and her family. She lived in Momma’s

I house—the family shrine—on the front beach of

Sullivan’s Island. Every time I went over to the Island—which

was frequent in the first months after Tom left—I tried to leave

the harsh realities of my new life behind me.

My old station wagon rolled slowly across the causeway, lib-

erating my daughter and me from the starched life of the penin-

sula to the tiny dream kingdom of Sullivan’s Island. Black magic

and
cunja
powder swirled invisibly in the air. The sheer mist

became the milky fog of my past.

From within the pink and white branches of the overgrown

oleanders, which lined both sides of the road, floated the spirits

of decades long gone.The
haints
were still there, just waiting for

us in the tall grasses and bushes. Suffice it to say that everything

in the Lowcountry was just a-wiggling with life and it wasn’t

always a warm body.

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D o r o t h e a B e n t o n F r a n k

The spirits urged me to roll down my windows and breathe

in the musk-laden drug of the marsh.The scents of plough mud

and rotting marsh life filled my senses like a warm shower of

rare perfume. Then the sirens sounded their cue and the draw-

bridge lifted up before us to allow passage for a tall-masted sail-

boat. We would be detained on the Charleston side for fifteen

minutes. I left my car to stand outside and feel the air. Beth

stayed in the car listening to the radio.

I walked to the edge of the marsh.The full force of the salty

air washed my face and, in an instant, I was a young girl again.

I was hurrying home to my momma and Livvie, my heart

already there.The sweet steam of Livvie’s simmering okra soup

beckoned in a long finger all the way from the back porch. In

my mind I heard the voices of my brothers and my sister as we

converged on the supper table, all of us bickering in Gullah over

the largest piece of cornbread. Livvie ran interference, telling us

to hush, warning us that Daddy was coming.

It was odd what I remembered about growing up. My first

associations were tied into the smells of the marsh and the aro-

mas of the kitchen. Maybe I should have done fragrance research

instead of planning literacy programs at the county library, but I

was always more inclined toward saving the world. One thing

was for sure, I needed a job that would let me offer my opinions

because, according to everybody I knew, that was one area where

I excelled.

Livvie. God, not a day passed that I didn’t remember her. She

raised me—all of us, actually. Here was an old Gullah woman

who put her own five children through college working as a

housekeeper. Just when she should have been thinking retire-

ment, she took on the notorious clan of Hamilton hardheaded

ignoramuses. She was the captain of our destiny, redirecting our

course as often as needed.With every snap of her fingers we woke

up to the truths of life and our own potential a little more. It was

because of her that we all loved to read. She’d shake her head and

lecture. “Feast your hungry brain with a good book,” she’d say.

S u l l i v a n ’ s I s l a n d

13

“Quit wasting time! Life’s short. Humph!” Humph, indeed.Who

was I kidding? It was because of her that we were not all in some

treatment program. She had taught us how to think—no small

feat.

She’d probably have had plenty to say if she could have seen

Beth and me right now, playing instead of working. I’d told my

boss I had a doctor’s appointment. A tiny lie. But I had an excel-

lent excuse for playing hooky on this particular weekday after-

noon. Heat. Over one hundred degrees every day since last week.

We were having a heat wave, Lowcountry style. It felt as if old-

fashioned southern cooks were deep-frying us in bubbling oil like

a bunch of breaded chickens. One flip of the wrist and the whole

of Charleston and its barrier islands sizzled in a cast-iron skillet.

We’re talking hot, Bubba. Take it from an old Geechee girl.

Geechee? That would be someone born in the Lowcountry,

which extends from the Ogeechee River down in Georgia clear

up to Georgetown, South Carolina. I was raised in the downy

bosom of the Gullah culture, as opposed to a Charlestonian reared

in the strictures of the Episcopal Church. Big difference. Gullah

culture? Ah, Gullah. It’s Lowcountry magic.That’s all.

Coming to the Island made me feel younger, a little more

reckless, and as I finally went back to my car and closed the door—

pausing one moment to lower the audio assault of the radio—I

realized the Island also made me lighthearted. I was willingly

becoming re-addicted. As we arrived on the Island, I pointed out

the signs of summer’s early arrival to Beth, my fourteen-year-old

certified volcano.

“Oh, my Lord, look! There’s Mrs. Schroeder!” I said.“I can’t

believe she’s still alive.” The old woman was draped over her

porch swing in her housecoat.

“Who? I mean, like, who cares, Mom? She’s an old goat!”

“Well, honey, when you’re an old goat like her, you will.

Look at her, poor old thing with that wet rag, trying to cool her

neck. Good Lord.What a life.”

“Shuh! Dawg life better, iffin you ask me!”

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D o r o t h e a B e n t o n F r a n k

I smiled at her. Beth’s Gullah wasn’t great, but we were

working on it.

“This ’eah life done been plan by Gawd’s hand, chile,” I said.

It was a small but important blessing how the Gullah lan-

guage of my youth had become a communication link to her.A

budding teenager was a terrible curse for a single parent, espe-

cially given the exotic possibilities of our family’s gene pool. But

speaking Gullah had become a swift ramp to her soul.

Gullah was the Creole language developed by West Africans

when they were brought to the Lowcountry as slaves. While it

mostly used English words in our lifetime, it had a structure and

cadence all its own and most especially it had many unforget-

table idiomatic expressions.

It was spoken by Livvie, taught to us, and we passed on the

tradition to our own children. We used it to speak endearing

words to each other, to end a small disagreement or to ignite

memories of the tender time we spent with Livvie.When I was

Beth’s age every kid on the Island spoke Gullah to some extent,

at least those lucky enough to have someone like Livvie.

I stopped at the corner for some gas at Buddy’s Gulf Station,

the Island institution renowned for price gouging on everything

from gasoline to cigarettes. We got out of the car, I to perform