The Beach House (20 page)

“Sure there is. The nurturing type.”

She skewered Cara with a look. “And you’re saying you are not the nurturing type?”

Cara looked her right back in the eye. “That’s what I’m saying.”

Florence burst out laughing. “The hell you aren’t. You just don’t know it yet. There’s nothing like a nest of hatchlings to bring it out, too. Okay, now here’s my suggestion. Just hear me out. We both know your mama wants to spend time with you this summer. This would be the perfect project for you to share. She might not be up to doing all the tasks, though, so you can take over a lot of the physical activities like getting up early and following up on the turtle track reports and checking the nests at night. Lovie can do the charts, write the newsletters and still come down to the beach as often as she feels up to it. That way, no one is taking away any of her duties.”

Cara made an agonized face. “But I’ll be taking
on
a lot of them. Flo, you know I’ve never wanted to be a turtle lady.”

“Oh, come on,” Emmi chided, nudging her in the ribs. “Your mama came over to my house and got me involved last summer and I have to admit, I was reluctant to have to get up early every morning, especially with the boys gone and no breakfast to make. But you know your mama. The next thing I knew I was walking the beach every morning, feeling great, and couldn’t wait for the sun to set so I could sit out there by the nests with the girls at night. Being part of the team grounded me and made this island my home again. You were just saying a minute ago how the summer loomed so long. This will give it focus. Best of all, you’ll have this to share with your mama.”

“And she needs you now,” Flo added simply.

Cara realized that this one quietly spoken statement was the winning argument. Her mind spun, trying to think of alternative solutions. But there were none. She felt herself being dragged along into this decision like a piece of driftwood in the tide.

“Will you help me? I don’t have a clue what to do.”

“Of course. We all will,” replied Flo. “But not to worry, Caretta. You’ve got the greatest teacher of all.”

Emmi’s eyes filled suddenly and she wrapped her arms around her once again.

“I’m so glad you’re home. Welcome back.”

The loggerhead deposits her leathery, Ping-Pong ball sized eggs into the nest cavity, laying two, three or four at a time. She will lay eighty to one hundred and fifty eggs in each nest.

CHAPTER NINE

O
n the South Carolina coast, summer doesn’t begin at the equinox. Summer begins after Memorial Day when the schools open the floodgates and kids pour out onto the beach with hurrahs of triumph, colorful towels flapping like flags and surfboards pointed toward the sea. The beach houses that line the shore are rented clear through until September when the schools pull the children back in. Until then, cars cruise the boulevard bumper to bumper.

For Cara, summer began with her first day on the Turtle Team. Soon after her “induction” into the team, a phone call came in reporting turtle tracks at 22nd Avenue. When Lovie woke up to the news, she smiled like the Cheshire cat.

“Fetch the red bucket,” she said, throwing back the covers.

With the bucket in tow, they headed out in The Gold Bug for the nest. It was a cloudy, introspective morning with a brisk, moist wind. Cara drove, enjoying the feel of the clutch again on a winding road after years of automatic in stop-and-go traffic. They bumped along Palm Boulevard with the top down like two teenagers on an outing. Looking to her right, she saw Lovie smiling as she held on to her cap, little wisps of fine white-gold hair flying against her small, slender hands. Sometimes she could look so young, Cara thought.

She parked along the sandy roadside, placed her hat on her head, then hopped out of the car to run around and help her mother out. Grabbing the supplies, they headed out along the twisting, narrow beach access path. The houses were so close together Cara could smell coffee and bacon coming from the kitchens. Ahead of her, Lovie was as nimble as a mountain goat, but she paused midway to cough. It sounded deep and wet and Cara recalled hearing that cough a few times around the house as well. An inner alarm went off.

“Are you okay?” Cara asked. “Maybe you’re catching something?”

“No, no, it’s just the dry air and sand.”

“I don’t know. You’re supposed to be taking it easy. Perhaps you shouldn’t be coming out here.”

“Nonsense, I’m fine. The doctor said exercise is good for me. Come on, let’s go find those tracks.” She cleared her throat and with a tease in her voice asked, “You do remember what a turtle track looks like, don’t you?”

“Yes, Mama,” Cara replied in singsong, picking up the bucket. She was never going to live down her first disastrous day searching for turtle tracks. The day before she’d run back from the beach to breathlessly tell Lovie she’d found tracks. Lovie made the phone calls to Emmi and Flo. Then they all raced to the designated beach with probes in tow, only to laugh until tears moistened their eyes when Cara’s tracks turned out to be the trash man’s tractor tracks.

Chagrined, Cara was determined never to make that mistake again. Once on the beach, she readily spotted the wide turtle tracks that carved the smooth, untrammeled sand. They traveled from the high tide line to a small body pit. Not far beyond it was a huge, man-made hole, probably the remains of a massive sea castle laid low by the tide.

“Fools,” Lovie muttered coming close. “A sandcastle is one thing, but a huge crater is another. Don’t they know a turtle has to crawl by? She might’ve gotten trapped in one of these pits.”

“I’m sure they didn’t even think of the turtles when they were building it,” Cara replied, moving on to the turtle’s nest. “Not everyone is as turtle crazy as you are.”

“They should be. The loggerheads have been coming to this beach for a lot longer than any of us have.” She picked up a long, tapered T-handled dowel and gave it with ceremony to Cara. “This was my probe stick. And now it is yours. It’s kind of a badge of honor in the Turtle Team, so don’t take it lightly. Only a few people are approved to probe a nest and I’m going to teach you how it’s done. So pay close attention.”

She drew lines in the sand, dividing the circular body pit into four parts. Then, beginning with one quarter, she taught Cara how to hold the probe stick and balance her weight before carefully pushing the stick into the sand. Her small, slender body moved gracefully, inch by inch, up and down, sliding across the small area like a ballerina doing pliés on the beach.

“It’s important not to push in fast like a drill because, if you should find the egg chamber, your probe will go through the soft sand like a knife through butter. You don’t want to push hard, either, lest you break an egg. So nice and easy, like this.” She probed a few more times with deliberate slowness and care. When she was done, her breath came short. “Now you try it.”

Cara took the probe stick, feeling more nervous than she thought she’d be. “At least I’ll get some payback from all those ballet lessons you made me take as a child.”

“No knowledge is wasted,” her mother volleyed.

Cara centered the probe between her legs, bent at the knees, caught her balance, then began. Each time she pushed the stick through the sand, she was sure she was going to come crashing into an egg.

“Not so fast,” Lovie admonished. “There’s no hurry. Why are you always in a hurry, Caretta?”

Cara took a deep breath, then tried again.

“People always seem to be in so much of a hurry,” Lovie continued as she sat down breathlessly in the sand. “Rush, rush, rush. What are they rushing toward? Life isn’t some kind of race. We all cross the same finish line, sooner or later. You’d hate to get the end in sight and suddenly wish you’d walked rather than run, wouldn’t you?”

“Maybe that’s why they call it the human race.”

Her mother laughed. “Well, we
are
all in it together. But the winner of this race gets no prize. So take your time, Cara. Move steadily and serenely at a turtle’s pace. Smooth movements. That’s better. Careful now. The dip always catches you by surprise. Sort of like in life.”

Cara moved slowly, thinking of the tai chi exercises she’d once taken. Eventually she caught her own rhythm, easing the probe down to feel the hard resistance of the compact sand, then slowly drawing it back. Then on to another spot, and another, one after the other until she’d made dozens of small holes filling half the circumference of the pit. Just as she was getting into it, when she least expected it, the probe slipped in deep—so deep she had to catch herself or it would have gone too far in.

Cara felt a soaring elation and looked over at her mother for affirmation.

Lovie smiled, pride shining in her eyes. “Congratulations.
Now
you’re a member of the Turtle Team.” She rose and coughed, patting her chest, then said hoarsely, “Okay, roll up your sleeves.” Coming closer with the red bucket she sank to her knees in the sand. “This nest is much too far below the tide line. High tide will destroy the eggs for sure. We’ll have to move it. So, let’s see what we’ve got.”

Lovie began digging out the sand with her hands, carefully probing with fingers for the eggs between scoops. Cara watched intently, then followed suit. Before long, the eggs were visible and Cara laughed out loud with the delight of discovering a treasure trove. Gingerly, Lovie reached in and drew one out, handling the single egg as though it were made of spun glass. She gingerly handed it to Cara.

Cara held out her palm, cupping the egg, bringing it close. “It’s the spitting image of a Ping-Pong ball. Only soft and leathery.”

“We can only move them now in the first twenty-four hours, but we mustn’t jostle them or turn them around lest the embryo tears from the shell.” She took the egg back and placed it right side up into the trusty red bucket.

One by one they retrieved the eggs and carefully placed them in the moist nest sand inside the red bucket. When they were done, they moved the eggs to a chosen spot above the spring tide line where they would be safe from saltwater flooding. Cara crouched at the spot her mother chose and began digging with a cockleshell an arm’s length into the sand. Then she carved out a flask-shaped chamber in imitation of the sea turtle’s nest. Lovie sat beside her and supervised every step, a bemused expression on her face. Once finished, Cara began reverentially placing each of the 104 eggs into the new chamber, right side up.

“You know what?” Cara asked, turning to face her mother as she reached in the bucket for another egg.

Lovie looked at her daughter. The sun broke through the gray, pinkening Cara’s cheeks as she grinned from ear to ear. “What?”

“This is fun. Who knew?”

Cara placed the egg in the nest, a look of fierce concentration on her face. Lovie remembered back to when Cara was a little girl, digging sand castles beside Palmer with the same expression.

Thank You, Lord,
she whispered fervently.
Thank You for the chance to play with my daughter again.

Dawn was causing a furor of excitement outside Cara’s window. The birds were relentless in their chirping and squawking, more dependable than any alarm clock.

“Okay, okay!” Cara muttered, rising slowly. She yawned loudly and dragged herself from the bed. Just as well the birds woke her. She had to patrol her stretch of beach for turtle tracks. Quietly she slipped on her shorts and a Turtle Team T-shirt and laced up her running shoes. The house was quiet; Lovie and Toy were still sleeping. Stepping into the cool morning air, Cara stretched, took a deep breath, then headed toward the beach.

The undisturbed sand was smooth and hard, its shimmering surface broken by small crab holes, tracks of birds and a smattering of shells. As she jogged along her assigned stretch of beach, Cara’s gaze wandered from the shoreline to the horizon. The sun pierced the bluish clouds with spectacular shafts of rosy light. Her spirits lifted and she got into the rhythm of the run. She’d been jogging this stretch for almost a week now. At first she’d been winded and muttered how she was only doing this for Lovie’s sake. But by the end of the week she knew the morning run was as much for her own sake. As each day passed the cloud of depression dissipated a little more and she missed her computer and e-mail a little less. Each day, she felt more fit and energized.

And each day Lovie presented a new lesson. Cara had crammed a lot into the past week. There were the tracks to measure, eggs to count, and the important art of moving a nest. She learned how to cordon off the nest with wooden stakes, tape and bright-orange signs to protect it from being disturbed by feet or bikes.

An hour later, Cara finished up her patrol. A few more people were out walking the beach or collecting shells. There were no tracks here today but several pale-gray ghost crabs scuttled into their holes as she passed. By the time she reached home again the phone would be ringing with reports from other volunteers and she’d be off again to check the tracks for nests. Such was her new morning routine.

And it was surprisingly fulfilling. Her life had turned upside down in a little less than a month, challenging so much of what she’d thought were fundamentals in her life. She’d grown up thinking Lovie had nothing to teach her. Yet in the space of a few weeks, she learned that her mother had a lot to teach after all.

She stopped before entering the beach house to kick off her running shoes. And as her mother’s humming wafted through an open window, it dawned on Cara that, for the first time in her life, the turtles were no longer a barrier between herself and her mother but a bond.