The Ocean At Night

PART I

TEAL

CHAPTER 1

M ama and Uncle Hank are wrestlin’ in the bedroom again. It’s real loud this time. I can’t sleep, Teal. Huck trotted into my bedroom, which was a whole kitchen and living room away from his and Mama’s rooms on the other end of our little almost house.

I called our place an almost house because it wasn’t quite a whole one. It was more like whatever was left of what used to be some rich guy’s weekend place in the sixties. The tin roof seemed cute to the tourists that came out to Folly Beach every season, down from the mountains or Ohio (I don’t know why so damn many from Ohio), but it was loud in a storm and attracted the lightning too. Our place was struck two different times, and once so bad that the fire department had to come out, and we ended up having to stay in a motel for two whole weeks. On top of that, the white paint was coming off the old Gullah-built stone siding, and the windows had already been rusted shut for years, although one of the famous Charleston-green shutters did cling on till the very end. Stubborn little bastard. It was the one outside of the window above the kitchen sink, a place where most people probably remembered their mothers standing to clean up after dinner. That’s not how I remember my mother, though. That sink didn’t see much action; nor did the stove or fridge, for that matter. But that one, that mule of a shutter, was the ruler of the kitchen, hanging on through wind, hurricanes, rain, and failing hardware year after year. A true Folly Beach, South Carolina native to the core. I kind of respected that old piece of half-faded wood. It didn’t choose to be a part of that broken down place, but it sure held its ground, rooted in deep like a century-old live oak.

As for everything else that was falling apart around there, it just had to be. Mama refused to ask the landlord to do a thing about any of it. I assumed it was because he was also her boss, and she didn’t want to rock a boat that wasn’t all that steady to begin with. But Ol’ Limeberry...he was everybody’s boss. He was probably used to keeping people up. Even Uncle Hank did odd jobs and handy work for him when he wasn’t too drunk for it. One would think he could have fixed some stuff for Mama from time to time, but Uncle Hank wasn’t much for doing people favors. He only did enough on the job for Mr. Limeberry to make sure he signed his name to the bottom of the paychecks. Mr. Limeberry signed the bottoms of all of our paychecks. It seemed like he owned three quarters of the houses on Folly Beach, not to mention the rest of the South Carolina coast. He had two or three restaurants, a laundromat and an ice cream shop too. He was the fat cat with expensive boat shoes and too much waist for his salmon-colored golf shorts…just like all of them were with two nickels to rub together—the other half of Folly—not the half that I was any part of.

Mama handled the weekly rentals, but a lot of times, I did. We rented the houses out to tourists for Limeberry Properties. It was mostly vacationers, but occasionally we’d get an artist or a writer hiding away, trying to suck some inspiration out of the salt water. Everyone seemed to believe that they would somehow be able to strain all the majesty out of the ocean like curd through cheesecloth, and sometimes it seemed that they could manage to do it. If they believed it enough they could. Never a born-and-bred though. Maybe we were just too close to the magic all of the time, and the exposure had cursed us more than it had cured us. I’m a firm believer that there absolutely can be too much of a good thing. The ocean without moderation is liable to drown a person fast. It sweeps them up in the tide either because they can’t get enough of it, or because they’ve already had too much of it and just can’t keep kicking any longer. Point is, when you live by the water, sometime or another, you’ll find yourself in over your head. The tourists would come for just a little taste, and it’d last them all year. Me…I loved the water as much as anyone ever could; it was in my bones as much as the marrow itself. But at the same time, my legs were getting weak from all the years of treading.

My favorite vacationers were the ones riding in solo, showing up with a face so broken it might as well have been whacked with a Louisville slugger. Those were the ones I’d see out walking on the shoreline after the sun had gone down, using the glow of the moon to try and find whatever part of themselves they’d lost somewhere in a big land-locked city, knowing damn well they weren’t apt to find it out there either. But I got it—a person still had to look. Three quarters of the earth is ocean water, so the math lied to us, told us whatever it was that we wanted was sooner or later going to wash up on that beach. So we hoped by the odds of it, that it would, even if it just came in the form of some hairbrained revelation spewed out from something that we felt small when standing next to. I think we’ve all had the need to find something in nature that’s felt like home and ask it for some guidance.

So I always understood the broken kind the most. They felt like real neighbors, cut from the same half-spoiled dough that I was. They wanted to be by the water, that was always the most stirred up under the moonlight, just to feel something…even if it was rage and frustration…or to look for a miracle that wasn’t ever going to come. We were the ones that were always a little like the ocean itself. We were full of all that incredible energy that moved around all of the time but could never seem to stretch past the shoreline, no matter how hard it reached for it. Even if each time was a little further than the shot before, eventually it just wouldn't be enough. We’d have no choice but to pull back and try again next time in a new tide.

Now, I’d never speak to any of them, the ones like me; they wouldn’t have liked it too much. When we’d spot one another though, we’d exchange a little look and recognize our own kind, two animals of the same strength. We’d keep a healthy distance like two lions passing one another by out on the open savanna, and we’d tip our sea-sprayed hats.

The ones like me were few and far between. It was mostly the happier people who sunbathed during the daylight hours that were our temporary neighbors. They’d show up during the holidays or the warmer months with surfboards that had never been ridden, and SPF 9,000. They’d ask where the best local seafood was, then go to a Bubba Gump’s anyway, making us all swallow our vomit when they showed back up with the to-go boxes. I hoped they’d enjoyed that pre-packaged shrimp that was probably frozen a thousand miles away and half a year before they tried to digest it.

Anyway, we’d get the place clean enough for them, fix what we could, and then call Hank Feller for the rest of it. I supposed that’s how he and Mama got together to begin with, working for Limeberry. But it wasn’t the worst gig out there. In exchange, we got our own little shack that wasn’t so cute when you were a year-rounder in a never ending battle with wind and water. Spoiler alert: the forces of nature always won that war. I spent more time cleaning sand out of my skivvies, and replacing storm door screens than I did anything else. Most of the work fell on me too. And the more beautiful and sunny the April to October season was, the more work I had to do. I was never the teenage girl throwing bonfires on the shore, or living in a bikini all summer long, though I admit when I saw them around, hanging off the backs of tricked-out golf carts with rims better than the ones on Mama’s old Honda, I wondered what it might be like. I’d stop and stare at the smiling faces, and freckled shoulders for a minute, and wonder what their lives would feel like inside of my skin. I’d see the surfer boy in Ray-bans and board shorts, and wonder what it would be like to know him…even if he turned out to be dumb as a box of hammers (which I was sure he would). I’d wonder. Maybe he’d even think I was cute if I’d wipe the scowl off my face long enough. I’d been whistled at enough times to know they’d liked my natural blonde hair, and bronzy skin. I didn’t have shabby features…just a shabby house. I’d think about it, for a second here and there…then pick up my tool box and go back to cleaning gutters and switching out rusty old locks.

No, I wasn’t the girl squealing like a hog from the teenage caravan. And high school was over. I’d be eighteen by fall of the year. I’d missed my chance at the glory days. Instead, I was the girl that cleaned up the empty carnival grounds after they’d already packed up all the rides. I sifted through what was left of everybody else’s fun…and it was really a terrible, eerie thing at times. I grew up as the undertaker of sunshine and summer nights. But it paid for fried baloney sandwiches and half the power bill just fine.

I had to do what I could to help. Mama had too much other stuff on her mind—like keeping a man entertained—to run the house in any sort of way. Those last couple months at the end of my fateful seventeenth summer, before Will Cianciola showed up and divided everything in my life into before and after him, it had been Uncle Hank.

Mama used Uncle Hank’s full name every time she addressed him. I guess she wouldn’t have done it this way if his last name hadn’t been Feller, which, of course, is redneck for fellow. So she’d always run around yellin’, Get your snow white ass over here, Hank Feller, or Where’s that Hank Feller gone off to today? Or my personal favorite, I can’t get that pukin’, drunk-ass Hank Feller up off my couch.

Mama had gotten me into calling him Hank Feller all the time, but to Huck, he was just good ol’ Uncle Hank, for that moment anyway. I used to think they really were my uncles when I was little like Huck. But then one of those uncles made Huck and took off before he could cry for the first time. I figured no uncle of mine would do such a thing, or that maybe uncle just meant something a whole lot different than what I thought it did. I was about ten when I figured that one out, so I figured Huck, at seven, had a little ways to go yet. He’d already been through a slew of faux uncles though, and I knew he’d learn, too, soon enough. No need to rush it. Turned out the word uncle could actually mean many things, some of them all right…and some of them uglier than slime on the very bottom barnacle of the pier that only showed its face at low tide.

I learned to tune them out, Mama and Hank Feller, tune them out, or put my earphones in. I’d shut out the screaming, or the yelling, or the loud, classless, um, fornicating? But I was also lucky to have the room on the opposite side of the house. I felt bad for Huck. Those walls were awful thin, and he was too young to learn the facts of life just yet. Especially with those two teachers. It’d been better to go down to a farm and watch the animals mate.

Come on in, Buddy. I waved him in like I did anytime he trotted by my door with that look on his face. I tossed my half-shot second-hand earbuds to the side. You can crash in here tonight if you want to, Huckie.

But your room is so far away from Mama. I might have a bad dream and get scared. He pulled at a thread on the sleeve of his faded Mickey Mouse pajamas, nervously making a tiny hole an even bigger one.

Well, I’ll be here. I’ve dealt with a bad dream or two in my lifetime. I think I can handle it. I put my skinny tanned arm around his tiny shoulders, noticing how unruly his blond head had gotten over the years…so much like mine, and our mother’s. You could spot a McHone from a hundred yards out just by the curly mess of gold perched on top of our heads.

You’re never here. You’ll leave to go down to the beach in the middle of the night lookin’ for teeth for that tan lady you want to work for. You always do. I hear the screen door squeakin’ when you sneak out there. He crossed his tiny arms and lowered his bed head.

Not tonight. I shook my head. "The place is still crawlin’ with cops. I went all the way up to the Washout tryin’ to find some good shark’s teeth. They were patrollin’ even all the way up there and in the marshes too. They’re still lookin’ for that little girl that went missin’ a couple of weeks back. They’re out there all day and all night. All my little hidin’ spots too. I don’t know where I’m gonna have to go to find my next crop, and I’m due some to Ms. Garvin. She was nice enough to let me work with her a little bit, but I’ve got to come through on my end somehow. I want this new job to work out so I can get quit Limeberry before I’m Mama’s age. I don’t want to get stuck…" I trailed off, and could feel my eyes searching for something that didn’t even exist yet.

Huck scrunched his nose up and asked a question that let me know he’d only heard half of what I’d said. A little girl? Did she get snatched? Mama always tells me if I wander too far off from her that some bad guy will snatch me. Is that what she did? Get too far away from her Mama or Daddy?

I don’t know. Hope not. I sighed.

Will I get snatched too? Are the bad guys still here at our beach? He eased off the doorway and scurried up onto my bed.

She wasn’t from around here. I bet she got in the water and didn’t know how to swim or somethin’. Probably didn’t know how to get out the undertow. She was little. Don’t worry, Huck. Nobody’s gonna hurt you. Plus, I’m not movin’ a muscle tonight. I searched his worried face. You’re all right. I guess I shouldn’t have said anything. I forget what a little guy you still are sometimes. I slipped my hand around him and pulled him into the crook of my arm before I whispered, It’s because we’re besties.

Maybe she didn’t get lost in the water either. Huck said drowsily, snuggling in closer to me, maybe she’s just lost a little bit, like when one shoe is under the bed.

Maybe so, buddy. I humored him. I hope.

Maybe the nice lady found her.

What nice lady? I bent around to look at him, making a double-chin for myself.

The one at the beach. He yawned, trailing off, I wanted to go to day camp with her. She said there were other kids, but Mommy wouldn’t let me…said it’d prolly cost too much money.

I didn’t think much of what he mumbled on about for a minute or two. I just tried to smooth his angry little curls while he shut his heavy eyes. But then I got to wondering, and asked, Who are you talkin’ about Huckie? What camp? I scrunched my nose up. Huck?

But he didn’t answer me. His chest moved up and down deeper and deeper, his breath filling his whole little pot belly before he let it back out again. So I rolled over, careful not to wake him and yanked the yellowing lamp cord out of the wall. Then I turned onto my favorite side and curled my skinny knees in toward my body. I let my own breath get longer and slowly take more time to clear out of my lungs, until the rhythm of it was even with Huck’s. And I was almost there…almost to that sweet spot where the real world always changed to dreams when something popped into my head and sobered me back to life again.

It was the woman on the beach from the week before last…the woman I’d never seen before that night. She’d made eye contact with me, perfect eye contact, her hazel green to my blue…then she rushed away down the beach. I thought she looked wide-eyed and hurried, a strange thing to be on the lazy lowcountry beachfront in late July. I didn’t even think about it then…the little girl she had by the wrist, I had assumed was her little girl. She kind of dragged her along as she whimpered. But whatever Huck had been mumbling on about, for some reason, made me remember her clear as day…and that memory dropped a rock that sank quickly down into the bottom of my stomach. It started out like a little pebble that night, but soon enough let me know, it had moved in for good, and was going to keep on growing every day. By the end of that summer, it would fill me completely.

CHAPTER 2

The house at the end of our block was the leasing office. It was kind of like the mullets I’d seen at the bad gas stations on the outskirts of town—neat as a pin up front where a pristine water cooler full of