Part 8 (1/2)

”We'll try. It might even be too hot for them.” He pointed to some frizzled brown growth in the crevice of an oak. ”That's resurrection fern. It's an epiphyte. It looks dead now, but when it rains-and it will-that fern will burst into green.”

”What's an epiphyte?” I asked.

”It lives off the air.”

At Stafford, after the road split and then joined again, the forest cleared and there was sky. On the right, across from where the plantation house once stood, was a field that served as an airstrip. ”You have to buzz the horses a couple of times before you land,” Andy confided. ”Even then they're stubborn. They think it's theirs.”

The forest grew denser the farther north we went. Andy took us to the Chimneys, the charred ruins of the slave quarters at Stafford; to Plum Orchard, a Georgian revival mansion, where we peered into huge windows at the wide, vacant rooms; and to an old hunting lodge, the wood grayed and overcome by giant sand dunes. We waited without luck by a marshy creek for alligators, but spotted ospreys and ibises near Lake Whitney. We rambled over trails with names like Roller Coaster, Duck House, and North Cut. And when we reached the tip of the island near Christmas Creek, we saw the giant sh.e.l.l mounds where, a thousand years before, the Timucua had held their banquets. Then, through a tangle of trees and winding paths, we came to the Settlement-the abandoned homes of ex-slaves near Half Moon Bluff. There was an old church there that Andy wanted to show us after we had our picnic in the graveyard nearby.

It was during that lunch, perhaps, as we sat in the shadows of the trees feasting on chicken salad, oatmeal cookies, and sweet tea, that John brought up one of the hypotheticals he'd sometimes play with: If you could choose-excluding being old and happy and in your own bed-how would you want to go? He said he wanted it to be quick. I disagreed. I didn't want want illness, I told him, but at least it had consciousness. You knew what was going on. Being hit by a car, you're just gone. Boom. Exactly, he said blithely. illness, I told him, but at least it had consciousness. You knew what was going on. Being hit by a car, you're just gone. Boom. Exactly, he said blithely.

The small, clapboard chapel that Andy took us to after lunch stood by a grove of longleaf pines. Pale gra.s.s snuck from the edges of the stone foundation, and I remember that the paint on the sills of the First African Baptist Church where he would one day marry was a worn, flaking red.

John and I went inside, but Andy did not. He waited for us by a barbed wire fence, arms crossed, one leg hitched over the other. Behind the wooden doors, the chapel had a musty, shut-in smell. There was a dirty green runner and eleven pews-five pairs and one on its own. In the center of the room was a stand with an open Bible. We sat in a back pew and said a prayer, and before we left, John placed a pinecone on the makes.h.i.+ft altar.

We took the beach route back, a straight shot of packed sand all the way. I sat in the back of the jeep next to the empty wicker baskets, a stray thermos rattling at my feet, while John rode up front with Andy. They were compadres-eyes narrowed by the glare and wind on their young faces.

”Hold on!” Andy shouted as he gunned the engine.

”Faster!” John rallied him. With one hand braced against the dashboard, he stood up and let out a war cry. He almost fell but, laughing, steadied himself. Andy floored it, and we zigzagged in and out of the waves. John turned back to me, alive from the speed. He put out his hand.

”You try!” The sound of his voice was lost to the wind and the roar of the engine. I shook my head vehemently-I didn't need to do this, the things he did-and I gripped the back of the seat. But he wouldn't give up.

”Don't be afraid. I've got you!” he yelled to me. I began to stand up, shaky at first, without commitment, one hand still glued to the seat, the other clutching his wrist on my waist. I believed in his hands. He stayed on me until I yelled back, until he saw on my face the same exhilaration he felt and knew that my fear was gone. I've got you! I've got you!

Andy dropped us at the beach near Stafford and took off. We would walk back. By then, the sun was blinding. I tossed my hat on the sand. John doffed his clothes, leaped into the flat water, and swam out as far as he could. I tied the long skirt of my dress on one hip and waded in, thigh-high, to wash off the dust of the day. The water was clear and there was no wind. I turned back to the land. There was no one there, and I could almost see the whole island, end to end-from Christmas Creek in the north to the jetties near the Pelican Banks in the south. Behind me, I could hear his strong, even strokes cutting the water, a sound of safety, of constancy. ”This is the widest beach I've ever seen,” I said aloud. It was low tide, and the sand was bare, dressed only by coquinas, slipper sh.e.l.ls, and bits of jellyfish-a string of tiny cabochon moonstones laid out like a necklace on the broad lip of the sh.o.r.e.

John came back and dressed, drying himself with his T-s.h.i.+rt.

”Brown as a berry.” He kissed my shoulders. ”Let's make it back for c.o.c.ktails.”

I laughed. ”More like a salmon.” I knew I was getting burned.

”Look.” He pointed up as we walked. From the west, a bank of black clouds raced toward us. Then-a deafening rumble.

”What do we do?”

”What do you mean what do we do? We keep walking.”

The rain started, lightly at first, in patches, as we moved south to the break in the dunes at Greyfield. But then the sky darkened, the rain kicked in, and, as hot as it had been minutes ago, I was suddenly s.h.i.+vering, my hat bedraggled and my flowered dress soaked through.

Out of nowhere, a red truck appeared. It was Pat. He reached over and rolled down the pa.s.senger's side window. ”You folks want a ride?”

His devil grin was a welcome sight. Relieved, I moved toward the truck.

”Thanks, I'm gonna walk,” I heard John say behind me.

”Why?”

”It's just rain.”

I was stumped. Why would anyone choose a downpour over a dry truck? When my efforts at persuasion fell flat and it was clear this was a nonnegotiable, I knew I had to choose-John or the truck. I didn't want to get any wetter than I already was and I hated the rain, but the truth was, at that moment, twenty minutes away from him seemed unbearable to me.

I hemmed and hawed. Pat revved the engine.

”For Christ's sake, make up your mind!” John barked. ”It's only rain.”

The pickup won, and I jumped in. I was not, to my dismay, the girl who walked in the rain. I was the girl who chose the truck. I smiled at Pat, a little embarra.s.sed that he knew this. As he smiled back, my hat slid to the truck floor, and I saw that my dress was stuck to my thighs. I began to shake it. ”Don't worry, you'll be warm soon,” Pat said, turning on the heater. Just then, the sky lit up. The storm hit full-tilt, and the rain came down in a crackling roar. Instinctively, I ducked.

When I lifted my head. I could barely see out the window. ”They don't call it a barrier beach for nothing,” I said.

”What?”

”I said, they don't call it a barrier beach for nothing!”

Whether he heard me or not, Pat nodded. Winds.h.i.+eld wipers beating furiously, we made our way up the roll of the double dune. Maybe John had changed his mind. Maybe he was running to the truck. I looked back. The gla.s.s was fogged, but I saw him. He was walking slowly-head down, hands deep in the pockets of his windbreaker. I was safe, out of the rain, but he was infinitely cooler; he was getting drenched, and he was happy.

The night before we left, we went to a party in a small A-frame in the woods-a roof raising for Mouse McDowell, one of Andy's cousins. We danced barefoot in the small hours to Little Feat and the Band with the inn staff and various Carnegie descendants-McDowells, Fergusons, Fosters. The virgin house throbbed to the beat and reeked of bourbon, weed, and sawdust. The heavy night air wafted through the gla.s.sless windows, and when Prince's Dirty Mind Dirty Mind came on, John pulled me in, mouthing the words on the back of my neck. We danced like there was no one else in the room, his arms over my shoulders, mine on his back. came on, John pulled me in, mouthing the words on the back of my neck. We danced like there was no one else in the room, his arms over my shoulders, mine on his back.

On our way back to the inn through an open field, with horses and armadillos rustling unseen in the dark, he told me he loved me for the first time, though I already knew. And as the night began to deepen, we made love on one of the porch swings at Greyfield, a fan overhead ticking time.

Afterward, I thought I heard someone. ”There's no one there,” he said. But moments later, below the high porch, Andy walked by, his blond head aglow in the darkness.

That fall, John switched apartments and began law school. He left the shared two-bedroom in a doorman building off West End Avenue where he'd lived for almost two years and moved to the top floor of a renovated town house on West Ninety-first Street. The building, more spruced up than those on the rest of the block, had a red door with globe lighting. Steps from the entrance was a community mural depicting people of all races in harmony, but if you left your bike outside overnight or neglected to pop the car radio, it was likely to be stolen. The apartment was a block from the park, around the corner from a D'Agostino market, and across from the PS 84 schoolyard, and afternoons, the sounds of children playing fell lightly over the street.

Before our trip to c.u.mberland Island, he took me to see the apartment, and we walked through the empty rooms on a summer night. We stood in the largest one discussing the pros and cons. ”What do you think?” He spoke softly, leaning in to nudge me. ”Should I take it?” He wasn't sure; there was another place closer to NYU. If there was a choice of trails up a mountain or where to set up camp for the night, instinct served him, but with less corporeal decisions, he'd check himself and weigh what others thought. Maurice thinks this, he'd tell me, or Mummy and Caroline said that. As the amber light deepened in the room, I saw, in a way I hadn't before, how much he trusted my counsel, desired my guidance, and, more than simply wanting my approval, needed me to be happy here, too.

I touched his cheek. ”I think it's grown-up. I like it,” I said, before asking if he would leave his water bed behind.

While we were away, the bare rooms were outfitted with st.u.r.dy essentials-comfortable furnis.h.i.+ngs you could kick about. A nap-inducing canvas-covered couch, a leather recliner, a plain coffee table, a small dining set. Simple lamps and mirrors. The masks he collected peered from the walls. I opened a kitchen cupboard. It was stocked with matching dishes and oversize mugs. In the linen closet, new sheets and towels had been stripped of their plastic and folded squarely by someone who knew how. ”You must have a fairy G.o.dmother,” I teased. He winked, aware this wasn't the norm. ”Well, Mummy did what she does best and called up Bloomingdale's and Conran's. Nice, huh?”

At the back, down a dark skinny hall, there were two small rooms. In the one that would become his study, there was a saw-horse desk and a pine bookshelf. Spider plants crowded the window. The bedroom was furnished with an antique highboy, a new bra.s.s bed with an art deco lamp of his mother's on the side where I would sleep, and, in a corner, one of his father's padded rockers. It didn't quite fit, and whenever he pa.s.sed it, he grazed the arm.

I moved as well, from Brooklyn back to Manhattan, and after a series of ill-fated and illegal sublets, I found a studio in a converted brownstone on West Eighty-third Street-a front apartment with tons of light and little floor s.p.a.ce. The stairwell was shabby-a torn carpet and the perpetual tang of Chinese food-and when the couple upstairs argued, as they did weekly, I could hear every word. But I was in heaven. A vanity, my grandmother's bed, and a green velvet love seat fit snugly, and there were high ceilings and a working fireplace. It was a perfect artist's garret. Plus, I had a lease, and in New York, where geography is destiny, it was eight blocks from John's.

The apartment had a terrace that jutted over the parlor floor below, and whether he remembered his key or not, John preferred to enter through my window. He'd give a whistle-soft, two-toned, and flirty-and with a foot on the stone planter and his hand on the iron rail, he'd hoist himself up the side of the brownstone. I liked it, and the neighbors got used to his Romeo act, but one night when we were in bed, we heard a voice through a bullhorn.

”This is NYPD. Come to the window.”

We burst out laughing. Then a spotlight froze the room.

”You go to the window,” he hissed.

”No, you!”

”Come on...the papers.”