Willow (24 page)

All I could do was nod.
"You should go back to bed," he said. "And don't forget our bargain," he added, then turned and walked back to the house, choosing to stay in the shadows as if he were some nocturnal creature afraid of being seen.
I
hurried back inside.
Why did he insist she wasn't out there on that dock? How could he not have seen her?
Was I imagining it after all?
As
I
feared, I tossed and turned and fretted in and out of nightmares until the first light of morning spread like warm butter over my face and shook my eyelids. I groaned awake and then lay there wondering about all that I had seen and heard just hours ago.
Had I dreamed it?
Or was my mother on that dock with a lantern, and was Linden hovering in the shadows?
Who were they, this mother and son who lived like hermits on this posh estate?
And how much of what and who they were was in me as well? Was my adoptive mother right about me after all, that I would develop some strange mental malady? Would I end up on a beach at night, staring into the darkness? Maybe for my mother there was nothing but darkness, even on the brightest, sunniest days. Was that my destiny as well?
Like a reader terrified by the words on the page. I was afraid to turn it and continue,
But I knew
I
had no choice. This was my story, too. now. These were my pages to read. I no longer had the luxury of ignorance. I already knew too much, and, like a ravenous glutton. I was eager to keep swallowing whatever new truth
I
could consume.

12
Linden
.
I had just started to rise when I heard a gentle

knock on my door.
"Yes?"
Thatcher poked in his head and smiled. He was

"I'm sorry.," he said. "I would have breakfast with you. but I have to go to Miami today on business. I'll be gone most of the day, but if you're up to it, I'd like to take you to dinner."

He smiled, looked to his side, and then came into the room to kiss me.
"It's nice to have someone like you here to greet first thing in the morning," he said softly. "It sort of jumpstarts the day." He kissed me again. "Gotta go,," he said, and hurried to the door.
^-
"Don't let my mother and any of her other friends drive you crazy. Go and do whatever you want, and don't let her talk you into anything," he warned. He waved and closed the door. It opened instantly, and he was there again. I'll have Jennings call you in a minute to see what you want for breakfast. I suggest you enjoy it on your balcony. Did you know Palm Beach has the best sunrise in America? Its rays are directly on the town: nature's spotlight."
"Oh. really?"
I
laughed. "You're still playing the role of president of the chamber of commerce."
"Some people here take that stuff about nature and energy very seriously. Willow. They believe in something called feng shui. Ever hear of it?"
I
shook my head.
It's an ancient Chinese discipline bringing everyday life into harmony with nature, and that includes interior decorating, how you set up your furniture. Time, space, and action are designed to increase energy, harmony, healing, et cetera, et cetera," he said, waving his hand. "Don't get Bunny started on it. She has redesigned the living room ten times following one guru or another."
Harmony with nature. I thought. It sounded wonderful. Everyone was searching for some comfort, some sense of security, even the wealthiest among us. I guessed in the end, we were all afraid of being alone.
"Anyway," Thatcher said. "enjoy the morning, and pretend I'm with you," he ordered with a smile, and was gone again.
I
felt as if my day had been jumpstarted, too. I guess it is possible to be swept off your feet.
I
thought, and dropped my head back to the pillow. What was happening? I didn't come here for this.
The intercom rang before
I
could get into an argument with myself again. It was Jennings asking what I wanted for breakfast. I ordered and then rose and went out onto the balcony.
It
was a glorious morning. I could understand why people might feel they were blessed living here.
I
gazed at the dock again and revived my memories from the night before. Perhaps today, I thought,
perhaps today after I finally speak with my mother for a while,I'll understand what is happening to me.
I went in and took a quick shower. I was out and in my robe again before the maid brought up my breakfast. Maybe it was the sea air, or maybe it was burning up so much energy tossing and turning in my sleep. but
I
was ravenously hungry and ate nearly everything on the tray. Then I put on a pair of shorts and a halter top, slipped into my sandals, and headed downstairs to uphold my half of the bargain
I
had made with Linden.
He was there on the beach, already prepared for work. He glanced at me and looked away. "I didn't think you would show up," he said in that sullen tone.
"Why not? I said I would."
He looked at me again, this time with a somewhat infuriatingly sarcastic smile on his face. "People here promise to do lots of things they never intend to do.'
"I'm not from here. remember? Besides, we made a bargain. Does that mean you won't keep your half? You're from here.'
He stared at me a moment.
I
thought he was going to say something very nasty, but suddenly his face brightened, and he laughed. "Okay," he said. He nodded at
a
large paper bag, "The clothes are in there."
I
gazed into the bag, then took it over the little hill to where the day before he had suggested I go to change. Everything fit as if it had always been mine. and I loved the lavender scent. When
I
returned, he looked at me with appreciation, maybe even more. His eyes moved over me, slowly taking in my face, my throat, my breasts and waist, and then up again slowly until he and I were standing there staring at each other. For a moment_. I wondered if he saw something of himself in me, enough to suggest who
I
might really be. Was that the reason for his close scrutiny?
His expression changed a little, the wall he kept between us crumbling enough for me to see another side of him, a softer side,
"You look just the way
I
expected you would." he finally said.
"And what was that. exactly?" I asked.
"Like someone fresh. innocent."
"Well, that's me," I said with a grin.
"To my artistic eye, at least." he remarked with a smirk.
"Where do I go?" I asked, not hiding my annoyance. He seemed to have a talent for hitting nerves, like some clumsy dentist.
"Oh. Just sit over here," he said, marking a small rise in the beach. "and gaze out at the ocean."
I sat, and he studied me a moment.
"May I?" he asked, coming over and putting his hands on my shoulders.
"Yes, of course."
He turned me slightly, and then he put his hands under my hair and spread the strands as he wished. He stepped back, contemplated me, and moved to my legs and smoothed out the skirt,
"Are you comfortable enough?" he asked.
"For now. I don't think I can sit here like this and not move for two hours." I warned.
"I'm not expecting you to remain like that for two straight hours. You can take frequent breaks." he said, and hurried back to his easel as if he were afraid I might jump up and run off and he would lose the moment. He worked with frenzied, quick motions, feasting on my image, digesting it and reproducing what he saw inside himself.
"I'm sorry if I frightened you last night," he said, about ten minutes after he had begun.
I
started to turn toward him.
"Oh, please, hold the pose for as long as you can."
"Right. I'm sorry you have trouble sleeping. Whenever that happens to me. I hate it
I
wake up cranky and angry at myself for worrying too much or eating the wrong things, whatever."
"Yes," he said. but I suppose people would say I wake up cranky and angry regardless of how I sleep."
"No. Really?" I teased. "I wonder why they would have such a thought."
"Very funny." He relaxed his shoulders. "I am what I am," he said with a shrug.
"Is it like that for you every night?"
"Just about." he said. He paused. "I'd rather you didn't talk about our little encounter. People will only tell you it's a symptom of inherited madness, especially the Eatons."
"If that were true about insomnia, there would be quite a few people suffering from mental illness out there."
"Who says there aren't?" he shot back, "If you get thirsty, I have some cold lemonade in my bag there," he said, nodding toward a white cooler.
"Okay, thank you."
We were both quiet for a while. Out of the corner of my eye, I watched him work. He seemed possessed by it, intense. determined. The effort made the veins in his neck stand out and the veins in his temples as well. He bit down on his lower lip so hard at times I thought he would surely draw blood.
"This is a very beautiful place to work."
I
said.
"I don't always work here. Sometimes I take my sailboat and go to a bay nearby where
I
can enjoy even more solitude. I'm often interrupted by the noise from the house or even some of the Eatons' guests wandering over to see what the mad artist is up to."
"You like being alone?" I asked.
He shot me a look as if I had asked the dumbest question.
"Often. I like being alone," I continued. "but I do enjoy being around people. too. Too much introversion isn't good, but not ever wanting or being able to be alone isn't good, either. It is like being afraid of the voices inside you that will become vocal if there is nothing else to distract or diffuse them."
"You sound like a psychology major. Is that what you are?"
"Yes." I said. smiling.
He stopped working. "That's not why you really came here, is it? I mean, if someone set you on us deliberately--"
"Oh, no," I protested. "I'm doing an entirely different project... it's for my sociology class."
That wall began to build again as his eyes turned cold and skeptical.
"Besides," I said, it wouldn't be an honest analysis if I snuck up on someone. It would be the worst sort of betrayal. You have to win trust in order to understand people and their problems and especially if you want to help them."
"How do you know so much about it?" he asked. "You sound like you're more than just a student."
"My father was a psychiatrist," I said.
"Oh." He looked relieved. Was he worried
I
had been a patient? "Poor you." he added, and returned to his work.
"Why poor me?"
"It's enough to have people analyzing you when you leave home, but to have it day in and day out like my mother had to bear, that has to be difficult."
It wasn't easy being a teenager." I admitted.
He nodded.
"I'll
bet it wasn't. It was hell for me.," he said.
"Why?"
Again, he gave me a look suggesting I had asked another dumb question. He didn't reply. He worked. I watched a sailboat turning to head back to wherever it had come from. The beehive sound of a motorboat made me think of Thatcher for a moment, and then
I
saw an airplane dragging
a
banner advertising a special at some restaurant.
"Take a break." he said after another ten or fifteen minutes, and opened his insulated bag to get the cold lemonade. He poured me a glass.
"Thank you."
He poured himself one and sat near me. "Have you and Thatcher become an item already?"
"What?"
He turned, and for a moment he seemed like a violin strung too tightly, ready to twang at the least careless touch.
"Why is it women have to play it so coy? You know what I mean."
"I don't think it's just women who play it coy." I snapped back at him. I held my breath. Would he go into a tantrum at my stem tone and end it all?
He surprised me with a smile. "You're right, Men can be just as affectedly modest, or phony. I should say-- especially Thatcher."
"You don't like him?"
"I don't care about him enough to like or dislike him. I just know who he is, how he was raised, and what he does for a living."
"Didn't he help you and your mother?"
"Yes, but it wasn't for any altruistic reason. He at his fees and his notoriety being the attorney for the madwoman and her mad artist son, I'm sure."
"He doesn't seem like that sort of a person. He's quite critical of those who are like that around here, in fact. Sometimes he sounds so critical
I
wonder why he continues to live here."
"Have you asked him?"
'Yes.'
"And what did he say, something like 'Where else would I live?'
"Something like that. What about you? Why do you stay here if you hate it so?"
I thought he would give me that look again, but he didn't. "I stay for my mother," he replied.
"Why does she stay?"
"She stays because she thinks..."
"What?"
I
asked almost breathlessly when he held the rest of his reply inside him.
I do not know what it was that made him decide to tell me. Maybe he felt something that bound us spiritually. Maybe he was suffering so with all his unspoken secrets gnawing away within his heart that he just had to open the doors. Daddy called it mental bleeding and said people in pain had to relieve themselves. He just had to make sure he was there when they did and get them to trust him enough.
"She thinks... thinks someone wonderful is coming for her." Linden revealed in a whisper. "Someone who will take her away from all this, erase years and years of pain. She dreams."
I could barely breathe. The breeze lifted my hair and caressed my face. The salt spray felt good on my skin, and the ocean's combing of the beach resembled a lullaby that was there to keep us both calm, meditative, safe,
"That's her new madness," he continued.
"Why do you say that?" I asked. "Why call it madness? Everyone dreams of good things for him-or herself."
He was silent, and then he turned to inc. "I lied to you last night. She was out there on the dock. You didn't imagine it, and
I
go out after her to make sure she doesn't..."
"Doesn't what?"
"Do anything more than stand out there waving that lantern." "Why does she do that?"
"Something in her past, some promise someone made to her, maybe... I'm not sure. She won't say."
"I don't understand," I said, shaking my head.
He turned back to me. "She thinks he's coming. She's a little lighthouse guiding him back to her heart. Crazy, right?" He was back to being belligerent. 'Good copy for an article or for a study or just for coffeetime gossip?"
"No." I said. "It's not crazy at all."
His eyes widened with surprise. "Why do you say that?"
"It's just a hope, a dream. You don't have to worry that she's going out there to hurt herself." I said. "She's going out there to keep herself alive. That's what hopes and dreams do for us. They help us go on."
He stared mare intently at me, and then, as if realizing he was permitting me to enter places inside him that no one was supposed to enter, he looked away quickly.
"That's nice." he said. but I don't have any hopes and dreams."
"Sure you do." I said. "Otherwise, you wouldn't be an artist."
He gazed at me again, some glint in his eves brightening like a lamp that had been kept shut up in the attic and was finally taken out and turned on. The fury and the darkness seemed to slide off his face as if he had been wearing a mask of ice that had begun to melt. Beneath it was a young man who could love and dream and work and live.
I
had a glimpse of him, but only a glimpse.
"Then I had better get back to work." he said, smiling, and jumped to his feet. "You okay with it?"
"I'm fine."
I
said. "Good. Thank you."
He returned to his easel, and once again we were two halves of the same precious artistic moment, capturing some truth, doing what he had told Thatcher he did. casting a line for inspiration and finding it, only this 'time, with me or even... because of me.
.
We broke at noon. He didn't want me to see his work in progress but promised I could after the next session.
I
changed out of the clothes. and he headed back to the beach house, telling me to come by at twothirty to meet his mother as we had planned.
Asher and Bunny were up and haying coffee when
I
entered the house. They were both surprised to see me.