A Hundred Summers Read online

  College boy.

  He plopped a cherry in Kiki’s ginger ale, and I strolled out on the veranda with her pink palm in mine, waiting for Mother and Aunt Julie to join us.

  The surf was high, crashing in ungentle rollers into the beach below us. When I set my drink on the railing and braced my hands against the weathered wood, the salt spray stung like needles against my bare arms and neck. The dress was Aunt Julie’s choice, a concession made necessary to avoid the threatened haircut, and though she’d clucked with dismay over the sturdy cotton and floral print, she accepted it as the best of a bad lot, and did her damnedest to yank the neckline down as far as physics allowed. “We’re going to throw out the whole kit tomorrow,” she’d said. “Burn it all. I don’t want to see a single flower on you, Lily, unless it’s a great big gerbera daisy, a scarlet one, pinned to your hair. Just above the ear, I think. Now, that would be splendid. That would out-Budgie goddamned Budgie herself.”

  Kiki popped up between my arms and leaned back against the veranda railing, staring up at me, her hand tugging my dress. “Who is Budgie Byrne,” she asked, “and is she really as much trouble as Mrs. Hubert says?”

  “You shouldn’t listen to grown-up conversations, sweetie.”

  She sucked her ginger ale and made a show of looking around. “I don’t see any other children here, do I?”

  She was right, of course. For whatever reason, my generation hadn’t taken up in our parents’ houses in Seaview, as had every generation past, filling the narrow lanes and tennis courts with screaming young children and moody teenagers, with sailboats racing across the cove and Fourth of July floats festooned in contraband impatiens. I could understand why. The things that attracted me back to Seaview every summer—its old-fashionedness, its never-changingness, its wicker furniture and the smell of salt water soaked into its upholstery—were the very things that turned away everyone else. You couldn’t satisfy your craving for slickness and glamour and high living here at the Seaview Club. During Prohibition, the liquor had been replaced by lemonade, and now that the gin and tonic were back in their rightful places, the young people had moved on.

  Except me.

  So Kiki was the youngest person at the club this evening, and I was the second-youngest, and the two of us stood there on the early-evening veranda, watching the surf come in, with nowhere else to go. I didn’t mind. There were worse places to spend your time. The veranda stretched the full length of the club and wrapped around the sides, with the long drive at one end and the rest of the Seaview Association on the other, cottage after cottage, porch lights winking out to sea. I knew this scene in my bones. It was safety. It was family. It was home.

  Kiki was saying something else, and another wave thundered onto the beach below, but somehow through it all I heard, quite distinctly, the sound of a car engine making the final curve before its approach to the circular drive out front.

  I couldn’t say, later, why the noise should have leaped out at me like that, out of all the cars making their way to the Seaview Club that evening. I didn’t believe in fate, didn’t hold any truck with foresight or even intuition. I called it coincidence alone that my ear followed the progress of that car around the corner of the club, picked out the low rumble as it idled outside the entrance, heard with startling precision the sound of Budgie Byrne’s voice, one week early, sliding into a high and tinkling laugh through the clear air, and a deep male voice answering her.

  Of course, she wasn’t Budgie Byrne anymore, I reminded myself. It was all my numb mind could come up with.

  I grabbed my drink, grabbed Kiki’s hand.

  “Your hands are cold,” she exclaimed.

  I strode toward the blue-painted steps leading down to the beach. “Let’s go for a walk.”

  “But my ginger ale!”

  “I’ll order you another.”

  I swallowed the rest of my gin and tonic as we walked down the steps, holding up my long skirt so I wouldn’t trip. By the time we reached the bottom, the glass was empty, and I left it there, balanced near the edge, where no one would tread on it accidentally.

  “Are the others coming, too?” Kiki accelerated into a skip by my side. Any break from routine made her giddy with excitement.

  “No, no. Just a little walk, the two of us. I want . . .” I paused. The gin was rising to my head in a rush. “I want to see how the club lights look from the end of the beach.”

  As an explanation, it suited her six-year-old imagination perfectly. “Tally-ho, then!” she said, swinging our joined hands. Her flat shoes skimmed along the sand, while my heeled sandals sank in at every stride. Within a hundred yards, I was gasping for breath.

  “Let’s stop here,” I said.

  She tugged at my hand. “But we’re not at the end of the beach yet!”

  “We’re far enough. Besides, we’ve got to go back before Mother and Aunt Julie start looking for us.”

  Kiki made an unsatisfied noise and plopped down in the sand, stretching her feet toward the water. “Oh, Lily,” she said, “look at this shell!” She held up a spiral conch, miraculously intact.

  “Look at that! May’s a good time for beachcombing, isn’t it? Nothing’s been picked over yet. Make sure you save that one.” I reached down and took off my shoes, one by one, hopping on each foot. The sand pooled around my toes; the water foamed up with alluring proximity. The tide had nearly reached its peak. I watched it undulate, back and forth, until my breathing began to slow and my heart to steady itself. Something bitter rose in the back of my throat, and my brain, unleashed and candid with the gin, recognized the taste of shame.

  So, there it was. I had imagined this encounter over and over, wondered what I should do. Had thought of the clever things I’d say, the way I’d hold my ground with an insouciant toss of my head. The way Aunt Julie would have done.

  Instead, I had run away.

  “Can I take off my shoes and look for more shells in the water?” asked Kiki.

  I looked down. She had arranged a circle of small dark clamshells around the conch, like supplicants before a shrine.

  “No, darling. We have to go back.”

  “I thought we were going to look at the lights.”

  “Well, look. There they are. Isn’t it pretty?”

  She turned toward the clubhouse, which perched near the beach, lights all ablaze in preparation for sunset. The weathered gray shingles camouflaged it perfectly against the sand. Behind the rooftop, the sun was dipping down into the golden west.

  “It’s beautiful. We’re so lucky to live here every summer, aren’t we?”

  “Very lucky.” The voices carried across the beach, too far away to distinguish. I was unbearably conscious of my own cowardice. If Kiki knew, if she understood, she would be ashamed of me. Kiki never turned away from a challenge.

  I took her hand. “Let’s go back.”

  By the time we reached the veranda again, I had planned everything out. I would secure a table on this end, the far end, sheltered, tucked around the corner from view. I would send Kiki to find Mother and Aunt Julie, while I let the club manager know where we were eating tonight. The surf, I’d say, was too fierce for Mother.

  After our meal, we’d pass through the rest of the veranda, greeting acquaintances, and when we reached her table I’d be composed, settled into the routine of shaking hands and expressing admiration for new hairstyles and new dresses, of lamenting the loss of elderly members during the past year, of celebrating the arrival of new grandchildren: the same conversation, the same pattern, evening after evening and summer after summer. I knew my lines by heart. A minute, perhaps two, and we’d be gone.

  Kiki skipped up the steps ahead of me, and I leaned down to pick up my empty glass. My hair spilled away from Aunt Julie’s pristine chignon, loosened by the sea air and its own waywardness. I pushed it back over my ear. My cheeks tingled from the spraying surf and the brisk walk. Should I visit the powder room, return myself to orderliness, or was it too great a risk?

/>   “Why, hello,” said Kiki, from the top of the stairs. “I haven’t seen you around before.”

  I froze, bent over, my hand clutched around the smooth, round highball glass as if it were a life buoy.

  An appalling silence stretched the seconds apart.

  “Well, hello, yourself,” said a man’s voice, gently.

  3.

  HANOVER, NEW HAMPSHIRE

  October 1931

  Everyone at the Hanover Inn recognizes the man adorning our table. We perch on our oval-backed chairs, the three of us, eating steak and scalloped potatoes, and there isn’t a diner nearby who doesn’t crane his neck, elbow his neighbor, whisper, nod in our direction.

  Budgie sits up straight as a stick, glowing with pleasure, and consumes her steak in minutely carved pieces. “I wish they would stop staring,” she says. “Do you ever get used to it?”

  Graham Pendleton pauses with his knife and fork suspended in the air. He fills his chair, fills the entire room: all square shoulders and slick brown hair catching gold from the lights above us. Up close like this, he is absurdly handsome, every angle in perfect symmetry. “What, this?” he asks, tipping his knife at the table next to us. On cue, the awestruck occupants return to their conversation.

  “Everyone.” She smiles. “Everyone.”

  He shrugs and sets back to slicing his steak. “Aw, I don’t notice, really. Anyway, it’s only on Saturdays. Once the old boys leave town, I’m just another student. Could you pass the pepper, please, Miss . . . ?” The word drags out. He’s forgotten my name already.

  I hand him the dainty cut-glass shaker of pepper. “Dane.”

  “Miss Dane.” He smiles. The pepper shaker looks ridiculous in his thick hand. “Thank you.”

  “Darling, you remember Lily,” says Budgie. “We spent the summer together, didn’t we? At Seaview.”

  “Oh, right. I thought you looked familiar. You’ve changed your hair or something, haven’t you?” He puts down the pepper shaker and makes a motion near the side of his head.

  “Not really.”

  But Graham has already turned back to Budgie. “Anyway, Greenwald’s the real talent. These old-timers are just too stupid to realize it.” He fills his mouth with steak.

  Budgie’s face assembles into a smiling mask. “What, Nick? But he’s the quarterback. He just stands there.”

  Graham’s throat works, disposing of the meat. He reaches for his drink, a tall glass of milk, creaming at the top. “Didn’t you see his throw, in the second quarter? When he got hurt?”

  “Of course it was exciting. But you’re the one running all day. Scoring touchdowns. You do all the real work.”

  He shakes his head. “I just get all the attention, because I’m the fullback, and because Greenwald’s . . . well, you know.” He drinks his milk, flushing Nick Greenwald’s Jewishness from his mouth. “You’re going to see it more and more, the forward pass. Plays like that, they fill the stadium. You saw how excited everyone was. He’s all skill, Greenwald. He’s got a terrific arm, you saw that, and an ice-cold brain. He just looks down the field and takes it all in, knows where everyone is, like a chess player. Never seen him call a play wrong.”

  “How is he?” I ask. The question nearly bursts from my lips. “His leg, I mean.”

  “Oh, he’s all right. He telephoned from the hospital. Wasn’t as bad as they thought. Single fracture, hairline or something. I guess those solid old bones of his are hard to crack. They’re setting it now.” Graham flicks his watch free from his cuff and glances at it. “He said he’d meet us here when they’re done.”

  “What, here?” I ask.

  “He’ll be hungry.”

  “He doesn’t want to go home and rest?”

  A laugh. “No, not Nick. He won’t even go to bed when he’s got the flu. He’ll make a point of coming tonight, just to show what a big boy he is.”

  “That’s ridiculous,” says Budgie. “And stupid. He’ll turn himself into a cripple.”

  “He wanted to hop off the field by himself, the fool. I had to hold him down myself when they put him on the stretcher.”

  “Stupid,” Budgie says again.

  Her voice is distant, behind the persistent thud of my heartbeat in my ears. My hand is cold on my fork. I go through the pantomime of eating a piece of steak, drinking water, eating a piece of melting scalloped potato. “He’ll be all right, though, won’t he?” I ask, when I’m absolutely sure I’ve composed my voice.

  Graham shrugs. “He’ll be fine. Well, he won’t play again, he’ll graduate in June, but it was a clean break, at least. Won’t give him any trouble. Lucky fellow. Now, last year, Gardiner broke his neck tackling someone at the Yale game. Went in headfirst, the idiot. Nearly died. He’ll be in a wheelchair all his life. Oh, look! Nick’s here.” He throws down his napkin and waves.

  I turn my head, and there stands Nick Greenwald at the entrance to the dining room, his left leg wrapped almost to the knee in a thick white plaster cast and his arms slung over a pair of crutches. I want to see his face, to see if it matches the impossible image in my head, but he’s standing in a gap between the lights overhead, and he’s looking to the side, inspecting the room. The angled light carves a deep shadow beneath his cheekbone.

  His face turns. He spots Graham and hops forward on his crutches into the glow of a chandelier. I have only an instant to take him in. He’s smiling now, and the smile transforms him, softens all the edges, making him less formidable than I thought he would be.

  Budgie leans in to my ear. “Now’s your chance, Lily. Remember to ask him about himself. They love that. And for God sake don’t talk about books.”

  “Nick! It’s about time. What did you do, hobble all the way here from the hospital? Or did you meet a pretty nurse there?” Graham yanks out a chair for him. “You remember Budgie, don’t you, Nick? Budgie Byrne.”

  “Hello, Nick. I’m sorry about your leg.” Budgie holds out her hand.

  Nick props his crutch under his arm and grasps her fingers. “Budgie. How are you?”

  “And this is her friend Miss Dane. Lily Dane. Drove up with Budgie all the way from Smith this morning, just to meet you.”

  Graham’s voice is jovial, joking, making it plain he’s just filling the introduction with nonsense to lighten the mood, with Nick’s cast and crutches weighing everything down. The trouble is, he’s too close to the truth.

  Nick turns to me and takes in my burning cheeks. He smiles politely. Under the electric lights, his skin is smooth and even, suggesting olive, and his eyes are a kind of hazel, hovering somewhere between brown and green. Washed and dried, his hair shows itself a few shades darker than Graham’s, a rich medium brown, curling back in rebellion from a thorough brushing. He is not glossy, like Graham, not painted with elegant strokes. But when he speaks, his eyes crinkle expressively. “Miss Dane. Nick Greenwald. I’m sorry I couldn’t give you a better show, after that long drive from Massachusetts.”

  “With Budgie driving,” Graham says. “Her nerves must be shredded.”

  “Oh, you were terrific,” I warble to Nick. “It’s a shame about your leg, though. Is everything all right?”

  “It’s fine. Fibula. It’ll heal by Thanksgiving. At least the cast is below the knee, so I can get around all right.” Nick sinks his body into the chair next to mine, and because he is not burly, not muscle-bound, I become aware only then of his utter largeness, his rangy long frame and the layers of sinew and skin that cover it. His dark jacket stretches endlessly across his shoulders. Next to him, Graham—who a moment ago filled the chair and the room—seems diminished. “Thanks for your concern, though.”

  I must have sounded like an idiot. He must think I’m some brainless boy-crazy girl, one of dozens sighing after him because he’s tall and handsome and plays football. Maybe he’s right. Maybe I’m no different from those boy-crazy girls, enslaved to the mating instinct. What do I know of him, really, other than that he’s tall and handsome and plays football, that he has uny
ielding eyes and moves like a leopard?

  Graham calls for a menu, and Nick studies it briefly, while the waiter stands just behind his shoulder. Everyone is staring at us again, staring at Nick and his set shoulders and his plaster-wrapped leg.

  “I’ll have the steak, I guess. Medium rare. Thank you.” He hands the menu to the waiter and reaches for his water.

  Your move, Lily. Think of something. What would Budgie say?

  “So, tell me, Mr. Greenwald. What are you studying?” I ask.

  “It’s Nick. History,” he says. “And you?”

  “English.”

  We drink our water in tandem.

  “That’s not the whole story, though. Is it, Nick?” Graham nudges him with his elbow. When Nick says nothing, he continues: “Greenwald’s been taking architecture as well, except his father doesn’t approve.”

  “Why is that?” asks Budgie.

  “Oh, he wants him to join the firm . . .”

  “I don’t mean his father. I mean Nick. Why is he studying architecture at all?” She is genuinely curious. An architect, in Budgie’s eyes, is more a tradesman than a professional, covered with plaster and sawdust and blueprints, someone to be ordered about, someone whose bill can be conveniently ignored until the next time he’s needed.

  “Because I like it,” said Nick.

  Budgie is horrified. “But you don’t actually mean to be an architect!”

  “Why shouldn’t he be an architect?” I snap. “Why shouldn’t he create beautiful things, instead of selling stocks and bonds or making lawsuits?”

  Nobody speaks. Graham starts to smile, coughs, and reaches for his milk.

  Nick squares the tip of his fork against the tablecloth, and does the same for his knife. “No, of course I’m not going to be an architect. Doesn’t mean I can’t study it.”

  Budgie watches his movements. Her lips curl upward. “Of course not. Graham, what was that you were telling me about the other day on the telephone? Something about rocks?”

  “The Grand Canyon,” Graham says affectionately, patting her hand. “I told you I thought we should take a trip there sometime. You can see how the layers of stone were laid down. Millions of years of geology.”