Page 6 of Dahlias, Sapphires, and Cool Autumn Dusk
“What I want is for everybody to be happy. Do you think that’s even possible?” I whispered, staring into his eyes for the truth. “Can you be happy?”
He blinked. “I am happy with you. I am happy with us. It’s everything else that I’m still struggling with, if I’m entirelyhonest. If I could lock us all up in here and never leave, I would be great.” But even as he said it, I knew he didn’t fool himself with the thought of holding time still. He wanted more—wanted to grow, to become the man he was meant to be. “So, yes, I can be happy. Alatheia. . .” But he trailed off, as if he left something unsaid.
I waited then eventually asked, “What?”
He smiled, amused that I noticed. “I don’t know. Never mind.”
I kissed him again, my lips unable to say things my heart felt. “We’re going to eat soon. I don’t know what. When Julian gets back, we’ll eat.”
“Sounds good.”
I called over my shoulder as I headed into the living room. “I need a few minutes to do something for your granny.”
If I didn’t tell them, they would read over my shoulder. I loved their curiosity, their infatuation with me. Craved it, actually. But my work had to be private, as per their grandmother’s orders.
“Yep,” Barrett answered. He tapped one ear, showing he only listened to music through one earbud. Jeremy lay out cold on the couch, face down, his arm dangling over the side. He snored, the sound muffled by the pillows where he planted his face. At least we knew he could still breathe.
I sighed.The early morning swims are getting to him.
At the desk, I opened my laptop to type while I read. I’d missed Dina’s journals over the past few months, and the way she saw the world at eighteen. It gave me hope, knowing she made it past all of it to the present. She remained a light in my sometimes very dark world.
DECEMBER 1ST1966
Dear Future Reader,
Well, I’m here! Lac Vieux, Louisiana. Growing up where I did, I never heard of or imagined such a place. Cool foggy weather permeates the chilly, fifty-degree air. It lends itself to the eeriness of the region, and perhaps to their mythology. I feel bad saying it, since Mrs. Lent and her friends and family have been so kind to me.
Reserved and untrusting…but kind.
I guess I should explain myself here rather than being vague. A remote exiled place, it seems to exist almost outside of time itself. People indeed lived the kind of lives the guys told me about—like their mother, with her five husbands. It was a common yet secretive practice on the two lakes that made up the town.
On the surface, it looked lovely. One big lake with a smaller one less than half a mile away, perfect for summery fun and wintery ruminations. We drove around the length of the town the day before, seeing all the waterfront houses. Getting anywhere away from the water took half an hour at least. The rural nature of the area didn’t make it foreboding—maybe not all of Sabine Parish itself—was surrounded by the largest pine trees I’ve ever seen. Apparently, there used to be more. A lot more, but it still seemed like a rather dense forest to me.
Their fathers made their money from logging, a dreadfully long and boring story and eventually the cause of their demise via shipping of the logs. On the larger lake, where Mrs. Lent lived, everyone seemed wealthy. Beyond living comfortably,their fathers had left an inheritance substantial enough for her children to open department stores in Manhattan—stores now left untended because I needed time with their family.
Which was pointed out to me quite plainly by Mrs. Lent, not that I blame her for being honest. I’m upending their plans, and I never even considered it or them when I made my demands. I’m a selfish, difficult girl.
Maybe my uncle could just see it better than most people. He knew, but it took others longer to notice.
The other lake—or the other side of the lake, as they called it, though it was really a whole different lake—was poor. Tattered children ran barefoot along little more than a dirt road, their scrubby clothes streaked with dust, their faces and hands unwashed. The adults moved differently too, slipping about with an almost predatory air, The whole atmosphere carried a very different rhythm.
The guys definitely prefer their side of the lake. They rushed past the other lake in a hurry, not saying much and then quickly changing the subject. Despite their hesitancy to share, I’ll ask them more about it soon. Still, they wanted me to see how their neighbors lived, pointed out a lot of things were just traditions.
On the porch swing with Nathanial the night before, we rocked and looked at the stars together. He admitted he thought when they moved away, they would leave the Life—that’s how they referred to it, to leaving behind their tradition. They would each have a wife of their own, live more standardly normal lives.
Then they met me, and they knew they wanted me together, the way they were raised.
When we leave, I’ll want to meet the other families in NY. How do they manage it? Here, people leave them alone. They pass their houses on, or buy them from each other, keeping the outside world out.
Nearby, they’re clearing land for a dam that will become a reservoir, but otherwise modernity hasn’t made it onto Sabine Parish.
“You wanted to leave it,” I told him. “You wanted out.”
“I still do,” he whispered back. “I love my mother. I have good memories, but I always knew I wasn’t made for here, for this town.”
Could we have all of it?
I need to leave. Mrs. Lent wants to teach me how to cook the catfish Robert caught out of the lake. (?!?!) They do something with cornmeal, or so I understand.
