The Summer Wind (21 page)

“Sounds good to a Marine.”

She skipped a beat. “You’re a Marine?”

“Yes, ma’am.”

She’d been right that he had the fitness and short haircut of a military man. “I thought you might be a soldier.”

“Not a soldier,” he corrected. “A Marine. A soldier is army.”

“Oh. Sorry.” Carson hadn’t known the distinction.

“Just different,” he explained. “But most military men live on a strict schedule.”

“I’ve never been much of one for schedules. I’m not lazy,” she quickly added, seeing his expression grow dubious. “I’m very disciplined. I surf and I’m out on the ocean at dawn most mornings. But living by a clock? Not so much. I have more of the free-spirit mentality. Making a schedule was a new experience, let me tell you.”

“You don’t have kids?”

“God, no. Far from it. I’m not even married. What about you?”

“Nope. Not married. No kids. Just a dog.”

“Girlfriend?”

He tried to hide his grin. “Nope.”

She noticed he didn’t ask whether she had a boyfriend. His diffidence was intriguing.

“What brings you back here today?” she asked, getting to the question in the forefront of her mind. “Yesterday I figured you were a tourist. But today you’re back and you know Joan.”

He looked out at the lagoon. “I’m back most days.”

Curious, she thought. Getting the man to talk was like pulling teeth, but she could be stubborn, too, so she waited him out. She didn’t want to press him. His reticence led her to believe he wouldn’t appreciate it.

“I’m doing a program with Joan myself,” Taylor volunteered at length.

Surprised that he’d answered her question, Carson turned her head to look at him. He was still watching the group in the water.

As if sensing her curiosity, Taylor stretched and started gathering his things.

“Got to go. My session starts soon.”

“Where is your session?”

“The other side of the park, where the boys hang out. They call it the bachelor pods.”

“Cute.” Carson smirked.

Taylor rose and slung his USMC backpack across his shoulder. “See you.”

They said a brief good-bye and she watched him walk off along the path to a different section of the park. She wondered if she’d see him again. She hoped she would. In his long cargo shorts, gray T-shirt, and sandals, he looked like any other tourist clustering the lagoon. There wasn’t any limp or physical signal of an injury. And there was no mistaking the power in his muscles as he made his way along the path. Now more aware of his background, she readily picked up how he turned his head from right to left, scoping out the crowd.

Dora got into her running clothes and tiptoed through the quiet, dimly lit house, careful not to wake anyone. She was delighted that she’d awakened before Harper for her morning walk. She moved swiftly down the streets, while above
in the trees birds chirped out their dawn song. Soon her feet hit the soft sand of the beach path and then, at last, the great expanse of the beach and sea. She stood on the precipice of the dune, smelled the sea air, felt its breath on her face and her chest expand at the sight of a new day’s sun rising. The sky was a glory of pastels that shimmered in reflection on the calm sea.

This early in the morning, the sand was untrammeled. Bits of mica glistened in the lavender light. Dora stopped to take off her new walking shoes, preferring to go barefoot during this stretch. The hard-packed sand was moist under her feet as she walked briskly near the shoreline. It was breakfast time for the shorebirds. Peeps ran on straight legs, playing tag with the waves, gulls cruised low, and higher in the sky, pelicans flew in formation.

Early mornings were an introspective time on the beach. A young couple jogged past her. In the distance, a man played with his chocolate Lab, throwing a ball into the water and watching the big dog jubilantly leap after it into the sea. Dora wasn’t jogging yet, but in only a few days, her pace had quickened and there was a snap and precision to her walk. She wasn’t as winded, either. As she walked, she kept pace by thinking of new words to describe herself:
alive
,
empowered
,
strong
. Just thinking the words made her feel better.

And reminded her that, like Harper, she felt a stirring of rebirth. Maybe even a resurgence of the bold young girl she once was, who she believed was still hiding within her.

She saw in her mind’s eye the photographs of Nate that Carson had e-mailed the day before. To see her little boy laughing and playing again was more than she’d hoped for. She wished
Cal could see this more outgoing, playful side of his son. Maybe he’d appreciate Nate’s uniqueness more. Mamaw and Lucille had huddled over the photos, arguing over whose idea it had been to suggest the trip.

Dora knew it had been a group effort—Harper and Carson’s brainstorm, and Mamaw’s generous funding—but in Dora’s mind, it was Carson who deserved the credit, for going solo with Nate like the fearless trouper she was, despite her complete lack of experience with children. She and Carson had talked several times in the past few days. At first they discussed Nate’s progress, but later their conversation shifted to whatever came into their minds. Not since they were young girls had they spent nights just chatting like this.

She was passing the black-and-white Sullivan’s Island lighthouse when she spied a small group of women clustered together atop a dune by the bright orange sea turtle nest sign. Curious, she veered on an angle across the softer sand to the dune. Three of the five women wore matching blue Turtle Team T-shirts. The other two stood by, eagerly watching one of the women kneel beside the sea turtle nest.

Dora walked up to the woman carrying a clipboard, a good sign she was in charge. This woman was tall, like Dora, slender, with glossy, dark brown hair under her cap.

“What’s going on?” Dora asked, drawing closer.

“We’re doing an inventory of the nest,” she replied, bending to her backpack. She pulled out plastic gloves and, straightening, handed the gloves to one of the team volunteers. Then she turned to Dora. “Three days after a nest hatches, we open it up to count the hatched and unhatched eggs. The Department of Natural Resources monitors the success rate of the nests along
our coast. Sometimes we find a few hatchlings stuck in there and we release them.” She smiled. “That’s the fun part.”

Something about her was familiar and Dora tried to place it. The woman wore sunglasses, so it was hard to be sure.

“Do I know you?” Dora asked. She hated to ask that question, since most of the time the answer was no.

The woman took off her sunglasses, revealing a striking face with dark brown eyes under arched brows. She was friendly but had the manner of someone accustomed to being in charge. She squinted and slowly shook her head. “Maybe. You look familiar to me, too.”

“I’m Dora Tupper. I used to be Dora Muir,” she added, using her local family name. “Marietta Muir’s granddaughter?”

The dark eyes widened with the woman’s smile. “
Little Dorrit?
Oh my word, of course I know you! I see it now. It’s me, Cara! I used to babysit you, a long, long time ago.”

Dora’s mind shot back in time to the early summers she’d spent with Mamaw, back when she was seven and Carson was four. She hadn’t been called Little Dorrit since she was a little girl.

“Cara Rutledge! Is it really you? I can’t believe it.” She stuck out her arm toward the nest. “But of course it’s you. You’re a Rutledge. You’re taking care of turtles.”

Cara rolled her eyes. “Yes, my mother roped me in, kicking and screaming all the way. Only it’s Cara Beauchamps now.”

“How is your mother? I’m surprised she’s not here with the turtles, holding court. Even after all these years I never see one of those orange nest signs without thinking of Miss Lovie.”

“Mama passed.”

“Oh, Cara, I’m so sorry. I hadn’t heard. Your mother was an
amazing woman. The pied piper of these islands. We all loved her; do you remember how we used to follow her around the island as she tended turtles?” Dora laughed gently at the memory. “I remember a couple of times you took us to your beach house on Isle of Palms. Miss Lovie used to give us sugar cookies and sweet tea.”

Cara added, “I was trying to get my mother to help babysit.”

“Do you still have your beach house on Isle of Palms?”

“Of course. I’ll never sell it. My mother adored that house. A part of her spirit lives on there. How’s your sister? She was such a cutie.” Cara shook her head. “I can’t remember her name. It’s been so long.”

“Carson.”

“That’s right. You two were such a pair. You with your white-blond hair and she with her dark hair. Wasn’t there a third sister as well?”

“That’s Harper, but I don’t think you babysat her much. By the time she started staying for the summers I was old enough to babysit. Mamaw’s not above going after free labor.”

Cara laughed at that. “I haven’t seen your grandmother in ages. Is she well?”

“Alive and kicking. She’s going to live forever, I pray.”

A squeal of excitement interrupted the two women’s reminiscing. Cara swung around and Dora, following her gaze, saw the volunteer who had been digging holding a small loggerhead hatchling in her hand. More people had gathered while she was talking to Cara and now they were crowding closer to the nest for a better look.

“I’ll catch up with you later,” Cara told her. “I have to get to work.”

Cara grabbed a red plastic bucket and brought it to her teammate, who placed the hatchling inside. Dora moved closer to watch in fascination as the two women who were opening the nest brought out dozens of broken eggshells, a few whole, discolored eggs, and, to the thrill of the onlookers, three more hatchlings from the nest.

Cara moved with the same efficiency and grace that Dora remembered in Miss Lovie, and she felt a pleasure in knowing there was a continuity between mother and daughter. She’d always wanted a daughter, someone with whom she could share traditions, go shopping, cook and bake, just be a girl. Then she thought again how this prayer had been answered. She might not have a daughter, but this late in her life she’d rediscovered her sisters.

Dora followed Cara, who was carrying the red bucket closer to the sea. Cara asked the group clustered at the shoreline to form two lines at either side of a wide opening that would allow the hatchlings ample room to find their way into the ocean. Dora took a place close to the water’s edge, excitement thrumming in her veins that at last she would witness this. She had come to these islands in the summer for most of her life and yet had never seen a sea turtle hatchling.

Cara put the edge of the red bucket to the sand and gently tilted it. The four dark hatchlings scrambled out, flippers madly pushing as they began their trek across the sand. One of the hatchlings had a slight dent in its shell and was having a hard time of it. She doubted that poor fellow was going to make it far with all the hungry fish in the ocean. The other three were vigorous, racing to the surf.

Cara returned to stand beside her, watching the hatchlings.

Dora said, “I can’t believe I’ve never seen this before.”

“I can’t either. It happens every year,” she said with a smirk.

“How long have you been on the team?”

“Oh, I guess around five years now. I started out helping Mama when she got sick, and then I got hooked. I didn’t know my interest in sea turtles would become a lifelong passion.”

Passion
. There was that word again, Dora thought. The thing that Harper was hoping to find. The thing Winifred told her wasn’t worth losing Cal over.

She followed the hatchlings close to the water’s edge.

“Keep your eyes on the hatchlings,” Cara told her. “When they reach the water, instinct kicks in and they dive. I never get tired of watching that immediate transition from scrambling hatchling to beautiful swimmer. Instinct is powerful.”

Dora silently urged the hatchlings on as they swam with all their might through the water; then an oncoming wave swept them up and sent them tumbling back to the beach like pebbles.

“Don’t move!” Cara called out to the onlookers. “There are turtles by your feet. Just stand still and let them crawl back.”

“That’s so sad,” Dora said mournfully. “They work so hard to get to the ocean, then they get tossed back. Can’t you help them? Pick them up and carry them to the water?”

Cara shook her head vigorously. “No, they need to make it on their own. Nature is an amazing teacher. We’ve learned that though it looks like the waves are hard on them, in fact the waves help orient the turtles in the right direction. They’ll swim for twenty-four to thirty-six hours to reach the Gulf Stream, where there are vast floats of sargassum weed. They act as nurseries for the hatchlings for the next ten years or so.”
She paused. “Still, it’s estimated that only one in a thousand hatchlings survives to maturity. That’s why we’re here. Every hatchling counts. And though the number of nests along our coasts is still way down from back in the days my mama was tending turtles”—she paused to grin—“we’re trending upward again.”

“You sound like your mama.”

Cara smiled. “I’ll take that as the highest compliment.”

Dora looked out as another wave tossed two of the three hatchlings back to the shore. And once again, the hatchlings righted themselves and took off in their comical scramble for the sea. She followed one hatchling to the shoreline, feeling an attachment to this small turtle that she’d never seen before and would never see again. Was it her maternal instinct? This desire to nurture a young life? Like Cara said, instinct was powerful.

This time when the dive instinct kicked in, the hatchling dove deep and made it past the breakers. Dora felt her spirits soar as she stood ankle deep in the warm water, cheering on the hatchling until it dove again, disappearing. She continued watching the smooth surface of the water past the breakers.

There they were! Her breath hitched when she spotted two tiny heads emerge as the hatchlings took a breath.

She stood for a while longer just watching the waves roll in, picturing in her mind the turtles’ epic scramble home to the sea. Perhaps for her, too, getting tumbled and tossed around a bit had been a good thing, she thought to herself. With luck, eventually she’d right herself and start heading in the proper direction. She had to trust her instincts.