Porch Lights Read Free Page A

whispered, “Love you, baby.”
    He grimaced a little, not liking being disturbed, and then he reached out and put his hand on my arm. It was a proprietary touch but also one seeking for reassurance that I was still there.
    A few minutes later, he sat up rubbing his eyes with his fists. “Mom? Where do you think Dad is?”
    “Heaven,” I said. “Don’t you?”
    “Yeah, but you know, it’s like he’s still around. But not in a creepy way.”
    “How do you mean?”
    “Well, like when before the end of the school year, I’d be studying for a hard test? It was sort of like he was there, telling me to keep at it, not to give up. Do you know what I mean?”
    “Yes. I do know. And you want to know something else?”
    “What?”
    “It makes me feel a little better.”
    “Yeah, but not for long enough.”
    “I agree with you, but you know what? I think it would be mighty strange if we weren’t sad right now.”
    “Yeah.”
    “One more thing: you don’t have to be sad every minute of the night and day, you know. And you can talk to me about it anytime you want.”
    “That’s two things.”
    “Right.”
    I sighed then, realizing we were little more than two hurt birds flying back to the mother nest to heal. I hoped I had made a good decision. A long vacation of salted breezes, hammocks to while away steamy afternoons, building sand castles, and making ice cream with my sweet dad—all those things could go a long way to mend our broken hearts. I hoped.

Chapter 2
Near the western extremity, where Fort Moultrie stands . . . is covered with a dense undergrowth of the sweet myrtle . . . attains the height of fifteen or twenty feet . . . burthening the air with its fragrance.
—Edgar Allan Poe, “The Gold-Bug”
    Meet Annie Britt
    F rankly, we had precious little to say to each other, but because he actually took his Old Man and the Sea hand off his fishing rod long enough to call me, I spoke to him. I had not heard from my estranged husband since the funeral. Of course, I was very polite to him. If I hadn’t known better I’d have said the spirit of James McMullen was conspiring to have us kiss and make up, but I don’t believe in that kind of nonsense. Well, not as a general rule. And that’s not why he called anyway. Buster, as he was known to all, had been to visit our daughter, Jackie, and our adorable grandson, Charlie, way up the road in Brooklyn, New York, and he didn’t like what he found. Like I had? Who in the world would be happy to see their daughter and her little boy struggling under the weight of that kind of traumatic and horrendous loss?
    I mean, I don’t want to sound judgmental, but Buster’s not exactly the expert of the world on the hearts of women and children. Apparently there had been a recent conversation between Jackie and Buster, and apparently Jackie had cried him a river. Weeping is not my daughter’s style. At all. She’s a soldier, for heaven’s sake! But everyone has a limit of what they can endure. His call truly alarmed me. Truly.
    She told Buster that she’s very, very worried about Charlie. He wasn’t coping well. He was having terrible nightmares, he was lethargic and not eating well. Oh, my poor dear little grandson! And just the idea of my daughter sobbing made my chest tighten. Buster, unsure of how to handle her, did the right thing. He brought the problem to me. As! He! Should! Have! After all, I was still the mother of the family, even if our child was a military nurse, toting a loaded gun around the world and even though her father preferred the waters seventy-seven miles to the north.
    I called Jackie immediately and pleaded with her to spend the balance of the summer with me on the island. Maybe beseech is the better word because it was more begging than pleading. Oh, she hemmed and hawed around for a while, and suddenly to my astonishment, she gave in, making me swear on a stack of Bibles not to spoil Charlie rotten. I promised enormous personal