Beach Trip by Cathy Holton Page B

in a clean nightgown, and the two were snuggled on Lola’s bed, reading
Winnie-the-Pooh.
The rain had stopped but an occasional rumble of thunder rattled the windows. Maureen set the tray down on a bedside table. “I’ll finish the story,” she said to Savannah.
    The child sat stiffly beside her while she read, slowly chewing her sandwich. When Maureen had finished, she stroked Lola’s cheek softly andsaid, “Do you understand why Mommy was so angry earlier?” When she didn’t answer, Maureen laid her down on the bed and pulled the covers to her chin. “I’ll expect you to call Mrs. Hampton and Charlotte in the morning and apologize for your behavior,” she said. “Do you understand? Is there something you have to say?”
    Her mother’s face was soft in the lamplight. Her voice was gentle. Lola thought of the family in the little house shut up behind their plate-glass window and she began to talk, slowly at first, hesitantly, but then with more conviction. She told her mother of the things Charlotte had done to her, of the slaps, bites, bruises she had suffered at Charlotte’s hands, of the Indian burns the girl had given her whenever her mother was out of the room.
    When she was finished Maureen stared at her for several minutes. Then she rose, vigorously smoothing the covers and fluffing the pillow behind her daughter’s head. “Don’t be ridiculous,” she said, leaning to turn off the lamp. “Louise Hampton is one of my oldest and dearest friends. She and I were Scotties together. You’ll call Charlotte tomorrow and apologize and then we’ll hear no more of this ridiculous nonsense.”
    She turned, and without another word she went out, closing the door firmly behind her.

Chapter 6

    y two-thirty the women had succumbed to the heat and gone in for a swim. A swollen orange sun hung from a colorless sky Cicadas sang in the trees. The heat was unusually oppressive for the middle of May. They swam slowly through the tepid water, making their way through the splashing, squirming toddlers, who bobbed across the surface of the water in their swim vests and water wings like so many brightly colored fishing buoys. Their mothers sat along the edges of the pool in twos and threes, dangling their lean brown legs in the water and keeping a wary eye on their undulating offspring.
    It was less crowded in the deep end of the pool, although some of the more adventuresome children followed them there, kicking their legs and squirming their bodies like fat tadpoles.
    “Jesus,” Mel said. “This is ridiculous.” They were huddled in a corner with their elbows resting behind them on the lip of the pool and their feet floating up in front of them.
    “There’s so many of them,” Annie said.
    “They’re all adorable,” Lola said.
    “I think those floaty devices are the worst things that ever happened to kids,” Mel said. “I mean, think about it. When we were kids we
knew
not to go into the water until we could swim. We were afraid of it. We respected its dangers. Nowadays kids are strapped into those things before they’re even weaned and dropped into the water. They can’t swim. All they can do is bob around helplessly but they lose their fear of the water, and there’s the danger.” As if to prove her point, a naked baby staggered to the edge of the pool and, without slowing his pace, stepped off into the water. He sank like a stone. The frantic mother ran after him and jumped in, screaming, “Claiborne, Claiborne!” until the water closed over her head. The lifeguard stood up on his chair and blew his whistle sharply but he was unable to dive into the soup of floating toddlers for fear of injuring one. He scurried down the chair and ran to the edge of the pool but by then the mother had surfaced with the baby in her arms. The child seemed oblivious to his near-death encounter. He grinned and blew bubbles while water streamed down his face.
    He reminded Annie of Agnes Grace, a girl she’d met while