Page 88 of My Favorite Lost Cause
Miss Ames’s body—found clutching a bouquet of dried roses—was recovered after nearly a full day’s search of the house andproperty, and was eventually discovered in a small shack “in great disrepair,” according to someone at the scene.
Her location contributed greatly to the difficulty in finding her, but foul play is not suspected.
“The heat alone would have killed her,” said Betsy Squires, a longtime member of the Oak Bluff Methodist Church. “I can’t imagine why she would have gone out there.”
I curl up in the hard wooden library chair and cry with my face pressed to my knees. I’m weeping for Margaret and William, yes, but also myself.
Not everyone gets a happy ending. Sometimes you just get one tiny moment of joy in a very long life, and you cling to it forever. I guess I already knew this—I just thought I might be an exception.
I’m pretty sure I won’t be.
39
MAREN
All night I have dreams that begin happily then bleed into nightmares. A nice moment with Charlie, down by the water, turns into discovering Margaret dead in an abandoned shack.
A baby is crying, and Margaret pats my hand and says, “That’s Millie’s, not ours.”
Kit’s getting married, but when the priest announces they’re husband and wife, it’s Charlie and that girl he danced with the night of the country club ball who turn toward the crowd.
I toss in bed and when I finally wake sometime just before dawn, my stomach is churning.
Charlie remains asleep beside me, not budging as I throw back the covers and race to the bathroom, barely skidding to a stop in front of the toilet before my stomach empties.
When it’s blessedly over, I let my face press to the cool tile floor, too weak and shaky to stand. I hope it’s simply food poisoning as opposed to the flu. There’s too much going on between my Marais & Wolfe contract and our final days at the house for me to be sick in bed all week.
I manage to brush my teeth, then slide back to the floor, tooweak to continue standing. A minute later, Charlie enters the bathroom, wearing not a stitch of clothing. Even as sick as I am, I’m still able to appreciate what an absolute work of art he is: lovely and large and muscly. All mine for not much longer.
Yet another reason I can’t afford to lose any days to illness.
“Jesus, Maren, what happened?” asks Charlie, squatting beside me.
“I threw up,” I whisper.
He laughs as he lifts me into his arms off the floor. “Yeah, I put that part together, hon. Let’s get you back into bed.”
I weakly shake my head, then press my face to his cool chest. “I don’t want to get you sick. I should sleep somewhere else.”
“I’m far too strong and masculine to get sick,” he says.
I laugh shakily. “I’m no doctor, but I’m not sure it works that way.”
I’m too tired to fight him, however, as he tucks me back under the blankets and though I want to talk to him, I drift off to sleep, exhausted.
The next time I wake, the sun is out, and Charlie’s fully dressed with his hand on my shoulder. “Drink, Maren,” he says, his brow furrowed as he hands me a glass of something bright red. “You need electrolytes.”
Reluctantly, I accept the glass, though I really just want to go back to sleep. “I think I’m better. Just tired. It was the chicken. I was worried I hadn’t cooked it enough. You’re not nauseous at all?”
He pushes the hair back from my face. “I told you. I’m too manly to get sick.”
I give him a halfhearted smile. “Oh, right. I forgot.”
“If you weren’t sick, I’d have a very reasonable and not at all selfish way to make you remember.”
“Maybe you should do it anyway. Then you can claim I was healed by your cock.”
“I intend to tell everyone that regardless,” he says. “You think you can eat something? I made soup.”
