Page 19 of Survivor
Chapter Thirteen
Frank
Dropping his backpack into the chair and kicking his bedroom door closed, Frank fell face first onto the bed. The past seventy hours had been busy, to say the least. He’d driven to Austin for Taylor’s graduation, partying like a rock star with his best friend Caleb and the graduate, when not a damn one of them were…rock stars. Well, Caleb may well think he was, in his own twisted mind, but they most definitely were not. His body was reminding him of that fact at the moment. Then he had to drive back to Dallas to pick up a shift for an officer that had recently become a father, and all that before catching his flight at the ass crack of dawn that morning from Dallas to Martha’s Vineyard.
There was a soft knock at the door before his dad peeked into the room. “Don’t be going to sleep now, or you won’t be able to sleep tonight.”
“Whatever,” Frank muttered, waving his dad away and grabbing a pillow, pulling it over his head to block the sun that was glaring through the open window. “Five minutes,” he pleaded, lifting the pillow just enough to look at his watch; he noted the time was 5:20 p.m. He could take a quick power nap before dinner. Hubert would surely be back up the stairs banging on his door if Frank didn’t make it down soon, so he wasn’t worried about sleeping too long.
When he woke some time later, his bladder was screaming. Half-awake, feet moving more by memory than sight, Frank stumbled into the bathroom to take a piss. Slowly, the fog of sleep lifted and he noticed how dark it was in the bathroom. Lifting the shade to peer outside, he saw the haze of twilight. “Fuck.” Glancing at his watch, he was taken aback to see it was two in the morning. A few more curses as he washed his hands before heading downstairs.
The path from his room to the kitchen was bathed in soft light, compliments of the Bath & Body Works Wallflowers that were plugged into sockets in almost every room in the house. The Stones had purchased several of the quirky scent-filled night-lights the first summer they’d visited the cottage with Taylor. The poor kid often had nightmares and Valerie had discovered that night-lights worked well at keeping the demons at bay. So, the following day Valerie and Justine left the men to sail and fish while they drove into Boston to do some shopping, returning with a bag full of the multi-functional gadgets that plugged into the wall, emitted lovely aromas, and cast enough light in the room to keep the nightmares away for the most part. Each one was a different design as well: bedazzled multicolored fish, a shiny starfish, and other random beachy things. There was one with an anchor on the face, the background blue and white stripes, a nautical theme. To this day that particular Wallflower was plugged into the socket in the hallway, just outside his bedroom.
Knowing there was no way he could go back to bed now, not if wanted to keep his days and nights straight, he set about starting a pot of coffee. While he waited, Frank dug a tablet and pen out of the drawer beside the fridge and started a grocery list. His dad would have stocked the pantry with dry goods and a quick glance in the freezer showed a variety of meat and seafood, but Frank loved to visit the local shops for fresh produce. An obligatory trip to the liquor store was in order as well. Caleb and Justine wouldn’t be down until the following week, but it was good to be prepared.
Coffee in hand, Frank went out the back door, softly closing it behind him so he wouldn’t wake his father, and headed down to the beach. As a boy, Frank would sometimes get up in the middle of the night and quietly leave the house, finding himself down on the beach, walking the path where the water met the sand. Burying his toes in the wet earth beneath him, Frank remembered the last time he was on the beach with his mother, mere days before the cancer took her from them. He flapped his arms in the breeze and cawed like a bird while his mom leaned back in the lawn chair Frank had dragged down from the house for her to sit in. She smiled and they both laughed and laughed.
The day of the funeral, Frank had held tight to the white rose the Reverend had given him. “You can put it on your momma’s casket so she’ll have a little piece of you with her, always.” The elderly man in the long black robe with a rosary and cross hanging around his neck told him, but when the time came, Frank couldn’t let go of the rose. Instead, he ran all the way back to the beach behind their cottage, not stopping until he was in the water up to his knees. Ears ringing, heart pounding, he held on to the rose in spite of the sharp bite of pain he felt in his fingers from the thorns and cried. He cried until he thought his lungs would burst and the water might rise up and drown him. His dad joined him there a few minutes later, offering Frank a sad smile, a rose in his hand as well. They both eventually let the ocean take the flowers along with some of the pain.
Frank closed his eyes and listened to the familiar sounds of Martha’s Vineyard. Waves crashing, birdsong, and if he strained he swore he could hear his mother’s laugh in the distance. Blinking, he held his hand out in front of him, opening and closing his fist, fingers wiggling. There were times when he swore he could still feel the sharp bite in his flesh from the thorns and it comforted him.
The day after his mother’s funeral, he and his dad drove to one of the small shops in town where Hubert purchased a rosebush, the tiny, white buds so much smaller than the ones they’d tossed into the water the night before. Hubert planted the bush at the end of the low-lying brick wall that ran the length of the cottage and by the end of the summer, the buds were proudly blooming. Over the years the roses flourished as did the bushes and other flowers Frank and Hubert planted in “Meredith’s Garden,” aptly named after his mother.
There was another memory made in the water that stood out among the rest: the night Frank realized Taylor was becoming a man. He’d been swimming, well, skinny dipping actually, naked as a jaybird when that sinking feeling of being watched washed over his skin. Turning back toward the beach, Frank recognized Taylor’s long, lean frame and swam back to shore, quickly grabbing his trunks and slipping them on. Shrouded in the darkness of night, Frank didn’t see the look of pure lust in Taylor’s eyes until he was close enough to reach out and touch him.
Thinking about the way Taylor had looked at him on Saturday when Frank walked up the stairs to his apartment brought the memory of that night so many years ago back to the forefront of his mind. And if Frank were honest with himself, the dynamic between him and Taylor changed that night on the beach. Oh, Frank had tried to convince himself that the lingering stares and subtle touches from Taylor were just his imagination, wishful thinking.
Tipping his head back, Frank stared up at the stars. “I’m ten years older than him.…He deserves better, deserves more.” There was a truth to his words; the age difference was a concern, but his heart and mind were of different opinions. One erred on the side of caution. His heart, however, needed to know how Taylor felt. In that moment, staring at the lighthouse across from him, Frank decided it was time to let the next rose fall and see where the petals landed.
