Heart of Palm (28 page)

“Yes. But she’s not going to want to sell.”

“
Millions
.”

“It won’t matter to her, Carson. She’s not going to want to move. She won’t want to change. You know she won’t.”

“Well, we need to change her mind.”

“Who’s we?”

“You and me, brother.”

“How do you know
I
want to sell?”

Carson shook his head. “Are you fucking kidding me?” he said. “Are you for real? Look around.” He gestured at the restaurant, the dozen or so tables filled with old folks enjoying their early-bird specials. “This what you want to do the rest of your life?”

“It’s not that bad,” Frank said. “Some people really like it here.”

“You one of those people?” Frank didn’t answer. “I didn’t think so,” Carson said. “Come on, Frank. Don’t be an ass. We gotta get her to sell.”

“I don’t know, Carson,” he said. “But I gotta go.”

Carson followed him back out of the restaurant.

“Frank,” he said. “Be reasonable.”

“I gotta go, Carson. We’ll talk tomorrow.”

Carson’s eyes slid to Frank’s truck. “Where are you going?” he said. “What’s that bed for?”

Frank kept walking, and by now Carson was following him to the truck.

“You bringing that to Aberdeen?”

“Yep.”

“For my daughter?”

“Bingo,” Frank said. “You’re a regular Sherlock, aren’t you?”

“Who asked you to do that?”

“What does it matter? They need an extra bed out there. I had one. I’m going to drop it off.”

“Did Elizabeth ask you to do that?”

“Carson,” Frank said. “Let me go. I’ll be right back.”

A car pulled into the lot, and then another, and clumps of customers. The beginnings of the real Friday dinner crowd began to straggle out of the cars and head toward Uncle Henry’s front door. Carson put his hand out. “Give me your keys,” he said. “I’ll bring the bed.”

“No,” Frank said. “I got it.”

“Let me bring it.”

“No.”

“Frank.”

“You’re not driving my truck,” Frank said.

“She’s my wife.”

“It’s my truck.”

Frank realized how idiotic this was becoming, but he couldn’t help himself.

“She doesn’t want to see you,” he said. “She needs time.”

Carson took a step back, narrowed his eyes. “How do you know that?” he said. “Who the fuck are you, Dr. Phil?”

Three more cars had pulled into the parking lot, and now George Weeden was getting out of one of them, walking toward them. “Bravos!” he called.

“Oh, Jesus,” Frank said.

“Give me the keys,” Carson said. “I’ll take the bed to my daughter.”

“Gentlemen!” George said. “I got you both in one place! Perfect. I want to tell you about a little idea of mine.”

“Give me the keys, Frank,” Carson said.

Frank wanted to slap him. Another car pulled in. He handed Carson the keys and turned back to the restaurant. George trotted alongside him.

“Carson!” George called over his shoulder. “I guess I’ll go ahead and talk to Frank first. I’ll fill you in by phone.”

Carson ignored him, started the truck, and pulled out of the parking lot. Frank didn’t watch him, but he heard the bed thumping in the bed of the truck as Carson accelerated over the bumpy dirt road toward Aberdeen. Elizabeth. She’d been trying to avoid Carson, had retreated to Aberdeen to escape him, in fact, and now Frank had provided him with a damn entrée, had practically rolled out the red carpet for Carson to walk in at Aberdeen, a hero with a twin mattress and a sheet set.
Shit.

The old resentment felt like rust, creeping through his veins, and the image of Carson just now at the wheel of Frank’s truck brought back an image of another truck, another summer night, Carson at the wheel that night, too, driving them all into tragedy and despair and a life’s sentence of atonement that Frank seemed to be the only one serving. Carson. Wasn’t Carson always at the wheel, when you stopped to think about it?

July 4, 1984. It had started right here, at Uncle Henry’s. Frank sometimes had the feeling that everything in his entire life was going to either begin or end right here at Uncle Henry’s. That night, at any rate, the whole thing began to unfold, unravel, undo itself right after the fireworks, when the people out on the deck were so far in the bag that even if they’d stopped drinking right then they’d still be drunk on Labor Day. And Dean right in the thick of it. King Drunk, as usual.

Carson had his first truck, a rusted-out Toyota he’d bought from an old man in Green Cove Springs. They came in off the tiny oyster-shelled beach behind Uncle Henry’s—Carson, Frank, and Will—where they’d been staging the launch of a stash of cherry bombs, quarter sticks, and M-80s Carson had picked up from a stand off I-95 just north of the Georgia border. The fireworks had left them all antsy, pumped through with adrenaline that had been wasted after each explosion erupted and each shell wilted in the damp sand.

They walked through the restaurant on their way to the parking lot, which was their first mistake, Frank realized later, because by cutting through Uncle Henry’s they set themselves up to be waylaid by their father, who was holding court at the bar. Dean was perched on a stool, his leathery face more florid than usual with the heat of God knows how many glasses of Jack. He caught sight of the three of them, then turned around to balance his drink on his knee and regard them.

“My boys,” Dean announced to the bar. “Would you just look at my three boys?” Still balancing his glass on his knee, he reached out and grabbed Will by the arm, pulling him close in an awkward hug, which Will suffered good-naturedly for a moment before gently pushing his father away. Will’s hair was pressed to his head from the heat on the beach; his T-shirt hung loosely on his thin frame. Tommy Bolla, who owned the Texaco on Seminary, grinned stupidly at Dean from an adjoining barstool.

“You got you some fine boys, Bravo,” he said. “And that one there is your spittin’ image.”

“Holy shit, these are some kids,” Dean said. He looked like he might cry. Will patted him on the arm, affectionate, always so tolerant of everything and everybody. Frank and Carson moved toward the door.

“We gotta go, Dad,” Frank said. “We’re meeting people.”

“Who you meeting?” Dean said.

“Mac and George. Tip, maybe.”

“Shit, Tip Breen?” Dean said. Tommy Bolla scoffed. “That piece of shit kid?”

“I don’t know,” Frank said. “Maybe.” He paused. “Will, you coming?”

“Listen here,” Dean said. He pulled Will in to him again. “Maybe Will wants to stay with me.”

“Leave him,” Carson said quietly to Frank, seeing an opportunity. “If he stays here we can go slide.” Will heard this reference, and his eyes widened slightly as he stood, still in the awkward corral of Dean’s arm. “I’m coming,” Will said. “I want to slide.”

Carson sighed. Frank hesitated. They’d never let Will come sliding before, out to the dunes near Ponte Vedra Beach, where they’d meet up with the Weeden brothers and any other kids looking for a diversion. In the spring, they’d retrieved an old car hood from a rusted heap they found decaying in the woods off Cooksey Lane. They’d turned the car hood upside down and drilled holes in two corners to attach a rope, which was then affixed in a long loop to the trailer hitch on the back of Carson’s truck. Out at the beach, in the wooded dunes, the car hood became a sled, pulled behind the truck at ever-increasing speeds and ridden only by those feeling most brave, or most stupid, on a given night. The dunes were peppered with hundred-year-old live oak trees and palmetto thickets, and the success and safety of any slide run were completely dependent on the skill and blood alcohol level of the driver of the truck. A live oak tree won’t move for a category four hurricane; it certainly won’t move for a buzzed 140-pound kid sliding on the back of a rusted car hood, no matter how much the kid might want it to in the split second before impact.

“I’m a buy my boys a drink,” Dean said. “C’mere.”

“Whyn’t you buy me a drink while you’re at it?” Tommy Bolla said.

“You don’t need a drink, you damn souse,” Dean said.

“We’re underage, Dad,” Frank said. The fact that he and Carson had a bottle of Crown Royal and a six-pack of beer locked in the truck outside was beside the point. He could see absolutely no good coming from having Dean buy his three sons drinks in the current setting. None of them needed a visit to the St. Johns County Detention Unit tonight, least of all Dean, who still had six months’ probation on his last two offenses, disorderly intoxication and misuse of 911, from when he threw a tantrum and called the police to complain that Tip Breen, nineteen years old and a recent installation at the checkout counter at Lil’ Champ, had overcharged him by two dollars on a six-pack of Coors.

“Oh, screw that,” Dean said. “Come have a drink with your old man. Henry’s not gonna say nothing.” And indeed, Uncle Henry himself, like almost any Bravo worth his weight, was well known for operating his personal and business interests somewhere quite south of the letter of the law, his spiritual rebirth notwithstanding. “And Bubbles ain’t here tonight,” Dean added, rolling his eyes. He pushed Tommy Bolla down to the next stool, positioned Will next to him at the bar. “Look,” Dean said. “Carson wants a drink, don’t you, son?” And indeed, Carson had shrugged and moved closer to the bar, standing behind Will and looking interestedly at the selection of beer taps. Will laughed nervously.

“Dad,” Frank said, pointing at Will. “He’s fifteen.”

“And what are you, a hundred and ten?” Dean said. He rolled his eyes, turned to Tommy Bolla. “Of course I had to have one what’s a God-damned nun.”

Carson smiled. Will laughed again, but he looked at Frank uncertainly.

“I’ll take Frank’s drink,” Tommy Bolla said.

“You shut up,” Dean said amiably. “Carson, what will you have?”

“A Bud,” Carson said.

“Three Buds,” Dean roared to Henry. “No, I’m dry, make it four.” Henry raised his eyebrows slightly but then wordlessly poured four tall beers and lined them up in front of Dean.

“Have a heart,” Tommy Bolla said.

“Oh, Christ, five!” Dean yelled to Henry, who returned to pour the fifth for Tommy.

“Beers for my boys,” Dean said grandly. He slid the drinks in front of each of them, smiled broadly. “Fellas, to life,” he said.

“To life,” Tommy Bolla said. “And to Dean!”

“To Dean,” Will repeated. His eyes were wide and round, but he was smiling, giddy with the attention he was receiving from Dean, who still clutched the boy in the crook of his arm, swaying slightly, as though Will were an infant and he was rocking him to sleep. Will swigged his beer. Frank left his own on the bar.

“To Arla,” Carson said. He tipped his head back and nearly finished the beer in one long pull. Dean’s face darkened.

“What’s that supposed to mean?” he said.

“What?” Carson said.

“That some kind of crack?”

“I made a toast to my mother,” Carson said.

“Like hell you did,” Dean said. “That’s some kind of editorial.”

“About the fact you’re sitting here every night instead of being home with her once in a while? Nah,” Carson said.

“I’m not sitting here every night,” Dean said.

“Oh, that’s right,” Carson said. “Sometimes it’s the Cue & Brew.”

“Carson, let’s go,” Frank said.

“Jesus H. Christ, Tommy,” Dean said. “You see what I got here? I got the moral majority here, Tommy. I got one who’s a nun and one who’s the pope. You see this, Tommy?”

“I see it, Dean,” Tommy Bolla said. He was eyeing Frank’s untouched Budweiser on the bar.

“Thank God I got Will here,” Dean said. He shook Will even harder against his chest, then ordered him another beer. Will laughed. His blue eyes were bright. Dean drew back and regarded him. “Look at this boy, Tommy, look at him,” he said. “This here is my boy. He’s his father’s boy, Tommy. Not like those other two pussies.”

Carson stiffened at Frank’s elbow, and Frank felt the familiar dull stab of unbidden envy in his own stomach. Will—the favorite. And don’t anybody forget it. Both Arla and Dean made no secret of their bias, made no shame of their favoritism. Will, Will, Will. It was always Will. He knew in another few minutes the situation would devolve even further. Give Dean one more drink and he’d be getting either weepy or combative, and Frank didn’t intend to stick around and participate in either option. Plus, he was dismayed to see how easily—and how quickly—Will’s second beer was going down. Another minute and Dean would be ordering him a third. His father’s boy, indeed. That’s what Frank was afraid of.

“Carson, come on,” Frank said. He slid his beer down to Tommy Bolla, who accepted it with a wide grin, his rough hand closing around the base of the glass. Dean glared at Frank. “Will, you coming?” Frank said.

“Maybe Will wants to stay with me,” Dean said.

“Come on, Will,” Carson said.

Will’s eyes darted from Dean to Carson to Frank and back to Dean again, and he looked like a boy much younger than his fifteen years, a boy now muddled by the consumption of just two beers, a boy so torn between allegiances, so eager to please everyone, so catastrophically kind and loving that it shamed Frank to be contributing to his consternation. But he had to get him away from Dean tonight.