Southampton Spectacular (17 page)

Then again,
she thought,
he can’t do much worse than sugar-covered fried dough, cotton candy, and soda.
So maybe he won’t try too hard.

He called at noon to say he would be picking her up early. She was ready by six in a blue cotton summer dress and sandals and her hair pulled up in a clip, and he called again, to say he would be there in a minute. She went to her parents in the living room before going outside, and she asked if she looked okay.

They stared at her for a minute. Neither seemed able to answer. Her father put his head down, then picked it up again. He was smiling broadly.

“What?” Devon said, suddenly nervous.

“You look beautiful,” her mother said gently. And then, with a smile on her face to match her husband’s: “We’re just worried for him.”

“For Dad?”

“For
him
,” her father interjected, with a wave out the window. He shrugged, as if to say that neither he nor his wife could be expected to offer any real assistance to Austin in this matter.

That kid is on his own.

“Anyway, where are you going in such a hurry?” Peter asked. “Aren’t you going to let him come in when he gets here? Don’t we get to say hi to him?”

“No,” Devon said quickly. “I still barely know him myself. You don’t get to size him up until later.”

“And when, exactly, is later?”

“Much later.”

“Okay, but maybe you could – ”

“I’ll be home early,” she said, though she was not sure she meant it, and  she walked out the door before they could pester her any longer. She looked along the curving driveway to the gap in the hedges leading to the street, and she was relieved to see Austin there already. He was walking toward her in a good pair of stone-white khakis and a light blue oxford.

Perfect
, she thought.
Not too fancy.

She could feel her breath coming slightly faster all of a sudden, and she was aware of a strong, unreasonably giddy feeling in her chest at the sight of him. She tried to fight this feeling down with more concrete observations on what he was wearing, but there wasn’t much more to see. Comfortable sandals, good belt, and that was it. Just a regular, tall, good-looking, supremely calm and athletic boy who had saved her father’s life, thrown a tennis match to talk to her, and chased off a couple of thugs who were bothering her, right before going on a ride that made everyone sick, simply because it meant he got to sit next to her for a few minutes. Which he could have done anyway just by asking.

She shook her head and tried to regain focus.

Where’s his car?

There, that was good. Objective. Critical. Everyone in Southampton was supposed to have a car. A
nice
car, right from the very beginning. You got your license, and the next day you got your car.

She forced herself to let him come all the way to the door, rather than sprinting out to meet him like a cooped-up collie. She liked the sight of him moving. And she forgot almost immediately to be critical.

As before, when he had been coming toward her along the side of the pool, she felt hypnotized by his walk. Each foot seemed to come down with distinct purpose, as though every step he took was something he thought about and enjoyed. He was looking at her with that steady, easy look of his, and there was a smile in his eyes.

He came to the entrance, and then they stood and faced each other silently. She gave him a moment, but he didn’t seem to need to say anything. “We’re actually
going
somewhere, right?” Devon said finally.

“Yup.”

But he still didn’t move.

“Where’s your car?”

“What makes you think I have a car?”

“You said you were going to pick me up.”

“That’s what I’m doing. You ready?”

Devon finally broke eye-contact, and she looked around as though checking for mooring lines that might prevent her from leaving the house. “Ready,” she said.

He glanced down at her sandals. “Those are comfortable enough to walk in?”

“Definitely.”

“We’re going to head down past Agawam first.”

“Okay.”

“And then dinner at 41 Main.”

“Good.”

“You’re unbelievably beautiful.”

She tried to keep a straight face, and failed. She was dimly aware that she would have agreed to almost anything he had said at that moment.
We’re going to fly down to Louisiana, kill, roast, and eat a wild pig, sell the leftover meat to the locals, and then fly right back here for dessert at Sip’n’Soda. Hope that works for you.
She would have nodded and said “works for me,” in a sing-song voice. And now the urge to kiss him was very, very strong, so that she could barely remember what she should say, or what they were doing, or how they had gotten here, standing in front of each other, in the first place. So to relieve the pressure that was building up in her chest and legs and head she rose up onto her toes and leaned forward and put a hand on one of his shoulders, and kissed him on the cheek.

Which almost made her feel better.

Except that he smelled of clean skin and cotton oxford and, way underneath the warmth drifting up slowly from beneath his collar, the faint tang of scrubbed-off sun lotion. The combination did not help her concentrate.

“Thank you,” he said, and smiled at her.

This calmed her slightly.

Please just say okay let’s go so that we can walk and I can breathe and I don’t act like a fool
.

“All right,” he said, and turned and took her by the hand. “Here we go.”

They walked down the driveway, through the gap in the hedge, and turned left on First Neck Lane. Toward Ox Pasture, and Agawam.

2

She gave herself a minute to let her head clear. When her breath was coming in a more regular rhythm and her heart seemed to be functioning normally, she asked about his car again. Simply because she was curious. They had all gone to the carnival two nights ago in James’s family Lincoln Navigator, but she had somehow failed to notice that Austin had arrived at James’s house without adding a car to the Dunn driveway.

“Your family has a car, I assume.”

She hated herself as soon as the words had come out of her mouth. What a stupid, presumptuous, stuck-up thing to say. What if they
didn’t
have a car? What if they were taking buses and trains everywhere?

He’s going to think this is all I care about.

But if Austin was offended, he didn’t show it. “Sure we do,” he said. “But it’s my dad’s, and sometimes he needs to head into the city without much notice.”

“I have one,” Devon pointed out, trying to keep her voice light. To show him that having a car was like having a spare tennis racquet. Didn’t matter either way; it was just a nice thing to have lying around. “We could use it. I could drive.”

Austin nodded. “That would be fine. Transportation’s on you next time. But it’s been quite a few years since I’ve been to Southampton, and I wanted to walk to town along Pond Lane. Past the lake.”

Devon smiled. No more explanation necessary. Southampton had countless picturesque roads and places, but the road leading down to the north end of Lake Agawam was on par with the best of them.

They were still on First Neck Lane now, walking on the left. On both sides of the road were tall, thick hedges, dark green and fastidiously trimmed. The hedges were ten or twelve feet high in most places, and they created the feeling of an unbroken wall of privacy between the road and the houses behind them; it was difficult to see where one property ended and another began. The effect was that of an immense, unbroken gated community stretching from the town center all the way to the beach. If you were walking or biking or driving down this or any other road in Southampton, you could enjoy the pristine beauty of the place, but you were not truly part of it. You didn’t know what went on behind those hedges. And as you came to each driveway you would be treated to a small, one-car-width break in the wall of green, through which you could see a huge house up on a rise in the distance; or a vast field with a flagpole and a little colonial to one side; or what looked like nothing more than a cottage, but with a garden at the entrance that seemed to have been prepared by Queen Elizabeth’s groundskeepers. Each break in the hedge was a glimpse into an entire world that you would never know. You would never see the people who lived there, never hear their dogs barking. You might possibly see their BMW or Mercedes or Ferrari come pulling in or out of the driveway, but that would be it.

Yet even with all this privacy and all these hidden things, the way was beautiful.

They came to the intersection of Ox Pasture and First Neck, and they turned right together. They knew the way. Now they were on Pond Lane, which had hedges that were slightly less tall, slightly less thick than those on most Southampton roads. Here they could see the houses and the landscaping and the fountain sculptures on the properties behind the hedges. Now the road began to slope down, and now even steeper, until both Austin and Devon were leaning back and letting their sandals slap along the pavement. The road had grown narrower here, and there was no more wide, grassy shoulder to walk on. They were almost down, almost all the way to the lake.

As they came lower the street began to level out, and they came to a sharp left. They hugged the right side of the curve so that any cars approaching from the other direction would see them in time. Then, as if without warning, they were walking beside a large and tranquil body of water, Lake Agawam.

The name was a holdover from the days of the Native Americans who had lived on Long Island; Montauk and Shinnecock and Agawam were all places they left behind. The name itself – Agawam – was unfortunate, since its phonetics brought to mind less-scenic images: bogs, marshes, swamps. And while Agawam was too shallow and reed-filled for swimming, it was a lake of near-perfect elliptical shape and natural beauty. Where Austin and Devon were walking now, they saw the tall reeds at the borders, the ducks and geese congregating at the edges to chatter with one another and snack on the grasses on the shallow bottom, and pairs of mating swans cruising along the shore like patrolling guards.

They had walked for long enough to be comfortable now, and warm, and the little town was in sight. Devon suddenly realized they had not spoken for fifteen minutes. Austin seemed to realize this at the same moment.

“How’s your father?” he said quietly.

“Great.” She gave him a wide smile. “Home and happy.”

He nodded.

She didn’t want him to ask anything more about her parents, so she moved the conversation herself. “I heard you were gone this past year,” she said. “Where’d you go?”

He absorbed the change in subject – no more family talk – and took a quick breath. “Year abroad in Spain. You speak Spanish?”

“I study it, sure. But I wouldn’t say I
speak
it.”

“We should work on that.”

She glanced at him. “Why?”

He shook his head. “Just warming you up,” he said, smiling at her mysteriously.

They were nearing the end of Pond Lane now, and on their right they had come to the north border of Lake Agawam. Here there was a little park with a meadow and a monument and, at the far side, a playground with a jungle-gym for children. The monument, which was a Greek-style, free-standing façade with columns and a short row of stairs, stood at the edge of the meadow, opening up facing the lake.

As they came to the end of the road they turned right, up Job’s Lane and into Southampton Village. They walked up the right side of the lane, weaving slowly through the early evening crowd. They passed by the Fudge Company, a superlative dessert shop, and Austin nodded once. “Back here after dinner,” he said.

They came to the top of the lane, where they turned left on Main Street, then cut to the opposite sidewalk without discussion; both of them knew where to find the restaurant.

“I have to get a question out of the way,” Austin said suddenly. “Before we start dinner.”

Devon watched at him as they walked. She waited for him to continue.

“You aren’t dating anyone at St. Paul’s?”

Devon smiled. “Should I be?”

“No, I didn’t – ” He stopped himself and gave her a patient look. “You know that’s not what I mean.”

Devon ran her hands down the bottom of her dress. “I was with a guy named Freddy Bateman for a few months. Until Spring.”

Austin kept walking. He waited for more.

“Spring was when I found out he was cheating on me.”

Austin drew air noisily into his mouth. “Mistake.”

“Yes.”

“I had a girl do that to me two years ago at Exeter, and I haven’t spoken to her since.”

Devon nodded. “That sounds about right.”

“Freddy Bateman sounds like a bit of an idiot.”

“Yes.”

They walked silently for a while, contemplating the deep and mystifying stupidity of the unfortunate Freddy Bateman and others like him. Main Street was long, and they still had a minute or two before they would come to the restaurant.