Southampton Spectacular (24 page)

People spilled out onto the porch. It was fully night now, but the moon was bright enough to illuminate a small dark spot out in the middle of Court 1. A few people coming out onto the porch noticed it, and they also noticed the little pile of dirt behind the hole. But they didn’t give it any thought. It was nighttime. No one was playing tennis now. The groundskeeping crew would take care of it; they had probably made that hole themselves. It would be gone tomorrow, one way or another.

Fixed, invisible, covered up.

1

That night, the night when James had told Devon everything, was the beginning of the end for Pauline. But Devon had no way of knowing this, and so the next day she only felt sadness.

She felt alone.

This information was hers now, this terrible, sickening knowledge of what James and Ned had been through – of what Ned was
still
going through – and yet the knowledge did her no good. She knew she was not allowed to share what she knew with anyone; James had been very,
very
clear about this. She could not discuss the matter with her friends, or with Austin, or with her parents. Not even with James himself, who had unloaded on her like a tired truck driver dropping off a shipment of spoiled milk.

Here, take this. I don’t care where you put it, just don’t try to return it.

Which is what she had wanted – she had
wanted
to help him share his burden, no matter how heavy – except that now she was staggering under the weight of it. As James had been. The load was too much to hold alone, and she could not think what to do. Any plan – anything that could even be
called
a plan – was unacceptable. How could you solve a problem without confronting it head-on, or admitting the problem existed in the first place?

How do I get rid of Pauline without telling anyone? Without embarrassing James? Without even acknowledging that Pauline does…

What she does.

Devon didn’t think she could pull it off.

The next day at the Beach Club she felt as though she were the only one not enjoying herself. It was another beautiful summer day, and the talent show had been a success. Every child had received his or her token award. Florin and Jasper had done well, and Austin and Barnes were proud of their participation. Austin, especially. They hadn’t yet talked about his behind-the-scenes Spain barrage, but she couldn’t just pretend that it hadn’t happened.

Not that she wanted to. It had been a sweet gesture, after all.

Also, everyone seemed to have moved past the end of the show – Ned’s breakdown – because he had sung so wonderfully; no one could deny the beauty of that performance, least of all Ned himself. And look, there he was, swimming around in the big pool as he so often did, diving down to the bottom and fetching pennies under the watchful gaze of James. Ned was fine, they all told themselves. Ned had simply had stage fright. And he had redeemed himself wonderfully. Yes, he had fallen apart a little bit afterward, but soon enough he had been taken away and comforted by his nice, pretty nanny. Now here he was, back at the club after so many days in hiding at his house. Redeemed and forgiven. Everything was good.

Devon looked around, taking in the pool scene. She had to admit to herself that everything
did
seem good. Austin was doing his laps, Nina and Barnes were doing their flirting, sparing routine, and Florin was even managing to get cozy with James. Or as cozy as you could get with someone who was holding a ten-month-old baby in his arms. James seemed more relaxed than he had in weeks. He even laughed out loud at something Florin said to him.

He had unburdened himself.

So Devon sat and pretended to read her book, a book that had now been stuck on the same page for what seemed like a whole month. She watched the scene of happiness and normalcy before her, and she thought of her parents, who were up at the cafeteria having their lunch, back in their happy, normal life.

She wondered what to do.

The problem, of course, was that she had promised James she would do
nothing
.

But then something happened.

Ned had been swimming happily in the main pool for almost an hour. He was diving for pennies, throwing them over the edge of the pool himself and then retrieving them in bunches. The challenge was to collect as many as possible in one dive, and Ned had gotten to the point where he could forage down at the bottom of the 9-foot-deep pool for as long as thirty seconds at a time. On this last go-round, he had thrown a whole handful of change down there; he was underwater for what seemed like too long. James stopped flirting with Florin, and he watched his younger brother at the bottom of the pool, watched his hands searching blindly, frantically, trying to get one more coin. And then all at once Ned was out of air.

He came swimming up, kicking and pulling at the water as quickly as he could. Except that rising up through water is a slow, maddening process when you are in real need of oxygen, and Ned was panicked. Instead of letting his natural buoyancy do the work, he flailed and wriggled like a wounded fish, and so he did not swim straight. He burst through the surface at the very edge of the pool and smacked his head on the underside of the concrete lip. He was in the process of taking a huge, gasping breath as this happened, and the force of the impact sent him back under. He gulped pool water instead of air, and as he began thrashing with pain and renewed panic he hit his head again and again, until finally he had the sense to reach up and hold the edge of the pool instead of ramming into it like a fly bumping against the inside of a window. He held on, and coughed, and breathed, and then he began to cry from the trauma of it all.

A few people looked to see what was happening, but they quickly turned away. Perhaps the Dunn boy was not okay after all. He seemed very fragile all of a sudden.

Devon expected Ned to calm himself after a moment, but he did not. Like the night before, his distress seemed to increase, to build on itself in waves. As though any traumatic event could open a door to a dark, spider-filled room that Ned had trouble closing on his own. Now he was crying louder, and louder still, and in another moment Devon saw Pauline approaching, reaching out with a towel and a helping hand, to take Ned away and comfort him.

Which was when Devon stood up.

There was no conscious thought to the decision. She did not intend to have a conversation with Pauline, or even with Ned. But she saw that James was not moving, that he was frozen, as before. Perhaps he would
always
be frozen in the presence of this woman, Devon thought. She was suddenly reminded of a time three years earlier, when Pauline had yelled at James for dropping a cup of juice near the pool; he had stopped and turned to the nanny with fear in his eyes. Fear that made no sense to Devon, because it was only a cup of juice, and because James Dunn, even at 13 years old, was already a strong, well-built boy who did not startle easily. Yet there he had stood, hunching his shoulders and wincing as though preparing for a blow to the head.

In any case, Devon was not willing to watch this happen again. She could not. And so as soon as Ned was out of the pool, Devon was there. She reached down and took his hand, and she smiled kindly at him. As though she had been looking forward,
so
looking forward to seeing him.

Ned looked up at Devon uncertainly – she was not someone he knew very well – but it was hard to resist that smile. She was certainly a friend of James; Ned knew that much. She was pretty, and she never shouted. She seemed nice.

But now Pauline was there, too. She did not seem happy to see Devon. “Excuse me?” she said. Her voice was quiet. And cold.

Devon didn’t look up. She kept her eyes locked on Ned. “Is your head okay?” she asked, and managed to make it sound as though she were asking him a funny question. A wonderful question. Ned almost smiled back.

“You are not in charge of this child,” Pauline said. A little louder now.

Devon reminded herself that conflict was not allowed. A
scene
was not allowed. She held Ned’s hand and kept ignoring the babysitter, kept looking down at Ned with a smile. “I was impressed with your diving,” she said to him. “How many did you get on that last try?”

Pauline grew impatient. She threw aside the towel she had brought over for Ned, and she reached out for Devon’s hand. “Let him go,” she hissed.

Devon finally looked up. In seven years, she had never been this close to Pauline. The babysitter was wearing lipstick. And too much eye makeup. Her skin glistened with suntan oil, and Devon could feel the wiry strength in her as she tried to pry her hand away from Ned’s. Devon looked into her eyes and saw real aggression there. Real hatred.

She’s terrifying
, Devon thought, and she wondered why she hadn’t seen it before.
We always knew she was off somehow, but this is more than that. This is awful.

Still Pauline was prying at Devon’s hand, and still Devon resisted. Suddenly the babysitter stopped. “Let go of his hand right now,” she said to Devon. “Last chance.”

Devon said nothing. She glanced down at Ned again, and she tried to feed him some of her calm. To assure him that no matter what happened here, it was not his fault. Then she looked back up at Pauline and shook her head slowly.

“Fine,” Pauline said. She reached out again, but this time she grabbed Devon’s index finger and twisted it quickly back.

There was a sickening popping sound, and liquid fire seemed to come flashing up Devon’s finger and through her hand and arm. She was aware, somewhere in the back of her mind, that Pauline had just broken the finger on her left hand, but this information seemed irrelevant. It was something to be addressed later. She made no sound. She held onto Ned. She looked steadily at Pauline, who looked back at her first with fury, and then with something like distress.

Devon glanced back down at Ned again. She could not speak, because if she had opened her mouth she might have cried out. So instead she gave him a little nod.

We’re still here. We’re still okay.

Pauline waited for another moment, as though studying Devon. Looking for cracks in the wall. “Okay,” Pauline said finally, still in that hateful whisper. “More for you later. Much more.”

Devon just nodded slowly at her, as if to say that this had been a lovely exchange, and she looked forward to their next meeting. She waited until Pauline had retreated all the way to her towel at the other side of the pool, and then she released Ned’s hand. She turned and walked back slowly toward her chaise, focusing all her energy on being silent, being unobserved, invisible.

Not making a scene. Not making a scene.

Except that if she didn’t get back to her chaise in about three seconds, she was going to faint. And that would be a scene all its own.

She was aware of Austin’s voice suddenly behind her. Next to her. He was saying her name in an urgent, insistent tone, as though he had been trying to get her attention for a long time.

“Devon? What just happened? You look strange.” He came even closer, took her hand.

Not the injured one, thank God.

“Devon?”

She turned to look at him, and now her brain decided that the pain in her finger was allowed priority. The fire came rushing back into her hand and her arm, all the way to her chest and stomach, and her breath caught in her throat. “I need a doctor,” she whispered to him, and her eyes filled with tears. “Quietly,” she managed to add.

Austin reacted well. He took care of her.

Her vision began to blur. She was quickly feverish from the pain, and then Austin was leading her out of the club, to the public beach entrance fifty yards away. She wondered where they were going – they were supposed to be getting her to a
doctor
– and she was on the point of telling him this when she heard the wail of a siren. All at once she was grateful to him for paying attention.

No scene. Almost no one had noticed anything happening.

No one except Ned’s mother, Tracy Dunn.

It had now been one full week since Mrs. Dunn had taken a drink, and her senses had returned with a vengeance. Her mind felt sharp, and the pain and nausea of withdrawal were nearly all gone; she was no longer distracted by the challenge of simply making it through the day. She could see and hear and smell things now that she had forgotten even existed. The shimmer coming off the water was beautiful rather than blinding. The sound of the ocean was invigorating. She could smell the sand and the salt all the way from here.

She had seen Devon get up. Had seen her take Ned’s hand, seen her take it in a way Tracy Dunn realized she was supposed to be doing herself. Then she had seen Pauline go over to them, and Pauline and Devon had said something to each other.

Pauline had reached out, and Devon’s body had twitched. Ever so slightly.

Tracy Dunn didn’t like what she was seeing.