The Dearly Departed (19 page)

“That's what I'm fighting,” said Sunny. “Who needs those demons anymore?”

Chet had worked his way down the bar, replenishing the peanut dishes, but returned to stand squarely in front of her, his arms crossed. “Go on. I'm interested. When did you stop trying to win trophies?”

“Really? You want to hear this?”

“It's my job,” said Chet. “Maybe I'll pick up a little golf psychology I can apply to someone else.”

“My senior year in college,” said Sunny. “I couldn't do anything right—after doing a lot right for three solid years.”

“I don't think you mean ‘a lot right.' I think you mean All-American.”

“Okay, All-American. But I lost it and I decided I didn't need it back.”

“Mental,” said Chet. “I guarantee it—strictly between the ears.”

“Whatever it took to ruin my round, I'd do it. I'd get home in two on a par five, then miss six- and seven-inch putts. I started dreading everything. Even before I teed off, I'd start thinking about how and where I was going to get snakebitten. The payoff was that Maryland made it to the nationals that year and that year only, and I didn't make the team.”

“Ouch,” said Chet.

“I took a break. A long one. When I graduated, I had no time, no money. I went to New York, so I had no land, either—which turned out to be a blessing.” She checked to see if anyone had entered the room. “After a whole spring and summer without picking up a club, I said to myself, You're pouting. You're a sore loser. Find another way to play, or you'll lose something you really love. So I took the train up to a public course in Connecticut. First, I'd walk the course with a couple of clubs and no ball. It made me something of the course crackpot.”

“Not that Zen-of-golf thing?”

“My own version,” she said. “Something like: Sunny stops thinking of herself as a prodigy and stops striving for perfection because she recognizes that she peaked at fourteen. Now I try to think, Good shot, and be satisfied. Like it's for me, not for a gallery or a match.”

“You're a better man than me,” said Chet. “
Plus,
I have to listen to these guys come in here bellyaching about how they missed by this much, and if only they had a Big Bertha or a better lie. The real good ones don't bellyache. They go out to the driving range and the putting green and they practice.”

Sunny asked who was in that category these days.

“Some new, some you know.”

“Any of my old teammates?”

Chet lowered his voice. “He didn't make it to the quarter-finals of the club championship last year—first time since he was about thirteen. He wasn't thrilled, believe me.”

“He used to cheat in high school,” said Sunny. “I don't know why I was so afraid to tell people that.”

Chet said, “Like we didn't know.”

“It was another way of ganging up on me. They all did it—I'd see their scorecards after practice rounds, and it didn't match what I saw playing behind them.”

“Tough couple of years,” said Chet.

“It wasn't the Dark Ages. It wasn't like girls had started playing sports the week before.”

Chet grabbed the wine bottle and poised it over Sunny's glass. “Refill?”

“Sure.”

“Relaxing a bit?”

“Might be.” She smiled.

“And you're not driving, right? Just ducking back through the bushes?”

“Not today. I came around and played the front nine.”

“
You?
Back-Nine Batten?”

“I'm a little old to be sneaking on. Everyone used to look the other way, but at my age it's not cute anymore.”

“You know why we didn't complain? Because we thought you had the stuff. If you were out there hacking around, sooner or later they'd have complained to your mother, God rest her soul.”

“I guess it didn't hurt to be the charity case next door, either.”

Chet stopped what he was doing—clanging cups and saucers in soapy water—to say, “What does that mean, ‘charity case'?”

“You know: the house—that arrangement. Abner Cotton?”

Chet shook his head. “I hate to burst your bubble, but I never thought anything like that. Did you ever see where I grew up? Plastic sheeting instead of storm windows? I always thought of you as this girl with nice manners and a beautiful swing. I never thought any of that other stuff. And as far as I'm concerned, you put us on the map. You can play whenever you feel like it. I'll mention it to Sid.”

“Who's Sid?”

“Bushey. The starter—all day every day since he retired.”

Chet looked up. His smile changed, became more formal. He nodded, acknowledging someone behind Sunny.

She turned around, and quickly back again. She murmured, “Shit,” then, “I should go.” But there was only one exit, and it was the door through which Randy Pope had just entered, still handsome and cocky, still with creases in his chinos and blond streaks in his hair. His firm hand guided her back to the bar.

“I missed you on the course,” he said.

“She played the front nine,” said Chet.

“Will you stay for another round? Drinks, I mean?”

“I can't,” said Sunny. “I'm already late.”

“For what?”

When she hesitated, Chet supplied, “She's going to the cemetery. It's nice this time of night.”

“I wouldn't,” said Randy. “The mosquitoes are bad enough by day, but they'll eat you alive at this hour.” He patted the stool she'd just vacated. “Please. Let me buy you a drink. Everyone in town would like the chance to sit down next to you and say how sorry we are . . .”

Chet nodded a wary approval.

Randy laughed. “Very nice. I'm the town counsel, and people are worried about having a drink with me at their friendly neighborhood country club. Good thing I'm not easily wounded.”

“Good thing,” said Sunny.

“The usual, counselor?” asked Chet.

Randy nodded. Sunny said okay, maybe she'd have something ice-cold, too. A lemonade?

“A virgin margarita,” said Chet. “My specialty.”

“How
are
you?” Randy tried again.

“How do you think I am?”

They sat in silence until he asked if she would mind sharing the taco chips. She sent them off to her right with an ungracious shove.

A minute later he asked, “You know who would be happiest of all about us having a friendly chat at the bar?”

“Don't say ‘my mother.' ”

“No—although I could make a case for that. I was going to say Regina.”

Her voice caught when she said, “Regina and I are doing just fine.”

“And that doesn't tell you anything? There isn't a syllogism here? If you and Regina are so compatible and if she thinks I have some redeeming qualities, wouldn't that suggest that I'm not an entirely worthless human being?”

Sunny shrugged.

“That's your position? Even though I'm not the same person I was in high school, and I'm sure you're not, either, you're unwilling to let bygones be bygones?”

“This isn't a good week for me,” she said. “I buried my mother less than twenty-four hours ago, so your bygones are very low on my list of priorities.”

Randy took a swig of beer and blotted his mouth. “Your mother's death was a tragedy. Absolutely. No argument there. But doesn't that put things in perspective and beg the question What did we do that was so unforgivable?”

Sunny asked evenly, “Are you talking about my tormentors?”

“Tormentors! My point exactly. What did we do other than tease you? Maybe gang up on you a little? Do that announcer thing—‘Now teeing up for King George Regional in sparkling white'—to rattle you, but it was all good clean fun. We were teenage guys, and we had a girl foisted on us who knew every rule, chapter and verse, and who did her math homework on the van. Maybe it wasn't very mature, but if you were totally honest with yourself, you'd realize we were egged on by your getting so bent out of shape at the slightest joke.”

Sunny gasped. “Did you think it was a joke to clink the loose change in your pocket, and give gimmes to everyone but me, and grind my ball into the muck and pretend the embedded-ball rule wasn't in effect?”

Randy turned his face away, but not fast enough to conceal his smile.

“
Was
it?” Sunny demanded.

“My point exactly—that Sunny Batten can throw some ancient grievance back at you, like whether or not the embedded-ball rule had been called on some muddy spring day fifteen years ago.”

“This isn't going to make her feel any better,” said Chet.

“I'm not trying to criticize you or say we didn't make your life miserable, but—”

“I'd be down to a six-inch putt,” she railed to Chet, “and one of them would say, ‘I think there's a little meat left on that bone, don't you?' ”

Randy smiled.

“You loved it! Every one of you. It was part of the golf season—torture Sunny. There wasn't one guy on the team, including Coach, who treated me like I was an equal.”

“Because you weren't! You were better.” Randy paused. “Even if you did drive from the ladies' tees.”

“You know Coach made me, and you know I hated that.”

“Look: I didn't measure your drives. If you got a few yards' advantage, that wasn't our major complaint. Some people are more fun to tease than others, and you made it very rewarding.”

Chet brought Sunny's margarita. “I'm not taking sides,” he said, “but one thing I've noticed is that guys rag on each other and make up names and do gross things and girls aren't made the same.”

“You let it rule your life,” Randy said to Sunny. “For us, golf was just one of two or three sports we played—”

“Without begging. Without having to circulate a petition.”

“That's what I'm saying—it was a very big deal to you. I understand that. Especially now.”

“Why especially now?”

“As an attorney. And an officer of the court.”

“Then don't blame the victim. Don't say, ‘If only Sunny could take a joke, if only she could have enjoyed our teasing and our conspicuously urinating behind trees, she'd have had a great couple of seasons.' ”

“She didn't have any brothers,” Randy explained to Chet. “That might have been part of the problem. My sisters can give as good as they get.”

“Remind me,” Chet said to Sunny. “Who were the other guys on the golf team?”

Sunny reeled off, “René Fournier, Jackie Buckley, Ray-Ray Goyette, Punchy Ryan, both Bettencourts—”

“Every single one's a member here,” said Chet.

“And this was the ringleader.”

“Of course,” Randy said proudly. “I was the captain.”

“And wouldn't you think they'd fake even the slightest display of team spirit at matches? If we won—thanks to me on most days—wouldn't you think there would be some high fives or some cracks in the united front?”

“Yes I would,” said Chet.

“Unh-uh. No one ever said anything remotely like ‘Thanks.' ”

“What about ‘I'm sorry'?” asked Chet.

“Least of all that,” said Sunny.

“Never?”

“Why should he? He thinks it was my fault.”

Chet moved a dish of peanuts closer to Randy. “C'mon, counselor. You're a grown-up now. When we tease the ladies, we apologize.”

“Some ladies roll with the punches,” said Randy. “Some even laugh instead of carrying a grudge.”

“What if the punches landed? What if she got scarred for life? What if she just lost her mother? What do we say then?”

“Don't bother,” said Sunny. “It's fifteen years too late.”

“Counselor?” prompted Chet.

Randy swiveled his barstool to face Sunny. “I'm willing,” he said.

“Wrong approach,” said Chet. “She doesn't have to meet you halfway.”

“In that case: I apologize, Miss Batten.”

“Say it like you mean it,” said Chet.

“I sincerely apologize for all the unconstructive and insensitive things I did, and for making your life miserable.”

“How's that?” Chet asked Sunny.

“He's a lawyer,” said Sunny.

“He's married to your best friend. He turned out okay. And what's that thing about one door closes and another opens? This could be it.”

“Meaning, I lose my mother and I gain Randy Pope as a friend?”

“Not him,” said Chet. “Regina.”

Randy put his hand out first. Reluctantly, Sunny shook it.

“Cold,” they said at the same moment.

“My fault,” said Chet.

 

A
fter all that—after the shock of finding his own would-be killer on the adjacent stool and practically getting booed in the process—Joey was disgusted to learn that the near assassin was a juvenile. Barely sixteen years old; learner's permit and no license. Eager as the boy was to confide every sin he'd ever committed, Joey couldn't even question William Thomas Dube or call his parents or do anything but give him Kleenex and, in the end, the Presidential steak and eggs. The kid prattled just the same—about sleeping at the dead man's house, about how the dead man's son was cool with everything.

The self-deputized Mrs. Loach refused to go home, and threatened to give the cowering boy the back of her hand. “He's a cold-blooded killer,” she spat out, then louder, to the boy, “Murderer!”

“
Attempted,
Ma,” said Joey. “Not to mention
alleged.
”

“When are you turning seventeen?” she demanded. “Because that's when the law catches up with people like you. I'm going to send you a birthday card in prison that says, ‘Now you're an adult. Now you're in for it.' ”