That Summer Place: Island Time / Old Things / Private Paradise

Summer, 1963

The Wardwells were coming back to Spruce Island. For the past three years they had returned every June, and each year Catherine Wardwell spent most of the month bugging him. He’d discovered she had an annoying habit of popping up at the worst possible moment, like when he was in the woods drinking the beers he’d found in a boat his grandfather had loaned to some sportmen. Or when he was making out with a girl named Kristy behind the old well house near the cove where her parents had moored their boat.

It was June again, and like Dylan had sung, the times they were-a-changing. The Coca-Cola Company made a major move in packaging, from bottle containers to aluminum cans. The Beach Boys hit number one on the pop charts, and Dr. Strangelove or Why I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Bomb opened in theaters with My Fair Lady.

But for Michael, June was hell month. Catherine Wardwell was back.

She was fourteen now, and she wore something called Erase for lipstick; it made her look too pale. She’d cut her hair short like some Seventeen magazine cover model. She looked pudgy and awkward and silly, as if she were trying too hard to be older.

He told her she wore too much makeup and looked half-dead. She told him his oxford shirt was buttoned too high and made him look like a geek.

It didn’t take long for her to get in his hair again. During that first week he woke up one morning and caught her peeking in the cabin window. He slipped outside and turned the hose on her.

The second week she stole a pack of cigarettes from him and had broken them all in two. He hadn’t cared much about smoking, just carried them to be cool, but to spite her he smoked all the stubs and blew the smoke in her face. She was so pig-headed she stood there and refused to run away.

But the worst incident was the afternoon he’d found a letter his dad had written to his grandfather on the day he was born, a letter that was filled with a father’s pride and dreams, things that only reminded Michael of the family he had lost.

No one had ever seen him cry; his pride would not let him show that he hurt.

But she saw him cry that day, when he was seventeen and sitting on a rock in a deserted section of the island. He thought he was alone when he sat there and sobbed in his knees.

That day she had walked right up to him and picked up the letter.

He cursed at her and tried to grab it away from her, but he could only see blurred images through his wet eyes.

She quickly stuffed it in her bra and ran away.

He didn’t have the energy to chase after her, so he just stared off into the distance, trying hard to picture his dad’s face and seeing nothing but the shadow of a tall man.

In a few minutes she came back, walking quietly.

From her tentative steps and her somber manner he could tell she’d read the letter.

She sat down next to him and handed him the crumpled paper.

He didn’t take it. Didn’t look at her. He only wanted to be left alone.

She began to smooth the paper against a rock, a lame effort to try to flatten it back to the way it had been.

It was a stupid thing to do. Like not having his dad anymore would hurt less if the letter weren’t creased.

She stopped after a minute and said nothing. Time passed in awkward and tense seconds that seemed to last an hour, one of those moments where you want to run away and hide from everything.

But she just sat there right next to him, so close that he could feel the warmth from her where their shoulders almost touched. She folded her hands in her lap and hung her head. Then she did the one thing he’d never expected.

She cried with him.

Summer, 1966

For the first time since 1963, the Wardwells had come back to the island. It was the same day he got his draft notice.

Dear Mr. Packard,

Greetings from the President of the United States…

There was no doubt the letter would change his future. The draft situation had newspapers and television stations full of protests and debates where activists argued against war, declaring the draft was archaic and unfair. Claiming you couldn’t buy beer, but you could die for your country. You couldn’t vote for the president of the United States, but you had to kill if he ordered you to.

Some who got the same letter went off to war. Some ran to Canada. But Michael just read the notice and set it down. He didn’t know how he felt about any of it. To him war seemed so far away, farther away than Vietnam. He went off into the woods to work so he wouldn’t have to think.

He hadn’t known the Wardwells were back this year. They hadn’t been back for two years so there was no reason to expect them. The moment Michael saw her leave the old house and walk down the beach toward the dock, he forgot all about the draft notice.

He was hidden in a group of cedar and maple trees that circled the cove. He was cutting wood from a tree that had fallen during the winter when he heard the hinges squeak and a screen door slam. He cast a quick glance toward the old Victorian rental house where a girl in a bright pink bikini came down the front porch steps and crossed the lawn.

He leaned a shoulder against a tree and just watched her. She had a body that was better than last month’s centerfold.

Then he recognized her face.

Gone was the pudgy and awkward blonde teen who wore too much makeup and followed him everywhere. She was taller now, a good three inches, and her shape blew him away. He remembered a poster he’d seen in Seattle, one of a soaking wet Ursula Andress dressed in a wet skin-colored bikini, her hair slicked back and her face and body guaranteed to make a man wake up in one helluva sweat.

He shook his head in disbelief. Gawky little Catherine Wardwell—the pest who knew all about sex, spied on him through windows, and had seen him cry—could have put the sexy Ursula to shame.

He felt a stab of something earthy and carnal go clear through the center of him. The ax slipped from his hand and hit the ground with a dull thud. He swore under his breath and shifted slightly.

He couldn’t take his eyes off her. And he didn’t want to.

Her hair was lighter, longer and straighter; it brushed her shoulders as she walked down to the end of the dock where a red and blue nautical beach towel lay spread out and a transistor radio with a tall silver antenna played the Lovin’ Spoonful.

He leaned against the tree and crossed his arms, then blew out a breath slowly, kind of a half whistle of amazement that a girl could be put together that way.

She bent over and tossed something on the towel.

He groaned and closed his eyes. He heard the music throbbing through the air with the same beat that his heart pounded. He opened his eyes because he couldn’t hide any longer. He had to see her.

She was standing with her toes curled over the edge of the dock, her stance stiff and straight, her arms raised high, ready to dive.

He shoved off from the tree and moved down toward her. This year things had changed; he was following her.

She dove in.

When she hit the water, his breath caught and held as if he had to hold his own breath along with her. He walked faster, down the dock toward the water. But when he reached the towel, he stopped. He stood there staring at the rings of water she left behind, while the music from the radio blared out over the cove.

Her head broke through the surface, sleek and golden and wet. He bent and flicked down the volume on the radio, then he straightened and waited until she turned in the water.

She froze the instant she saw him. “Michael?”

Her voice was older and throaty. It made him think of things like smooth soft skin. Hot deep kisses. And Trojans.

He took two steps to the edge of the dock and squatted down, resting a hand on his thigh. He just looked at her and enjoyed the view. The air grew hotter and tighter and felt heavy.