Brad knew she spoke the truth. His mother would hemorrhage at simply hearing Angie’s story. His father would disown him. “We can leave” he said, “go away to California or Utah or somewhere.” “Brad,” she said, “haven’t you figured out by now that in the thousands of years of civilization by man the only thing we truly know for sure is that family is everything?” It was thirty years before he saw her again.
Brad Hawkins was lying on the beach with a tropical drink in his hand. It wasn’t his first. He reflected that he was probably headed for a serious alcohol problem…but it wasn’t really that important anymore was it? Ten months before a giant tornado had struck his home in Mississippi before going on into Alabama and Georgia to ruin more lives. When it left, it had taken his wife and two daughters, his parents, and his only living sister with it.
There had been nothing left, his business, his home, his parents’ home where his family had lived for over a hundred years, and everything he had known since his childhood was gone. He lived in an agony of guilt in the FEMA trailer they had placed on his property for a couple of months before the insurance check finally arrived. He had been on a business trip in Atlanta when the tornado struck. His entire family was at his parents’ house for a barbecue when the tornado struck out of nowhere. Their remains had been found in his dad’s storm cellar.
After the funeral expenses and the sale of the lands left to him, Brad was a millionaire several times over. He didn’t care. He drowned his feelings of guilt in oceans of Crown Royal one afternoon and he’d awakened to find himself in Destin, Florida. He’d never left. There was nothing at home for him, not a thing from his past to take him back at all.
He finished off the colorful drink and signaled to the sweet young bikini clad waitress for another. “Brad!” he reflexively looked up at the sound of his name. He couldn’t find the source of the voice, though for a moment it sounded familiar. A young man in his late twenties came running up from the beach, bending over to pick up a beach towel right in front of him. The young man looked familiar.
The faint smell of a perfume made from jasmine wafted past his nose. Brad looked inside the drink in his hand and sniffed it. This was like one of those movies where everything came back to the guy with amnesia. “Brad!” Damn it, he knew that voice. He turned to see a well- tanned woman of about his own age reach for the familiar man. She was dressed all in white, with a large white sun hat and dark glasses. There was no mistaking that face, and now he knew where he knew the voice from. The last thing he heard before he passed out was that same voice saying “watch me.”
When he awakened he was staring up into his own face, even though it was a younger version, it was his own face. Angie knelt with them, holding his hand as the young man tilted his head up to give him the lukewarm water brought by the anxious young waitress. “Angie?” he asked. Tears were in her eyes as she nodded. “What…” he started. She silenced him with a touch of her forefinger and said, “You shouldn’t talk right now. You’re dehydrated, you’ve had way too much to drink, and I believe you’ve just had a terrible shock.”
“We can get Mr. Hawkins back to his room” the waitress said, and we’ll have the hotel doctor come by and check him over. She stood aside as two young giants helped him to his feet. “I’m ok guys, but thanks.” “They have to at least go with you Mr. Hawkins, it’s hotel policy” she told him. “I’ll come with you Brad” Angie said. She kissed the young man’s cheek and told him she’d meet him later. She patted his shoulder “I know, you have questions” she said, “I’ll explain to you later, at dinner.”
Brad entered his room with Angie close behind him. “This is beautiful” she said “and so big”, taking off her hat. The air conditioning felt wonderful after the heat of the beach. “Is your family here with you?” she asked. For the first time since the funerals, he broke down and cried like a baby.
“And there was nothing left?” she asked him quietly. He nodded, “absolutely nothing. Almost fifty years of my life, and all I have is six tombstones to show for it.” He reached for the fresh bottle of Crown Royal on the coffee table before him. “Would you like a drink?” he asked. “Brad, that’s not going to bring then back” she said. He set the bottle back on the coffee table, “I know, and it really doesn’t help the hurt very much either.”
“Why didn’t you tell me I had a son?” he asked. She hung her head, not wanting to look him in the face. “I was wrong” she said, “but I couldn’t tell you.” “You were so young, so proud” she sniffed and touched her handkerchief to her eyes. “When you spoke of your home, your family, and going back to the life you had planned there. There was no room for me, no room for a child. I couldn’t bear the thought of you giving that life up to run away with me, away from the roots you held so dear.” He reached for her, to comfort her, but she held him back. “And I was furious with you because you wouldn’t” she laughed through her tears.
He laughed with her. “Life was so simple then” he said. “Everything was either black or white, no need to complicate things by adding the grays of reality.” We could have run away, you from the hardness of your life, me from the responsibilities I had inherited. “I’m so sorry” he said, but you had to have known I would have helped if you’d just told me.” “You’re still sweet” she touched his face, “but by the time I had Brad I had a plan and enough anger and determination to see it through.”
They spoke for hours, as twilight fell and they watched it from the deck of the penthouse suite. “Oh my God,” she said, “I’ve got to meet Brad for dinner. I promised to explain to him…I know he knows…you look too much alike!” He offered to go with her, but she said she thought this would be something she could do better alone. She promised to come back as soon as she could. He stood and held her “You’ve got to promise I can meet him, offer him some kind of explanation.” She kissed him softly and he was transported back to Ole Miss, to the Grove where she’d kissed him the first time. The shock went through both of them. She pulled back, surprised, and then promised she would try to set something up. When she left, he headed for a long soak and a shave. He was whistling.
She returned about eleven o’clock. Brad had had to quickly run to the Silver Sands Factory outlet in Sandestin to buy some clothes that fit. His liquid diet and lack of interest in eating had at least burned off some of the middle aged lard he had added over the years. He had nothing that fit him at all. He met her dressed business casual, and all in all he looked better than he had in years. He felt better than he had since the tornado.
She looked approvingly at him as she entered the penthouse. “There will be some rough going over the next few days,” she said, “but he’ll come around. He’s a good man.” Brad poured a stem of champagne for her and they went out on the patio deck in the moonlight. “It was still hard” she said. “I’d never told him anything about you except that I’d loved you.” “No husband?”, he asked, looking at her bare ring finger. “No husband, but many men” she laughed. “I’ve never loved any man but you and my papa and brothers” she said, gazing at him over the champagne glass. She walked to him and kissed him, and they were swamped with emotion. Her nipples hardened and showed through the white dress. He grew an erection harder than he’d known in years.
She backed away, “This is going too fast” she said. He stepped forward. “Angie, we’re almost fifty years old, nothing is fast any more. I won’t lie to you, I loved my wife. I still miss her so much it hurts every single day. I never forgot you though, and she knew it. She came to accept you as an invisible part of our marriage, even though it wasn’t fair to her.” He kissed her again, slowly, tasting the same woman he’d known thirty years before, remembering her touch, her taste, her heat. “Brad, I haven’t bathed, I’m wearing the same dress I’ve had on all day…” He silenced her the only way he could.