Hers was the last house on the ocean side of the road, but there were five more, almost identical houses facing the beach on the other side of the road before it dead-ended in a stretch of sand and low shrubs. She’d learned on the Net that each beach area had its own name, Middle Beach the next one east with Sea Grape to the west. Atlantic Beach Road had once connected to Middle Beach, an article explained, but a hurricane had washed it out twenty years earlier and it had never been rebuilt. Now you had to either walk along the sand or go back out to Route 1 and follow the signs.
Leslie turned and gazed at the ocean. The water was glass calm with tiny waves lapping at the flat, wet sand. Gulls wheeled overhead, screaming to each other and occasionally diving after fish. A pair of swans cruised low over the water, looking somehow out of place.
The Rogers Cottage bordered a small parking area that ended in a seawall that paralleled the ocean and beyond lay several yards of flat beach where water had obviously been only hours before. She’d learned that the lack of full-time beach made this section of the Connecticut shore less desirable than others. Of course, Leslie thought. That’s why the nice man in the market told her she’d need a tide chart. There was more beach area the lower the tide.
It was just after four o’clock and several women in bathing suits sat on the damp sand under a beach umbrella, supervising two young children who were paddling around in the shallow water. Colorful plastic toys littered the beach. Sandbars, interspersed with areas of flowing water, extended almost to the small rocky island about half a mile offshore. She’d read that it was called Short Island as a sort of joke, since the islet was opposite the eastern end of Long Island.
Finally, when the urge to put on a pair of shorts and wade in the water became overwhelming, Leslie got out of the car and walked past what she assumed were more rental cottages, toward the rambling, two-story building that sported the sign ATLANTIC BEACH HOTEL—ENTRANCE.
The lobby was uninspiring, but she’d been warned not to judge. Filled with white wicker and ferns, with sandy floors and whitewashed walls, it looked like something out of a photograph taken fifty years earlier. A tall, slender man in his early twenties with dark brown hair that he wore almost as long as hers and deep brown eyes stood behind a small desk. When she told him her name he tapped a few computer keys and found her reservation. As he handed her a card to sign and took an imprint of her credit card, he cast a few admiring looks her way. She ignored his appreciation. She was used to it and marveled that even a ponytail, baggy clothes over a sports bra that flattened her large breasts, and a complete lack of makeup couldn’t conceal her natural sensuality. She knew it and had grown accustomed to it. She was pretty sure he’d watch her walk out and maybe find some reason to check with her later to make sure everything was “okay in the cottage.” It was flattering of course, but it got old really quickly. She’d been dealing with it since junior high.
He explained the hotel’s policies, described the location of the air conditioner’s controls, and urged her to make full use of the kitchen or eat any or all her meals in the hotel’s dining room. He also invited her to attend the cookout the following evening. “If there’s anything I can do to make your stay more comfortable, please feel free to ask, either in person or by phone. Anything at all.”
Several minutes later, key in hand, she walked back to her new “home,” unlocked the front door, and carried her suitcases and groceries into the house. A light breeze wafted in through open windows and, although she could put on the air conditioner, she loved the smell and decided that she’d leave it off as much as possible. Resolved that she’d delay poking around the house that would be her home for the next month, she stuffed her perishables into the refrigerator then dug in a suitcase and found a pair of denim shorts and a loose-fitting, light blue T-shirt, slipped her feet into a pair of flip flops, and headed outside.
The strip of dark sand was slightly wider than it had been when she drove up and she saw that the seawall was about four feet high with sets of wooden steps at intervals leading up to the parking area. On the water side of her house and all the others to the west along the ocean was a concrete area with an outdoor table and chairs, then a long flower box to prevent you from accidentally falling off the edge of the seawall that bordered the beach.
The tide was obviously on its way out, and she wandered down to the water’s edge, slipped off her flip flops, and waded in the surprisingly warm water. She remembered a trip she’d taken to Maine with a client one summer. The water was almost unswimmably frigid so she was delighted to realize that she’d be able to paddle around in the ocean without freezing her parts off.
“Hello,” a woman’s voice called as she waded slowly through the tiny waves. Leslie turned toward the sound and a woman waved, her smile wide beneath a pair of dark sunglasses. “Come over and sit with us when you’re tired of the water.”
Leslie saw the three women she’d noticed earlier sitting in the shadow of a large beach umbrella. She wasn’t sure she wanted to visit and she didn’t quite know how she was going to answer their inevitable questions but she walked over and crouched beside a forty-something woman with piercing blue eyes and neatly cut auburn hair. “Hi. I’m Suze Murdock.” She indicated the two other women and listed their names too quickly for even Leslie, who prided herself on her ability to remember names, to catch. She leaned forward with a forced intimacy when she spoke.
“I’m Leslie. Leslie Morgan,” she said. “You must be the mayor,” she said, remembering Joe’s comments in the market. Suze. What a weird name for a mature woman, she thought.
Slightly surprised, the woman said, “How did you know that?”
“I stopped at the market in town and the guy there mentioned that we’d be neighbors.”
“Oh,” a matronly, black-haired woman said, suddenly beaming, “you must have met my husband.”
“I guess I did,” Leslie answered, settling herself on the corner of Suze’s blanket. “You must be Marie.”
The woman extended her hand and Leslie shook it. “I am, and it’s nice to meet you. We noticed you come out of the Rogers Cottage. Are you staying there?”
“I took it for the month of August.” She had resolved to answer questions as briefly as she could. She certainly didn’t want to get into what she did for a living.
“It’s a wonderful place to get away,” Suze said. “The greatest. And you summer folks are so good for our economy.” She pulled a camera from the pocket of her shorts and snapped a picture of Leslie. “That’s for my scrapbook. I keep pictures of most of the things that go on around town.” The whole idea of having her picture in Suze’s album made her a little uncomfortable, but, after all, she’d been photographed many times before in more interesting settings.
“Mark and Tammy, you’re getting too far away!” a tiny, slightly frowsy woman called. Leslie glanced down the beach and saw two young children running back up the beach. “Sorry to attempt to deafen you,” the woman said, looking apologetic. “I’m Abby Croft and those two wild animals are Tammy and Mark.” She brightened and her chin lifted when she talked about her children.
“Nice to meet you. Are you all visiting for the summer, too?”
“No, indeed,” Suze said. “Marie and I are permanent.” She said it with a bit of pride, like summer visitors weren’t quite as good. “Abby is here for the summer like you, though. Her husband, Damian, commutes here on weekends from Hartford. You married, Leslie?”
There was obviously no block in front of Suze’s mouth. “Nope. Never have been.”
“From the city?”
“Manhattan born and bred.”
Marie chuckled. “We think of the city as Hartford, since it’s so much closer. Manhattan. Joe and I used to get to the Big Apple a few times a year, for shows and such, but we haven’t had a chance to in many years. Too much to do here, and too many kids.”
“Oh?” Leslie said, glad to detour