Dream Me(35)

I wondered whether Mai felt like I did, a fraud, but I suspected she didn’t. I was sure Jessie and our dinner server knew I was staff, just like them. They knew I didn’t belong there, and I didn’t want anyone to think I was trying to be someone I wasn’t. All those years of country club living. The lines behind the gates of a country club are clearly drawn and everyone knows what side they belong on. Mai wasn’t from our world, although hers was harder than mine. Mai wrote her own rules.

Nobody asked us what we wanted for dinner, they just started bringing in different courses, which were all incredible—soup, salad, actual fresh-tasting vegetables, and snapper fillets. I thought about the rosy-fleshed flowers of the sea we saw in the ice box, picked and waiting to be gutted and scaled.

After dessert, which was crème br?lée, we went up on the deck and watched ribbons of turquoise and pink sky peel off from the sun just before it slipped below the horizon. We sat on deck chairs and watched an owl glide in to settle somewhere high up on The Lucky Lady for the rest of the night. On that yacht, I wouldn’t have been surprised if a rainbow suddenly appeared and curved over us from bow to stern. I knew money didn’t buy happiness, but it was unbelievable what it did buy.

“So what do you think, Babe?”

“What?” My mind had been drifting. I’d had an amazing time, but now that it was dark my only thought was getting back to Zat and finishing what we started the night before.

“Do you want to stay for the party?” Mai was looking at me like she really wanted to but couldn’t say yes unless I agreed.

“You’ll know a lot of the kids from tennis,” LeGrand said. He was on his third drink since we got there. Who knows how many he’d had before? Anyway, he seemed to hold his liquor very well; apparently, he’d had a lot of practice.

“Umm, you mean like Mattie Lynn and her maidens-in-waiting?” I regretted those words as soon as they came out of my mouth. I’d better be careful about getting too comfortable around LeGrand and letting my guard down. It could cost me my job.

“On second thought,” Mai said.

“Ladies, do I detect you have a problem with ML?”

“ML, now is it?” Mai half-snorted.

“No, no problem. I like her, she’s a good kid.” I kicked Mai’s ankle with the side of my foot. The last thing I needed at the club was word getting out I didn’t like Mattie Lynn.

“That’s good, because I want you to know ML, or Mattie Lynn as you call her, is a great gal. A good and trusted friend of mine since we were practically babies.” I noticed his drawl was just a little bit slower. More drawn out. He was getting that sentimental tone in his voice some drunk people have. “And I will not tolerate any unkind remarks against my ML.”

I thought we’d really blown it. LeGrand’s voice warbled like he was going to burst into tears at the thought of Mattie Lynn’s halo slipping from her beautiful head. But then he took another sip of his drink and looked over at us with a wicked wink and that ironic smirk. We all burst out laughing and I was relieved, like I’d just been saved from something bad.

“How’re you such good friends if you live in Memphis?” Mai asked. “I probably know her better than you.”

Thankfully she’d dropped her snarky tone after my warning kick. Even though I got the idea LeGrand wasn’t awed by Mattie Lynn the way everyone else was, I suspected they were close on some personal level.

“We play a lot of tennis every summer. And we text occasionally during the school year. Facebook . . .” LeGrand sounded like he was reconsidering how well he did know Mattie Lynn. He had a hesitant look on his face as though he had just been confronted with a fact which put in doubt everything he’d always believed to be true.

“Anyway, we seriously wish we could stay but, unfortunately, I told my parents I’d be home early tonight. My mom needs help—”

“Wallpapering the kitchen,” Mai interjected. I guess she didn’t trust me to come up with a good enough excuse. “And I promised I’d help them.”

LeGrand held his glass up to eye level and chuckled at it as though he was sharing a private joke with his drink.

“Well, I guess I’ll see you tomorrow then, at Friends Across the Bay.”

“Friends Across the Bay,” Mai repeated. “Such great community outreach.” She really couldn’t resist and I knew I’d better get her out of there fast.

“Thanks again for dinner!”

“Thank you, ladies,” LeGrand stood up and bowed, “for your companionship.” I thought he was going to fall forward for a minute, but he caught himself.

And just as we made our way down the ramp, who should be waiting to board but Mattie Lynn and about ten or fifteen other kids, some of whom I recognized from tennis.

“Mai, so good to see yewww! How have you been this summer? Babe, are you leaving already? Won’t you stay?”

To her credit, you could totally believe she wasn’t surprised to see us there and was disappointed to see us go. But then again, maybe she thought we were delivering fish or something.

And all I could think about was the last time I saw Zat.





Twelve


That night I slept sporadically. I flopped around on my bed like a dying snapper in a bed of ice, but I didn’t feel like I was in any bed of ice. Even with the AC roaring away I woke up a few times so drenched with sweat I finally pointed the vents of the air conditioner downwards to hit me on the bed with its full frigid force. When I woke up, I couldn’t remember any of my dreams. I wasn’t sure if I’d seen Zat, but I seriously doubted it. No headache.