PART I

 

 

      In a flurry of tangled arms, Mom instinctively pushed Cassie away, trying to save her—save us—from getting dragged under. When the seizure forced a final gasp, it was all too late. All Cass could do was watch, helpless, as she swallowed and sank away, a silent descent into the murky ocean, arms reaching up, eyes wide, unblinking. Our Mom’s deep blue goodbye. 

     Trauma, bubbles.

     After that, I pretty much never left my sister’s side again. I became Cassie’s living, breathing primal self, the little monster within. She needed me now more than ever. Even if she didn’t know it …

 

Grace Wilder

The Swamp House Diaries

(Page 1)

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Chapter 1

 

A BRUISED AUGUST SKY crept along on spider legs of lightning strikes and black rain far out at sea—like her, alternately wicked and gorgeous. Sitting at a little corner table at the One Ocean Lounge in Delray Beach, Cassie Wilder stared absently at the silent lightshow, reflected in the bar mirror next to her pale face. She hardly recognized herself.

     Tonight, she’d gone Casual Girl. 

     She had bought four outfits and four wigs, all at discount stores up and down the coast, from Marshall’s and T.J. Maxx to nondescript salons in dreary strip malls. Paid cash. Tonight she picked out a silky white blouse over tight blue jeans. The auburn wig with bangs. Fat reading glasses. Topped off with a smear of bright pink lipstick. Her vibe: An office staffer meeting a friend for a drink at Happy Hour.

     As soon as the waitress set down her Bombay gin and tonic on a napkin, Cassie almost spilled it, getting it to her lips. 

     “Tha—” she started to say, feeling suddenly faint, dizzy, wretched. She cleared her throat, tried again. “Thank you.” For a moment, things moved sideways: Her drink, the waitress, the walls, the bar. Moving violently, wildly, sickeningly sideways. 

     Thankfully, the sudden vertigo attacks didn’t lasted that long. But they came on more frequently now. Clear alcohol always helped. She took a healthy swallow, waiting for the gin to kick in. She couldn’t get her drink down fast enough. After a minute, the gin hit that delicious sweet spot, the room began to slow down. Everything became clearer again—illuminating. Steadier. 

     At the far side of the lounge, two men chatted it up. They liked to meet for a beer after workouts at the Second Avenue CrossFit center. A couple mid-life gym rats. She knew the brawny guy drank rapidly, because he always had some place to go at the top of the hour. When he left, his friend—late forties, wispy gray-flecked beard, shiny bald head, lean physique—finished his beer at the bar, as usual, talking to the barkeep, usually about baseball. 

     She left her corner table and sat two stools down from him and ordered another drink. The spinning, thankfully, in retreat.

     Sure enough, the Graybeard and the barkeep talked about last’s night’s exciting eleventh-inning Marlins win to move on to the division series against the Phillies. When she broke into their conversation with a prediction that Miami didn’t have the pitching to beat Philadelphia, the Graybeard countered with a friendly protest. 

     But before he could make his case to the adorably cute girl with pink lips, she waved him off, apologetically. “Sorry, the office,” she said, picking up her cellphone, suddenly sounding irritated: “What now?”

     The Graybeard retreated to his beer. 

     He struck her as someone who could get easily defeated, so she spoke rapidly into the phone. “Yes … no … just do it … What comes around, goes around …” and hung up abruptly. She spoke into her drink. “You treat people like that, you get what’s coming. Simple human nature.” He smiled politely, pretending to have a clue what she was talking about. She continued, “What’s that saying? Karma’s a bitch—no, karma’s a boomerang!” She chuckled at that, then turned toward him to get a better read, her eyes a piercing blue. “Who said that?”

     Puzzled but intrigued, the Graybeard joked, “Shakespeare?” 

     She scoffed. “As an old English Lit major, pretty sure it’s not Shakespeare. Maybe the Dalai Lama or John Lennon.” 

     “English Lit,” he repeated, a bemused look on his face. “How’s that working for you?”

     She had him. She smiled, returning demurely to her drink.“Oh, once upon a time I wanted to be a writer. So, I thought I should study the great writers. Instead, I’m a well-read secretary.”

     She finished her gin. 

     “We call them executive assistants,” he said.

     “Ha,” she chuckled. “You must be in marketing or human resources.”

     “Neither,” he said, and changed the subject. “Having a bad day?”

     “I’m starting to feel better. The boomerang has turned … as we speak.”

     “Well then, let’s celebrate. How about I buy you a drink? Salute boomeranging justice.” He smiled. “I’m Jonathan.”

     She smiled back. “Grace.”

     “Pretty name.”

     She didn’t respond but grabbed her phone and made a show of turning off the ringer. At first, he came off as somewhat shy and halting, which she thought odd, given his decent looks and the fact he exuded money. Little things. The crisp linen shirt, the soft Italian leather shoes, the manicured scruff. That Patek Phillipe watch. The guy wreaked of sporty luxe. 

     The drinks loosened him up. After a while, he became downright gabby. She learned more than she cared to know. No children, divorced, a Vet, played Yale baseball. He considered a pro career, but pursued medicine instead. Today he runs a research lab for an agricultural company. He lives alone with his cat. A rescue.

     “What kind of research lab do you run?” she asked.

     “Genetics.”

     “Ah, so you’re the one. Editing strawberries into basketballs—using that CRISPR thing.”

      “Something like that,” he chuckled. “Never underestimate a well-read executive assistant.”

     “Any regrets?” she asked.

     He looked puzzled. “About?” 

     “Messing with Mother Nature. Playing God.”

     He shrugged. “Genetic engineering is going to cure cancer.” He pointed to his bald head. “Cure this.”

      “And I thought you were being trendy.”

He laughed at that one, too. “You know, you really should write a novel. You’ve got that writerly vibe about you.”

     “Actually, I’m working on a book for a friend.”

     “You’re a ghostwriter.”

     “Hmm, I like that.”

     “Well, good for you. What’s it about?”

     “A true story that reads like medical thriller.”

     “Right up my alley. What’s the title?”

     “I’m waffling between two. The Swamp House Diaries and the more evocative Do Know Harm. As in, K-N-O-W.”

     “Ah—another ‘science is evil’ book.”

     “It’s more a cautionary tale.”

     “How’s it going so far?”

     “So far … it’s writing itself.”

     They batted it around for a while, exploring, flirty talk. Their heads tilted back, faces painted. Her legs poked out and touched his knees—when she mentioned she had a taste for something sweet. 

      He looked out the large oceanfront windows. The storm had edged far out to sea, the sky over the coast clearing up nicely. “I know a place with the best cannoli on the planet,” he said. 

     His eyes looked so hopeful. 

     She slurred, for effect. “Just desserts. Why not.”

 

 

Twilight. 

     They cruised up the coast on Highway AIA in Jonathan Nations’ silver Lexus convertible. Top down. Wind whipping. Worried the wig might fly off, she asked Jonathan for a hat. He reached into the backseat and pulled out a Nomad Blues baseball cap. She tilted it jauntily over one eye. Kicked off her flat sandals. With her feet propped against his leather glovebox, she declared: “If I would’ve known all this”—she waved her arms toward the open blue sky, the Lexus, the stereo blaring Tom Petty’s Runnin’ Down A Dream—“I would’ve picked you up.”

     They drove past Boynton and Pelican Bay and the McMansions on Manalapan, to Palm Beach, where he hung a left on Worth Avenue to Renato’s, its big lazy fans blowing air-conditioning out into an open courtyard. Surprisingly busy, he slipped the maître d’ a folded bill and got a quiet table, where they shared a bottle of red wine and a plate of appetizers—followed by a creamy latte and cannoli. 

     “Well?” he asked, after her first bite.

     “Lucky me,” she enthused, her pale eyes twinkling. 

     He chuckled at that one, and then tilted his head back, distracted. “Sorry for staring but. Your eyes. They’re wild in this light. They keep flashing, blue then green. They’re different. You’re different.”

     He leaned in and gave her a soft kiss on the lips. 

     She rolled with it. 

     Feeling emboldened, Jonathan Nations asked if she’d like to go somewhere private for a night cap, and she responded with a playful, “About time.” So, they left Renato’s and drove to the south end of Singer Island, to his tony waterfront townhome at Ocean 18, which looked like something out of Architectural Digest. All white tiled, elegantly spare, with shocks of vibrant artwork here and there. 

     She walked straight up to the colorful butterflies abstract. A Peter Max. 

     “This is an original,” she sounded impressed. “Very sixties retro of you.”

     “I had two. My ex took the twin.” A tad bitter. “Make yourself at home, Grace. I have a date with a cat.”

     She followed him into the kitchen where he opened a can of wet cat food. In pranced a beautiful yellow-eyed calico, who arched up against her bare leg, purring.

     “What’s her name?” 

     “Lucy.”

     “C’mere, Lucy, you sweet, gorgeous thing.” She picked up the cat and nuzzled her face into the soft fur. “Can I keep her?”  

     “She’s usually so skittish with strangers,” he said. “Brandy?” 

     She lifted the cat’s face to her nose. “You know, Lucy, what they say about too much liquor. Increases desire, decreases performance.”

     Jonathan Nation laughed at that. “You’re trouble.” He poured two sniffers. He then watched her step out on his balcony to take in the magnificent water views of the Palm Beach Inlet and darkening Atlantic. He drained his brandy in one gulp and came up from behind her. 

     Kissed her neck.

     “So much for the small talk,” she said. 

     She took his hand and led him into the bedroom, on the way, grabbing her shoulder bag. When she went into bathroom, she left the door slightly ajar so he could watch. She took off her thick glasses and slipped out of her jeans and slowly unbuttoned her blouse and slid it over her shoulders, careful not to disturb the wig. 

     A towel draped over her arm, she flicked off the bathroom light and moved to the side of his bed, lingering there in the moonlight, letting him take her in.

     “Now I’m the lucky one,” he sighed.

     She smiled at that. “Take off your shirt, Jon. Let me see all those crunches.”

     He wasn’t lying naked on the bed. He was propped up against a pillow, before he did exactly as she instructed. He unbuttoned his shirt and tossed it to the floor.

     Teasingly, she said, “You know, Jonathan, you’ve been wondering all night—why does this girl look so familiar?” 

     He nodded, ever so slightly. “Did cross my mind.” 

     “We met once, briefly. I wore it different,” she said, indicating her hair. “At Sweetwater.”

     She pulled off the auburn wig, shaking out her short shaggy blond hair. He started to sit up in the bed, when she dropped the smile and the towel and he caught a glint of a shiny object at the end of her outstretched arm, and then heard a soft pop-pop from the barrel of a gun. 

     He felt a sharp sting to his bare chest, and looked down, bewildered. No blood. Just two tiny red marks, like mosquito bites, over his heart. 

     “You …” he started to say, looking up, suddenly remembering. He gripped his throat, and coughed out, “You bitch.”

     Amused, she corrected him. “Boomerang. Karma’s a boomerang, not a bitch. I thought we cleared that up, Jonathan.”

     He went to stand up, but too late. He fell back into the bed, grimacing from the sudden lightning stab to his chest. His throat tightening, muscles seizing, he gasped for air and started to convulse, helpless, his eyes marbling in terror—and for a good long agonizing couple minutes, he slowly, inevitably, suffocated awake.