Alma picked nervously at the mound of chicken salad on her plate. Her stomach was in knots, and she wasn’t sure how she would manage another bite of the sweet, creamy concoction. She used her silver fork to stab a mayo-slathered pineapple and washed it down with a gulp of oversweetened iced tea.
Whit sat glowering next to her at the table. He didn’t even pretend to eat. That left Alma, Evan, and his aunt Maggie and uncle Sexton to try to make conversation. Alma and the senator both seemed unable to meet the challenge, but Evan and Aunt Maggie were doing their best.
“Did you get a chance to talk with Emma Jane Watson at your party?” Evan’s aunt asked.
“Yes, ma’am. She seems to like Suwanee.”
“And her mother told me that she’ll be coming out this summer,” Mrs. Prentiss said.
Coming out?
Alma shot Whit a glance. He rolled his eyes and mouthed, “Debutantes.”
Alma catalogued the phrase in her mind, surprised to learn that there was another meaning for “coming out.”
“I’ll ask your mother if she’d like to host a tea for Emma Jane in July. You know, her mother hosted a lovely party for Lucy and Annabeth when they came out.”
Whit leaned in to whisper in Alma’s ear. “I’m still waiting for my party.”
Alma lifted her napkin to her mouth, stifling a giggle. Maybe she was wrong about Whit. Maybe he was sure about his identity.
It felt good to hold back a laugh, to get her mind off of the real reason they were here—even if only for a minute. On the drive to Lake Rabun, Evan had assured Alma that everyone knew why they were coming. So why were they having a polite meal filled with meaningless chitchat? Wasn’t anyone going to get to the point?
Aunt Maggie’s chair scraped lightly across the floor. She stood to clear the table, and Alma stood to help. They silently removed the china plates, crystal glasses, and heavy silver cutlery. This was not exactly what she had imagined for a casual Sunday lunch at a “cottage” on Lake Rabun. She was expecting maybe fried chicken and coleslaw on paper plates.
To get here, they drove along country roads, Southern style—the kind with dilapidated double-wide trailers and rusted-out trucks up on blocks in weedy yards. Eventually, the trailers gave way to stately homes that had to be about a hundred years old. Apparently these houses had been in families for generations. They all stood on rolling, manicured lawns, across a small lane from the lake. On the other side of the lane, each house had what Evan called boathouses, but what any normal person would describe as full-sized homes built on stilts over the lake.
Alma thought that she had seen over-the-top, but this was new. It was a tasteful, chicken-salad-on-china-plates, old-South opulence that would scoff at ostentation. Part of her longed to spend a summer afternoon curled up in one of these white Adirondack chairs, reading a good book beside the lake. Another part of her felt nauseated by this wealth-saturated beauty smack in the middle of poverty. Or maybe there was just too much mayonnaise in the chicken salad. Alma hated mayonnaise.
She returned from the kitchen to find that Evan and his uncle were no longer at the table. They were nowhere to be seen.
Aunt Maggie spoke to her, gently.
“Alma, dear, Evan and his uncle have gone into the library to talk. May I offer you some more iced tea?”
Anxiety rose in her chest. What would she do in this house without Evan?
“No, thank you,” she replied politely.
“There’s no reason to keep Alma locked up here, Mother,” Whit announced. “Won’t you allow me to show her the sights?” He spoke as if this were a cruel joke.
His mom shook her head vigorously, but he continued, speaking slowly, as if to a small child.
“Alma, darling, can you promise my mother that you will not permit me to ingest any, ahem, substances while we are on our little tour?”
Mrs. Prentiss’s face went red.
“And that you will not permit me to enter Mr. Wilson’s drugstore to purchase any cough syrups, et cetera?” He drew out the “et cetera.”
Alma realized that Whit was the one being held prisoner here.
Mrs. Prentiss looked directly at Alma and forced an everything-is-just-fine smile.
“As a matter of fact, I do need some Aleve. I just ran out and my tennis elbow is flaring up again. Alma, would you like to walk with Whit down to the drugstore?”
Alma nodded. “Sure,” she said.
“It does seem to have warmed up quite a bit from yesterday,” Mrs. Prentiss said. “Fresh air probably would do you both some good.”
At this, her first acknowledgement that anything was actually wrong with Alma, that any crisis at all had occurred in her life, Mrs. Prentiss reached into her purse, gave Alma a twenty-dollar bill, and walked away.
“Free at last,” Whit said. “Let’s get out of here before she changes her mind.”
She and Whit rushed from the house. It was a nice day, sunny and cool but not biting cold as the day before, and the air felt good pumping through her lungs.
“So, you’re under house arrest?” Alma asked.
They walked along the winding lane that hugged the shoreline.
“Yes. After my visit to the hospital Friday night, my parents decided that I need another twenty-eight-day vacation. Until that fun begins, I’m imprisoned here in socialite hell with my mother.”
“Rehab?”
“Mmm-hmm.”
“But you don’t want to go?”
Whit stopped walking and whipped his head toward her, eyebrows raised.
“You’ve obviously never experienced the joys of the twenty-eight-day program.”
“No.”
“Well then, suffice it to say that no, I am not inclined to go back to rehab.”
Alma wondered how many times a seventeen-year-old kid could have been in rehab, but she thought it might be weird to ask.
“You know, Whit,” she said, “this little prison of yours isn’t so shabby. You should see where my dad and brother are hanging out.”
“I heard about their situation,” Whit said. “What a debacle.” He shook his head. “Only in Gilbert County, Georgia—imbecile capital of the world.”
“Actually, it’s happening all over the country, especially in the South,” Alma said. “Looks like Gilbert County’s got some competition for that title.”
“And this, uh, strategy is intended to solve what problem, precisely?”
“The problem of people like me hanging out with people like you, I guess.”
“Ah, well, that makes perfect sense, then. They definitely should continue on course.”
His deadpan delivery was flawless.
Alma knew he was a mess, but she loved being with Whit. He was eccentric, sarcastic, and inclined to use big words. All of these traits, in her estimation, were assets.
“Wanna see the dam before we go on your little errand for my mother?” Whit asked.
“Sure,” Alma replied.
They turned off the lane and onto a gravel road. Whit pulled a beat-up pewter flask from his waistband, unscrewed it, and took a deep swig.
“Am I supposed to take that away from you?” Alma asked.
“Most certainly, yes.” Whit replied. “Do you want some?”
“No, thanks. I’m still getting over Friday night.”
“Me, too,” Whit said. “Thus the need for my friend here.”
He lifted the flask toward her, and she saw that it was engraved with “SWP III.”
“It has your initials?”
“Sexton Whitfield Prentiss the Third,” he said.
Who carried an engraved flask around? And what kind of name was Sexton Whitfield anyway? Alma marveled that the name had survived three generations, even without any discernible first name embedded anywhere in it.
“Was that like a Christmas present or something?” she asked.
“Yes, to myself, three years ago. Since then, it’s been a constant companion.”
The gravel road ended at a narrow bridge. On one side of the bridge, sparkling waters filled the crevices between sloping mountains, forming Lake Rabun. On the other side stretched a void from which emerged the deafening roar of falling water.
“Mathis Dam,” Whit announced. “It feeds energy to the Terrora Power Plant.”
Whit took Alma’s elbow and pulled her toward the dam.
“I’ve always liked that name,” he said. “I mean, Terrora power. There’s something poetic about power and terror in the same name. You know?”
Then he led the way onto the narrow bridge that separated deep waters from nothingness.
* * *
Evan hadn’t wanted to leave Alma alone out there, but when his uncle took his arm and sternly led him into the library, he didn’t seem to have any choice.
“Evan, son,” he began once he had closed the door behind them, “I’m very disappointed in you. You’ve shown poor judgment bringing her into our home.”
So Alma had been right. Thirty-six hours and the revelation that his girlfriend was an “illegal” produced a complete reversal in his uncle’s opinion of her. She was no longer the “great gal” who charmed him at the country club. She was “her.” And she was not welcome in his house.
Evan’s uncle went to a mahogany table, lifted a glass decanter, and poured himself a drink. Bourbon, probably.
His uncle stood and sipped, gazing out the window toward the lake, while Evan began describing all that he knew about the García family’s situation.
His uncle listened patiently. Then he sat next to Evan in a wing-backed leather chair and asked, “Son, are you still escorting your mom to all those charity events?”
“Yes, sir,” Evan replied, confused.
“And how’s that working out for you?”
“OK, I guess. What’s this got to do with anything?”
Evan had no idea where this conversation was intended to take them.
“I don’t want to be unkind, son. But I do want you to recognize that children pay for the mistakes of their parents. That’s just how life works, whether we like it or not.”
Evan didn’t want to grasp the connections that his uncle was working to establish.
“Uncle Sexton,” Evan said, “my dad is a selfish ass who refuses to grow up. I know that.”
“Well, at least we can agree on that today,” his uncle replied, taking another sip.
“But I choose to fill in when he abandons my mom. It’s my decision.” He remembered Alma sitting on that bench at school, telling her story. “Alma and Raúl, they didn’t get to make a choice, and Mr. García is about as far from a selfish ass as any man can be.”
“But he made a bad choice, Evan. And now he and his family have to live with the consequences.”
Evan felt the anger rising. He turned to face his uncle, who stood and walked slowly back toward the window.
“How can you say that, Uncle Sexton? It was the only choice he could make if he wanted to give his kids a future. He gave up so much for them.” Evan could almost feel Alma’s body, brittle against him, after she had told him the worst part. “Alma’s mom died in the desert for this,” Evan said, his voice rising. “She died. Do you have any idea how many people die in the desert trying to get here?”
His uncle turned to face him squarely.
“Yes, son. I know all too well. And I’m very sorry for your friend and her brother. But I need you to listen carefully to me. There’s not a damned thing I can do about this. If I were to help your friend, the entire state of Georgia would be on that lawn outside my office tomorrow, waving their signs and yanking their votes. It would be political suicide, son.”
Furious, Evan stood and tried to speak, wanting to ask his uncle who the selfish ass was now. But Uncle Sexton held up his hand to pause Evan’s interruption.
“But more importantly,” he said, “I have sworn to support and defend the Constitution of the United States and to represent the people of Georgia, Evan. It’s my job to understand their interests and to make those known in Washington. And the people of Georgia want an end to illegal immigration.”
Evan’s head was spinning. He slumped back in his chair and rested his forehead on his hand.
“And what about family?” he asked, unable to look up. “What about your responsibility to your family?”
Evan’s uncle sat down next to him and touched him lightly on the arm. “Evan, I love you like a son. You know that.” A subtle trace of emotion rose in his uncle’s voice. “I want what’s best for you. But I also need for you to know this: being part of a political family means we sometimes sacrifice our own wants and needs for the wants and needs of the people.”
“Even when the people are wrong?”
“I don’t believe the people are wrong about this, Evan. But yes, sometimes even when the people are wrong. Your mother and I have known that for a long time.”
“How?” Evan exploded. “How can you possibly not see the ugly wrongness of all of this, Uncle Sexton? I just don’t get it.”
His uncle gazed out over the lake, saying nothing.
“Do you know that I went to the jail yesterday? I went to post bail for Raúl and Mr. García.”
“I know, Evan. Your Uncle Buddy called to tell me.”
“And did he tell you,” Evan asked, emotion rising in his voice, “did he tell you that when I came in, he patted me on the back and said not to worry. He told me ‘boys will be boys’ or some bullshit like that.”
“No, son. He told me you were upset, though.”
Evan slumped deeper into the chair. He felt like screaming and crying at the same time. He felt completely out of control.
“He told me he would get my friends out, but that was before he knew who my friends were.”
“What’s your point, son?”
Evan tried again, this time cutting to the chase.
“Maybe the sacrifices you and Mom keep making, maybe they’re a mistake. Maybe they’re the mistakes that my mom is paying for, that I’m paying for.” He paced in front of the window. “Maybe they’re just eating away at our whole family.” He stopped and looked directly at his uncle. “I mean, hell, look at your own son.”
Evan involuntarily tossed his head toward the room where Whit, messed up out of his head at noon on a Sunday, recently sat slumped in a chair, eating nothing, saying nothing.
“Listen to me, boy. I’m not sure what you’re trying to say, and frankly I don’t think I want to know,” his uncle almost whispered. “But I am sure about this: It is time for you to end this thing with Eduardo García’s daughter. It’s time for our family to move past this particular set of mistakes before we have to live with some ugly consequences.”
“No,” Evan said simply. “I’m not abandoning Alma for ‘the good of the family.’”
He turned his back to his uncle and stared out the window.
“I know it must seem a hard thing to do now,” his uncle said, moving beside him. “But you’re young, and you’ve got a lot of life ahead of you.” His uncle lifted a hand and placed it on Evan’s shoulder. “In a few months, you’ll be far away from all of this, playing soccer, enjoying college.” He wasn’t looking at Evan. Both of them had eyes fixed on the horizon. “You’ll forget all about this mess.”
Evan pulled away from his grip.
“It’s way too late for that, Uncle Sexton,” he said. “Alma and Raúl, Whit and I—we’re already living with the ugly consequences of a bunch of mistakes we never made. We can’t escape them. I mean, damn, look how hard your son tries.” Evan stepped toward the door. “But I’m not Whit, and I don’t want to escape them. I want to fix them, and I will.” He paused and then corrected himself. “Alma and I, we will. Together.”
He turned his back on the only real father he had ever known, and walked away.