forty-nine

Aunt Gert! Aunt Gert, come quick! There’s a race car in your driveway.” Kate had heard the sound of a big engine and looked out the living room window to see an older model Ford with the number 10 painted on the door.

“Katie, have you been breathin’ ammonia in there, cleaning that bathroom?” Aunt Gert called from the kitchen.

“No! Hurry up!”

Aunt Gert made it into the living room and looked out the window just as Peyton climbed out of the car.

“He’s back!” Both women screamed it together and nearly tripped over each other racing out the front door. “Peyton!” they yelled as they ran to him and smothered him with hugs and kisses.

“Hold on just a minute, ladies!” He laughed as he struggled to free himself. “I’ll be right with you.”

Peyton held the door open and helped three passengers out of the back seat while the driver climbed out from behind the wheel.

“Lisa?” Kate said. “I can’t believe it’s you, honey!” They hugged each other before Peyton introduced Lisa to his aunt.

“Miss Lisa, I have long waited to meet you, and you do not disappoint.”

“I’m so happy to meet you, Aunt Gert. I’m sorry—I shouldn’t call you that.”

“Oh yes you should.” Aunt Gert looked at Peyton. “I like her. She’s grade A. Now who else is with us?”

“This is my friend Will Fournier, who gave us a ride from Daytona,” Peyton said.

Will stepped around the car and made an awkward bow in the general direction of Kate and Aunt Gert.

“Well, we are in your debt, Will,” Aunt Gert said as she and Kate shook his hand.

“And these two,” Peyton said, “are Bonnie and Jasper.”

Kate knelt down between the children and put her arms around them. “Hello there.”

“Hello,” said Bonnie, her voice breaking as tears rolled down her cheeks. Seeing his sister in tears made Jasper cry.

“Oh, sweethearts, what’s the matter?” Kate said.

“It’s a long, long story, Mama,” Peyton said as he and Lisa picked up the children.

“I trust more information will be forthcoming, but for now, everybody into my house,” Aunt Gert said. Will turned to get back in the car. “You too, Will. Get yourself in here. I’ve got questions and I want answers. I’m willin’ to feed you for ’em.”

Peyton hadn’t realized how much he missed the sleeping porch at Aunt Gert’s. St. Augustine had seen more rain than usual, she said, and the river was running high. Peyton could hear the swift flow outside and the calls of crickets and cicadas like voices harmonizing in a church choir. The palms and bananas surrounding the purple bungalow were whispering in the wind, which was blowing the rain outside, and thunder was rumbling off in the distance. There was no more peaceful place on earth than Aunt Gert’s sleeping porch in an early morning thunderstorm.

Peyton wished Lisa were lying here beside him. Nothing would be more perfect than sharing a thunderstorm in the quiet darkness with her. Then again, sharing anything with Lisa made it perfect. Now that he had seen what it would be like to actually live with her, to have her beside him morning and night, he didn’t know how he would get through the tedium of high school—of passing her notes in class and “no going out on a school night” and movie dates with everybody else in town. He felt married to Lisa and knew he always would.

Pirate climbed onto the bed and stretched out next to him. Peyton scratched the cat under its chin, which was the only affection it would tolerate, at least from him. “You’re a poor substitute, ol’ boy, but I guess you’re all I’ve got right now.”

Staring out at the darkness, listening as morning birds took over the night song of crickets and cicadas, Peyton wondered whether Lisa was fast asleep or lying awake, longing for him as he longed for her. Was it wrong to hope so? Nothing would ever convince him of that.

Aunt Gert fed Pirate his bacon before dishing out more of it, along with eggs, toast, and plantains, to a tableful of hungry guests. Peyton’s mother poured the orange juice, Aunt Gert offered thanks for a safe return, and everybody dug in.

“Where’s Lisa?” Bonnie asked.

“She’s calling her sister back home,” Peyton said. “Sure hope she gets good news.”

“She did,” Lisa said as she came into the kitchen and Peyton pulled out a chair for her.

Aunt Gert filled a plate for Lisa and set it on the table. “You don’t look too happy about it.”

“That’s because I don’t feel right about it,” Lisa said. “Judy got hold of Bobbie Ann in Key West. She said she didn’t tell anybody when I left. And she’s happy to lie to her mother and say I got homesick and caught a bus to Savannah this morning. It’s a two-day trip, so as long as I catch the bus in the morning, my folks will never know any different. I can go home and act like nothing ever happened.”

“I take it that doesn’t suit you?” Aunt Gert asked her.

“I don’t like lying. But more than that, it’s just so unfair to Peyton. He rescued me from my horrible cousin. He kept me safe. He risked so much for Bonnie and Jasper and found work so he could feed us all. It’s not right for my parents to treat him like every other boy in high school.” She reached over to hold Peyton’s hand under the table. “He’s not like them at all.”

“Here we go again.” Aunt Gert covered her face with her hands as if she just couldn’t face young love in her house again.

“Peyton, I don’t want to take the bus home,” Lisa said. “I want you to get your license and drive me. And when we get there, I want to tell my parents everything you did to protect me and get me home. I’ll figure out a way to keep Bobbie Ann out of it, but I want them to know what you did.”

Peyton leaned over and gave Lisa a kiss without a thought to his mother or his aunt or anything else.

“Oh, dear heaven!” Aunt Gert said.

“Anybody home?” Finn was at the kitchen door. Peyton jumped up from his place and hurried to open the door for him. “I hear you did yourself a little boatin’!” Finn said as he shook Peyton’s hand and clapped him on the back.

“You saved my life, Finn. You saved a bunch o’ lives with what you taught me. I sure do thank you.”

Finn shrugged it off. “Weren’t nothin’. ’Course, if you was to spread it around at the VFW, why, I wouldn’t object.”

“Pull up a chair,” Aunt Gert said. She fixed him a plate and a steaming cup of coffee as Peyton introduced him to Lisa and the children.

“I can’t believe I’m sitting at the table with you!” Lisa said with a big smile. “I’ve heard so much about you.”

“All true, if it was good,” Finn said with a grin.

“Well then, it’s all true.”

“Oh!” Peyton’s mother got up from the table. “I almost forgot something. I’ll be right back.” She hurried out of the kitchen and came back with a small square box wrapped in navy-blue paper and tied with a white satin bow. “Happy belated birthday,” she said as she handed it to Peyton.

“Thanks, Mama.” He untied the bow and unwrapped the box, which held a key nestled on a bed of cotton. Peyton turned it over and over in his hand, then looked up at his mother.

“What is it, Peyton?” Bonnie asked as she chewed on her third strip of bacon.

“It’s a key,” he said.

“To what?”

Again, Peyton looked at his mother, who said, “A 1947 Chevy Fleetwood convertible. The color’s called Freedom Blue. Cream interior.”

Peyton and Lisa both squealed and jumped up from the table. He lifted his mother and twirled her around the kitchen. “But—where is it?” he asked.

“Parked outside the courthouse so you can drive it right after we get your license. Aunt Gert says the clerk will let us use her address.”

“When did you have time to buy a car?”

“I didn’t. Your daddy bought it right after Christmas. We had gone out to dinner and were on our way home when he spotted it at a dealership and decided then and there that you would be driving it. He bought it that night, and we took it to your Uncle Jimmy’s for safekeeping. I asked Jimmy to have it delivered down here after you left for Key West.”

Peyton turned the key over and over in his hand. “Daddy picked it out for me?”

“Yes,” his mother said. “He was smitten with that car right from the start, and when they told him the color was called Freedom Blue, that sealed it for him. He said he couldn’t think of anything better to give you on your sixteenth birthday than a little taste of freedom.” She put her arms around Peyton and held him tight. “He loved you very much, son. Always remember that. Enjoy his gift. Make the most of it.”