“Yeah, I’ll see you there,” I echo, watching him walk away.
“Already unpacked?”my mom asks. I’ve just finished resorting my clothes in the cabinets over the bed. The only thing I kept out was my bathing suit and a cotton dress to wear over it.
The breeze picks up and hits the kitschy wind chimes made out of pearly shells my mother hung up when we moved in. After a moment she says, “Do you want to know why I ran away back then?”
I brace myself. “Yes, if you want to tell me.”
“I want to.” She takes a deep breath and starts, “In 1974, Richard, Sugar, and I were accosted by Donald Gaskins on the highway between here and Myrtle Beach.”
This revelation should be more shocking, but it’s not. I’ve seen the scar. I’ve connected the dots, between the jagged mark on Martha’s chest and the one on my mother. Even so, I’d hoped it wasn’t true.
“Oh Mom, I’m sorry.”
“It was the single most terrifying moment in my life. I still have nightmares. I’ll wake up in the pitch black and think I’m back there. Back with him.”
I have no idea how to respond. We’ve spent the last month digging up story after story about the evil Gaskins performed, each one worse than the one before. I swallow through the lump in my throat and ask, “Did he hurt you?”
“He hurt all of us,” she says. Her voice sounds stony. “In our own ways.”
My mind spins around the book, the interviews, the desire to find other close-call victims. “Is this why you found Martha?”
“I’d always wondered if we were the anomaly. Were we the only ones that got away? It seemed unlikely since he was such a risk-taker. That wasn’t my intention with the book, though. I just needed to get the story out there. Stumbling upon the idea of other victims gave me a second focus—something positive to search for.”
I look down at my hands. “Is this why you and your family here stopped speaking for all these years?”
She nods. “We were young and immature. Terrified. Even though we walked away alive, the encounter haunted us. Unlike Martha, I didn’t find my guardian angel. All I wanted to do was blame everyone else. I blamed Sugar for talking me into sneaking out that night. I blamed Richard for his terrible carbreaking down on the side of the road. I blamed Gaskins for being a disgusting pervert. Most of all, I blamed this tiny part of the world for no longer being the safe sanctuary I thought it was. So I ran. I ran fast and furious and I never looked back.”
I knew the feeling of looking for something better in the distance. “So what exactly happened? Tell me your story.”
“Sugar loved to sneak out at night. She was the adventurous one. Skinny-dipping, smoking cigarettes, sneaking beer from her dad’s fishing cooler. The riskier, the better. During the school year she toned it down, but the minute I arrived each summer we were back to our hijinks. It scared me. I was never one for a lot of risk, but Sugar made me bold. When I was twelve, we snuck out of the house to go night swimming.” She shakes her head at the memory. “Jimmy came with us and brought a friend. Richard.”
“You met when you were twelve?”
“Yep. He was cute, even then. All legs and arms. Shaggy, blonde hair. I had the biggest crush.” I raise an eyebrow but let her continue. “We ended up not that far from here. None of these campers were here then, but our grandparents owned the property. It was all marsh lands and we mucked through the tall grass to get to the edge of the water. I remember being terrified of getting stuck, and at one point losing a shoe in the sticky mud. Richard pulled me out and carried me the rest of the way on his back. I was convinced he saved my life.”
“From that point on, the four of us we were inseparable. I was close to Sugar, of course, but Richard and I had something different. A chemistry that when we were younger was a goofy friendship. Later it became much more.”
“So you loved him?” I ask.
“So much. More than I can describe.”
“I don’t understand how you lost that? How did he fail you?”
“Gaskins messed us all up. Sugar and I were still in high school. Richard was at the Citadel but home for summer break. He’d hardened a bit—school was tough, but we spent the summer playing hard and he had finally begun to relax.
Even though we were older, our grandmother didn’t approve of us being out late, so when we got the idea to go to Myrtle Beach one night we waited until after everyone thought we were asleep and climbed out the window. Richard waited for us a block down the street in his car,” she explains. “We didn’t even make it down there. Just outside of Cherry Grove, Richard’s car died and we had to pull over. Sugar and I went out to help him, and by help, I mean hold the flashlight and wait to wave someone over.”
“That sounds familiar,” I say.
“He’d just repaired the car when Gaskins pulled up. Sugar got in the car and started it while Richard and I came face to face with this dirty old guy. Like Martha told us, Gaskins pretended to want to help. Instead, Richard got a concussion. I have this.” She pulls down her shirt enough for me to see that scar.
“So not from a fence?” I ask.
“I wish. More like a rusty hunting knife. By the grace of God it was the only physical damage he did to me. Richard came to and attacked him. Thank god for that military training. Otherwise we would have been done for. Sugar hid in the car, scared senseless, but she got the car started and was able to drive us away.”
“Wait,” I interrupt. “I don’t understand. If Richard saved you, then why did you run away? Why did you hate him?”
She sighs and looks out past the dunes toward the water. “I suppose I was embarrassed. Gaskins left me compromised. I fared better than his other victims, but I couldn’t get the feel of his hands off of me or the evil look in his eye out of my mind. I wanted away from here and away from anyone involved. Richard and Sugar were collateral damage. Then later, whenI found out they had been dating, my heart broke. I felt so betrayed.”
