Harsh is the Fate

Philip ran up the beach for two miles, away from the center of activity to the south. Pausing to catch his breath, he dropped onto the sand, panting and perspiring. He let the cold surf wash over his legs, soaking his trousers. Too numb with exhaustion to care, he lay on his back and gazed up at the murky dawn sky, recalling the crisp blue Virginia sky on a certain balmy day last October.

He had stepped out of the back door at Howard Hill in time to see Caroline carrying buckets of water she’d just drawn from the well.

“My God, Carrie, put those buckets down,” he had admonished.

Caroline had turned toward him, her arms straining under the weight of the water. “But Cassie and I still have laundry to finish.”

“Let me carry those buckets for you,” he had fussed, as he relieved her of her burden. “From now on, let Cassie or someone else draw water from the well. And I will have no arguments from you, young lady,” he added, silencing any further protest.

Following her into the steamy summer kitchen, he placed the buckets on the dry sink. “I’m not sure I became a Colonel in the United States Army to fetch and carry like a house servant but for some strange reason,” he turned smoldering eyes on her, “I’m enjoying it.”

“Thank you, kind sir.” She gave him a playful curtsy.

“Come here, you saucy wench.” He pulled her into his arms and inspected her cheeks. “Let me see if there are any more freckles here.”

“Oh, you,” she cried out, and swung her fists at him.

Laughing, he gripped her wrists and kissed the small fists struggling to break free. “Why do you get so upset when I mention your freckles?”

Jerking her hands free, Caroline rubbed her wrists. “Being a man, you would not understand. I have done all I can to avoid getting them but I cannot help getting them now that I have so much outside work to do.”

Moved by her inference to the hard work she’d endured during the war years, he said, “I wasn’t making fun of you, sweetheart. Forgive me?”

She folded her arms across her chest, turned her back on him, and pouted.

“Well,” he sighed with feigned exasperation, “since you are not speaking to me, I suppose I will have to try something else to make it up to you.” Circling his arms around her waist from behind, he nuzzled her on the neck.

Her immediate response was to lean back into his embrace and mutter, “Damn Yankee.”

He spun her around to face him. “Madam, I am shocked at your unseemly language.”

Caroline suppressed a smile. “It’s your fault, Colonel darling, for contaminating my ears with your filthy army language.”

He placed a hand over his heart. “I promise to amend my uncouth speech. I certainly would not want you to acquire any more of my unsavory habits. Unless, of course, it is more of your precious little—”

Exploding into laughter, he ducked the wooden spoon she had flung at him. . .

Philip sprang into an upright position with his arm across his face as if to avoid the spoon thrown at him. But there was no wooden spoon, and no Caroline, only sand between his toes, and the smell of salty sea air.

Groggy and disoriented, he glanced around, surprised to find himself on a New Jersey beach instead of the summer kitchen at Howard Hill in Virginia. The dream was so vivid he could still taste Caroline’s lips. Smell the soapy cleanness of her skin.

Falling back onto the sand, he moaned aloud, “Oh God, will this ache for her ever go away?”