Ivy of Our Hearts

Seventeen

"Nora." I tested her name on my tongue.

Margaret pulled herself off her elbows. Her shoulders curved in a way that would have made an orthopedic cringe. "What do you mean she isn't here?"

We waited for an answer which never came. The hand he'd used to stroke Manderley fell over his eyes.

"Nora." Margaret tested the name on her tongue. "Nora," she said it again, this time to her sweater still dripping where she'd hung it. "Who's Nora?" she mouthed at me.

"How should I know," I mouthed back, but the steady dripping of her sweater caught my attention as well. I tugged at the frayed hem of my sweater as my thoughts fell into a fixed rhythm of Nora. Nora. Nora. Drip. Drip. Drip.

Phillip never took his hand away from his eyes. After a while we stopped waiting for him to and instead watched the tide lap against the shore. It didn't bore us to just sit there. I didn't think either of us were bored, not even the bird, which from time to time would let out a caw, which I believed was meant to wake Phillip. The lap of the tide against the shore quieted the song in my heart to a murmur, both soothed me.

Margaret watched the tide in the same way she'd watched the rain during the storm, like she could command it, like if she stared hard enough Nora would appear dripping and as magnificent as her name implied. Was it possible to be haunted by a name?

Nora.

Why couldn't she have been named something extraneous, like Opaline or Ebba or Delilah? Nora implied that she, whoever she was, could haunt us whenever she pleased, that she could and would haunt Phillip. And did he want her to haunt him?

I couldn't bear it if he did, but I'd been friends with Margaret long enough, and had seen her date countless boys, to know that the touch of some was more permanent than others, and that their names must have been etched into her with permanent ink.

Even still, my mind relayed, Nora. Nora. Nora. Drip. Drip. Drip.

It went on as the sun dipped below the horizon; so that the sky looked like it had been embarrassed for us, maybe at our inability to let Nora be, and flushed a sudden deep pink. At the same time, Phillip lifted his hand and Margaret said, "Oh, so he does live."

Sitting up, he rubbed his neck, which should have been sore considering he hadn't moved for two hours.

"You sleep like the dead," Margaret said.

He punched her shoulder tenderly. "Except I wasn't sleeping."

"That must have been a good daydream then," she said. She got up and stretched.

Getting up, too, he said, "I don't dream and tell."

As they stretched and yawned, tugged on their clothes and bags, I stayed sprawled out on the blanket, listening to their banter, how they got on so well.

"What kind of dreams do you have then?" she asked.

"The kind that I don't want to share."

"The arousing kind?"

I glanced at him then. His cheeks flushed. He might have thought scratching his ear distracted from it, but it didn't because the flush had crept all the way up to his ears. He didn't deny it either. "Maybe," he said, with a slight shrug.

Margaret stuck out her bottom lip, disappointed that he hadn't told her the truth. Her teasing him could have been a way to find out more about Nora.

Phillip tugged the blanket underneath me. "I don't think I can carry you and Manderley," he said. She'd already perched on his shoulder. He waited for me to crawl off it before bundling it up and swinging it over his shoulder the way he had before.

I slipped on my backpack. Margaret and I gathered the trash. We said our goodbyes to the lake and headed back to the cabin. Gnats clung to our tanned skin but our hearts still sung despite them, despite Nora, and the fact that once we got back to the cabin her name would trail us from room to room, begging to be said again. I wanted to forget he'd ever mentioned her, but there must have been a reason why he had, that he loved her or had loved her. Love, the word had never tasted so sweet on my tongue now that I had him.

Phillip let out a long line of expletives when he saw he'd left the door open. I should have told him. "Don't come in," he said, thrusting out his arm for us to stop. He stomped in while we waited at the door. "If you're in here I will find you," he said to our four-legged intruders. "Manderley here hasn't had a decent meal in weeks. Heck, I haven't had a decent meal in weeks."

"Would you hurry up? I need to pee." Margaret shifted on her feet. When that didn't work, she knelt. "I don't think anyone's here but us," she said, as she ripped out shards of grass.

Seconds later, Phillip stuck his head out of the door. "Okay, it's all clear."

Margaret shoved her share of the trash into my chest. Phillip leapt out of the way as she ran in. "You could have used a tree you know," he said.

I slipped past him into the kitchen. "Trust me, she has," I said, dumping our trash onto the table. Manderley sat nestled above the sink. Her eyes were closed. Phillip locked the door. Yawning and running a hand through his hair, he came over. He opened the cabinet beneath the sink. A wastebasket had been hooked to the door. I handed him the trash and he shoved it all in, wiping his hands on his jeans after. He ran a finger along Manderley's head, and the bird nestled farther beneath her wings.

"Want me to make you something?" he asked me.

In the other room, a pipe sprung to life. "Hey, don't use up all of the hot water," he said. He filled the kettle, set it back onto the woodstove, and lit it. "Should be ready in a while," he said, turning back to me. "Sit down, pull out a chair, relax." He dragged out a chair and sat. After another loud yawn, he leaned back in his seat. "Are you going to stand there all night?"

While I did enjoy watching him, I tugged the straps on my backpack, my cheeks warming. I'd just realized I hadn't bathed in days and I'd been so close to him all day. Ignoring the question, I went to the bathroom door and pounded on it. "Hurry up, Margaret," I said. I wanted to add, "Why didn't you remind me that we hadn't bathed." But I didn't. I should have gotten into the lake after all.

She shouted back, "I just got in. Give me a minute."

I took a whiff of my armpits and cringed. Not good.

"The water doesn't stay too hot for long. She'll have to come out sometime." Phillip leaned against the wall; ankles crossed.

I dropped my arm, my cheeks now flaming.

"Sorry to interrupt," he said, grinning at me. "The water's almost ready."

"It needs to boil," I said, like he wouldn't have known it had to boil first. I might as well have added a duh at the end. I crossed my arms, angry now that he'd caught me in the act. A girl couldn't even smell herself in private.

He tilted his head, eyes drifting from my eyes to right below my neck.

"Why are you looking at me like that?" I asked.

He shrugged. "I don't think you smell that bad."

The bathroom door fell open enough for Margaret to ask, "Who smells bad?"

"We thought you were in the bath," Phillip said. He lifted his brow at her, like he had at Manderley, although this cocked brow meant something different.

"It got cold," she said. She stuck her arm through the crack in the door. "Ivy, would you get me something to change into."

I slipped into the bedroom, glad to have a reason to be away from him until I could bathe.