Hiya! Terribly sorry about the little mishap. This IS the FULL update for those who were confused by my last author's note. Please enjoy and I do plan on updating very, very soon.
In this chapter, the Grant Family take a vacation to Mellie's home state of South Carolina. Years and years have passed since Olivia came to visit Fitz in his office that night. They've gone forward, moved on, it would seem. It would seem. Little Evie is now 10, Teddy, 12 years old and as shown, inseperable.
Tell me how you find it!
Nocturne
Fourth of July, 2022-
Fitz, Mellie and the children flew out to South Carolina that year to stay at the Pritchard family's old lakehouse for the fourth of July. The place had been kept in excellent condition. Mellie's Grandpa Robbie and Grandma Maybelle had built the place together with their own two hands in 1936. It was a square lakehouse, four stories high, with a creamy eggshell paint job and navy blue shutters. The interior of the house on the lake had a rustic, mahogany colour and smell. The front lawn was thick and a bit overgrown with common weeds. No one had ever bothered to mow it after Grandpa Robbie passed away in 1989. The house was classically furnished with very little upgrades made, except the basement now doubled as both a storage space for canned tomatoes and half-century old Spam and a game room for the kids. Fitz and Mellie's master bedroom was a huge, white space with a four post white bed, flat screen tv and sliding doors that lead to the deck outside overlooking the lake. They still hadn't made the upgrade to a wireless internet connection. The requirements couldn't be met in a place so secluded, so if any of them wanted to use the computer, they they were out of luck. When Mellie informed the younger kids of this, Teddy and Evelyn argued that there would be absolutely nothing for them to do without their laptops and ipads. When Mellie suggested that they leave them at home, ten year old Teddy scoffed. They brought along the ipads tablets anyway.
In the middle of the circular lawn, an immense weeping willow slumped amongst the weeds. Mellie and her sister Harmony used to climb the branches and swing from them in the summers. They'd run around the house playing pretend. There was a big, friendlier breed of magnolia tree growing beside the house, its branches daring so close Mellie could reach out of her window and yank one inside.
The house overlooked the clear water and was totally secluded from the rest of the world. In the summers, everything was slow moving and quiet. The days edged on, still, like the lake.
All three cars pulled up to the driveway.
Karen brought along Michael, her newest boyfriend, taller than the last, less pretentious than the one before. They met in Karen's Psych class the year before and were inseparable. Karen was quite tall, strongly built. Shoulder-length, chocolate brown hair, a square jaw, bright eyes and shapely legs like Mellie.
Gerry pulled up with his very serious new girlfriend, Siobhan. Gerry looked very much like Mellie's side of the family as well, same ski-jump nose, high forehead and dimples. His girlfriend was oddly quiet at times, but nice enough. She rarely complained about anything, really. Plain and normal was written all about her. She wore forest green Chocos and her dirty blonde hair was gathered into one solid french braid down her back. Gerry loved most how smart Siobhan was, and kind.
The ride down had gone smoothly. Fitzgerald, Mellie, Teddy and Evie all rode down together in the same car. Fitz drove while Mellie rode shotgun. Mellie was craning her neck every now and again to make sure her kids were still alive in the back seats. Their heads were tucked so far into their tablets and other devices that each pair of eyes had begun to glaze over.
The house was classically furnished with very little upgrade made, except the basement now doubled as both a storage space for cans of tomatoes and century old spam and a game room for the kids. Fitz and Mellie's master bedroom was huge white space with a four post bed, flat screen TV and sliding doors that lead to the deck outside overlooking the lake.
With eight people and the dog in the lakehouse, it was sure to be a crowded weekend.
"Well, here we are, guys." Karen observed, her eyes squinted in the sun, "What do you think?"
Evie and Teddy rolled their eyes in sync and wheeled their bags to the front porch.
"They don't seem too thrilled to be out here." Michael said, concerned.
"They're just a little wiped out from the drive, I think. Once they get a solid nap in, I'm sure they'll be fine." she said with a smile. She wrapped her arm around Michael's waist, "Come on, I want to show you my old room."
It was true that the youngest of the Grant children were less than ecstatic to be on this family getaway. Sure, the lakehouse was picturesque, and the chance to spend time with their older brother and sister was a rare gem, but the car ride was cramped, long, and miserable. Not to mention Fitz's presence was sure to put a damper on their excursion.
He was as he had always been, terribly moody and stuck in his ways. Teddy at the age of twelve had seen first-hand just how stubborn his father could be. He had grown used to it, like a sick person coming to terms with an ailment. He loved Fitz. He liked the favoritism that Fitz showed him, and he liked the affection. He was, in more ways than one, a perfect son. Great grades, loads of friends, athletic prowess, and a winning attitude. It all came so easy to Teddy. He was the kind of child a father could dote on, make feel special.
But, there was an added pressure to being the favoured son, the apparent favoured child. Soccer, baseball, swimming, lacrosse, Teddy had done it all and excelled, but it was never enough. Fitz was always pushing Teddy to be more. More than he was, more than he could handle. That pressure had added strain to an already delicate father-son relationship.
"Teddy get you and your sister's bags." Fitz ordered. "And don't just leave them anywhere, take them all the way up the stairs to the second room on the left."
"Yes sir." Teddy mumbled, yanking the bags from Evie's hands. She stuck her tongue out at him playfully. He winked back at her.
"How you feelin', Dad?" Gerry asked.
"Stiff." he gruffed.
Gerry look to Evie, "How about you, munchkin?"
Evie was distracted by the look of the house. It was so old looking and marvelous in a way that the ranch back in California wasn't. Fascinating. "I'm fine." she replied, absentmindedly.
"Shit, it's hot out here." Mellie exclaimed, tugging on the neck of her lightweight blouse. "That is one thing I do not miss about South Carolina. It's always balmy as camel's hump in the summer. Christ!"
It had been years since the family had come down to stay. The last time Fitz and Mellie had come to South Carolina was in 2003 when Gerry and Karen were still learning to count on one hand. Things were different then. Quiet, more simple. Their lives had yet to be cluttered by sticky affairs, assassaination attempts or stolen elections.
Mellie was greatful for the simpler times. As much as she loved Teddy and Evie, she sometimes longed for the days when her marriage was more than just for security, or for show. She knew in her heart that Fitzgerald wanted the same thing. He only lacked the ability to show it. The Grant clan was all together for the first time and years, and this weekend had to run smoothly for them all. Mellie needed to prove to herself that when given the chance, all of them could sit down and spend some quality time together like any other all American family.
"Wow, it's beautiful." Siobhan marveled.
"It's old as dirt," Gerry said dismissively. "Come on,"
Mellie, Karen and Siobhan went into town to go grocery shopping later that evening while the others stayed behind at the house. Fitz, Michael and Gerry took to chopping firewood out back, drinking a few beers and catching up. Evie and Teddy hung out inside.
/
They had been engaging in a thrilling round of "Spy vs. Supervillain" when they both collapsed onto the couch, thoroughly tuckered out.
"You know what we should do?" Teddy said, mischievously.
"What?" Evie asked in a sigh.
"We should run away." he said.
She sniggered.
"I'm serious."
"Teddy, no. Why? Where would we even go?"
"It'll be fun. I saw the paddle boats out back, we could sneak out when it gets
dark and cross the lake. I mean, we've already got our stuff packed and everything."
She could sense the excitement mounting in his voice. He was always so clever, her brother. And, to be fair, the idea of running away did appeal to her, even if she couldn't grasp why.
"I don't think so, it's getting dark, and if Mama finds out, we're gonna get in so much trouble."
"Evie, we can paddle all the way to the next town over before anybody finds out.
Don't be such a baby."
"I'm not being a baby. I just don't want to get in trouble. And I'm a poor swimmer."
"We're not back stroking across the lake, we can take the boat." Teddy said, triumphantly.
Evie took a long pause and thought about it. Teddy could take good care of her in the unlikely scenario that something did go wrong. Plus, if they got caught, she could just argue how her big brother roped her into doing it. "How will we be able to sneak out without being seen?"
"There's a little crawl space underneath the dock. I saw it when I went downstairs. When it's dark enough, and if we're really quiet, we can slip out from our room, back down here in the basement, crawl under the dock and into the boat with all our stuff. We'll need a flashlight of course," he added, the cogs turning marvelously in his head.
A noise came from upstairs, footsteps, "Mom and Karen are back."Evie said.
"Okay, let's reconvene upstairs after dinner."
They heard the muffled call of Mellie's voice, "Evie, Teddy, haul ass, and help us get this stuff on the grill, please."
The looked at each other naughtily.
"Who's doing it, then," asked Teddy.
"I'm not."
"Me neither."
They sank further into their perches.
"NOW, kids! Help us with these groceries." Mellie demanded.
They both groaned.
/
Darkness had settled, the deck was lit by dying orange flames, flickering in and out. They had stuffed their faces with juicy cheeseburgers, charred hot dogs, pasta salad, chips, crisp veg, and they were full enough to pop.
"Okay, okay, okay, when Dad was President,"
"Oh, Karen, please, no," Fitz said, throwing his hands up into the air.
"No, no, let me finish, Dad, please. When Dad was President in I guess it was his third year, me and Gerry used to be so bad. I mean, I couldn't have been anymore than fifteen, and already I was skipping class, sneaking out of my dorm room at night to get drunk with my friends, smoking weed.
It was a mess, but for my sixteenth birthday, Fitz bought me my first car, this big, sexy, black escalade. It was gorgeous. When he gives me the keys to it, Dad goes, 'Karen, you're a good girl, I know you can handle this. Prove me right.' So, it's the night of my little boyfriend, Chris' big End of the Year party at his house. My friends in I are cruising in around town, drunk, drunk out of our minds."
"Karen, please," Mellie begged laughing hysterically, waiting for the punchline. She remembered the 2011 fiasco quite well. As funny as it was to think about now, as Karen was a grown woman, it was a nightmare when it first happened.
"I would just like to remind everyone here that had no part in this little escapade." Gerry chimed in proudly.
"Okay, so way in the car, my brand new car, on the way to Chris' party. On the highway, not ten minutes out, when who pulls up?"
"The police," Fitz said.
"The police! Of all people." she said exasperated, still reliving the experience in her mind. "I was terrified."
"I'm sure," Siobhan said.
"So, yeah we were arrested. And I had to call my Dad. I didn't do that at first though. I called a friend of my Dad's first, Olivia."
There was an odd little clink of silverware on Mellie's end of the table. Fitz fell into a random coughing spell, but everyone else was so amused, they didn't notice.
"Mum and Dad did find out about it maybe two days later and they were so pissed. They took away my credit card and my car and I had to spend the whole summer in the White House which was awful in case you were wondering."
"Thank you, honey," Mellie said, sipping her wine.
"Sorry, mom."
"So you were arrested," Michael asked, seemingly impressed.
"Detained for like, five hours, but essentially, yeah." Gerry said.
"How could I not have read about this or even heard. . ." Michael inquired.
"Olivia was always very good at what she did. Saving my behind was all in a days work."
"Fitzgerald has always kept those with extraordinary resources and, um, talents in his tight little circles. Isn't that right, honey?" Mellie replied viciously, giving eyes over to her husband.
/
Teddy and Evie had already been excused from dinner by this portion of the evening.
"Is that everything?" Evie asked, pacing around the bedroom in circles.
"Yep."
"Alright, let us go over the list one more time: canteens."
"Check."
"Blankets, pillows and what have you."
"Got 'em."
"Lighters."
"Yeah."
"Flashlight."
"Yes, Evie."
"Provisions."
"Of course. I have enough Ham n' Cheese sandwiches packed for at a week."
"The Twinkies?"
"Come on, sis." he smiled.
"Okay. This is still a bad idea." she said apprehensively.
Teddy peaked outside the window overlooking the deck. "Okay, it looks like they're finishing up. Let's head down to the basement."
Gingerly, they took the staircase down to the basement. They hung down in the room for everyone else to come back before Evelyn just couldn't wait anymore.
"It's dark, Teddy. Let's just go." she insisted
They popped open the basement window, Teddy helped Evie through first, then she grabbed his hand and pulled her brother through. On all fours, they crawled quietly underneath the wooden deck, Teddy leading the way.
It was difficult, as there was very little space between the moist ground and the wooden heading above. It occurred to Evie mid-crawl that there were probably snakes under there, but she couldn't stop. At night it was still very hot and sticky outside, she could feel herself growing sluggish. But there were only a few feet more. Teddy was leading the way. All would be well.
"Shh- quiet," he hissed.
There were footsteps from above. The light on the deck flicked on. Whoever was up there was quite still, lingering, waiting. But open discovering nothing and no one, slid the door back shut, it was dark once again.
They crawled the remaining way to the small, blue paddleboat. They both slung their bags over into it. Teddy flashed the torch into the boat to check for holes, and when all was clear, he wobbled in, one foot in front of the other. Then he sat down at the front of their vessel.
He stuck out his hand, "Come on."
Evie followed. She sat plunked down on the bench and fumbled over the knot in the rope. When it was undone, she pushed off, and they floated out.
For a long time, they paddled along in silence.
But, after a while it was getting harder for Evie to paddle because the oar was almost as big as herself and Teddy got the feeling they were steering away from their destination.
"Why do I feel like I'm the only one paddling?"
"I am, it's hard. My arms are getting tired. I can't do this anymore. I need to stop." she complained.
"Fine. Let's stop for a minute. Look over there," Teddy instructed, pointing to a far off corner of the large body of water. It was dark, but she could still make out a small clearing in the moonlight. She looked back and saw the house not far behind them. The kids were a good ten minutes out from home. They could still turn around. "That's where we're headed. That's our newest conquest. What should we call it? I think it should be called Theodoreland."
The clearing was at least another thirty minutes out. It was a funny thing, this wild dark. Back home, nighttime was night, sure. But there was always life somewhere. People somewhere. Down in the woods, there was nothing. Nothing but the murky black water and the ghoulish black trees surrounding it.
"Teddy," Evie's small voice said. She sounded sleepy, too.
"What?"
"Do you ever think about where I come from like, who my Mom and Dad are?"
"I know who your parents are."
"I know, but my real Mom and Dad. I think about them sometimes."
"Mom and Dad are your real Mom and Dad. Just like I'm your real brother and Karen's your real sister and Gerry's your real brother. We're as real as we feel. Besides," he said, his tone changing from serious to light, "where we're going there won't be any grownups ever, ever again. No one to tell us what to do or where to go. No more stupid prep school,"
"Or tennis piano lessons,"
"Or having to eat our vegetables,"
"Or bedtime!"
"And no Fitz." Teddy said pointedly. "No more dumb Dad yelling at us or bossing us around."
"No Mom." Evie was reminded sadly.
"Yeah." he agreed.
They wallowed in that reality for quite a while, each conjuring up all of the other things that wood be sorely missed when they went away. No more lacrosse, no more ice cream sundaes or pepperoni pizza. No more long drives down to the beach, no more racing bikes down the street. Maybe this wasn't such a good idea after all.
"Do you think they know?" Teddy asked, his voice shaking.
"Know what?"
"That we've left. Do you think the others have figured it out already and are looking for us?"
"Who would come looking for me, Teddy? They don't care about me, especially Fitz. He's probably happy to be rid of me. But, I don't care. It's just us now."
Looking around, Teddy could see that they had floated further out on their own and they were now sitting, in earnest, in the middle of the great lake. It was remarkably dark out there. The stench of aquatic life and algae filled their nostrils. Tiny bugs danced on the water's surface, making little click-clacks and whirring noises. Moisture permeated through the air and it was balmy out there.
Evie reached in between her legs, down into the rucksack. She couldn't see down into it, but she almost had what she was looking for when her elbow jerked and her wooden oar plopped into the deep current, disappearing underneath.
Her heart sank, with only one paddle, the journey was sure to be prolonged. She shoved her hand into the water, stretching herself as far as she could go to search for it. The boat was tipping as she reached for it and water fell into their carriage. Teddy was still looking ahead and even though she couldn't see him, save for the silver moon lining all around him, she could tell he was thinking hard.
She struggled to reach further into the water. She got down on her knees in the boat for leverage. She thought she'd had had it when-
A disappointing little splash in the water. Like a stone, not a little girl.
"What was that noise?" Teddy flicked on the flashlight and turned to his sister. But, looking back into the canoe, he saw no one.
"Evie?" he cried. He pointed the light into the thick, blue water and saw little ripples forming. "EVIE?"
He dove into the water and swam around frantically, completely unable to see. He stayed underneath for twenty seconds before poking his head back up. No sign of her. He dove further, this time swimming ten feet below the surface, willing the lung capacity to keep him there for a good minute. His fingers grazed something solid once, but reaching his hand around it, found only the second oar, he let go of it and resurfaced.
"Evie?" his called. A vomit-inducing panic set into his stomach. Was he drowning? He couldn't believe. He couldn't breathe. She could swim. She was gone. The water had taken her.
It was so dark there, so quiet, save for the sound of his own heart thumping in his head, he thought of curling up and sinking to the bottom like a stone, the water filling his eyes first, then his ears, then his lungs, and he, too would die.
/
Half an hour later, the sullen boy dripped quietly into the master bedroom. He flickered on the lamp at the bedside table.
"Teddy? What's wrong?" Fitz said groggily, too sleepy to notice his son's current state of shivering dampness.
"Something terrible's happened."
And, there it is. I'm shaking a bit myself from writing it. It was definitely an experience. Questions? Comments? Review. Review!