But instead she tossed it into the fire.
“No!” Doug said. He leaped to his feet and reached out to save it, but the fire was too big and hungry. The pages of the Notebook were swallowed in a burst of white light.
There was a confused murmur around the fire. Had anyone understood what just happened? Pauline dashed for the house. Doug wanted to chase her down and demand an explanation. What the hell was she thinking? What had she just done? He collapsed into his chair; his legs felt heavy and useless. As he stared into the fire, his eyes blurred with tears.
Your father will be a cause for concern.
Doug pinched the bridge of his nose. The wedding was over. Really over. Beth’s precious words, gone up in smoke. In a way, it felt like losing her all over again. And he had never gotten to read the last page.
Doug pushed himself to his feet and walked around the circle to check on Jenna. Had she seen what happened?
No—she was curled up in Stuart’s lap with her pretty blond head resting on his chest. She was singing along with the guitar player: They are one person, they are two alone, they are three together, they are for each other. Her face was serene, as though everything was right with the world.
THE NOTEBOOK, PAGE 43
The Honeymoon
I really wanted to go to Europe—Italy or London—but we didn’t have the money and your father was studying for the bar. And so your father chose St. John because it didn’t require a passport, it was tropical, and because we could camp there. It was cheap.
I was skeptical about his choice at first because it wasn’t what I had imagined I wanted, but I fell in love with the place the second the ferry pulled into Cruz Bay. St. John has a magic and a uniqueness, just like Nantucket. It is 70 percent national park, and it is breathtaking.
Daddy and I stayed at the Maho Bay campground, where we lived in a rustic cabin. We heated water in a large black bladder and took what we called sun showers. We rented a kayak. Daddy paddled and I lay across the front like Cleopatra. We hiked through the ruins of the old Danish sugar plantations. We snorkeled with rays and sea turtles, we encountered wild donkeys walking along the side of the road, we gazed at the stars from the beach, we drank rum punch.
Daddy and I returned to St. John on our twenty-fifth anniversary. We stayed at Caneel Bay, and we ate lobster every night. We rented a nice new Jeep. We did the island like people who had money, but we were no more or less happy than we had been the first time. It was exactly the same. All that mattered was that we were together.
SUNDAY
ANN
Beau—the White Elephant bartender, originally from Charleston—made the best whiskey sours Ann had ever tasted. She drank one down as she oversaw the preparations for the brunch, and doing so put her in an excellent mood. It was a sparkling, sunny day, and the open-sided tent on the front lawn of the White Elephant had resplendent views of the harbor. Under the tent were two long tables swathed in white linen, each with twenty-four seats, and eight arrangements of luscious, multicolored hothouse roses in round cut-crystal bowls. The waiters had chilled two cases of good champagne (Pommery, a favorite since the wine-tasting group). The orange juice, Ann had been assured, was freshly squeezed, pressed by the tiny hands of industrious elves all night long—or so joked Confederate Beau, who couldn’t have been more beguiling. Ann was wearing a white lace sundress and her new pearl choker; she could now wear white without worrying about competing with the bride.
The buffet included standard brunch fare—fruit salad served in a carved-out watermelon, Danish, bagels and muffins, as well as bacon, hash browns, and home fries, eggs Benedict with Canadian bacon, spinach, or lobster, and an omelet station. In addition were Ann’s regional specialties: barbecue from Bullock’s, fried chicken, collard greens, hush puppies, coleslaw, regular grits and cheesy grits. Later they would bring out banana pudding, a bourbon pecan pie, and red velvet cake.
The Dixieland band—five men in their sixties, two with white handlebar mustaches, all five wearing peppermint-striped shirts, suspenders, and straw boaters—were tuning up. There was a small dance floor. Ann was a little disappointed that only fifty people had RSVP’d—she had been hoping for eighty to a hundred—but the right people would be here. All the groomsmen were coming, all the Carmichaels, and Maisy and Sam, and all of Ann and Jim’s friends from Durham.
And Helen was coming—or at least Ann believed she was coming. She had RSVP’d yes, although that seemed to have a fluid definition for Helen. She clearly thought it was okay to say she would be in attendance and then not show. Her place at dinner the night before had sat empty, although no one had missed her, with the possible exception of Maisy—and so Ann figured it was probably a wise decision Helen had made, despite its rudeness. And Jim had been right: Ann was far happier without Helen under the tent. Ann didn’t know if she should wish for Helen to show today or not. “Not show” would be the obvious answer—let Helen loll around in bed with Skip Lafferty all morning—but a part of Ann still wanted to prove something to Helen. This was Ann’s party—and look how lovely it was!