“I’m sorry, Cowney. Sometimes I poke fun when I’m on edge.” Essie settled deeper into her seat and pulled a small, golden mirror from her handbag. She drew an errant strand of dark, chestnut hair from her left cheek and tucked it behind her ear. With her other hand, she steadied the compact in front of her and admired the reflection of the procedure. If she had been like most girls I knew, her next move would be to produce a shiny tube of deep red lipstick and slowly apply it as I wiped away the beads of sweat forming on my own upper lip. Unfortunately, at least in this moment, Essie was not like most other girls. She tucked the mirror back into her black bag and balanced her chin in the palm of her hand, resting her right elbow on the passenger side door.
And still the perspiration came. It edged its way up my spine, forcing me to pull my chest forward into the steering wheel so that fresh air could dry the back of my damp shirt. The sweat then ringed my collar and finally framed my hairline. I rubbed my face as if I was still sleepy from the early-morning departure, but the foggy embarrassment was too much to absorb. Until now, I assumed that I looked at Essie like I looked at every female of a certain age. There was little distinction in my immature lust, not that I had the right to be discerning. She did nothing to evoke a deep longing. She sat prudishly, reserved and so utterly unaware of her femininity that it was as if I was compelled to seek it out on my own. Though I was slightly older, I felt ingenuous in her presence.
From the margins of my peripheral vision, she appeared almost wistful. The car’s right two tires grumbled across the rocky shoulder of the road, and I eased the steering wheel straight so as not to worry her. I was sure the awkwardness of my lame foot anywhere near the gas pedal had already done enough of that, and I didn’t need her questioning my equilibrium on top of everything else.
“It’s okay. I talk too much. Everybody tells me that.”
“No. I mean, it’s a long ride, right? Tell me more. I like a mystery.” Essie smiled, crossing her arms and leaning back.
Fresh air in the car gently circulated and for the first time during the whole ride, I began to really see Essie for who she might want to be: a respected lady rather than a respectable lady. Maybe she would be a detective, a mystery writer, or a scientist. Maybe we would both become scientists, discover cures to childhood diseases and deformities together in our shared laboratory. The possibilities coursed through my thoughts, but I forced myself to confine them there. I gave her that moment. Shut my big mouth and just nodded.
Within half an hour, Essie was drifting in and out of sleep, jerking her head upright periodically and fumbling to make a pillow of her clenched hands. There was a sweet innocence in her uncontrolled movements. It was a vulnerability that made me feel that at least her unconscious self had some level of trust in me, that maybe she wasn’t worried that my gimp foot would cause us to wreck or that my unsophisticated ways would lead us down the wrong road.
The only two people who had ever trusted me to drive them before were Lishie and my uncle Bud, and Bud had to be pretty damn desperate or incapacitated to allow someone else to drive him anywhere. He would huff like a deflating balloon because I was driving too fast or sigh, with a slow leak, because I was driving too cautiously. We shared the car between the three of us, so with me working in Asheville, Bud would have to get used to walking while I was away or get his broken-down pickup fixed after three years sitting idle in the yard. But Essie’s trust, that was something far better than Lishie or Bud could provide, and even though she didn’t say another word to me on the drive for quite some time, I still relished knowing she might be dreaming next to me.
When Essie and I arrived in Asheville proper not long after, she yawned, arched her back, and smiled again. The sidewalks on either side of us seemed to move like conveyor belts as sharply dressed men fell into office buildings and tightly dressed women pulled small children behind them, careful not to drop purses or their early-morning purchases. An almost rhythmic opus of car horns signaled lackadaisical street-crossers and distracted drivers. A haze of dust and cigarette smoke billowed from passing cars. The starched pallor of city dappers (as my uncle liked to call them) was threatened with each turn of the steering wheel or application of the squeaking brake pads. Emerging sunlight sparkled off copper guttering and art deco tile designs framing doorways. I wished desperately that I could tune a car radio to mellow jazz. One of the first items on my list after a few paychecks was to buy a radio. I wouldn’t be able to buy one just for the car, but maybe I could take it with me on long rides if I stockpiled enough batteries. In truth, I didn’t know a whole heck of a lot about jazz, but there was no denying that one true fact—Asheville was a jazz city. It breathed blue notes.
By the turn of the second signal light, I was swerving consistently to avoid an errant stray dog or misguided fruit cart. The tempo had taken a strong upturn. Essie, now fully awake, gripped her purse with one hand and the edge of the seat with her other, signaling her distaste for my navigational talents. “We’re not in that big of a hurry, are we? I think we could have bypassed some of this. That way you wouldn’t be in such a rush.”
I had little time to consider her comforts, not entirely sure of my route, though I had navigated the streets before. In truth, this was not the most direct route to the resort, but I thought the excitement of downtown might conjure a smile from Essie. She seemed more “city” than any other girl I knew back home. I gambled on her inborn metropolitan inclination.
My foot ached from the constant stop-and-go pressure on the brake and clutch. I needed to stretch my legs. My toes started to go numb. I was quickly regretting my decision to prolong the ride. The slow traffic allowed me the opportunity to fully sense a distinct nervousness about Essie as well. She lifted her chin as she looked out the windows, as if to imply to the passersby that I was most certainly her driver and that was all. She brushed the skirt of her dress flat and patted the sides of her head, sticking her up-do into permanent alignment. None of this was for my benefit. Her breathing became deep and rhythmic, in the way that nearly forced me to mimic it myself. She was calming herself. I never would have thought a girl like that got nervous.
By the third traffic light, as we now eased into the heart of Asheville’s downtown, Essie sighed again; but this time it was different. The tall buildings folded around us, concrete sisters of the Smoky Mountains edging the horizon. Essie squared her shoulders. A peaceful energy surrounded her. It was almost as if she had finally aligned herself with the morning sunrise, a calm after an invisible storm. The golden glow cocooned her body.
Given the week I had in Cherokee under Bud’s surveillance before Essie and I made our trip to Asheville, though I know now I was wrong, I would have thought it was sheer luck or divinity that placed me in the driver’s seat. Try and relax, I told myself. Perhaps it was the discussion about the inn’s rumors or what it might be built upon, but the road ahead felt uneasy in more ways than one—as if the wheels of the car were rolling over secrets.
Chapter Five
I eased the Model T up the private driveway, feeling as much a newcomer as Essie probably did. Essie’s fidgeting in the passenger’s seat seemed to feed my own unrest as we wound our way up the driveway to the inn. Iron gates and alabaster homes lined the path, each in competition with the Grove Park’s opulence. As we edged the top of the hill, newly erected barbed-wire fencing, completely at odds with the serenity of the property, unsettled me. The only barbed wire I had seen at home was used to keep cattle and horses corralled. I had ripped more than one pair of good jeans on those fences.