A Seaside Story Read online

  A Seaside Story

  A Novel

  C. J. Foster

  Foundations Book Publishing

  Brandon, MS 39047

  www.FoundationsBooks.net

  A Seaside Story

  By C.J. Foster

  Cover by Dawné Dominique Copyright © 2020

  Edited and formatted by Steve Soderquist

  Copyright 2020© C.J. Foster

  Published in the United States of America

  Worldwide Electronic & Digital Rights

  Worldwide English Language Print Rights

  All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced, scanned or distributed in any form, including digital and electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system, without the prior written consent of the Publisher, except for brief quotes for use in reviews.

  This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, businesses, places, events, and incidents are either the products of the author’s imagination or used in a fictitious manner. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, or actual events is purely coincidental.

  To my beloved mother…

  Table of Contents

  Chapter One

  Chapter Two

  Chapter Three

  Chapter Four

  Chapter Five

  Chapter Six

  Chapter Seven

  Chapter Eight

  Chapter Nine

  Chapter Ten

  Chapter Eleven

  Chapter Twelve

  Chapter Thirteen

  Chapter Fourteen

  Chapter Fifteen

  Chapter Sixteen

  Chapter Seventeen

  Chapter Eighteen

  Chapter Nineteen

  Chapter Twenty

  Chapter Twenty-One

  Chapter Twenty-Two

  Chapter Twenty-Three

  Chapter Twenty-Four

  Chapter Twenty-Five

  Chapter Twenty-Six

  Chapter Twenty-Seven

  Chapter Twenty-Eight

  Chapter Twenty-Nine

  Chapter Thirty

  Chapter Thirty-One

  Chapter Thirty-Two

  Chapter Thirty-Three

  Chapter Thirty-Four

  Chapter Thirty-Five

  Chapter Thirty-Six

  Chapter Thirty-Seven

  Chapter Thirty-Eight

  Chapter Thirty-Nine

  Chapter Forty

  Chapter Forty-One

  About the Author

  More from Foundations Book Publishing

  Chapter One

  “The Strip is no place to take the boy,” Lydia Toscano declared, and not for the first time since Kate had originally announced her intentions.

  The latter, accustomed to her mother’s annoying affinity for beating even the most inconsequential issues to death, looked up from the last of her packing. “Vegas isn’t just The Strip, Mom,” Kate reminded her, amused by the older woman’s perceptions that the entire city was comprised of mob-run casinos, superficial celebrities, and quickie wedding chapels that featured serenades by Elvis impersonators.

  “How should I know?” Lydia retorted. “It’s all that boss of yours ever lets you write about.”

  Kate sighed, mindful of the reality that Lydia rarely read anything past Vegas Essential’s table of contents because it was a glamorous world that she simply couldn’t relate to. She was mindful as well the unsettling events of the past week had made her mother even edgier and more contrary than usual. Kate absently tucked her black pumps into the space between her bathrobe and quilted lingerie bag. “I think a little change of scenery might do him a world of good,” she said. Unspoken between them hovered the painful words neither one was quite ready to accept.

  Cassy isn’t coming back. Cassy is dead.

  Lydia was now clucking her tongue as she paced the length of Kate’s former bedroom. “You have no idea what you’re getting yourself into,” she warned. “A boy like that—“

  “His name’s Jimmy, Mom.”

  Lydia glared at her. “Are you saying I don’t know my own grandson’s name?”

  “Well, as infrequently as you use it…” Kate let the sentence go unfinished, opting instead for a diversion that would allow her to finish her packing in peace. “I’ll need you to get me the doctor’s phone number in case there’s any problem filling prescriptions.”

  Lydia put both hands on the armrests to push herself out of the comfy depths of an overstuffed—and much-circulated—chair that had seen better days. It had begun its service in the living room when Kate’s parents were newlyweds, gravitated to the master bedroom as the bedtime-story chair when Kate and Cassy were little, then finally found its current niche when Kate left home to go to college. At this moment, though, the only thing Kate could see was how fatigued and fragile her mother suddenly looked to her as she crossed the room and stepped out into the hallway.

  The Toscano women had always shared a lean physique and varying degrees of sun-kissed blonde hair. From her late father, Kate had also inherited deep green eyes and a defiant chin. On what had become too infrequent visits lately to the Jersey shore of her birth, she’d catch herself looking at the now silver-haired Lydia and wondering how much of what she saw was a glimpse into the future. Was it just the hardships of life in general that had taken such a perceptible toll on a woman who had yet to turn sixty, Kate wondered? Or had whatever enthusiasm Lydia once embraced for getting up every morning fallen by the wayside when she became a widow?

  As she folded the silk jacket of the suit she had worn to Cassy’s funeral, her gaze wandered to the open window.

  To the east and across Ocean Avenue lay a broad strip of beach that flirted with a glistening Atlantic. In the early 1900s, Avalon Bay had been a booming seaside resort that brought stylish tourists from New York, Pennsylvania and as far away as Boston. Even its brief resurgence in the late ’70s and ‘80s, as many of the surrounding shore towns began to decline, had introduced new generations to the tempo of the Jersey shore and invited pushcart entrepreneurs and street performers to respectively hawk their wares and talents to the fun-loving crowds.

  Even its reputation as a playground for mobsters hadn’t suffered from the popularity of shows on TV, though Kate was fairly certain that any wannabe thugs she may have encountered during her upbringing weren’t exactly bright enough to be classified as Mafia kingpins. She caught herself smiling in reminiscence of the neighborhood pizza parlor she and her friends liked to frequent after football games.

  Come next weekend, Memorial Day, a predictable trickle of sun-worshippers in all manner of swimsuits and large-brimmed hats will converge on what had been the old Boardwalk, though never in the profitable numbers of an earlier era. A part of Kate half-wished she could extend her stay an extra week and introduce her nephew to some of the sillier rituals associated with the advent of summer by the sea: Noisy arcades, games of chance, and a neon Ferris wheel harkened back to simpler times when kids and adults didn’t rely on iPods, cell phones, or text messaging to keep them entertained. That Cassy had fashioned no shortage of excuses the past five years not to bring her son to the old stomping grounds only fueled the irony that his first time in his grandmother’s seaside house should be under such unhappy circumstances.

  To the west and dismally visible above the treetops were the smokestacks of the plastics factory where many a local had earned his or her first paycheck working an assembly line. For some inexplicable reason, advances in technology and foreign outsourcing had yet to breach Avalon Bay and thus, nudge this fire-belching, rusted dragon into a long-overdue state of retirement. Until that day came, however, it remained a dreary environment of regimentation, low pay, long hours,
and minimal advancement that fostered two kinds of individuals in Kate’s view: those who welcomed the daily monotony as an excuse not to think about the past, and those who regarded factory tenure of any length as a rapidly closing door to the future.

  Her father had fallen somewhere in-between. He was a hard worker whose company loyalty was a mix of not wanting to stray too far from his hometown roots and being aware that he hadn’t been able to get the education required for a desk job. It was either the factory or become a security guard like his friends Sean Neal and Rob Lorenzi. Jim Toscano chose the former so he could be home in the evenings with his family.

  “Make me proud, Katie,” he had always told her, lamenting his blue-collar prison. A lump came to her throat whenever she remembered his request, bringing with it the regret that he hadn’t lived long enough to see her rise to the challenge and become a well-paid featured writer.

  The silence of her nostalgia was suddenly broken by the sound of a loud shriek coming from the direction of her mother’s bedroom. As Kate ran into the hall in response, an exasperated Lydia had already emerged and was gesticulating that a crisis of unspeakable proportion had just transpired. It was a look, of course, that Kate had come to know well throughout her childhood, and which covered anything from running out of sugar for a cookie recipe to discovering that moths had made a sumptuous snack of a favorite wool sweater.

  The source of her current vexation was readily apparent from the clue of only one pronoun. “Just look at what he’s gone and done now!” she snapped as Kate reached the open door and, brushing past her, stepped inside.

  She suppressed a smile at the sight of all her mother’s shoes and slippers placed toe-to-heel in a colorful serpentine across the carpet. Just over her shoulder, she heard Lydia mutter that she had absolutely no idea what had gotten into him to make such a mess of her footwear. That the young perpetrator was nowhere in sight filled Kate with more concern than her mother’s assessment that it would probably take at least a month of Sundays to restore order to her closet. “Jimmy?” she gently called out. “Jimmy, honey, where are you?”

  A giggle from behind the wicker clothes hamper rewarded Kate’s patience. Grape jam from his morning’s toast still creased the corners of his mouth as he burst out of his hiding place like a miniature cannonball heading for the hallway. Kate intercepted him and held him in her arms as he struggled to get free. The dark blond hair she had so meticulously combed after breakfast was already unruly and one of his shoes, she noticed, was missing. “Parade!” he squealed, pointing to his pint-sized contribution to the colorful line-up as he broke free from his aunt and returned to the shoes. “Parade!”

  “It’s a beautiful parade,” Kate praised him. “But we need to put all of these back in Nana’s closet now, okay?”

  “Parade!” Jimmy shouted again, this time louder.

  From the corner of her eye, Kate could see her mother folding her arms and shaking her head. Truth be told, she could also read exactly what was running through Lydia’s mind; specifically, the same script she’d been playing over and over ever since Jimmy’s condition had first been diagnosed. It was Cassy’s deadbeat ex—and not a twist of fate—whom Lydia would steadfastly blame throughout all eternity for providing the genes that made her first grandchild defective.

  Jimmy had now grabbed a fuzzy pink slipper and a tennis shoe and was twirling around in a headache-inducing circle with them.

  “It’s not like he comes equipped with an ‘off’ button, Mom. We just have to be patient.”

  Even as the words left her mouth, Kate knew that Jimmy’s autism wasn’t a phase he’d simply grow out of on his own. Cassy’s income since his birth had been sporadic at best, making it hard to acquire, and maintain, medical insurance to cover the myriad of therapy Jimmy needed. Her periodic reliance on subsistence from the state had helped a few of his medications, but even Cassy seemed to recognize that government handouts weren’t a long-term solution.

  “Maybe I can find a special-ed school for him or something,” she had mentioned to Kate in what turned out to be one of their last phone conversations. With or without their mother’s help Kate had promised her that she’d look into some options, she realized figuring out where Jimmy was going to live would soon become a more significant priority.

  Her attempts to currently restore some semblance of order to Lydia’s closet weren’t getting anywhere fast, largely owing to her boisterous nephew’s, help.

  “Oh, just let me do it,” a vexed Lydia said. “Your cab’s going to be here in another twenty minutes.”

  Kate sighed as she got to her feet and reached for Jimmy’s hand. Their transportation to the airport had been another bone of contention, with Lydia insisting it was easier for the two of them to take a taxi than it was for her to take them herself and then spend an hour orbiting the parking lot. Kate’s observation that the drive would give them that much more time together fell on deaf ears. Unspoken was the reality that any amount of time in a confined space with Jimmy was a level of torture Lydia would just as soon not endure.

  As they reached the bedroom doorway, Jimmy suddenly pulled his hand out of Kate’s and hurled himself straight at Lydia’s knees with a force that nearly caused the older woman to lose her balance.

  “Parade!” he hollered.

  Lydia’s eyes met those of her daughter as the latter crossed the room to collect him. “You have no idea what you’re getting yourself into with the boy,” she warned. “No idea, whatsoever.”

  The cab pulled into the driveway of the two-story clapboard house a few minutes earlier than expected. Not surprisingly, the strident tooting of a horn to announce its arrival gave Jimmy a new sound to imitate.

  As Kate hurriedly tucked in the hem of the Curious George t-shirt he had already managed to spill juice on, she offered to give him a special prize if he could play ‘The Quiet Game’ with her. She pretended to zip her lip and put the imaginary key deep in her pocket. Jimmy giggled and imitated her, dramatically flailing his own imaginary key with both hands.

  “I really don’t know where you get some of your ridiculous ideas on parenting,” Lydia chided her.

  Kate shrugged. “Pretty much making ‘em up as I go along, Mom.”

  “Well, you can’t bribe the boy like that forever. For heaven’s sake, Kate, what are you going to do when he’s a teenager?”

  The thought of her trying to coax a grown-up Jimmy with a plastic baggie of Fruit Loops struck Kate as funny and it was all she could do to keep from chuckling at the imagery. She had never met Cassy’s ex, only seen pictures of him, but at moments like this, she’d catch herself wondering how much Jimmy might one day emulate Luke’s edgy arrogance, shaggy hair and total disdain for neatness. If the latter ever made the ranks of rock stardom he seemed to so covet, Kate predicted that his picture would be regularly splashed across tabloid covers for trashing hotel rooms.

  The sound of the cab honking a second time precluded her from further musing on the subject. “Could you run Jimmy downstairs for me, Mom? I just want to take one last look and make sure we haven’t forgotten anything.”

  Lydia pursed her lips but, to Kate’s relief, offered no protest.

  Their bags, including Jimmy’s much-worn Mickey Mouse backpack, had already been loaded into the trunk of the cab when Kate stepped out the front door and onto the porch. Jimmy, she noticed, was already in the backseat, his pudgy fingers splayed on either side of his face in the window as he flattened his nose against the cool glass.

  “Are you sure you’ve got enough cash?” Lydia asked her.

  Some things never change, Kate reflected in amusement. Her mother had been using the same sign-off line ever since Kate had been old enough to go anywhere on her own. That she had just flown out from Las Vegas on her own dime and that many of her clothes were designer labels, a tangible testament to her doing well apparently hadn’t registered with Lydia one iota. Maybe she thinks it’s what keeps us connected, she thought, tempted to ask her for a co
uple of dollars of snack money just to validate their fragile mother-daughter bond.

  “I’ll call you when we get in,” Kate promised as she leaned in for a hug.

  “Are you sure it’s not too much?” Lydia murmured, tilting her head in the direction of the cab.

  For a second, Kate wasn’t sure whether she was referring to the cost of the cab fare or to the pint-size occupant who was now doing his best impression of a goldfish. “We’re going to be just fine, Mom,” she assured her, an answer that conveniently fit the parameters of either question.

  Goodbyes had always been awkward between them, this one being no exception. As both women hovered in the awkward limbo of who should pull away first, neither of them heard the driver’s approach until he spoke. “Excuse me, ma’am, but if you want to make your flight…”

  Her sidelong glance of acknowledgment of his presence was enough to render them both suddenly speechless. In the space of Kate’s quick breath of astonishment as he removed his dark glasses, she felt her heart jump into a somersault.

  The beginning of a smile tipped the corners of John Neal’s mouth as his eyes of sapphire blue regarded her with speculative curiosity.

  “If I knew you were coming,” he said, “I’d have baked a cake.”

  Chapter Two

  Kate had often heard the saying that time was rarely kind to high school quarterbacks once they got past the regimen of daily drills and high school exercises. As she composed herself from the shock of seeing one of them standing at that very moment on her mother’s porch, she resisted the urge of blurting out a “Wow.” The passage of fourteen years had made John Neal even more rugged looking and tan than she last remembered him. His dimples likewise reminding her of all those wistful times she had mentally compared him to Robert Redford.