Read Online Beach Girls by Luanne Rice - Free Book Online Page B

them.
    So when they'd gotten to the graceful brick train station, sixteen-year-old Emma had picked out a pair of Coast Guard Academy cadets. The young men were standing on the siding, dressed in their white uniforms, waiting for the train. Their trousers were so clean, so sharply pressed; their shoes shined to a high polish. Overhead, pigeons cooed in the eaves. Ferry whistles sounded, and seagulls screeched from the dock pilings. Across the Thames River, just-built nuclear submarines lurked in the open bays of Electric Boat.
    Emma's hair was messed up from driving in the open car. Her skin was tan, gleaming. She wore a gold necklace and bracelet. Her damp T-shirt clung to her body, and Stevie saw the men notice her even before she approached them.
    “Hello,” she said to the cadets.
    “Hi,” they both said at once.
    “We're raising money,” she said. “My friend and I.”
    The young men looked at the two girls, fresh from the beach, and tried not to laugh.
    “For a really good cause,” Emma said. “There's a hungry lady, and we want to buy her some food. My friend will cry if you don't help. She honestly will.”
    It took the cadets exactly thirty seconds to open their wallets. Stevie watched in amazement. She saw how Emma smiled with the strangest combination of flirtation and humility, how she had kissed them both on the cheek when they'd handed her the money, how she thanked them for keeping the coast safe for everyone.
    “Easiest thing I ever did,” Emma said, walking back to Stevie.
    The men had given her ten dollars each.
    After Madeleine arrived, Stevie drove back to Bank Street. They went to the granite Custom House, and looked for the woman. Her cart was still there, parked in the alley, but she was gone. They drove down the street slowly, looking for her.
    “We have to find her,” Stevie said.
    “She's all right,” Emma said. “She probably got hot from lying in the sun and went to find some shade.”
    “We have to give her the money,” Stevie said.
    “She's survived without our help all these years,” Emma said. The words were harsh, but her voice was gentle. Stevie knew that Emma was trying to make her feel better, even when Emma turned toward the backseat and told Maddie how Stevie wanted to save the world by bringing street people back to Hubbard's Point.
    They had waited for fifteen or twenty minutes. Emma was impatient; Stevie could tell by the way she kept flipping around the radio dial, trying to find good songs. The woman didn't come back. Stevie folded up the two tens and stuck them into a tattered blanket on the top of the loaded shopping cart.
    Emma got out of the car and took one back.
    “This is to feed us,” she said. “You can't take care of others and forget about yourself.”
    “Emma—”
    “I begged for that woman's food,” she said. “I'm a beggar now—my mother would totally kill me if she knew. So you have to let me treat you and Maddie to an ice cream.”
    “You've never been hungry in your life. You wear gold jewelry to the
beach
.”
    “Stevie, you need someone to tell you it's okay to be happy. It really is. We love you, Maddie and I. You want to save every person, every lost bird. Well, your friends are here to save you—how about that? Come on—let's get back to the beach, okay?”
    The top was down, the sun was shining; Maddie was so glad to be back from seeing her aunt, and she wanted to hear everything that had happened at the beach in her absence. They had stopped at Paradise for sundaes, and when they'd buried their cherries in the sand, they'd done it in honor of the homeless woman. Stevie had felt guilty for wasting food. Her sundae tasted like sawdust. When Emma saw her put the dish down, she leaned over and fed Stevie with her own spoon.
    “There, little birdy,” she said, gazing into Stevie's eyes, making sure she included a big taste of whipped cream as she put the plastic spoon into her mouth. “Enjoy the summer day.”
    “But . .