“But,” Daddy pushed further, “wouldn’t it be nice to find a good man who would make you happy?”
“Oh, Daddy,” I said, and now I felt a little breathless. My heart pounded so hard and so fast in my chest that I swore Daddy could feel and hear it too. I remembered what Daisy had said once, you could be good or you could be happy, but maybe you couldn’t be both. “I don’t think that will ever make me happy,” I finally said, my voice coming out husky, the words catching on the way out. I inhaled sharply, wanting to say more but stopping myself just short.
Daddy’s face was so close to mine now, and we stared at each other. Something honest but still-unspoken passed between our eyes in a quick flash, before Daddy looked away first. He patted my hand gently. “It’s late,” he said. “Get some rest. Everything will look different in the morning.”
* * *
AND DADDY WAS right about that. The next morning, Blocks was gone; his things had completely disappeared. Daddy didn’t come downstairs for breakfast either. The dining room was so quiet you could’ve heard a golf ball slice the air. And I ate my grits in peace.
But when Daddy still hadn’t come downstairs by ten o’clock, I walked up to check on him. The door to his room was closed, and I knocked and called out for him. He didn’t answer, and I closed my eyes for a second, remembering that moment between us last night. The way he had looked at me, like he knew what I was trying to say, that maybe he’d always known. And maybe that was why he’d been so keen on Blocks in the first place.
“Daddy,” I tried again. Still nothing.
Finally, I opened his bedroom door, walked inside. Daddy lay in his bed perfectly still. I stared at him, but his chest didn’t appear to be rising and falling. His eyes were closed, and his face was a preternatural shade of gray.
Oh, Daddy. No.
I ran to his bed, fell to my knees, and grabbed his hand. But it was limp, cold. Lifeless.
Daisy July 1919
THE SOUTH SEAS
THERE WAS A RADIANT SORT of bliss that settled over me in the weeks after my wedding. It came on immediately in Tahiti, a place with the bluest shade of water and whitest pearls of beach I’d ever seen. Every day, it was me, and it was Tom, and it was sun, and the sand and the water. We languished in a straw hut with sheer curtains for walls, lying naked in our giant round bed, listening to the sounds of the sea. My face glowed pink from the heat and from the happiness, and from the feel of Tom’s hands strumming lazily across my bare skin.
I thought about what Jay had written. That Tom would never make me feel the way that he had. But he was wrong. Every single nerve in my body felt alive on my honeymoon. Tom and I were together every day, every night. His skin felt like my skin; his body was my body, too. I woke up in the morning and there was no such thing as worry. Or sadness. There was nothing in the world at all but my dear, sweet, delicious Tom.
By the time we got to Oahu, six weeks after the wedding, we remembered how to put our clothes on, and one early morning we left our suite at dawn and took a walk through Kapiolani Park. We clung to each other, strolling along the long grassy slope in between towering palm trees. I could still feel the breeze of the ocean, even though I’d lost sight of it for a moment, and my skin felt damp, my hair stuck to my cheeks. Had I checked a mirror I might have been horrified by what I saw, and yet, I felt the prettiest I’d ever felt in my entire life.
“They used to play cricket in this park,” Tom said as we walked through the grass barefoot. “Father had a friend from Yale who moved to San Fran after college. Used to invite him here every May for a rousing cricket match.”
“Cricket? That’s like polo without the horses?” I asked.
“Oh, no. Not at all. I have so much to teach you still.” Tom laughed, and pulled me to him, kissing the top of my head fiercely.
Tom had offered to let me ride his ponies when we were dating, but the one time I actually mounted a horse, I’d been much too high off the ground and had immediately panicked and begged Tom to help me down. Never mind the idea of actually batting around a ball, or, whatever it was Tom did when he played polo. It’s not a sport for a lady, as Mother would say. Not that I’d let that stop me if I truly wanted to learn.
“Ahh, well. Cricket. Polo. What does it matter? The park is empty now.” I pulled out of Tom’s grasp, held my arms out to my sides, and twirled around in the grass enough times I started to get dizzy.
Tom ran to catch up with me, grabbed me, and kissed me hard, openmouthed in that intense way he always did that made my face burn instantly hot. “You’re right,” he said, pulling back a little. “The park is empty. Whatever could we do here?” His dusky eyes caught the sunlight and practically seemed to sparkle with mischief.
“Tom.” I swatted his arm lightly. “You’re positively wicked.”
He pressed his body against my body, and I could feel every inch of his torso through the thin linen of his clothes. He had sinewy thighs, strong from riding, and when he pressed them against me now, I gasped a little. “Daisy,” he whispered my name, like it was sinful, and moved my hand to the waistband of his pants, pushing my fingers down.
“Tom, really.” I laughed and inched my hand up, resting it across the hard muscles of his stomach.
“You think I’m joking?” he whispered, catching the bottom of my earlobe gently with his tongue, then his teeth. “Look around, we’re the only ones here. And I can’t wait until we get back to the hotel.”
I looked around again, and he was right. Kapiolani Park was still empty, except for us. It was very early in the morning. Everyone else in Oahu was just waking up, eating breakfast, or heading to the beach. Tom moved my fingers back to his waistband.
Mother’s snow goose voice popped into my head. Daisy Fay! Behave like a lady! But then I heard Mrs. Buchanan, too, at the atelier. I felt a giggle of embarrassment rising in my throat at that thought; certainly she didn’t mean anything like this. But I felt that red-hot power all the same. I was Tom’s wife. I was no longer Daisy Fay of the Louisville, Kentucky, Fays. I was Daisy Buchanan, in the midst of an extended and lavish honeymoon in the South Seas. I could do as I pleased, when and where I pleased.
“Not here. Not so out in the open,” I whispered, feeling illicit, even though there was no one around to hear me but Tom.
I took his hand and ran across the grass pulling him behind me. And then behind the shade of a towering palm tree I was warm and breathless. Tom swooped down and kissed me hard on the mouth again. I pulled back a little, moved my hands to his waistband, tugged his pants down. I smiled at him. And then, I held his gaze as I fell to my knees in front of him.
“Daisy.” He closed his eyes and whispered my name, grasping a fistful of my hair in his hand. “Daisy, Daisy, Daisy.”
Jordan July 1919
CHARLESTON