Chapter 27 #3
“On the way back to Urbana, we got a call on my dad’s big black bag car phone that I got a starting position on the varsity soccer team at my new high school, as a freshman.
That same year I got pulled up to the varsity teams for basketball and baseball, too, so we both forgot about Mike.
Fast forward, my dad arranged for us to play the course for my fifteenth birthday and Mike was the first guy we saw when we got to the clubhouse.
That’s when we learned he owned Liberty Oaks and several other properties and businesses around the area.
My dad and I played our game and then Mike crashed our lunch again.
That time, though, he was more focused on me than my dad.
My interests, hobbies, school grades, friends, what I wanted to be when I grew up. ”
J.P. took a deep breath and another deliberate stroke of his paddle to keep the current and conversation moving.
He hoped Kenny wouldn’t sense his trepidation.
He wasn’t sure if he was more hesitant to share details of his past or the fact that he noticed a fin grazing the surface of the water had been closely following the kayaks.
“At the time, I had never been to a job interview, but I imagined that’s what it felt like.
I didn’t have answers to many of his questions, and he told me that I should by the age of fifteen.
That kind of resonated with me. I liked this guy.
I liked the way he interacted with people and how people responded to him.
I realized I liked everything he had and that I really liked golf.
On the drive home that year, I called my coaches and quit soccer, basketball, and baseball. ”
“You put a lot of stock into a stranger you randomly met in South Carolina. What did your parents make of all of it? Were they okay with you quitting? I’d imagine they sunk a lot of time and money into you and those sports over the years?” Kenny questioned.
“They were skeptical at first,” J.P. continued.
“Especially since my school didn’t have a golf team, and my athletic director guaranteed them I’d graduate with some type of athletic scholarship if I stuck with soccer or baseball; but we found a club program that I joined, and I got more serious about my studies than I had ever been.
I was eventually accepted into the Professional Golf Management program at Penn State which was a double-edged sword for my parents who were die-hard Buckeyes fans and alum.
They got over it after my first home match at State College.
Then over the summers I’d stay down here with Mr. C, free of room and board and out of trouble, interning at various courses and perfecting my game. ”
“Let me get this straight, you spent the summers of your late teens and early twenties there? Playing golf by day and unwinding on those decks at night. Life was tough for a young adult J.P! Did Mr. Cunningham have a wife or children at home?” Kenny wanted to know so much more about this man—or family—who opened their home up to a teen from outside Columbus they knew little about other than he had a good swing and SAT scores.
“No. It’s a tragic story.” J.P. turned somber.
“After Mr. C graduated from the Air Force Academy and served his time, he returned to his native New York. He reconnected with his childhood sweetheart, and they quickly got married, eager to start a big family. They planned to have a few biological children and eventually expand their family through adoption. Mr. C worked as a hedge fund manager on Wall Street and his wife was a schoolteacher at a public school in Washington Heights. They were active in the city’s social and philanthropy circles but were close to retreating to a quieter life somewhere around Hilton Head and running a bed and breakfast.” J.P.
nodded toward the mansion on the beach. “But when Mrs. C was seven months pregnant with their first child, she was killed in a car accident on her way to Brookyln to meet Mr. C at a fundraiser for the Boys and Girls Club.”
“Oh my God. That’s heartbreaking. I’m not a parent and I don’t have a spouse, but I can’t imagine how anyone would ever get over that,” Kenny sympathized. Like so many of the stories she covered, she couldn’t help but question why terrible things happen to good people.
“Me either. I didn’t know Mr. C before the accident, and he’s only shared snippets of his past over the years, but people have told me he’s never been the same.
The accident that stole the perfect life he had at his fingertips is the reason he does a lot of what he does today.
Like that house, it’s not a bed and breakfast but he opens it up to people year-round.
You never know who’s going to walk through the door.
” He laughed trying to lighten the moment.
“From the little bit that I’ve heard from you and Derek at the guard house, it seems like he is an extraordinary man who is important to a lot of people.
” Kenny smiled. “But let’s get back to you!
With your education you may be more than a glorified handy man who occasionally teaches a golf lesson? ”
“I wear a few different hats down at the course. I manage the teams who work in and around the clubhouse.”
“Is that a cryptic way of saying you run the whole show?” she asked.
“Something like that,” he replied. “You can grill me more about it later, reporter woman. There’s a more interesting story unfolding behind you that I’d hate for you to miss.” J.P. grabbed the side of Kenny’s kayak so both boats stopped and started floating with the current.
She turned her head and out of the corner of her eye saw a fin grazing the surface of the water. It was so close she could touch it. She gasped but nothing came out. She could feel her hands loosen the grip of her paddle. J.P. grabbed it before she completely let go and dropped it into the ocean.
“Breathe, Kenny. It’s a dolphin! Actually, it’s a pod of dolphins! Four of them have been trailing us for a while now. Let me turn us around.” He dragged the blade of his paddle in the water and spun around the kayaks.
She hadn’t opened her eyes or closed her mouth since the initial shock of seeing the tip of the dorsal fin at the rear of her boat.
Her focus was squarely on trying to not shake so violently that she tumbled overboard into what she determined to be shark infested waters or throw up from the instant wave of nausea that overcame her when she saw her life flash before her eyes.
Breath in, two, three, four. Hold two, three, four. Out two, three, four. Breath in, two, three, four. Hold two, three, four. Out two, three, four.
When her heart rate tempered and she was confident that the organ wasn’t going to beat out of her chest and through her life jacket, she slowly opened her eyes.
“Oh my God,” Kenny shrieked. “J.P., look at them!”
Two dolphins bobbed up and down like buoys on either side of the kayaks, clicking and squealing with excitement.
Their curved rostrums were wide open which made the friendly pair look like they were displaying the widest, happiest, toothiest smiles Kenny had ever seen. She couldn’t help but smile back.
“Look at those two over there,” J.P. said with a grin as big as the dolphins. “They look like they’re waving to us.” He nodded to another duo a few feet away that were upright and spinning in circles, flipping their flappers faster than Kenny’s heart was beating a few seconds earlier.
“I think they’re dancing, putting on a show for us.” She looked in awe as the set that bobbed next to her disappeared below the water. “Where do you think those two are headed?”
“I’m not sure exactly, but not too far. About 400 of these bottlenose dolphins call Hilton Head home. Most groups migrate every year, like retired snowbirds, but these Lowcountry dolphins stick around.”
“Why is that?”
“Because they are smart. Next to humans, they have the second largest brain of all mammals.” J.P.
laughed, thinking Kenny would have some snarky comment about him possessing a useless wealth of knowledge.
“Would you ever want to leave if you didn’t have to?
” he followed up when she didn’t immediately have a quick-witted response.
“No,” Kenny replied, thinking J.P.’s simple, yet loaded question was deeper than he intended.
Despite being on vacation and away from the stressors and problems of everyday life, she couldn’t help but wonder if there was a life outside the one that she was living.
Maybe even a version entirely different than the desired life she was seeing in those nagging dreams. In her mind, there was no world outside her fast-paced, deadline-driven, adrenaline-fueled life in New York, squeezing in an occasional yoga class as a thinly veiled attempt to balance her equilibrium.
But the peace and calm of the last two weeks made her question that notion. And maybe even her priorities.
J.P. handed Kenny the paddle she almost dropped, and they began kayaking back in the direction they came from.
“Me either. I guess in many ways I haven’t.
” He shook his head almost in disbelief that he made the decision years ago to never leave.
“When I was still playing golf, I had the opportunity to travel the world and visit some of the most magnificent places in America but when it came time to make a decision about laying roots—well professional roots, I haven’t gotten around to the personal roots.
” J.P. paused, trying to reel in an accidental tangent.
“Anyway, I never had a second thought about coming to Sea Pines.”
“Do you mean you golfed professionally? Or did you happen to find someone to fund your expensive hobby?” Kenny asked, half joking, half serious.