Free Undertow by Elizabeth O'Roark Page B

nothing. Jordan was just joking and Ethan was in an awkward position – he can hardly act dismissive about our relationship in front of my family.
    But all through the afternoon and evening the comments continue to flow, both subtle and not at all subtle, and Ethan seems to welcome them. He doesn’t act like someone who’s just being polite.
    Over dinner Jordan glares at Ethan. “So we haven’t discussed this, but I’m pretty sure I forbid you to ask my sister out until after graduation.”
    “What’s this, now?” my mother asks, looking frantic. Probably petrified something will get in the way of the Maura-Ethan Wedding Express.
    “Jordan told Ethan and Graham they couldn’t ask me out until I’d graduated,” I explain.
    Ethan smiles happily at Jordan and puts his arm around my shoulders. “Come on, man. Who’d you rather have for a brother-in-law, me or Graham?”
    I stiffen. He says it so casually, as if we’ve discussed it, as if it’s a foregone conclusion. He doesn’t notice my shock. Neither does Jordan. My mother casts a knowing glance at me, and I’m just relieved she doesn’t give me a thumbs-up.
    Jordan relents. “God, it would suck to have Graham in the family. You know I hate Clemson. Fine, you’re forgiven.”
    The conversation moves on, but I do not. I can only think about Ethan, about what he is expecting and what my parents are expecting. I find it somewhat annoying that they are so thrilled by my relationship with Ethan, that for them it completely eclipses graduation and law school. I know my mother, and I know she is already imagining me buying a house on their street, spitting out a baby within a year of marriage and leaving him or her with a nanny so I can don my tennis whites and spend my days at the club. I can’t really fathom her sudden desire to have me living in her world, seeing her often — she’d certainly never been interested in it when I was a kid. But with or without Ethan, it isn’t a future I want, and the need to explain that to my parents weighs on me.
    “Maybe Maura could help,” Ethan is saying. It’s only then that I look around and return to the restaurant, where every face is turned toward me expectantly.
    “Help with what?” I ask.
    “Nice attention span,” my brother gripes. “You’re gonna make one hell of a lawyer.”
    “With the lawsuit,” Ethan replies.
    “What lawsuit?” I ask.
    “Maura,” my mother chides. “Were you not listening at all?”
    “Sorry,” I say sheepishly. “It’s been a long day. What lawsuit?”
    “At Old Cove. We’re trying to block off the beach road and get rid of the public access points,” my father tells me.
    “What? Why?!” I exclaim. The beach road in front of my grandparents’ house is the main thoroughfare – limiting use of the road and access ways would make it virtually impossible for most of the residents on the island to get to the only decent beach.
    “Because we’re sick of having the entire beach full of riff-raff all summer,” he says.
    “But the beach is public land,” I argue. “And what about the people who live a block or two behind us?”
    “They can use the beach farther down,” my father says.
    “But that’s at least a mile away,” I gasp. “You can’t expect people who live one block from the beach to walk a mile to get there?”
    “They don’t have to walk,” my mother chirps. “They can drive.”
    “That’s so crappy,” I exclaim, looking at them, aghast. “The beach is public property.”
    “Actually,” says Ethan, surprising me. “The state’s ownership ends at the high water line.”
    “You agree with this?” I ask.
    He shrugs. “It would be nice to have the beaches less crowded.”
    “So what exactly is being proposed?”
    “We’re petitioning the state to make the frontal road local access only, and to remove all the public access boardwalks along the mile of Old Cove,” my father tells me. “I was suggesting you might want to help with