The Edge of Winter

by Luanne Rice

  “Mickey,” he whispered, so softly she had to tilt her face up, feel his kiss, pour herself into him.

  “Shane, I’m so sorry about before,” she said when they stopped.

  “What do you mean?”

  “Getting so mad at you about my father,” she said. “It wasn’t your fault, and I’m so sorry.”

  “Love means never having to say…” he said, smiling, starting to quote from an old movie.

  But Mickey reached up, touched her finger to his lips. The night was as miraculous as Joe O’Casey had said, and Mickey knew it all had to do with forgiveness. People made mistakes, took wrong turns, made horrible decisions. But as long as there was love and hope, they could talk about it, see everything in a new light, forgive each other. Look at Tim and his father; look at him and Mickey’s mother. Even, especially, Mickey and Shane—and it was all because of forgiveness.

  “Love means always having to say you’re sorry,” she whispered, kissing him again as the snowy owls flew in reckless pathways overhead.

  27

  As Neve drove Tim back to the art gallery so he could get his truck, she felt the spring air coming through the Volvo’s open window. The night was cool, but it held a promise of the warmth to come, the melting of the winter’s last snows. Spring peepers called from the woods. And the image of the snowy owls flying through the mesh corridors seemed like the greatest hope of all.

  “Do you think your father will really be able to release the owls?” Neve asked as she drove.

  “I think it’s possible,” Tim said. “I’d never have believed it.”

  “No,” Neve said. “Neither would I.”

  As they drove through downtown, she skirted the seawall. The moon was in its last quarter, settled low in the sky, illuminating a slice of yellow in the harbor. The crane, floating on the barge. Just seeing it felt like a knife, cutting through all the goodness. Turning into the gallery’s driveway, she felt Tim’s hand on her arm.

  “Don’t stop,” he said. “Come down to the beach with me….”

  “It’s so late,” she said, stopping on the side of the road.

  “I know. But Mickey’s staying at the barn. You have your cell phone—she’ll call if she needs you.” Tim leaned over, kissed her. “Tonight we need each other.”

  Neve nodded. She knew that was true. They decided he’d take his truck, so she waited while he backed out, then followed him down the shore road. The night air felt sharper and crisper than before. The yellow crane was still there, rocking as the protected waters of the harbor rose and fell, but Neve didn’t even see it. All she could think about was where she and Tim were going, and that brought the sense of goodness back.

  When they got to the ranger station, Neve pulled in beside Tim. She was still wearing the black dress she’d worn to the opening. The sound of the breakers filled her ears, and their salt mist carried over the beach and dunes, brushing the skin of her bare arms.

  Tim unlocked the door; he stood back, let her pass in front of him. He started to turn on a light, but she turned around, pressed herself into his arms, led him into the living room. The quarter moon tipped over the water, splashing a sparkly net across the waves. Her heart caught in her throat as she thought of everything this beach meant to them, and she stood on tiptoes, kissing Tim to let him know how she felt.

  He had a message of his own. She felt it coming through his hands and lips, telling her with everything he had. They held hands, walking into his bedroom. She’d never been in here before; she had the feeling very few people had. It was all Tim: just the bed and dresser, a shelf full of marine books, a chart of the Rhode Island shore, some photos of shorebirds.

  And a picture of Frank.

  It wasn’t like the one Joe had—of Frank in his dress uniform, looking solemn and dignified for the camera. No, it showed a young man in camouflage gear, sunglasses, and a big floppy hat, grinning from ear to ear. Neve stared at it, seeing the tremendous life in Frank’s face and smile, and she noticed that Tim kept it right by his bedside. It had to be the last thing he saw when he fell asleep, the first thing he saw when he woke up.

  “What a wonderful picture,” she said.

  “I love it because it looks like him,” Tim said. “Not many of the pictures I have do.”

  “So vibrant, and handsome…and right there.”

  “That was Frank,” Tim said. “Right there. He was so present, always in the moment. No matter what was happening, he had his eyes open, he just took it all in.”

  “Was it good to see his friends tonight?” Neve asked.

  “Better than anything that’s happened in a long time,” he said. “Except you. Nothing’s been better than meeting you.”

  They stood by the bed, kissing for a long time. Neve felt so conscious of the bed’s nearness, and she figured Tim did, too. She felt magnetized to him, with such crackling energy that when he pulled away, she leaned in his direction.

  Neve watched as Tim rummaged through his bedside drawer, came out with an envelope. It was big and square, as if it held a card. He sat on the bed, smoothing it on his lap. Neve sat beside him. He looked over at her, tried to smile.

  “I’ve never shown this to anyone,” he said.

  She couldn’t speak, her mouth was so dry. Instead, she just took his hand. When he passed her the envelope, she knew he wanted her to read what was inside. She pulled it out, trying to keep her hands steady. The card showed two people, a man and a little boy, both wearing dive gear, standing at the bottom of the ocean. A submarine had been hand-drawn in the background. Fish swam all around. Bubbles were coming from the boy’s mouth, and the words Happy Father’s Day! were printed above the waves overhead.

  Opening the card, a sheet of paper fell out. Neve unfolded it and began to read.

  Dear Dad,

  Happy Father’s Day! I know this card is late, and I really have no excuse except to say it’s been a little busy over here. Also, I apologize in advance for the sand. There’s been crazy wind the last few days, and our tents are full of sand. It kind of reminds me of the beach during summer storms—except over here the sun is always shining, and the wind never stops blowing.

  I wish we could go for a dive. I miss the ocean so much; the river isn’t quite the same. Even though I can’t tell you much about where I am and what I’m doing, I’m sure you understand. That’s one thing about coming from a family where lots of us have been to war; some things just don’t need to be said.

  Grandpa talked to me about it more than he did to you. Maybe I’m figuring that out a little. It’s something you don’t want to talk about—maybe not until fifty years go by. But I will say that my buddies are great, the best friends I’ve ever had. We’d do anything for each other, you can count on that. I’m just one of the crew. But sometimes I imagine what I’d do if I had to lead—if it all fell on me. And you know, Dad, when I imagine that happening, I think of you.

  I think about you staying calm. No matter what happens, no matter how loud or close it gets, I just think about you. That time we went diving, and when we came up we were in a thunderstorm—man, all those lightning bolts hitting the beach and the boat and everything around us, and our air nearly out, and how you just held my hand and eased me underwater, how you taught me to conserve my air and breathe calmly instead of as if I was scared to death, how you taught me something and saved my life.

  I think of the time we went ice fishing in New Hampshire, and how we were way out in the wilderness and our car wouldn’t start. And how it was before you had a cell phone, and we were stuck in the middle of nowhere, on the frozen lake. We’d gone up more to watch eagles and hawks than to fish, but that day you became the greatest fisherman in the world. Cut a hole in the ice, showed me how to drop my line in, wait for the tug. We ate like kings that night, Dad, and even though we nearly froze in our tent, when the ranger came by the next morning—I didn’t even want to leave!

  The sand in my tent here reminds me a little of the snow in our tent up there, s
o it doesn’t seem as bad. I remember you laughing about it, no matter how cold it got. So I try laughing about it now, no matter how hot it gets. My buddies have started doing the same. We just have a blast, Dad. Even Major Wrentham chuckles, sort of.

  He’s not a bad guy.

  Anyway, there were just a few things I wanted to say for Father’s Day. I know you and I went at it before I came over here. I just want to say—I didn’t get it then, but I do now. We don’t have to go into it here, but I want to tell you I appreciate what you were trying to do. We’ll talk about that when I get home.

  Mainly, more importantly, I want to tell you how much I love you. I couldn’t ask for a better dad. And I’d better not even try, because you’re what they’d give me. You’re my hero, Dad. I’m not a Marine because of you. But I’m a diver, a fisherman, a joker, a beach bum, and a bird freak because of you.

  THANKS A LOT!

  Just kidding. I’m proud to be your son. In all the ways I can think of and probably about a million I can’t. Say hello to the beach for me? There’s all this damn sand, but not a speck of salt water! My buddies call the blowing sand “Desert Music,” but I tell them they’re nuts. It’s “Beach Tunes,” and that’s all there is to it.

  Love,

  Frank O’Casey

  Neve finished reading the letter, unable to breathe. She touched his name. Outside the house, she heard the waves crashing and sharp grains of sand blowing against the wood shingles.

  “I got that letter two days after his funeral,” Tim said. “He and his unit were crossing the Euphrates, west to east, sixty miles south of Baghdad. Insurgents had forced a gap in the embankment, flooding the terrain—it must have weakened the ground, because the bank gave way beneath Frank’s tank. He never got out.”

  “Oh, Tim!”

  Tim nodded. He took the card from her, held it in his hands. She knew that he was trying to feel Frank; Frank had touched the paper, and that meant something.

  “We knew that he was in a dangerous situation,” Tim said. “His mother and I, and my father. I don’t think there was a moment that we didn’t have CNN or news radio on. We’d been following troop movements. So when I got the call…”

  “They called you?” she asked, surprised they would deliver that news in a phone call.

  “Beth called me,” he said. “I picked up the phone, and she said, ‘They’re here.’ ”

  “I asked her—‘Is it two of them?’ Because the military always sends two to notify you; one of them is a chaplain. I thought, if there’s just one, then we’re okay. I thought, damn her—why was she home? Why’s she looking out the window? If she didn’t see them, if she didn’t answer the door, then Frank would be okay.”

  Neve listened, gazing at the card. At first she’d thought Frank had bought it somewhere, but the more she looked, the more she realized that he had drawn the whole thing—not just the U-boat. He was a good artist, had some of his great-uncle’s talent; he’d really captured the affection between the father and son divers—she thought it was so achingly sweet that a Marine had made the son such a small boy.

  “She said the tap on the door was so light, she almost didn’t hear it,” Tim said. “She said if she’d closed her eyes, she might not have heard it at all. But she did hear, and she did open the door. I was on the phone the whole time, so I heard what they said. And that was the end of it.”

  Neve held him. She couldn’t believe that it could be the end—her eyes fell on Frank’s picture. His smile held such light and life; could it really be over in an instant, a tank plunging into the river where human life first began?

  Frank was in his father’s heart, and his mother’s and grandfather’s, and even though she’d never met him, in Neve’s. But for Tim, knowing he’d never see or hear or touch his beautiful son again was a grief beyond knowing. Did the sound of sand blowing give Tim comfort or drive him mad? Neve held him and rocked him, letting the sounds of the sand and the ocean from which it came reverberate around them, wash through the walls and surround them.

  After a while, he pulled her down on the bed. She knew that he wasn’t putting anything behind him. Instead, he was bringing Neve into his life with Frank, into their family. She felt it, and was honored. Their arms were around each other. Waves kept breaking on the beach, but the house was solid. Neve closed her eyes and kissed him. The sound of the sand and waves continued with no sign of letting up. She kissed him, and she didn’t stop.

  Tim lay with his eyes open. His life had been destroyed that day when the two men showed up at Beth’s door. Until just a few hours ago, he’d never talked about it, never shown anyone Frank’s card, never let another soul read Frank’s letter.

  They’d fallen asleep on his bed. Neve rested in the curve of his arm, her chest rising and falling in deep sleep. Tim lay as still as he could, listening to the waves pound the beach. His heart was racing—could it be from the dreams?

  His dreams had been the same for weeks: writing Frank’s name in the sand, the German sailors peering out of the U-boat at him. Holding Neve now, he realized that tonight’s dream had been different. Frank was alive—all those nights of scrawling his name had brought him back. He stood beside Tim and Neve on the beach, and said one word: Remember.

  Just thinking of the dream, hearing that word in Frank’s voice, made Tim’s eyes flood. Remember? How could he think Tim would ever forget? But then he realized something else—the German sailors were gone. The waves had died, and the dream sea had been as flat as a lake. Somehow Tim knew that the U-boat had been taken away, that the evidence of war, of its trail of attack and death so close to their beloved home, had been erased.

  That’s what Frank had meant in the dream: Remember.

  Tim’s arms were around Neve. He felt such a surge of life, feeling her lying beside him. She was on her side, bottom pressed into his groin. Her sleeveless black dress had bunched up to her hips; he leaned over, kissed her bare shoulder. His lips brushed her skin.

  Her auburn hair spilled over her face. He reached over, moved it away. Easing her toward him, onto her back, he kissed her lips. She slid her arms around his neck, pressing her body against his. He felt the swell of her breasts against his chest, heard her moan gently as he slid his hand beneath her, held her close.

  Their heads were together on the pillow. Kissing tenderly, then suddenly the opposite. He felt her holding him so tight, wanting to make love, something neither of them had done in a long time. That made it as amazing as anything else—made the desire more explosive than the ocean waves pounding the beach outside.

  When they were finished once, they made love again. A long time passed, because all of a sudden, gray morning light was coming through the window. It was silver, tinged with the pink of dawn. Birds, migrants from the south, filled the thicket along the dunes. Their song nearly obliterated the sound of the waves.

  “Good morning,” Neve whispered.

  “Morning, Neve,” he said.

  “I woke up in the middle of the night and thought I was dreaming,” she said. “Being here with you.”

  “I dreamed of you,” he said, the dream coming alive again. Remember…

  “Were we doing this?” she asked, smiling and kissing him, reaching down.

  He smiled, kissed her for a while, then shook his head.

  “We were doing something else,” he said. “Do you have to work today?”

  “In theory, yes,” she said. “But if Dominic doesn’t owe me a day off after last night, then he really needs to find someone else. Why?”

  “I want you to come to the beach with me.”

  “I have to get home, then go pick up Mickey and Shane. Thank heavens it’s Saturday, because I’m not sure they’d feel like going to school.”

  “Bring them back here, okay?” he asked, kissing her again. “Shane and I are making a dive.”

  “Like…” she began.

  “Like me and Frank,” Tim said.

  “I’ll get the kids right away,” Neve said,
giving him one more kiss before getting up.

  The wind was always calm first thing in the morning, and today was no exception. The only sounds were the birds and the waves. Tim wouldn’t say this out loud—not yet, anyway—but early mornings he missed the sound of the sand blowing.

  He missed hearing what he knew Frank had heard in his tent, halfway around the world, the music of, not desert music, but beach tunes, when he’d written that last letter to the father who still and forever loved him so much.

  28

  Mickey and Shane had watched the owls last night, until they were too tired to stay awake anymore. They fell asleep in sleeping bags on the barn floor, and they woke to Mickey’s mother shaking them gently, asking Shane if he wanted to go diving. He’d jumped up, eager from the first moment. And old Mr. O’Casey was going to go, too—he’d agreed to meet Damien’s old crew members down on the beach, to show them the site of U-823, but first he was going to drive the dive boat.

  Driving to the beach, they had passed through town. Both Mickey and Shane had been born here. They were natives, and they knew every inch of every street. So when the car swung along the big seawall near the boat launch, Mickey got a knot in her stomach—because there was the huge underwater engineering barge, with the yellow crane sitting on top.

  “Look at it out there, just waiting,” Shane said.

  “It’s as if Mr. Landry moored it there just so it would be in our faces,” Mickey said.

  “Seems as if people are excited about it being there,” Shane said. “They’re all looking.”

  And it was true. Mickey noticed many cars parked by the seawall, the people standing around in groups with coffee and doughnuts from the bakery, staring out at the crane and talking. Others came by boat; they circled the barge in wide, slow circles, curious about such big machinery and trying to get a better look.