by Deb Caletti
He slides the cake from the knife onto her plate. “Don’t kill me, promise? Photography. It’s a hobby.”
“Aargh! I read novels. I used to swim. I indulge in bad TV.”
“You run a business. You were an editor.”
“That sounds grander than it is. I mostly shoveled the slush pile. What do you write? Fiction? Let me guess. Something intelligent and historical.”
“Ha, no. Poetry. Clearly, I am not in the writing game for the bucks.”
“Hmm. Probably not.”
“I am…How should I say it? Somewhat of an expert on American Romanticism? I’ve spent years studying the life and work of Edgar Allan Poe. Teaching it, writing about it. Quite a lot of critical essays on Pym, Poe’s only novel…Dare I admit? Proud member of the Poe Studies Society.” He cringes for effect.
“So, who’re your influences?” She laughs. “Okay, I’m not going to tell you I edited Best Places to Bring a Date in Seattle.”
“Nonsense. I’m sure you edited many kinds of books.”
“I just realized I should probably call you Dr. North.”
He sits across from her again. “Such a beautiful, intelligent woman, and she gives herself no credit,” he says. He barely takes two bites of his dessert—no wonder he’s in such great shape. He reaches for her hand. Rubs her skin with his thumb.
Oh, God, that’s nice. It’s gentle and lovely, and his eyes are incredible, actually. They stare right through her. Beautiful—though people have called her this before, it’s not a word she connects to herself, with her prominent nose and all her mediums: medium height, medium-length brown hair, medium-brown eyes. But perhaps she could be beautiful, the way he’s looking at her. She remembers her old confidence—at least, she recalls when she didn’t feel as vulnerable as she’s felt lately. Okay, maybe that was a long, long time ago. She felt brazen and sure maybe for a few months of summer back when she was seventeen. Most people, she supposes, feel brazen and sure during those exact same months.
It’s gotten dark out. So dark. It’s a deep dark, sea dark, endless. There’s only the slow, far-off turn of the lighthouse beam, and the twinkle of boat lights across the bay. It could be just the two of them all alone out here.
The candles flicker. Isabelle swallows the last of her wine. Clyde Belle, with his torrid thoughts, who once lived in this very house, has been gone for years. The space between Henry and Isabelle has gotten soft and quiet. Intimate. She realizes how much she doesn’t know about him. Old adages about love taking time and things being too good to be true just seem stingy and scared when hope swirls and hums in your bloodstream. “So.”
“Another so,” he teases.
“Tell me. You’re here on your own? No wife, no kids visiting on the weekends?”
“And we were having such a nice time.”
“I’m sorry.”
“No, no. I just hate to talk about all that, don’t you? Who came before, what happened. How it all went wrong.”
“I do. I hate it.”
“Especially now. First date and all.”
She feels a jab of misstep. A hit of wrongdoing. It’s her old baggage, this sensitivity to criticism, coming from a childhood requiring perfect moves and vigilance. She’s also surprised. First date. Well, of course it’s one. She hadn’t exactly called it that, so it’s somehow strangely shocking to realize what this is. “I apologize. For leaping into the deep end.”
“It’s fine. How about the abridged version? I was married. Not long. No children. But she left me. Just a few years ago. And that’s enough for now, right?” He laughs. “That’s plenty.”
“Oh, heartbreak,” Isabelle says.
“Well, look, if it hadn’t happened, I wouldn’t be here.”
He takes her hand.
“And I am liking here very, very much.”
The music has long since stopped and the house is silent. The night is. There’s not a car engine, or a wind through a tree, or a plink of rain on the roof. Just the silence of that house out there on the bluff. Energy begins to fill the space between them, and this energy is so real it could be a sound. First, it’s a low hum, and then it builds to something more, something large. Dear God, she feels it. The big thing waiting, needing only one small move to tip it over to ravage-energy, the teeth-clacking, hair-pulling kind. She feels it right there, and he must, too, because he clears his throat and pushes his chair back, and Isabelle decides it’s time to collect her purse and head home.
“It’s been such a lovely evening,” she says. Her voice is hoarse. Lovely—it seems wrongly prim and gentle after what she just felt.
“It has,” he says, and the moment is gone. “And we forgot all about the car.”
“The car!”
“I’ll come out and see it.”
“It’s pitch-black out.”
“Let’s go.”
The Acura is parked in the gravel spot in front of Remy’s house, and it’s too dark to see a thing. They need a flashlight, at least.
His hand is cupped against the glass as he peers in. “I’ll take it,” he says.
“You can’t take it! You can’t even see it. I haven’t even opened the door.”
He reaches in the pocket of his jeans. He removes a check, which he unfolds and then hands to her. It’s not so dark that she can’t see the figure written there. “Oh, my God, no. This is too much.”
“Not at all. It’s fair. Blue Book. I’ve done my research. Sold! Quit shortchanging yourself.”
“You can’t do this.”
“I can and I did. Now get in, and I’ll drive you home.”
—
She likes it all—she likes his age, forty-six, and his decisiveness, and his broken heart, and his Ph.D. She likes the way he can handle this unknown car without accidentally flipping on the windshield wipers or popping the hood. She really liked that dinner, but who wouldn’t, after meals of cereal and Marie Callender’s frozen lasagna? She’s nervous, though, because it’s very dark, and far off, there’s the creeping sense that she’s in over her head. She thinks it’s because of the discrepancies in their experience: He knows wine, and she picks whatever’s on sale and has the best label. He’s got the assurance of a man who’s been with fabulous, accomplished women. She’s just her regular self, who spent much of her adult life with Evan, whose finest points, truthfully, were his great sisters and his ass in jeans.
She’s just being insecure. And when he reaches her street and parks and pulls her to him, Henry North’s experience instead becomes a proven asset, because, holy hell, that kiss. Well, damn. That right there is what a kiss should be. Her first thought is how much she’s missed kisses like that. But her next thought is wondering if she ever really had them.
Her breath is gone, stolen. He pulls away. Her mouth is wet.
“Where did you come from?” she whispers. It’s a lover’s question, asked when a person can’t believe their sudden good fortune. But it’s a better question than she knows right then.
“See you soon,” he says.
She hopes so. Already, she badly hopes so.
The car pulls away, and she watches the red brake lights disappear down the road. There’s not even a small bit of regret about selling it. Her heart is doing that rising, soaring thing. It’s all wings and liftoff. She’s taken flight. Regrets are for later, anyway.
Chapter 6
When he wakes, Professor Weary’s sheets are on the floor, kicked off from his thrashing. It’s hard to sleep when it’s this hot. Maybe it’s that cramp that’s woken him. It’s there in his calf—the tightening that comes after long hours crouched on damp jungle ground, waiting for corvids to take their bait of cat food and hard-boiled eggs. The birds need to be caught, tagged, and identified, in order to be studied. One corvid is not like the next. Each is an individual and needs to be understood as an individual. But catching them is very, very difficult. They are rightly wary. They are incredibly smart. They will watch the food for weeks on end, sensing a trap.
<
br /> They are much smarter than many humans, who’ll plop right in, even when the net is practically in full view. In the middle of the night, that’s when Weary gets most angry with himself. He’s angry because his love and care for Sarah was too little, too late. He should have seen. He should have acted.
He rubs his calf as he lies in bed, and then it starts. A sound—a scritching and scratching. Maybe that’s what woke him. He gets up to see what the noise is, and no, it’s not some bird, some raven messaging with its beak. It’d be a nice touch of the fates, a raven, but no. It’s just the sharp tip of a palm frond, bent from wind, scraping the shutter. He opens the window, yanks and pulls, yanks and pulls, until the frond breaks.
He tosses it, and it falls, falls, falls.
How can he sleep after that? Even though the branch lands with only a soft plink, how can he possibly drift off now?
Limbs break and bones crush. Skulls do.
He comforts himself with thoughts of Raven, who made the world. Not Poe’s annoying bird, but Raven, capital R, honored by so many ancient people—Greeks, Hindus, Natives, Celtics, Norse, more…Raven created the world, but he created humans, too, and through trickery and seduction and honest concern—yes, actual care—provided them with fire and rivers and food, and even taught them how to make love. He created death, but he also carried their souls to the land of the dead.
And sometimes, when something so terrible happened that sadness traveled onward with that soul, Raven would bring the soul back to earth to right the wrong.
How can you not respect that, huh? Seduction, sex, death, retribution? Weary does. Plus, for such a powerful creature, Raven’s misdeeds were so wryly hilarious, and his frailties so humble. People should remember when hearing such tales, when narrowing their eyes at the slick black wings and sharp beak and craftiness, how complicated the situation was. You could judge him for the bad things he did. And, oh, he did do bad things. But he had his reasons. He had good reasons. What a weight Raven carried.
Making things right is a tough business. A haunting business. You worry; you worry a great deal. You hope nothing bad happens, before you can get in and save the day. Nothing else bad, nothing more, because too, too much has already happened. Maybe even Raven had sleepless nights such as this, Weary thinks, as he turns his pillow to the cool side for what feels like the hundredth time. What’re you going to do? Darkness is always the dance floor where anxiety spins with regret until you finally drop from exhaustion.
Chapter 7
Isabelle swirls her coffee in its white mug. It’s the best stuff, thick as chocolate. One swallow makes you sure your luck has changed. Nicky Talbott, the barista at Java Java Java, still has that beard he had when they graduated, but now he also has hemp bracelets and a twinkle in his eyes that must come from either strong beans or finding his passion. Isabelle remembers how shocking it was that someone their age could grow a beard like that. She always liked Nicky, even if he was high their entire senior year.
“You look happy, Iz,” Jane Mason says. She takes her reading glasses off, sets them on the table, and nods. “Yeah. You look better than I’ve seen you in weeks.”
“I do?”
Isabelle feels better than she has in a long while, too. Since she met Henry, since they’ve been spending time together after that dinner at Remy’s house, everything looks different. She feels like a teenager. She’s all “Wonderwall” and “Fever” and “Love Potion No. 9.” When she wakes up, she’s excited for the future, and she hasn’t felt that in ages. She wants to go places and see new things and allow her heart to be blown wide open. And those flares of anger—they’ve gone right out. Poof! Extinguished. Why be angry? Why spend time on the negative, when life is beautiful and way too short? Anger isn’t healthy, anyway.
“More than weeks, Iz. Years? Years! You look like the weight of the world is off your shoulders. I mean, first you’re free of that douchebag Evan…And you must be finally getting through all this shit…” Jane waves her hand across the table, where statements and spreadsheets are fanned out like a tarot deck. Jane has managed the office at Island Air for thirty years, ever since Isabelle’s mother, Maggie Austen, inherited the place from her mother when she died. Jane has been there through everything, every malfunction and season of bad weather and disaster; the increase in boat population; the noise complaints; the mandatory safety changes. Yet she’s still going strong. Her flannel shirt looks like it’s been around the block, because it has. Isabelle has never seen Jane in anything but flannel shirts and jeans, with her long, gray hair pulled back in a braid and her eyes a soft, tired blue. Jane spent more time with Isabelle’s mother than anyone else on earth, including Isabelle, which is maybe the thing Isabelle finds most miraculous.
“I don’t know how you did it,” Isabelle says.
“It all looks harder than it is. Everything was already organized in the computer. Basically, all I had to do was push a button, print it out.”
“I mean Mom. Dealing with her all those years.”
“Ah.”
“What do they say? You have the patience of a saint. I wonder about those saints. If they didn’t just go in their rooms and scream into their pillows.”
“I admit, there were a few days where I had Jack Daniel’s to thank.”
More than a few, Isabelle guesses. Jane has a drinker’s face. Then again, Jane lost her partner, Eva, to cancer a few years ago, and that plus a life of Maggie Austen may have caused the additional wear and tear.
“I feel like I should apologize to you.”
“To me?”
“I sort of…Ran off. Left you holding the bag. You were here, so I didn’t have to be.”
“Oh, no. No! This is my life. This is my home. I love it here. You should have gone out in the world and had other experiences. You still should! Your mom and I—okay. She was tough on a person. When she didn’t like you, she could get petty and cruel as a junior high school girl. She could make you feel two inches tall. When she loved you, though—it was complicated, but she was loyal as hell.”
“She was. She’d do anything for you, if you were on her side. Her generosity was boundless then.”
“And, God, she could make you blush like a virgin, the things she’d come out with! Right? If I had a quarter for every dick and cunt…”
“That’s not something a person says every day.”
“The Sisters of Mercy of my old high school would have washed out my mouth. But I miss her. We all do. We haven’t heard a good tit joke in months. Don’t tell Kit I said that, or else he’ll make twelve of them before his first flight of the day.”
“She was hilarious, wasn’t she? One of the funniest people I know. Knew. The past tense is weird.”
“It is. It always is. But without a doubt, Isabelle, she had a heart of gold, at times.”
“Definitely. I’m glad to hear you say this, though, because I felt bad. I heard how she talked to you sometimes. I mean, I know how that feels.”
“Most of the stuff she’d aim my way, I just…Whffft.” Jane zips her hand over her head. “And, well, we understood each other. Her own mother—do you remember much about her? You were pretty young.”
“She had a cookie drawer, and a coat with lots of pockets, and a little dog I loved.”
“Maggie was a pussycat next to her.”
“Oh, wow. I can’t imagine.”
“I can. You grow up like that and you’re always on the offensive. You watch out for what might hurt you. You strike first. Either that or you learn to step carefully, like I did. Like you did.”
The bells that hang on the door of Java Java Java ring, and Isabelle startles. She half expects Maggie to walk right in then, furious at her betrayal, but it’s just a tourist couple holding hands and looking up at the chalkboard menu. Isabelle loved her mother. Loves. But she was always scared of her, and she still is, even now that she’s dead. Powerful people—truly dead doesn’t even seem possible.
Oh, for Christ’s sake, Isabell
e, Maggie says. Stop being such a pussy.
“Remember the whole thing with Phil?” Jane chuckles.
Phil owned Lake Union Air in Seattle, and their reliance on each other’s ports meant they needed a smooth-running partnership. “War of the Roses,” Isabelle says.
“She hated him. He looked like your father, that was the real problem.”
“Whatever happened with that? I stopped asking.”
“I forbid her to talk to him.”
“He’s been really nice to me since I’ve been here.”
“He’s a nice guy, he just didn’t tiptoe around her, which was against her rules.”
“Remember Harv?”
Jane winces.
“I still feel bad about Harv’s kids.” Maggie and Harv had a relationship for a few years. Harv’s daughters hated Maggie, and the feeling was mutual. When Harv died, Maggie left them out of the obituary she wrote for The Parrish Chronicle.
“Yeah. Well, she was a child inside. That’s the thing you have to remember.”
Isabelle does remember. She can still hear Maggie’s small voice on the phone, telling Isabelle how much she missed her. Maggie would clutch Isabelle’s jacket sleeve when they had to say goodbye. This was such a different mother than the one who gripped a young Isabelle’s wrist hard enough to leave marks, saying, Stop hanging on me! Stop being such a whiner!
“You know what, Isabelle? Every person is complicated. Every single one. Even me, even you.”
“That’s for sure.”
“And you know, about your life in Seattle…I’ve been wanting to ask you something. While we’re here, sitting in front of these numbers.”
“Go for it.”
Jane leans forward. Her eyes aren’t tired anymore, and, Isabelle swears, her gray hair enlivens to a bright silver. “All this…I mean, I understand, this is a family legacy. Island Air, daughter to daughter, whether that’s your plan or not. But you’ve been saying you’re not sure about it. I want to tell you, you’ve got options.”
There’s a surge of steam from the espresso machine, and then the bells bang against the door again. Officer Ricky Beaker saunters in. They call him Tiny Policeman because of his height, sure, but also because his attitude makes you want to take him down a notch. Still, attitude or no, he raises his hand to Jane in a wave, and she does the same back, because everyone here has known one another forever, and that’s just what you do. Bud from Bud’s Tavern is placing his order at the counter, and Tiny gets in line behind him. In recent years, Tiny has traded his usual coffee at Boss Donuts for the good stuff, and who hasn’t. Memory flash: her mother’s ever-present cans of Folgers on the kitchen counter, which disappeared sometime in the 1980s, although one still survives, full of nails and screws, in the garage.
