Home Fires

by Luanne Rice

  STANDING at the podium, addressing the crowd under the hot midday sun, Ned was roasting in his cap and gown. Sweat trickled into his ears, down the back of his legs, into his shoes. Everyone else was feeling the heat, too. Half his classmates were giving him goony looks, rolling their eyes and pointing at their watches. Ned knew that they could take it. All his concern was reserved for one person, the girl sitting between his father and Mike Mallory’s mother, the slightly sunburned beautiful girl to whom Ned had directed his entire valedictory address: Maggie Vincent.

  Just before taking the stage, Ned had had the paralyzing thought: what if I bore her? After all, most of his speech was about his class, about their four years at Deerfield and what would happen next. But there she was, seeming to hang on every word he said, giving him a constant smile of encouragement.

  A lot of his friends in the graduate section kept leaning over, looking down their rows to catch a better sight of her. Ned knew it was crazy, but he felt almost prouder to have Maggie at his graduation than to have been chosen valedictorian.

  Looking into the audience as he spoke, his eyes met his father’s. He had been afraid of this moment. His father had been so reserved in their conversations lately; Ned knew he had let him down. But as if nothing had ever happened between them, his father was beaming.

  “Get over it,” Maggie had told Ned one midnight call recently. “Your father deserves a life.”

  Ned had expected to look at the seat beside his father’s, the place where his mother should have been, and feel strong sorrow that she was missing his high-school graduation. That she would miss his college graduation, and his medical-school graduation, if such a day should ever come. Ned had been afraid that he would look at the seat beside his father and see his mother’s ghost shimmering with dreams of what might have been.

  That’s why he hadn’t wanted Anne to come; he hadn’t wanted her in his mother’s place.

  But the strange thing was, when Ned looked into the audience, all he really saw was Maggie. One night they had talked from midnight until the sky turned milky blue with dawn. They had talked about the island, Deerfield, their parents, their worst nightmares (Ned’s was one where his hockey coach’s wife had blood dripping out of her teeth, like venom from a snake’s fangs, and she was trying to bite him), countries that had had at least two names in their lifetimes, dictators, the difference between Indian and African elephants, anything that would keep them from hanging up.

  He couldn’t wait until his father got that phone bill.

  Now he was coming to the end of his speech, the part where he would read his favorite poem by Wordsworth, the one that would always remind him of Deerfield. He imagined Wordsworth’s part of England to be very similar to Deerfield: rolling hills, river valleys, bitter winters, verdant springtimes. When he had read the poem to Maggie over the phone, by the end he was as choked up as he felt now.

  His last four years had been as happy as possible for a boy living many miles away from his father and a lifetime away from his mother. Deerfield was the reason. And so, Ned turned his attention from Maggie Vincent and his father to the friends and teachers he would miss so much. Giving them all a big smile, he took a deep breath and launched into “Lines Composed a Few Miles Above Tintern Abbey.”

  “Five years have passed; five summers, with the length/of five long winters! …”

  Ned Devlin’s Deerfield years had come to an end.

  Chapter 17

  Whether Maggie Vincent realized it or not, she had given Thomas Devlin heartsease. Just hearing that Anne had asked about him, that she still thought of him, however occasionally, went far toward soothing his mind. It gave him a mission. Anne might say Ned wasn’t the problem, but Thomas knew that deep down he was at least part of it.

  The mission would officially begin by giving Ned a talking-to. This required prying him loose from Maggie. Now that the island school was out, before summer jobs began, the two of them had become surgically attached. Long days at the beach, on the tennis court, or just hanging around the yard.

  When Ned was little, Thomas had hung a tire swing from a high branch in one of the oaks, and now Ned and Maggie swung on it for hour after lazy hour, all wrapped up in each other.

  Thomas had to vie with Ned for the use of his own truck; he had gotten used to the sight of Ned driving down the road, his arm around Maggie’s shoulders, Maggie’s hair blowing out the truck’s open window. Ned would beep and wave as he passed his father, working in the garden.

  One afternoon, in the midst of restaking the tomato plants that had doubled their height in the last heat wave, Thomas saw Ned and Maggie pull into the driveway.

  “Hey, Dad,” Ned called, heading into the house with Maggie.

  “Just the man I wanted to see,” Thomas called back.

  The kids ambled over, all sunburned and tousled, lightly holding hands.

  “Maggie, I bet you know how to make great lemonade,” Thomas said. “This old farmer could sure use a glass.”

  “Just point me to the lemons and sugar,” she said.

  She already knew the way to the kitchen. Ned started after her, his toes practically catching her heels, and Thomas had to smile at the sight of his son in thrall to love and, probably by now, sex.

  “Hang on, son,” Thomas said. He adjusted his old Red Sox hat, to shield his eyes from the summery glare.

  “What’s up?”

  “Let’s grab some shade,” Thomas said, leading Ned to the picnic table he had placed among the scrub oaks so many years ago. Every year his skin got more sensitive to the sun, no matter how much sunblock he used. He blinked the stars out of his eyes, taking off his dark glasses. When having a serious talk with someone, especially your child, Thomas Devlin was a firm believer in letting them see your eyes.

  “I’ve been letting you get away with being a bully,” Thomas began.

  “Me, a bully?” Ned asked, incredulous.

  “Yes. When it comes to Anne.”

  “Oh, Dad,” Ned said, impatiently, as if this were old news. He glanced at the kitchen door, agonizing as the seconds away from Maggie ticked by.

  “Maybe you and I should have had this talk a while ago. On your spring break. The minute it became clear that you had a problem with her.”

  “I don’t have a problem with her,” Ned said, spoken like a sullen child.

  “She thinks you do.”

  “What difference does it make?” Ned asked. “You should do what you want.”

  “And not care about how you feel?”

  “It’s just … shit.” Ned stopped, as if he couldn’t get the words from his brain to his lips.

  “The parallels to your mother,” Thomas supplied.

  Ned shrugged. An acorn fell onto the old pine table with a knock. For a few moments both men were absorbed watching a squirrel at work a few branches above their heads. Thomas felt his breath coming easier than it had in two months, and not for the first time he wondered why people make it so hard to talk to the people they love. They imagine the worst, they set up obstacles to prevent the truth from coming out. But in the end, when they finally muddle through, they find relief.

  “It was hard to take,” Ned said finally. “The part about you saving her from a fire.”

  “When I couldn’t save your mother.”

  “Yeah, that part.”

  “Anne understood before I did,” Thomas said. “She told me that you sort of had to hate her for surviving when your mother could not.”

  Ned didn’t answer, but his expression told Thomas that Anne had been right.

  “You’re going to have to work that part of it out,” Thomas said slowly. “I’ll help as much as I can. You always have Dr. Struan to talk to.” The psychologist that had helped both Thomas and Ned in the years since the fire. “But I love Anne. I don’t know if she’ll have me, but I want to be with her.”

  Ned nodded, looking his father dead in the eye for the first time since they’d sat down. He seemed about to speak, but
then he caught sight of Maggie, hovering by the kitchen door with a full glass pitcher of lemonade, obviously not wanting to interrupt. She was a good girl with fine sense, Thomas thought.

  “Is that it?” Ned asked.

  “I’d like a last word from you.”

  “Dad, in families there’s no such thing as a last word,” Ned said.

  However, for the last word on this subject at this moment, Ned’s grin and the way his arm shot into the air, waving Maggie over, told Thomas the whole story: love would reign. It was as much of a blessing as he could hope for.

  The three of them sat under the tree, sipping from glasses of lemonade made with just the right measure of mouth-pucker and sweetness.

  “How’s your aunt?” Ned asked Maggie.

  Surprised, Maggie’s eyes flickered from Ned to Thomas. “She’s fine,” Maggie said, smiling.

  “Keeping busy, is she?” Thomas asked.

  “Working, mainly.”

  “That’s good,” Thomas said as he watched Maggie’s smile turn impishly sly.

  “She only gets a day and a half off a week,” Maggie said. “And next Monday afternoon, she wants to take me whale watching. She thought she should experience firsthand what she’s pushing on helpless tourists.”

  “That sounds very smart.”

  “Anyway, the thought of being cooped up on a glass-bottomed boat, or whatever it is, twenty-five miles out with a bunch of cameras—it’s not my thing.”

  “Sounds like a ball,” Ned said wryly, proving to Thomas exactly how besotted he was. Thomas happened to know that Ned loved whale watching.

  “Anyway, if I bail on her, there’ll be an extra spot available. I mean, if you know anyone who might like to go.”

  “I’ll keep that in mind,” Thomas said, smiling at this young woman, his son’s girlfriend, who obviously had a brilliant future as a matchmaker.

  MOST Mondays Anne left the office at noon. She would head home and get straight to work at her table. This morning she had decided her next collage would be a stained-glass window. She would copy one of Notre Dame’s magnificent rose windows from a postcard she had tucked away, and she would add the collage to her series. That would stop her from puttering, as she’d been doing lately, with the picture she had started of Thomas’s snow-covered house. It didn’t fit the series, but she kept going back to it.

  Today, however, she was going whale watching with Maggie. She joined the parade of twenty-three passengers on their way to the town dock. In spite of herself, she felt excited.

  Like most jaded islanders, she knew marine animals were everywhere. The jetties and ledges were thick with harbor seals all winter; porpoises played in shallow island waters; you could see whales on nearly every ferry crossing, if you were patient and kept your eyes peeled.

  This expedition promised something even better. The boat would head twenty-eight miles out from the island, to Hurricane Banks. Marked by a few shoals, this was the spot where the continental shelf dropped into deep water. The currents were powerful, and they constantly circulated tons of plankton, attracting the whales.

  Leaning against a piling, Anne looked around for Maggie. They had ten minutes to board the vessel, and there was no sign of her, and she was beginning to wonder. But aside from the obvious pleasures of Maggie’s company, Anne would miss something else if Maggie didn’t show up: Maggie was bringing lunch.

  “I have a message from your niece.”

  At the sound of Thomas’s voice, Anne whirled around. She hadn’t seen him for so long, she just stood there, taking everything in. He stood back, beyond arm’s length, looking nervous and uncomfortable, his shoulders hunched.

  “From Maggie?” Anne asked finally.

  “Yes. She won’t be able to make it today.”

  “Oh.”

  “It’s my son’s fault. He becomes severely disabled when she’s more than six inches away.”

  “My sister tells me Maggie has the same problem.”

  “Ah,” Thomas said. A gentle smile tugged at his mouth, but his eyes darted nervously around. “Maggie thought maybe I’d like to take her place.”

  Anne could see by his posture, his discomfort, that he expected her to object. She didn’t like being pushed into things, but she couldn’t deny how good it felt to see him.

  “I do have this extra ticket,” Anne said. “This morning I had to turn away at least ten people who’d hoped to get aboard, and I hate to see the seat go to waste. Want to come whale watching?”

  Thomas nodded, grinning. “I can’t think of anything I’d rather do,” he said.

  Onboard the vessel, the deckhands pulled up the gangway right behind them. Bill Hannigan, the captain, waved to them. The young deckhands, who went to Anne for their paychecks every Thursday, gave them a warm welcome.

  Moses Court, third mate and year-round volunteer firefighter, pointed out the best spot on the starboard rail.

  “We have a good forty-five-minute ride out to the Bank,” he said, “but when I give you the high sign, stand right there and look twenty degrees off the bow. They’re playing like crazy out there.”

  “Are there always whales?” Thomas asked.

  “Not like today.”

  “How do you know they’re out today?”

  Moses winked, tapping his forehead with his index finger. “We’re psychic,” he said.

  “Radio contact,” Anne explained when Moses walked away. “All the different captains call each other to let everyone know where the action is. The season is short, and they’re all after the same thing.”

  “Enough money to make it through the winter,” Thomas said.

  “Right. There’s enough business to go around, so there’s no need to be cutthroat. I hear them all day, on the radio in my office.”

  Anne and Thomas strolled around the boat. They shouldered around Cape Amelia, and the captain set a course for open water. Standing in the bow, Anne felt the chill of fresh air at sea. Thomas was so close, their arms were nearly touching. She shivered, from the breeze or his proximity. It came upon her so strongly, she had to step away.

  “Maggie sent along the lunch she said she’d bring. Are you hungry?” Thomas asked.

  “Starved.”

  They settled onto a long, blue bench on the top deck. Here the hot summer sun counteracted the stiff sea breeze, making Anne feel sensual. She watched Thomas unwrap the lunch Maggie had sent. There was curried chicken salad with slivered almonds and red grapes on sweet brown bread, chilled watercress soup in a silver flask, and fresh orange juice mixed with sparkling water.

  They ate the delicious food, ignoring the seagulls perched on the rail, crying for a handout. It wasn’t until Anne tasted the dessert, chocolate cognac truffles, that she figured out the picnic’s romanticism. Maggie had obviously raided the Seduction Table.

  Instead of mentioning it, she just smiled at Thomas. He returned the smile, rolling his eyes in rapture.

  Full and content, Anne leaned back, taking the sun on her face. This felt good, being with Thomas right now. They were miles out to sea, together among strangers, far from his son and her sister and the gathering torrent of letters from Matt. Anne reached for Thomas’s hand, and she held it. He squeezed back.

  While people around them talked excitedly about the action they would see at the feeding grounds, Anne and Thomas quietly watched two minke whales approach the port side, take air, and disappear beneath the water’s surface. No one else noticed.

  With the twin diesels throbbing two decks below and the rhythmic waves bearing them farther away from the island, Anne let herself relax. Don’t take it anywhere, she told herself. She didn’t think about how this had happened, she didn’t analyze Maggie’s actions; she simply enjoyed this moment in time.

  Presently, Moses waved down from the bridge, directing them to the starboard bow. Anne led the way, touched to be accepted as an islander insider by the ship’s crew. She and Thomas leaned against the rail. Waves broke over a barely protruding rock, and at f
irst Anne thought it was a whale. Then she saw the real thing.

  Whales everywhere. She cried out, before she could stop herself. This was more magnificent than anything she had imagined, better than the brochures she handed out every day, better than the sales pitch she had been giving.

  People crowded along the starboard side, squashing Anne into Thomas. His arm went around her, and she leaned into his body.

  Whales were feeding: coming to the surface, breathing the air, then sounding with a graceful arch of the back. As they dove, their great tails would rise straight above the surface, like a two-pronged Neptune’s spear. And the whales were breaching: zooming with torpedo force out of the water, seeming to hang in the air, then smashing back into the sea.

  Anne offered Thomas the binoculars, but he nodded that she should use them first. She focused on one old whale, floating on his back, sunbathing. He, like most of the others, was a humpback. They had long white flippers and knobbly spines, relatively elegant sloping snouts, and the biggest one Anne saw looked about seventy feet long.

  The captain circled the feeding grounds along with several other companies’ boats. It might have felt hokey or commercial or exploitive, but to Anne it felt spectacular. She lowered the binoculars. She wanted a large field of vision, to take in the whole scene. Cameras clicked and whirred, and the passengers exclaimed every time one of the whales came to the surface.

  At some point during the show, Thomas’s arms came around her. They encircled her from behind, and Anne felt his mouth against her ear. He whispered something.

  She couldn’t hear his words above the noise of the crowd and the big diesels, but she felt his warm breath. She half turned, just enough to brush his cheek with her lips. She wanted to ask him to repeat what he had said, but finally she did not. Turning back to the whales, she believed she already knew. Only, she wasn’t quite ready to hear.

  ON a hot June afternoon, with the sun high in the sky, in the tall grass between his yard and the potato fields, Ned Devlin lost his virginity. He saw shooting stars. For the first time in his life he made love to a girl. Or, rather, Maggie made love to him.