True Blue (Hubbard's Point)

by Luanne Rice

  “I'll go to summer school with you,” he whispered. “When does it start?”

  “I think it started already,” she said.

  “Maybe my grandfather could get us in. Talk to the teachers he knows, get them to help us make up the stuff we've already missed.”

  “We'd go together?”

  “Why not?”

  “I've never gone to summer school before,” Quinn whispered, “and I've never had a boyfriend.”

  “Two new things.” He grinned.

  “I don't change easily,” she warned him.

  “I know that,” he said, pulling her down beside him on the scratchy old blanket, the wood floor hard underneath their bodies. He kissed her tenderly, knowing that every second was precious, that she was delicate, that life was taking them on a ride that could end anytime, anywhere. Michael Mayhew had plans: Oh, he had plans.

  Two SUMMER DAYS passed, and the morning of Six-tus's departure dawned with sunlight and fair breezes. Sixtus woke up early. His body creaked, moving around the house. Arthritis was creeping in; he felt a shiver at his core. He was so afraid of becoming dependent; he'd seen it happen to many of his friends. He'd die before he saddled Rumer with his care. Looking out the window, he felt relieved, knowing Rumer would have nothing to worry about weatherwise, watching her old man sail away.

  But by eight there was a strange chill in the air and a dark line along the horizon. While the Clarissa waited at the dock, everyone from the Point gathered on the rocks to see Sixtus off. The group was loving and festive as always, but there was an ominous feeling in the air. Rumer stood beside him, oddly silent. He had told her to invite Edward if she felt like it, but the aristocratic farmer was notably absent.

  “Dearest, what will you do for freshwater?” Winnie asked, sounding worried. “You can't drink the ocean….”

  “I've got a water maker,” Sixtus replied, unobtrusively clenching and unclenching his fists, trying to work the stiffness out. “A desalinifier that'll eradicate every bit of salt and leave the sea tasting fresh as a spring. Thanks for asking.”

  “And food?” Annabelle asked. “What will you eat?”

  “Oyster juice,” Sixtus said. “I've got cans of it—full of protein, and it's easier than cooking.”

  “Sounds hideous,” Hecate said, wincing.

  Zeb walked over carrying a large carton, which he laid at Sixtus's feet. “Freeze-dried meals straight from NASA. It's what we used to eat in space.”

  Sixtus nodded, moved that Zeb would come to the party at all. Glancing over at Rumer, he could see her looking every damn place but at Zeb—avoiding his eyes at all cost.

  “Look what Zeb brought me,” he said.

  “Delicious. Freeze-dried macaroni and cheese,” she said, lifting one of the foil packets.

  “Don't knock it, Larkin,” Zeb said. “It hit the spot in orbit.”

  Sixtus sighed, and both kids looked at him. The feeling of trepidation was thick in the air—he had the sense of a storm building, although the marine forecast was for clear skies.

  “What, Dad?” Rumer asked, sounding anxious. “Are you okay?”

  “I want you two to…” he began sternly, then trailed off.

  People—even impetuous children—don't set out to ruin their lives, but sometimes parents can see their children making enormous mistakes from a long way away, just like dark clouds bringing a storm across the sea. Sixtus would never understand why Elizabeth had set her sights on Zeb, for that was just what it was: After a lifetime of at best liking and at worst barely tolerating the boy next door, she suddenly went after him with a vengeance.

  Zeb had been a late bloomer, Sixtus remembered. Small for his age, he had had a growth spurt his last year at Columbia. He had shot up four inches, lifted enough weights over the winter to give himself a big chest and shoulders, and announced his plans to go to graduate school at UCLA.

  Sixtus had always believed Elizabeth had fallen in love with the “L.A.” part of UCLA more than anything else. She had been acting in New York, getting plenty of parts off—and some parts on—Broadway. She had played Portia in summer stock in the Berkshires, Juliet in Montauk and Lower Manhattan, part of the company in As You Like It at Shakespeare in the Park, and now she was ready to move from the stage to the screen. Rumer had brought Zeb to watch Elizabeth in Romeo and Juliet at a theater off Broadway. When she returned to Connecticut, the spark had been struck, and Zeb and Elizabeth were on. The long day's journey into destruction had begun.

  Sixtus sighed, wondering about the role he'd played in it all. He should have noticed as it was going on. Something—his own distance as a father?—had made a needy girl out of Elizabeth. She'd always had to have more of everything: attention, acclaim, love, even the boy meant to be with her sister.

  “You want us… what?” Zeb asked.

  “Never mind what,” Rumer said. “He's just getting ready to say good-bye, and he knows how I hate goodbyes—right, Dad?”

  “That I do, my love.”

  “Hmm,” Zeb said, remaining unconvinced. He watched Sixtus, expectation in his eyes.

  “What's wrong, Dad?” Rumer asked. “Having second thoughts?”

  “No, sweetheart. You wish I would, don't you?”

  She glanced at the boat. “I wish I could lie and say no,” she said.

  “You were never one to lie,” Sixtus said. “You're my truth teller. All I have to do is look into your eyes to know the whole story.”

  “Do you think you'll see Elizabeth when you get to Canada?” Rumer asked.

  “I'd call it a dim possibility.”

  “In what way? She's there, shooting.”

  “Yes, but on a tight schedule—as she always reminds us.”

  “I hope you do see her; I know you'd like that,” Rumer said, and Sixtus saw Zeb flinch.

  Now, glancing around his party for Michael, Sixtus felt a rush of old sorrow for what had been lost between Rumer and her nephew. Once Elizabeth got sober and realized how much Michael and Rumer meant to each other, she had stopped Michael's visits. Always with a reason—never the real one: He has a cola, he's coming with me to the set, we're going to Aix-en-Provence for the summer.

  “Okay,” Rumer said, turning toward the Clarissa. “You've got the beacon on board?”

  “The radio transmitter, yes,” Sixtus said.

  “You're not going to get lost at sea,” she said. “But I want you to have it in case you need us—you might get lonely and want to call!”

  “You're taking care of me the way I used to take care of you,” Sixtus said, sliding his arm around her. This was the kind of care he could bear: love.

  He remembered how she and Zeb would go off on adventures for hours, whole days. They would swim out to Gull Island, then across to Stony Neck State Park. Once they had rowed across Long Island Sound to Orient Point. Another time, they had ridden horses up Serendipity Hill at night to see stars from the peak. Sixtus and Clarissa's challenge had been to let them go, give them space to grow, protect them from afar.

  “That's what she wants,” Zeb said. “To take care of you.” Rumer's gaze slid around as if she wanted to look anywhere but at Zeb. But finally she just gave up.

  “I do, Dad,” Rumer said, and Sixtus saw the first tears in her eyes. He looked down to keep from getting choked up himself. How long would it be before he became so arthritic he'd really need care?

  “I'd feel better if you'd tell us you're actually going to use the electronics on board,” Zeb said.

  “Convince him, Zeb,” Rumer said.

  Sixtus shook his head and laughed. “I'm an old Irishman doing what a whole lot of my ancestors did before me—sailing across the sea. Only this time, I'm going in the opposite direction—back to Ireland. I've got a good sextant. You of all people, Zeb, should know the value of the stars. They're my map in the sky. They'll show me the way.”

  “They will,” Zeb agreed, “but there are easier ways. GPS, INMARSAT… I personally placed satellites in the sky to help
navigators on their boats.”

  Sixtus smiled. He understood the younger generation's reliance on GPS and computers—all they had to do was point and click, and the magic coordinates would come up onscreen. Such navigation was like following a cookbook—someone else's instructions— without a deep understanding of one's own.

  “Zeb, thank you. Rumer—you know I wouldn't go offshore without electronics. I'll have the beacon on— don't worry. But that's my backup: I'm going to do sun lines. I'm going to shoot the stars… that's how I'll find my way.”

  “Just want you to be prepared,” Zeb said.

  “Well, don't take it personally if I don't use them, son,” Sixtus said, slapping him on the back. “I'm sailing a classic Herreshoff, not some plastic soap dish. When it was built, a sextant was as good as it got. Expect miracles from nature, and you'll get them.”

  “Dad…”

  “Dearest,” Winnie said, coming over to join them. Her dark blue silk robe had huge epaulets on the shoulders—the nautical look in honor of his departure. Perhaps she had worn it in H.M.S. Pinafore, or perhaps she counted an admiral among her many admirers.

  “What is it, my love?” Sixtus asked, noting the worry in her face.

  “Reassure me, if you will, that that lovely boat of yours is seaworthy enough to cross the Atlantic.”

  Sixtus laughed, glad to be distracted from the looks flying between Rumer and Zeb, from the emotional tone of his good-bye to them.

  “The Clarissa's, seakindly, Winnie.”

  “And boats like this have sailed across the ocean?” she pressed.

  “They have,” Sixtus said.

  “Single-handed, Dad?” Rumer asked.

  “Most certainly. I'm not a pioneer, sweetheart. I'm only doing what's been done before. In 1978, a man named Lloyd Bergeson sailed the Cockatoo II—another New York 30—single-handed to Norway.”

  “And he made it safely?” Rumer asked.

  “He did,” Sixtus said, his heart racing as he hoped she wouldn't ask the next question.

  “What's wrong?” Zeb asked, stepping slightly away from Rumer and Winnie.

  “Wrong?”

  “You've got a cloud over your face the size of New England. What really happened to the Cockatoo IP.”

  “It sank on the return voyage. Don't tell Rumer that story, will you, Zeb? I remember how she was during your missions, watching the sky and afraid you'd be swallowed up.”

  “She hated me then,” Zeb said. “I was married to Elizabeth.”

  “That's in the past,” Sixtus said steadily.

  “What do you mean?”

  “Listen, Zeb. I was dead set against you and Elizabeth getting divorced—because it's against my religion. But there's an old saying: No amount of wishing can stop the cause of an effect.”

  “A simple law of physics.”

  “Physics, nature, the human heart,” Sixtus said. “You can't stop a tidal wave, a hurricane, a falling tree. Get in the way, and you're done with. That's what you and Rumer brought to this Point so many years ago. Don't stop it again.”

  Turning his back, unwilling to say more to Zeb, Sixtus walked around the crowd, saying good-bye. Quinn ran over, gave Sixtus a huge hug.

  “Be careful, please?” she asked. “Don't run into any whales or anything. I hear they're all over the Gulf Stream. And don't ram into any sunfishes—they're huge, and supposedly they love to sun themselves on the surface.”

  “Yeah, be safe, Grandpa,” Michael said.

  “I will.”

  “If you get lonely,” Quinn said, her voice low with emotion, “you can do what I do…”

  “What's that, honey?”

  “I close my eyes and think of my parents,” she said. “No matter where I am, no matter how alone I am, I can always hear them. It's easiest by the sea…when I can hear the waves. Or even better, in my boat, where I can feel them… lifting me, supporting me, carrying me along. I think Clarissa will do that for you, Sixtus.”

  “Clarissa, my boat?”

  “No, Clarissa, your wife. She's with you always.”

  “Oh, I know that, Quinn,” Sixtus said, taking the girl's hand. He had always felt a great connection with her. It seemed amazing that one so young could know so much about real love and the human condition. Grateful that Michael had her for a friend, he kissed the top of her head.

  “You belong in college, Quinn. To get there, summer school would be a fine start.”

  “We're going tomorrow,” Michael said.

  “What? To summer school?”

  “We are,” Quinn said. “We would have gone today, but we didn't want to miss your party.”

  “Why?” Sixtus said. “What made you change your minds?”

  “We met,” Quinn said simply. “And things started to make sense…”

  Michael didn't reply, but he nodded.

  Sixtus hugged and kissed Quinn and Michael, then returned to the adults to say his good-byes. Annabelle McCray, knowing his love of Irish literature, gave him a book of Yeats's poems and a copy of Joyce's Portrait of the Artist as aYoung Man.

  Hecate, dressed in her customary black, gave him a small vial offish bones, hydrangea blossoms, and cod liver oil. A cousin of the magical women at the Bridal Barn, she knew a thing or two about talismans and blessings.

  “FOOT a safe trrrrip,” she purred, closing his fingers around the glass bottle as Sixtus kissed her.

  Winnie gave him a small tape player and a collection of opera cassettes. “Some of my favorites. Good sailing, my dear friend,” she said, wrapping him in an embrace.

  “Thank you, Winnie,” Sixtus said, moved speechless by the love pouring out from his family and neighbors. Although Mrs. Lightfoot—the old woman who lived in the house on the Point and never left it—hadn't come, she had raised the American flag on the mast beside her house along with signal flags spelling out “bon voyage.”

  Looking down the rocky coast, Sixtus could see the tide turning, and he knew it was time to go. Music drifted down from the McCray cottage. The tune was Cole Porter, lush and romantic. If Clarissa were there, Sixtus would have grabbed her in his arms, swung her around the dock. Instead, he took Rumer's hand and began to dance with her.

  “I'll miss you, Dad,” she said.

  “I'll be back before you know it,” he said.

  “Call me when you get to Halifax.”

  “Of course I will.”

  “Malachy Condon lives in Nova Scotia… let me give you his number,” Sam Trevor said, walking over to hand Sixtus his card. “He's a great guy, an oceanogra-pher who lives on his boat in Lunenburg. If you need anything at all, give him a call. He'll steam on out into the Gulf of Maine to meet you.”

  Sixtus accepted the card—partly because he knew it would give his daughter a little peace of mind to know he had someone looking out for him.

  “Dad, I believe in you,” Rumer said.

  “That means the world to me, sweetheart,” Sixtus said.

  She was about to cry. Glancing around, he spotted Zeb standing with Winnie and called him over.

  “Dance with her,” he mouthed over Rumer's head.

  Zeb nodded.

  The song was “Every Time We Say Goodbye.” “One of your mother's favorites,” Sixtus whispered too softly for Rumer to hear. Now all he wanted was to be alone with Clarissa, sailing away on their long sabbatical. He hugged Rumer hard, kissed her forehead, and pressed her into Zeb's arms. She struggled to get away, as if she would climb on board and sail away with her father, but Zeb held her tight.

  “Dance with me, Rue,” he said. “We'll dance Sixtus right over the horizon.”

  “I don't want him to go,” she wept into Zeb's shoulder.

  “Remember the roof,” he whispered back. “Remember what we said up there… you have to let him… it's his vision, his dream.”

  And it was, Sixtus knew. He wasn't afraid at all. The world opened before him: The sea was his road, and it lay at his feet while the wind blew at his back. He carried his
gifts on board, stowed them below. The Cole Porter still played, and Wnnie began to sing. Les Dames de la Roche stood on their beloved rocks of Hubbard's Point, waving as he cast off lines.

  Sixtus pulled his white cotton sun hat on his head and raised the sails. The main filled, and then the jib, as the Clarissa sailed majestically away from the dock. His heart soared, beating fast. As perhaps only Quinn knew, he was alone with his wife, on their boat; he felt her spirit as truly as he felt the wind in his hair. She was his partner and sweetheart, his eternal guide. Their friends and family called and sang from shore, wishing them well.

  Quinn started up her lobster boat, and she and Michael led him out of the cove. The voices grew more distant until all he could hear was the wind in the sails, the waves against the hull, and the throb of Quinn's engine.

  “Don't forget,” he called. “You two have made me a promise to go to school.”

  “And don't you forget you promised to be very careful and come back to Hubbard's Point safe and sound,” Quinn called back.

  “I won't. I never break my promises.”

  “Nor I mine,” she said.

  They had reached the red can buoy marking the north end of the Wickland Shoal, where Sixtus would bang a left and leave Hubbard's Point behind.

  “We're ready to see you over the horizon,” Quinn said, circling the Clarissa once with her lobster boat, then throttling back to let Sixtus swing the tiller and come about. The sails luffed, then filled again, the sloop pointing eastward past the Wickland Rock Light.

  “Good luck in school, you children,” Sixtus called, sailing away.

  “Watch the waters off Point Jude,” Quinn yelled. “They can get a little rough.”

  “I will!” Sixtus smiled, knowing she was referring to the time she and Allie sank in a big storm on their way to Martha's Vineyard.

  He glimpsed the Point, all the shingled cottages with their bright shutters and tangled gardens, American flags flying in the wind. Hubbard's Point had been founded by the working class, by Irish immigrants, by people without money who'd had the foresight to put down roots by the sea that had brought them to the United States. He loved this land with all his heart, and he knew he'd be taking a bit of it with him. When his eyes fell on the Mayhews’ old green house, he said a prayer for the new owners and what would be—that they would hold true to the spirit of the place—and he looked over to see Rumer and Zeb still waving from the dock.