by Luanne Rice
“Regis,” Agnes said, her voice croaking.
“You’re awake!”
“How’d you…find me?”
“Cece followed you.”
“Excuse me, what are you doing in here?”
At the sound of the irate voice, Regis looked over her shoulder, still holding Agnes’s hand. She saw a male nurse standing there, with shockingly bright red hair and blue eyes, and dressed in baggy blue scrubs. “I’m her sister, it’s okay.”
He stared at her for a few seconds, as if maybe he knew her from somewhere. “She’s supposed to be resting,” he said eventually. “She really hit her head. Maybe just a few more minutes, okay? I wouldn’t do it, but someone might call security.”
“She needs me,” Regis said.
“I understand,” he said. “But just a few more minutes. What she needs most right now is sleep.”
“Thank you…” Regis broke off to read his name badge. “Brendan. She and I have shared a room together our whole lives. Except when I went to college last year.”
“You’ll be apart after you get married,” he said.
“What?” she asked, shocked.
He gestured at her engagement ring. “After your wedding,” he said and stepped closer, pulled the covers up higher on Agnes, right around her chin. The gesture seemed so protective and tender. Regis thought of Peter, wondered whether he’d do that for her if she were ever hurt and cold.
“Look,” Brendan said, “why don’t you let her get some rest? She’s getting good care, I promise. She’ll be a lot more ready for visitors tomorrow.”
“I’m not a visitor,” Regis said.
“I know. You’re her sister. You make me think of me and my brother. But still. Let her rest, okay?”
“You promise to watch over her?”
“I promise.”
“Her name is Agnes.”
“I know,” he said, breaking into a big smile, pointing at her chart. “And yours is Regis. I heard her call you that.”
“Yes.”
Just then the curtains parted, and a female nurse stood there. She looked surprised—not to see Regis standing there, but to see Brendan.
“What are you doing here?” she asked. “I thought you were off tonight.”
“I switched my shifts,” he said.
“Must have been pretty recently,” she said. “You’re not on the schedule. Better tell the office, so one of us can go home.”
“I’ll take this patient,” he said, gazing down at Agnes.
“She’s on my list,” the other nurse said, frowning.
“That’s a mistake,” he said. “Because she’s on mine, too.”
“Like I said, you’d better clear it with the office.”
“I will,” Brendan said. He gave Agnes and Regis a quick glance, as if to make sure he should really leave, then followed the other nurse.
“I swear,” Regis said, holding Agnes’s hand. “I don’t want to leave you.”
“You can,” she said weakly. “Just come back tomorrow, okay?”
“I’ll leave you in the care of Brendan,” Regis said. She looked into Agnes’s eyes and chuckled lightly. “He has red hair.”
“So?”
“Cece told me about you chasing an angel with red hair when we went to get Mom tea. Jesus, Ag!”
“She shouldn’t have told,” Agnes said, not laughing at all, closing her eyes.
Brendan returned. Something about the way he smiled, standing close to Agnes, the way he had tucked the covers around her, made Regis realize that it would be okay to leave.
“Brendan,” Regis said, “I’ll be back tomorrow.”
“That’s good,” he said. “Like you said, she needs you.”
“Look after her, okay?” Regis asked.
He nodded, not saying a word.
With that, he let Regis kiss Agnes’s forehead, and then gently eased her out of the cubicle. Regis glanced back, just happening to see the hem of his jeans poking out from under his green scrubs. She saw some burrs stuck to the denim—the kind that grew in the Academy field, along the stone wall.
Regis stood there in the glow of fluorescent hospital lights, feeling as if she had encountered something strange and wonderful. She knew about her sister’s penchant for visions—something Regis thought was basically hooey. She didn’t even believe in what she’d heard her aunt had seen, so she wasn’t about to believe it about her sister.
Brendan was real; he wasn’t any mere vision, but he had certainly appeared tonight just when Regis needed him most, for peace of mind. He was a true-life angel, that was for sure. Since he was taking care of Agnes, he deserved elevated status. Regis dubbed him Brendan, the redheaded archangel of the ER.
She would leave her sister with no one less.
Nine
The tide had risen high during the night, and now it had ebbed all the way out to the end of the jetty. Rockweed and Irish moss glistened in the morning sun, and periwinkles studded the glossy rocks. Crabs scuttled for cover as John walked through the tide pools.
He kept his eyes peeled, scanning for the rock that had done it. Orienting himself by way of the wall and the spot where he’d pulled Agnes onto the beach, he narrowed in. The water would have been a good two feet over the top of the rock last night. Even in the blackness, the stars had illuminated the surface, the ridges of breaking waves. She never could have seen what was underneath. But she’d lived on this beach her whole life. Wouldn’t she have known better than to dive here?
He looked up at the hillside—to the stone wall that snaked down the hill, all the way to the edge of the bank—where it became a breakwater, jutting out into the cove, meant to prevent erosion of the Academy land. What had she been doing, running on top of the wall? And what had possessed her to go crashing into the water?
John walked over to the spot where she’d gone in, pebbles crunching underfoot. The tide was still going out, rivulets through the mud. Green weed stuck to his feet. He didn’t care. His baby had hit her head on a rock, one of these right here, and he had to find the one.
It wasn’t hard to figure out. He scanned the immediate area; most of the rocks were too small, and last night they’d have been too far underwater to do much harm. But this one, taller than he was, massive and broad…he ran his hand over its rough surface. Was that a slash of blood on the granite, or just a streak of rose quartz? John felt it in his soul: this was the rock that had injured Agnes.
Throwing his shirt up on the beach, he went to work. Took the shovel and crowbar and pickax and sledgehammer he’d borrowed from Tom’s toolshed—behind the convent, out where he kept the mowers and landscaping equipment, and John’s great-grandfather’s stonecutting tools.
Using the shovel, he dug around the rock now, throwing sand off to the side. It wasn’t part of the moraine, wasn’t attached to the ridge of granite left behind by the last ice age. No, it was just a boulder from the field. John knew that one of his ancestors had rolled it down the hill, into the water—at the same time he’d cleared the Kelly land, built the walls.
Digging was a waste of time. Grabbing the pickax, he started swinging. Every blow jolted his whole body. He found a crack and felt something give. Chips flew. He shut his eyes, swung again and again.
After a few minutes, he was covered with sweat and stopped to rest. As he did, he heard a loud meow. It startled him, and he looked around. He was used to cats; many strays lived in Portlaoise Prison, and over the years, he had welcomed several into his cell. Each of them had comforted him, but there was one that had become his favorite: a small white cat that had reminded him of Sisela.
He heard rustling in the brush at the top of the beach. Pausing, he walked closer to investigate. A cat meowed again and again, as if in distress. He crouched down, leaning on the shovel’s handle, peering into the tangled vines and beach roses.
She sat so still, he almost missed her. There, nearly hidden, he saw glowing green eyes, those of a white cat. God, she looked so much like
Sisela, she took his breath away. He felt a quick sting, just behind his eyelids. His old cat, his old beloved life…But it couldn’t be her—she would be almost nineteen by now. He knew that she must have died while he was in Portlaoise; he had grieved for her along with everything else. But maybe this cat was one of her kittens…. His eyes blurred with tears.
“It is you! You’re really home!”
John heard the voice, and when he looked up, there she was—running down the hill through the grapevines and wildflowers, her black veil and habit flying out behind her. John let the shovel fall to the sand, caught his sister as she jumped down from the bank.
“Johnny,” she said, breaking into sobs.
“Bernie,” he said.
Holding his sister, he let himself cry. He’d held the emotion in for so long. It cracked his chest now, making him shudder, flowing out. Bernie felt so real, here on the beach they’d loved as children. She’d been there for him from the minute he was born.
“You’re really here,” she wept.
“I sometimes thought I’d never see this day,” he said.
“You have no idea how much I missed you.”
“And I missed you,” he said. “Your letters really got me through.”
“Johnny, they were nothing. You don’t know how much I wanted to be with you. Those few visits felt like nothing…”
“You had to keep this place running,” he said. “I understood.”
She reached up, held his face between her hands. Her cheeks were streaked with tears. He felt her staring into his eyes, trying to gauge how he was doing. With anyone else he would have pulled away, but not Bernie.
“You’re still my little brother,” she said. “I’d do anything for you.”
“You did, Bernie. I know how hard it was to get permission from the order to fly over. And all your letters and prayers—I had you with me every day. Believe me, you were with me in my cell.”
“It wasn’t enough,” she murmured. “I felt so helpless.”
“You looked after Honor and the girls, just like you promised.”
“I love them,” she said. “Honor is my sister—that’s how I feel about her. And the girls are…” she trailed off, tearing up again. “They’re the closest I have to children of my own. Bless them all.”
“Bernie…”
They hugged again. Then stepped apart and, as if by agreement, dried their tears.
“You don’t look any older,” he said, smiling. “Not one bit.” And she didn’t. Her face was unlined, her eyes clear and bright, and the wisps of hair he saw sticking out from under her wimple looked as red as ever.
“John, you still look exactly like my little brother.” She reached up to touch his face again.
“But old now,” he said. “I got old in prison, Bernie.”
“Johnny,” she said. Her eyes were filled with pain, and he could see that she had counted the days right along with him.
“I’m sorry for what you must have gone through, worrying about me,” he said.
“No,” she said, taking his hand. “Not me…you, Johnny. I prayed for you every day. The entire community did.”
“Nuns praying for a murderer,” he said.
“Stop it. You are not a murderer. It was a terrible thing, but not intentional. You had to fight that poor man to keep him from hurting Regis.”
“That’s how you see it?” he asked.
“I know your heart, Johnny.”
“Maybe you don’t,” he said.
His heart was thudding so hard, his ribs hurt. He flashed on the rage he’d felt that day, one memory that hadn’t dulled: the sight of Greg White descending on Regis. John remembered what his fists had done. As terrible as that was, he wished the story had ended there.
“I know my brother,” she said stubbornly.
“Thanks for saying that, Bernie,” he said.
“Has Honor been down to see you today?” Bernie asked.
“Not yet,” John said.
“Agnes is improving. She’s awake and alert. They’re going to do an MRI at ten, but Honor said the doctors sound very positive. They’ll probably release her soon.”
John felt scalded; Honor hadn’t even bothered to come tell him. He felt color rising in his neck and face and saw it register in Bernie’s expression.
“It will get better, Johnny,” Bernie said, reading his mind. “Honor is a little bit in shock. Because of Agnes, but also because she wasn’t expecting you to be here this soon—none of us were. It’s a gift, beyond belief…. But for her, with the girls and all, it will probably take somegetting used to.”
“Tom helped me,” he said. “He got one of the Kellys involved, and they got me out early, for good behavior.”
“Tom loves you like a brother,” Bernie said, keeping her voice even.
“Well, I’m your brother, and we both know he’d do anything for you,” John said.
She didn’t nod, didn’t acknowledge what he’d just said. She just gazed at John, as if she was afraid he might disappear again. “Six years was too long,” she said. “Remember the outcry in Ireland…a lot of people thought you never should have gone to jail.”
“Yeah, well…” John wanted her to stop.
“John, I still don’t…I’ll never understand,” Bernie said, taking his hand. “Why you pled guilty the way you did.”
“They had witnesses who’d heard me threaten him, Bernie. I told him I’d kill him, and I did.”
“Regis would have told the court that he attacked you,” she pressed.
“I didn’t want to put Regis through it,” he said. “Or Honor.”
“They would have welcomed the chance to tell what happened,” Bernie said. “They wanted to stand up and fight for you….”
“Well, I didn’t want them to,” he said, his voice rising. Then, seeing the hurt in her face, he shook his head. “I’m sorry, Bernie.”
“It’s okay, John,” she said. “You’ve been under such a strain.”
He nodded, wanting her to let it go at that. He gazed up the hillside—he couldn’t help watching for Honor. There was something he wanted to do before she came—if she came—and he was itching to get it done. He glanced over at the pickax and sledgehammer, and Bernie saw.
“I want to ask you what you’re doing,” Bernie said. “But I have the feeling it’s between you and that rock.”
He didn’t reply. Bernie stood right beside him, sandals on her feet. Overhead, one seagull hovered and dropped a mussel on the rock, cracking the blue-black shell. Then it dropped down and ate the meat.
“Do you still feel the need to do hard labor? Didn’t you get enough of that at Portlaoise?”
“It’s not like that,” he said.
“It’s just that you’re doing a really good imitation of Sisyphus. ‘The gods had condemned Sisyphus to ceaselessly rolling a rock to the top of a mountain, whence the stone would fall back of its own weight. They had thought with some reason that there is no more dreadful punishment than futile and hopeless labor.’ That’s Camus. You don’t have to do penance, Johnny.”
“That’s not what this is,” he said.
“What, then?”
“She’s so beautiful,” he said.
“Honor?”
He nodded. Who else?
“She looks the same, yet I can see the years that have gone by. They’re in her eyes, in her skin…the color of her hair. But it’s not a shock to see, it’s just what’s right. I feel I’ve been with her all along. It’s what I always imagined: going through life with her.”
“It’s what we all imagined.”
“She’s moved on, though. I can tell by the way she looks at me.”
“Don’t be so sure of that.”
He shrugged, staring at the boulder. He touched the red line—Agnes’s blood, the vein of rose quartz. “I want to know it all. How long did it take for her to forget me? Or was it already over, even before I went to prison?”
“She hasn’t forgotten you,
” Bernie said softly.
“Is she going to keep the girls from me?” he asked, his chest tightening. “She didn’t even let me know about Agnes. Doesn’t she know it’s killing me? Seeing them all last night, for such a short while. And to know they’re all there, just over the rise. And I’m here. I feel a million miles away.”
“But you’re not,” Bernie said in her steady, realistic way. “Give her a little time. She has a lot on her mind with Agnes. I’ll keep you informed about everything. She asked me to. If you want to go to the hospital, you can use the convent car. Or I’m sure Tom would drive you.”
“Thanks, Bernie.”
“Are you okay here?” she asked, gesturing toward the stone cottage.
“I’m fine.”
“I don’t even have to ask you who got it ready for you.”
“Nope.”
“Thomas X. Kelly strikes again.” She swallowed hard, her eyes welling up again. “I’m just so glad you’re back home. You have no idea, John.”
He nodded, and just then he knew he couldn’t handle this anymore, the tension of being with someone he loved. The feelings were too huge. She must have read his mind, because she suddenly kissed him.
“I’d better get back to work,” she said. “I’ll find out about the MRI and let you know. Depending on what they find, Agnes could even be released later today.”
“If she’s not, maybe I’ll take you up on your offer about the car,” he said.
“Okay,” Bernie said.
John gave her one more hug, and then he watched her scramble up the path to the top of the bank. She followed the wall straight up the long hill, looking back to wave at him.
John waved back. He felt ready to explode. The tide had turned. It had just started to flow back from the sea, filling the tidal pools and swirling in the sand. Six hours between tides, six years since he’d been here, with his family. He pictured Honor as she’d looked back then, and as she’d looked last night, so terrified about Agnes.
He couldn’t hold it all inside. He grabbed the pickax and started swinging. Six years of pent-up longing came tearing out of him, and bits of rock began to fly. He couldn’t stand anything that hurt his daughters, and he attacked the boulder as the gentle tide swirled in around his feet.
