Firefly Beach

by Luanne Rice

  “He was sad,” Caroline said. “That’s what I remember most. So sad. He was acting crazy, but it was because he loved your mother so much.”

  “Did he say that?”

  Caroline nodded. His questions were taking her back. She could see the gun in his shaking hand, the floury fingerprints on her mother’s pregnant belly. The terror in Clea’s eyes.

  “He cried,” Caroline said. “I’d never seen a grown-up cry before. He told my mother my father didn’t love her anymore. Because he loved your mother instead. He was wild.”

  “Then he shot himself?”

  “He was going to kill us,” Caroline said, and she could see from Joe’s expression that he hadn’t known that part. He looked stunned.

  “You and your mother?”

  “Well, and Clea and Skye too. Even though Skye wasn’t born yet. She came two days later, on Christmas, so I think of her as being there.”

  “But why?”

  Caroline stared at him. His blue eyes were clouded with apprehension, his wide mouth twisted. He’s afraid to hear, she thought. Suddenly she remembered seeing that six-year-old in the picture, all smiles, in his father’s shaking hand.

  “Because my father had stolen what your father loved,” she said steadily. “I guess he thought that killing us would be taking what my father loved.”

  “His wife and daughters. My father was going to kill you.”

  “But he didn’t, Joe,” Caroline said. “Your father couldn’t do it.”

  Joe closed his eyes.

  “I’ve always thought of him as a good man,” Caroline said, her throat aching. “A good man who was desperate. Crazed by love, you know?”

  “Hmmm.”

  “He had this with him,” Caroline said, reaching into her pocket. She had thought she might have this chance, and her fingers trembled as she handed Joe the photograph of himself, stained with his father’s blood.

  Joe accepted the picture. He held it, staring at it for a long time. When he looked up, his eyes were angry and glittering. He wiped them.

  “What the hell,” Joe said.

  “He loved you,” Caroline said. She could see that it cost Joe a lot to be near tears in front of her. He stared over her head, holding himself together. His eyes were closed, his dark lashes resting on weathered cheeks.

  “He did,” she said when he didn’t speak.

  In response, his mouth twitched. The seas were picking up. A line snapped free on deck, slapped against the planks like a live animal, startling his eyes open. A halyard clanked, metal against metal, in the wind. Joe’s clear blue gaze went straight back to the old photo.

  “I love that picture,” she said. “I’ll understand if you want to keep it. It belonged to your father, but I love it. It means so much to me.”

  “My picture?” Joe said, his voice harder than ever. “Why?”

  “My old friend,” Caroline said. “Joe Connor.”

  “I put an end to that, didn’t I?” Joe asked.

  “I couldn’t believe it,” she said, “when you told me not to write you anymore. I didn’t know you thought our fathers were friends. I told myself you knew the truth. But I didn’t think it was up to me to tell you the details.”

  “It wasn’t,” Joe said. “I used to think it was, but I was wrong. We were just young.”

  Caroline lowered her eyes, trying to stop her hands from shaking. Was he forgiving her? For harm she had never meant to cause in the first place? Why did she get the feeling that letting her off the hook, even to that extent, took a major effort? His lips were tight, his eyes hard and distant. She had the feeling he had gotten what he wanted out of her. Now he wished she would just disappear. When she looked up again, she caught him holding his picture, staring at it.

  “It must have been awful,” Caroline said, “for your family.”

  Some emotion flickered across Joe’s face. He put the picture down, rested his chin in his hand. But he kept glancing at the photo. He touched the bloodstain with his finger.

  “Was it?” Caroline asked. “What happened?”

  “Nothing much,” he said. “My mother remarried after a few years. They had a son, so she got the chance to do things right with him.”

  “Sam,” she said.

  To Caroline, sisters were a blessing. She couldn’t imagine life without them. Maybe Joe felt the same way about his brother, because his eyes softened, and his mouth relaxed. He pushed the picture across the table to Caroline as if he were done with it forever. He may not have intended to send it flying, but it slid right off the gimbaled table onto the floor.

  “Yeah,” Joe said. “He’s a pain in the ass, but he’s a good kid. An oceanographer of all things, went to the same school I did. A twenty-seven-year-old know-it-all.”

  “Sounds like he looks up to you,” Caroline said, smiling.

  Joe shrugged. His smile faded as another memory took hold. He looked Caroline in the eye as if he had another bit of unfinished business. “I blamed your father for what happened,” he said.

  “I blamed your mother,” she countered.

  “He had no business putting guns in your hands. No matter what, but especially after what happened with my father. Right in front of you.”

  He exhaled, shook his head.

  Caroline wondered how he’d feel if he knew the whole story. She wasn’t about to tell him, and she doubted Skye would call him again. She closed her eyes, thinking about what had happened at Redhawk.

  “I know how you feel,” she began, her voice straining. She stopped when she saw Joe shaking his head.

  “No, you don’t,” Joe said.

  “What do you mean?”

  “My father killed himself,” Joe said. “It’s pretty bad to find out your father was so miserable, he’d rather blow his head off than come home.”

  “I know,” she said. Caroline’s heart was pounding, her hands shaking. The waves had picked up, and the boat pitched beneath them.

  “You don’t, Caroline,” Joe said, trying to keep his voice even. She could see that he thought he was alone, that his pain was exclusive, that Caroline was just a witness. “I’m sorry, but you just don’t.”

  “I was there, Joe!” she cried, the words tearing out of her throat. If he didn’t understand how that had been for her, if he wouldn’t believe how much she had cared…“I was with him! It’s one of my first memories, your father dying. I cared so much, Joe. About him and you.” She had so much emotion inside her, she felt it bursting in her chest. “We were almost the same age, you and I—all I could think of was: That little boy’s father died.” She broke off to get control of herself.

  Joe watched her, not saying anything or moving closer.

  “Our parents were so angry at him, and they wanted us to be too. My father went crazy knowing he’d threatened us. That’s why he gave us guns, because of what happened.”

  “That’s why he took you hunting?”

  Caroline went on as if she hadn’t heard. “My parents hated your father, and they wanted me and Clea and Skye to feel it too. We didn’t though. You can’t believe how upset they’d get that I wanted to write to you. But I had to do it.”

  “Why?” he asked.

  “To console you.”

  “You were only five,” Joe said. “Why should it have been your job to console me?”

  “It wasn’t my job. But I couldn’t get you out of my mind,” she said.

  She felt the boat pitching. She wondered how earthquakes felt, to have the ground shift underneath your feet. She felt Joe’s arms come around her. His embrace was rough at first. He pulled her to her feet. She couldn’t look at him, but his hand on the back of her neck was gentle. He traced the skin beneath her hair, and she heard herself moan through her tears.

  His lips brushed her cheek, and she raised her face to meet his kiss. His face was coarse with two days of not shaving, and his grasp was tight. They kissed as if they were saving their own lives. It tasted like salt: the sea, tears, and blood. The kiss
was harsh and violent, and it made Caroline feel as if she were standing on deck in a storm. His touch shivered down her skin, made her tingle and shudder as he whispered her name.

  Scared by the emotions she was feeling, Caroline tried to push away. Joe’s eyes were dark, even more angry than they had been at the beginning of their discussion. But he wouldn’t let go. He looked bewildered, as if he couldn’t believe he’d just kissed her. Gripping Caroline’s arms, he held her still. His mouth brushed her cheek, and he whispered something she couldn’t understand. When he pulled back, his eyes were almost tender. The expression lasted only an instant. He let go of her.

  “I’d better get back,” she said shakily.

  Caroline felt a sharp mixture of pain and longing, tension and relief. But she could breathe easier than she had since coming to the boat. Without looking at Joe, she bent down to retrieve the picture on the floor. She brushed it off, slipped it into her pocket. If he saw, he didn’t say anything.

  They headed up on deck to feel the wind on their faces. Cold air had swept down from Canada, and it slashed across the open ocean. Caroline pulled her jacket around her. The boat rose and fell. The wind had whipped the waves into whitecaps; Caroline could see them in the starlight, crested with foam. Standing on deck, she felt like crying and didn’t know why.

  The old ship lay wrecked on the reef below. The seas were high and rugged. If they waited much longer, it wouldn’t be safe to take the launch. Caroline climbed over the lurching rail, her nerves tingled with danger. The black ocean foamed and chopped. Her fear had such primal power. She was an expert swimmer, but she thought if she fell in, she would disappear. Sitting close to Joe as he took the wheel, their arms touched through their heavy jackets.

  He drove less aggressively than he had on the way out, as if he had exorcised some demons. Or perhaps he was just being cautious in the building seas. Caroline’s hand closed around the coin he had given her that day. Clutching it as the small boat flew across the sea, getting closer to shore, she felt it was a talisman to keep them safe. A creature slashed through the water, bright as neon, and she jumped. The fish left a trail in the water, phosphorescent fire.

  When their feet were on dry land, Joe stood before her, not knowing what to say. She had the feeling he wanted to apologize for his kiss. Her voice trembled, but she spoke anyway, to take him off the hook.

  “Thanks for dinner,” she said.

  “Thanks for coming.”

  “Are you sure you can make it back to the Meteor?” she asked, staring at the whitecaps, at the small boat tossing at the dock.

  “Yes, I can make it back,” he said.

  Why did she feel disappointed? That kiss had started something. A feeling of heat filled her chest, and she realized that she wanted Joe to hold her again. Caroline shivered, the desire was so unexpected and strong and unfamiliar.

  The waves hit the dock; she felt the spray in her face. It cooled and soothed her, and she let it push her feelings for Joe away. A poet once wrote that cathedrals were never built beside the sea because it was so beautiful it would distract the people from praying. Caroline agreed. Most of her travels took her to other oceans, and she felt the need for another one soon. She had to get away from this.

  Glancing over at Joe, he seemed about to speak. He took a step toward her, but something stopped him.

  A car was coming down the road. They could hear it over the wind, and they turned in time to see a yellow cab drive into the sandy parking lot. A single passenger sat in back. He paid the driver. When he got out, he grabbed a soft black bag and an enormous backpack from the trunk.

  The man stood alone, silhouetted against the dockmaster’s office light. The taxi drove away.

  “Hey, a welcoming committee!” the man called. His voice was exuberant, full of humor.

  “Holy shit,” Joe said.

  Joe stuck his hands in his jeans pockets. His posture was straight, his sturdy shoulders thrown back. A small smile crossed his lips, but he did his best to keep the pleasure out of his eyes.

  The man was young. He looked like a college kid; he had a baseball cap on backward. He had a lanky build, wore wire-rimmed glasses, and was coming straight toward them with a ridiculous grin on his face. Pulling off his cap, he revealed short blond hair, darker than Joe’s.

  “How’d you know I was coming tonight?” he asked, dropping his bags to give Joe a bear hug. “I was trying to make it a surprise. Standing out here, waiting for me. Jeez!”

  “I didn’t know,” Joe said. He let the young man hug him for so long without getting prickly or pushing him away, Caroline started to smile. She knew a sibling reunion when she saw one.

  “Hi,” the newcomer said, stepping back and catching sight of Caroline. He had a wonderful, wide-open smile, and it occurred to her: Joe would look like that if he ever looked really happy.

  “Caroline, this is my brother, Sam Trevor. Sam, this is Caroline Renwick.”

  They shook hands. Was it Caroline’s imagination, or did Sam react to her last name? If nothing else, she had learned tonight that the Renwick name was evil magic to Joe, and she didn’t suppose it would be any different for his younger half brother.

  “Nice to meet you,” Caroline said.

  “Same here,” Sam said, his grin back full force. “You coming out to the boat?”

  “Heading home, actually,” Caroline said.

  “Yeah, she was just leaving,” Joe said, unintentionally abrupt. Or perhaps he had meant it to sound the way it did, rude and dismissive.

  “Still an old grouch,” Sam said, laughing. “He tries the same thing with me, and I don’t even hear him anymore.”

  “I didn’t mean—” Joe said, looking at Caroline apologetically.

  Caroline smiled. She didn’t know which was the truth, Joe being mean or Joe being contrite. No matter which, Caroline took her cue. She said good night to the men, climbed into her car, and pulled out of the parking lot.

  Only when she reached the main road did she see a flash of light in the eastern sky. It was bright and fast, close to the horizon. She saw another, higher in the sky. Shooting stars, she thought. It was the night of the Perseid meteor shower, and she had been too absorbed in Joe Connor, in their past and present—in their kiss—to gaze up at the sky and count the shooting stars.

  Holding tight to the barnacle-encrusted coin Joe Connor had given her, Caroline Renwick drove slowly back to her inn.

  August 5, 1978

  Dear Joe,

  I dreamed about you last night. It was the strangest thing. I was standing on a rock, in the middle of the Sound, with waves crashing all around. They were about to sweep me away, when all of a sudden I heard your boat. You were rowing out to get me. I heard your oars hitting the water, and my heart was beating so fast and hard, I thought I was going to drown. But I knew you were coming, Joe. You did too. In my dream, you looked just like you. But in real life, I don’t even know if I’d recognize you. I think I would, just from your letters. Wow, I’m glad I survived that dream.

  Gratefully yours,

  C.

  August 14, 1978

  Dear C,

  If I thought you were going to drown, do you think I’d row? I’d take the fastest motorboat I could get.

  Love,

  Joe

  P.S. I’ve been thinking about that too. What it would be like to see you in real life.

  AT THE HOSPITAL, SKYE WANTED TO HEAR EVERYTHING. If she ignored the antiseptic smell, the nurses walking by, and Skye wearing pajamas during the day, Caroline could almost imagine they were just two sisters having coffee. Only it was tea, lukewarm, in paper cups. And her sister’s face was bruised, shades of yellow and fading purple.

  “What’s he like?” Skye asked.

  “He has an amazing boat,” Caroline said. “Like a floating laboratory, so high-tech, you can’t believe it. They analyze the sediment and artifacts right there—”

  “Not the boat,” Skye said. “Him.”

  “He’s g
uarded,” Caroline said, flushing as she remembered his arms around her shoulders, his deep kiss. “Very guarded…never mind about that. How are you?”

  “Why won’t you let me care about you?”

  “What are you talking about?” Caroline asked, shocked by the question.

  “I want to know about you, and you always turn it back to me.”

  “I answered you—”

  “In the most perfunctory way, just to get me off your back. You’re like this all the time. Maybe you don’t even know you’re doing it.” Skye exhaled. “Does he realize he’s in love with you?”

  “Skye,” Caroline said, shaking her head.

  “He is. Of course he is. Why else would he come to Black Hall? Don’t tell me it’s for that sunken ship. There are plenty of buried treasures around the world. He’s here for you. You got under his skin all those years ago, and now he’s come to sail away with you.”

  “That’s not true,” Caroline said.

  “Love,” Skye said, staring out the window.

  “Love is not the answer to everything,” Caroline said, shaken by Skye’s accusation. “No matter how much you want to believe it.”

  “Is he what you expected? After all this time, does he match the picture you had of him in your mind?”

  “I don’t know,” Caroline said, comparing her image of Joe as a cowlicked child with the serious blue-eyed man. Oddly enough, they weren’t completely different, only the man had lost that boy’s loving, open smile.

  “It must be like a wish finally coming true,” Skye said. “Seeing someone so important after all this time. It would be like…”

  “Like what, Skye?” Caroline asked, alarmed by the change in her sister’s tone.

  Skye’s head was down, but when she started to talk, Caroline could tell she was trying not to cry.

  “Like Andrew Lockwood coming back to life,” she said.

  The sisters sat in silence. What if it were possible? Caroline could see him now, that other tragic boy from their past. His eyes were brown, not blue, and he had lived in the mountains, not by the sea. She put her arm around Skye.

  “Did Homer come home? Mom was here this morning, and she said he was gone again all night.”