Fireflies

by P. S. Bartlett

  “He was asking me about the Flynns again,” Owen said quietly.

  “The family from Ireland? So?” Sarah said, sounding a bit unconcerned. “You said they were just people ya’ knew Owen. Why so grim?”

  "Sarah, will ya’ take a walk with me, outside?” Owen said reaching out his hand to her.

  Now Sarah was uneasy. A look of trepidation crossed her face but it didn’t impede her from taking his hand and following him into the kitchen and out the back door.

  “Owen, where are we going?”

  “To the barn, I need to show you something,” Owen said gravely.

  Sarah’s apprehension was growing but she continued to hold his hand and follow him. There was still a fair amount of twilight but when they entered the barn, Owen lit the lantern and asked Sarah to take a seat on Fagan’s stool.

  He walked over to the far wall of the barn, where Fagan had built shelves to for his tools. Underneath them was a wide cabinet with a door that stood about two feet high. Owen leaned down and opened the cabinet and took out a small box which was about ten inches wide and six inches tall, which had a lid with a hinge at each end. He carried the box over to Sarah and placed it on her lap.

  “Owen, what’s this box?”

  “Open it Sarah.”

  Sarah turned the box and slowly lifted the lid. Inside the box was a folded shirt and an old flour sack, both soiled and yellowed from time.

  “Owen, what is this?”

  “Sarah, I’m about to take you on a journey across the Atlantic Ocean, many years ago.”

  “One journey across the Atlantic was more than enough fer me,” she said with deep concern.

  “Not like this one,” Owen replied as he knelt down in front of her.

  Owen began to relay the story about Patrick Flynn’s journey. He told of how Patrick ran away in the night from his uncle’s farm and hitched a ride on the farmer’s wagon to Dublin where he ended up on a ship headed for Philadelphia.

  “He carried his food aboard the ship in this sack,” Owen said, taking it in his hand. “And he stuffed the sack of food inside of this shirt.”

  Sarah sat speechless as Owen continued on.

  Rachel had welcomed Patrick into their cabin as a guest. A guest who slept on the floor on a blanket, but those accommodations were still far better than below deck. Rachel had even offered Patrick a set of Owen’s clothes. “Oh he has so many clothes,” she said as she handed him the neatly folded breeches and shirt. They may have been worn dozens of times but to Patrick, they were pristine.

  Owen and Patrick became fast friends and although outside of their cabin, Patrick maintained his role as their cabin boy, behind closed doors was a much different story. Owen even taught Patrick to read and write and he learned to count past one hundred. He shared his books and his toy boats and even started allowing Patrick to sleep at the opposite end of his bed at night. Within a month at sea, they were as brothers and Rachel began to love Patrick like a son.

  One night, early into the voyage, they realized people were dying. Owen and Patrick snuck out onto the deck after Rachel had fallen asleep to explore what the strange splashes were they were hearing. They were horrified to see with their young eyes, wrapped in tarp were the shapes of human beings of all sizes and shapes. Sometimes they heard as many as three. Patrick lead Owen in a prayer, explaining their souls needed a voice to find Heaven. Every night after, when they heard the water break, they would say a prayer together and mourn, as they knew no one else was.

  About two weeks before the end of the voyage, Patrick noticed Owen was unable to keep his food down. No matter what Rachel tried, even just bread and water, Owen would lose his bowels and vomit repeatedly. Rachel sent Patrick for the doctor but he had told her Owen was in God’s hands. Rachel didn’t sleep, nor eat, nor bathe for days on end. She made Patrick sleep in her bed and keep as far from Owen as he could. She would keep him out of the cabin for the entire day, only allowing him in at night to sleep. Patrick would sit the whole day long outside the cabin door and run for water or whatever Rachel needed in order to care for Owen. He would hear her weeping through the door, begging God not to take her only son. She would weep until she’d pass out from exhaustion.

  When she fell silent, Patrick would creep in and wipe her brow. The stench of the cabin was horrible and he’d wrap a handkerchief around his face and clean up as much as he could and somehow manage to get Rachel into her bed. He would then toss the rags overboard and sleep outside of the door in fear for his own health and life.

  One morning, when he awoke outside the door, he did not hear Rachel weeping. He stood and rubbed his eyes and stepped inside. He had expected to find Owen well at last and sleeping peacefully. What he found was complete horror. Rachel was sitting on the floor, holding Owen’s lifeless body in her lap and his head fell back over her arm. His legs were draped across what was once her elegant gown but was now nothing more than rags.

  Patrick bolted from the cabin to call the steward. The doctor and the steward both followed behind Patrick, as they raced back as quickly as they could in hopes of saving the child but upon opening the door, they realized it was too late. Rachel had passed out from grief and was now lying on the floor beneath her son. The doctor instructed the steward to take the boy below and have him wrapped. Patrick was angry and began to scream and hit the steward with all of his might but the doctor pulled him away and said, “Son, your brother is dead. Let him go be with God.”

  Patrick froze, “My brother?”

  The doctor lifted Rachel and called to Patrick to help him lay her on her bed and then sent him for a maid to come and thoroughly clean the room. Patrick obeyed and as Rachel slept, Patrick left her that evening, only to sneak out and pray for Owen, when for what was his last time he heard the surface of the water break.

  He stayed at her side, wiping her brow and holding her hand until finally, almost two days later, she finally awoke.

  “Owen? Owen?” she called softly, still weak and delirious from grief.

  “It’s Patrick, Miss Rachel. Owen’s gone to be with God,” Patrick said as he lay down on her and cried.

  All of the following days, he tended to Rachel. He fed her and he called on the maid to come and bathe her. He even took money from her purse to pay them extra to take special care with her, until the final evening when he stepped out onto the deck and saw land. They were still many hours away but Patrick packed and arranged to have Rachel’s belongings picked up and delivered to the address he had found on letters written to her from her sister in Philadelphia. He’d done everything to make sure she would arrive safely and intact, although still lost in her anguish and barely able to walk on her own.

  The morning they made landfall, Patrick laid out her most beautiful dress. The one he’d first seen her in the day she had rescued him from the steerage. He once again called on the maid who had become very attentive and caring to Rachel and who had stopped accepting payment for her care, to bathe and dress her and prepare her for her to disembark.

  “Now you take good care of yer’ ma, child,” was all the kind woman said as she helped Rachel out onto the deck for the first time in weeks and sat her in one of the chairs with the little round tables, bolted to the floor. Patrick sat with her until the whistle blew. Suddenly, with no explanation, Rachel turned to him and weakly smiled. Patrick’s heart lifted as he awaited her first words since the night before Owen had died.

  “Thank you,” she said.

  The ship was alive and loud with the crew lining the deck and removing the trunks and loading carts. Rachel did not move until she was called upon to do so. Patrick sat and wondered what his fate would be. He was worried this would be the last time he would ever see his beautiful Rachel, the angel that had saved him and who he saved as well. His wandering thoughts gave him the promise she would still want him to come with her to live at her sisters and still allow him to work for her, although everything he’d done for the past several weeks was not done out of obligation bu
t rather from his heart.

  Once her name was called to depart, she stood on her own at the table and turned again to Patrick and reached out her hand.

  “Come along Owen. We’ve finally reached America.”

  “But Miss Rachel, I’m not Owen, I’m Patrick,” he said bewildered.

  “Do you want to come and live with me?”

  “Well yes Ma’am I do but…”

  “For some cruel and nameless reason, God and the sea have chosen to take my beloved husband and now my only son but by some mysterious purpose, they’ve seen fit to give me another. My sister knows only that I have a son named Owen. I don’t want to be alone. You may take my hand now and I shall lead you into this new world as Owen Whelan, my own son or I can have you carry my bags and follow me as Patrick Flynn. I pray if you love me as a mother, you will choose the first.”

  “You took her hand,” Sarah sobbed.

  Owen nodded and lowered his head into her lap.

  Chapter Twenty-Five

  Owen and Sarah heard the carriage approaching, as Fagan and Connell were returning from the Olsens.’

  “Words have escaped me,” Sarah said, as she wiped the tears away from her face and blew her nose hard in her handkerchief.

  “They’ve escaped me since the day I set foot in this world but I’m here. I am Owen Whelan. Patrick Flynn was just a poor, sad little boy looking for a decent life and he found one. He found more than that, he found love was possible in a cold cruel world, Sarah,” Owen said, taking her hand.

  “What about your family in Ireland, Owen. What of the Flynns?” Sarah asked as they headed back to the house to avoid Fagan and Connell’s discovery.

  “I don’t know. I can only assume Rachel had reported Owen’s death as mine. Most likely, as far as the ships passenger log, Patrick Flynn died of dysentery at sea,” he replied. “In most ways, I believe he did because a very big part of me died with that boy, Sarah. He was closer to me than me own brother, Dillon.”

  “Dillon? Dillon Flynn you say?”

  “Yes, I’m surprised after all of these years I can still remember his name. Ennis has his eyes ya’ know.”

  That was a name Sarah certainly hadn’t forgotten and never could but how was this possible? How had fate twisted her life in such a peculiar and hurtful way and yet filled her whole existence with so much love? Pieces of her own past life were beginning to fall into place. Faces, voices, mannerisms and mysterious emotional connections were all at once making sense and although this awakening shocked her to her core, it answered so many questions, which almost made it worth the weakness in her legs and lightness in her head.

  Sarah turned and began to walk faster and faster toward the house. She had heard far more than she had every imagined hearing and it was too much to comprehend. She’d never heard of such horrible things and her own journey to America had been almost pleasant compared to the unbelievable and tragic saga Owen had shared. Then, to hear the name Dillon spoken aloud after all of these years and to find out she had married the brother of her first true love was at last pulling her down to her knees.

  “Sarah!” Owen shouted as he rushed to her.

  “I just need to lay down Owen. Please, just help me to me bed,” She said, placing her arm around his neck.

  Hearing Owen shout, Fagan and Connell turned in the dim light near the barn to see what was happening.

  “Ma!” called Connell, as he sprang to Owen’s side and placed her other arm around his neck, lifting her into his arms.

  “Take her up to bed Connell. I’m right behind you,” said Owen, pausing only for a pitcher of cool water and cloth.

  “What happened to Ma?” Fagan asked as he burst into the kitchen.

  “Yer ma is tired is all, Fagan. This week has taken it all out of her,” Owen said rushing the pitcher upstairs to the bedroom, where Connell sat on the bed next to his mother holding her hand.

  “I’ll be fine. I just feel a little lightheaded is all. Stop fussin’ about, Owen,” she said as Owen poured the water into the basin and soaked the cloth.

  “Now let me put this on yer head, Sarah,” he said, laying the damp, folded cloth across her brow.

  “Thank you Connell, I’ll see to yer Ma.”

  “All right, Da. Just call me if you need me,” Connell said, reluctantly standing up to leave.

  Fagan stood in the doorway of the room and motioned to Connell to come out and leave them be.

  “This is all due to Ennis,” stated Fagan as they walked into their room and shut the door.

  “I’m sure it couldn’t be because of what happened with you and Mary now could it Fagan?” Connell said smartly in a whisper, so as not to wake Brogan.

  “Don’t you mention that, Ma doesn’t know about any of that.”

  “Fagan, you can’t be so naive to think Da hasn’t told her by now. He can’t keep any secrets from Ma.”

  They became engaged in a whispering argument but fell quiet for a moment, when Brogan moaned and tossed in his sleep, in fear of waking him.

  “All I’m sayin’ is Ma is worried sick over Ennis and if what you say is true, I’m sure that isn’t helping any,” said Fagan, as he pulled off his boots.

  “I haven’t seen Ma go down like that since she was carrying Ennis,” said Connell.

  “Well no chance of that,” Fagan laughed quietly.

  “Oh really?” Connell replied, standing in his under breeches with his hands on his hips.

  “Ma is too old. She can’t have any more babies, Connell,” said Fagan as he pulled his shirt over his head and slid into bed.

  “Oh Fagan, let me educate you a bit my dear brother. Better yet, goodnight,” Connell said putting out the lamp and sliding into bed himself.

  “Owen, so Dillon Flynn was your…brother?”

  “Yes. My brother was named Dillon Flynn.”

  “You lived with yer Uncle Dan then?”

  “How’d ya’ know about me Uncle Dan, Sarah? Is Ennis getting his sight from you?” Owen asked, his eyes wide with shock.

  “Dan Flynn was my stableman back in Ireland, Owen. Upon his death, your brother Dillon took his place,” Sarah said, slightly turning her face away.

  “Indeed me uncle had a way with horses. I marveled at him as a boy. So me brother Dillon got the horse gift too. That’s good. That’s very good he had that. How was he? What was like, Sarah? If he took care of yer horses you had to have known him?”

  “I knew him Owen. I knew him,” Sarah said, turning completely away from Owen now.

  “Sarah…” Owen said as he placed his hand on her shoulder. “Did ya’ love me brother?”

  Sarah nodded.

  “Sarah, don’t. It’s all right. It only proved to me you have impeccable taste in gentlemen,” Owen said smiling and trying to ease her misplaced guilt.

  “Owen, you know Dillon was the reason I came to America in the first place,” Sarah said turning back to him, her eyes again filled with tears.

  “Of course I know. Well, I didn’t know his name or it was me brother but all the same, yes I know,” he replied. “Ya’ know Sarah it’s a funny thing really.”

  “Funny? How can you find this funny a‘tall?”

  “Well, when Ennis was born, I thought to name him Dillon but when you had already picked out a name for him, I figured Ennis was a fine name, too, but then, as the months passed and I noticed those eyes, I thought to meself’ Dillon would have been a good choice. But ya’ know I always let ya’ have yer way, well except of course fer Patrick,” Owen smiled.

  “Yer the most wonderful husband that’s ever lived Owen Whelan,” Sarah said taking his hand.

  “Well I certainly hope you didn’t just figure that out because you shoulda' known that all along,” he smiled with a wink.

  “Dillon was a fine lookin’ lad. Me Uncle Dan favored him. He would take him along wherever he went and taught him to ride and how to handle horses. I wondered most of the time if me uncle even knew I was alive. They had six kids ya’ know
. Six! Besides Dillon and I that is and a couple of ‘em were younger than us. Every night the meals would get smaller and smaller. I felt so guilty the night I left because I had taken the last of the food. I’d probably left them with no breakfast ya’ know but I had to go. I had to get as far from that place as me legs would take me. The last time I saw me brother, he was fast asleep.”

  “The last time I saw him, he was starin’ down the barrel of me father’s rifle,” Sarah said softly.

  “He didn’t kill him did he?” Owen exclaimed.

  “No but he ran him off and after that, I never saw him again.”

  “I’m sorry, Sarah. We don’t need to be talkin’ about all of this. Come along, if ya’ can stand, let’s get ya’ into yer night gown and get ya’ ta sleep,” Owen said, patting Sarah on her hand.

  “Owen, just one more thing…” Sarah said, rising to her feet. “I love you and I don’t ever want ya’ to doubt that. No matter what kind of foolish, overindulged spoiled girl I was, I wouldn’t change a thing.”

  “Well yes you were a high-spirited thing weren’t ya’?” Owen laughed. “I love you too Sarah. Even with all these blessed children ya’ve given’ me, without you, I’d be a lonely man.”

  “Owen, have you ever had any regrets of leaving that night? Weren’t ya’ the least bit frightened?” Sarah asked as she slipped her nightgown over her head.

  “Oh I was scared all right, but everything just happened so fast I couldn’t give into it. That first day on the ship, if it hadn’t been fer Rachel, I’m sure I would have joined Owen and been a splash in the sea,” he said, hanging his head as he sat down on the bed again to climb in.

  “You were a very brave boy Owen and after tonight, we don’t have to ever speak of this again,” Sarah said pulling him close to her and before long, they were once again like two young, freshly married lovers tangled up together, then after a while, pressed tightly together in slumber.

  In the early morning hours, Sarah had slipped out of bed as always and headed down to the kitchen to begin her day. Her hands always knew exactly what to do and she gave very little thought to them as she moved through her morning rituals. Her mind went to the field where Dillon had kissed her and held her for the last time but this time, she thought only fondly of him. Something had turned in her when she’d opened up to Owen the night before. That lustful, lively girl she once was became no more than a distant memory and her pubescent passion for Dillon no longer rose in her chest to bring her to a sigh. Now her thoughts only made her smile for a moment and then continue onto other more immediate concerns.