by Luanne Rice
“I did not,” her father said. But he stayed in his chair, seeming to stare out the window at the harbor lights. Cass saw that his eyes were fixed on his own morose reflection in the amber glass. She stood still, wanting to say something more, to leave on a better note. But when her father refused to look her way, she took her things and slipped quietly out the door.
T.J. and Belinda would be waiting at home, but Cass walked the waterfront from Keating’s Wharf to Doc Breton’s. The October evening was frosty. In the ugliest way possible, her father had mirrored Cass’s own fear: that the outward signs of Josie’s hearing loss would alienate her from the world. She shook her head to dislodge the thought and hurried along, feeling the chill.
Except for a ghostly wind and the skittery sound of a hundred water rats, Doc’s pier was silent. Cass knew that her father sometimes came here for solitude, and she could understand why. She tried to shake free of the fear and anger that gripped her. With her back to the town, facing out to sea, she could pretend it was an earlier time, the dawn of the twentieth century, when rules were a rich man’s racket and smuggling a way of life.
This was Cass’s territory, the waterfront. Breathing the sea air, Cass felt how closed off she had become. Wrapped tight as twine, she couldn’t draw a deep breath at home. Since Josie’s fever, Cass had lived small, in the interior, watching for little signs and missing the big ones.
She headed back toward Keating’s Wharf. The cold night was clear, full of star trails. Venus hung just above the harbor; Cass believed she could chart its iridescent progress through the night. She headed past Lobsterville and the warehouse, now totally dark. Her father had gone home.
Up ahead, Cass saw lights on the Aurora. She wondered whether John Barnard was aboard, getting ready for a long trip. Approaching the big stern dragger, Cass saw him coiling lines on deck. For a minute, she hung back in the shadows. She heard music coming from speakers onboard.
“Hi, John,” she said.
“That you, Cass?” he asked, peering up.
“It’s me.”
He hesitated, and suddenly Cass felt shy.
“Come down here where I can see you.”
When Cass didn’t move, he offered his hand. She took it, jumping onto the deck.
“Are you heading out to Georges Bank?” she asked.
“Later tonight. I gave the crew shore time till midnight.”
“Oh. Leaving on the old tide, huh?”
“Middle of the night, yeah,” John said. “Convenient.” He and Cass had been standing close since she’d jumped aboard. Now he raised his hand, moved it so close to her face that she wondered if he was going to brush back her hair.
She felt her heart skittering in her throat, waiting for his touch. But then, as if he had just realized what he was doing, he stepped back.
“Great news about Billy’s new boat,” he said.
“Thanks.”
“I’ll be right behind him,” John said. “Next year at this time, I’ll have my own ship.”
“I don’t doubt it,” Cass said. “Not that we want you to go.”
There had been something awkward in the air, something dangerous and romantic, but it had passed, and they leapt at the chance to talk business. Cass pitched in, helping him coil lines on deck.
“Cass, your father needs to put some serious money into his boats or he won’t have any captains left. He keeps up the fishing equipment, because that’s where the money is. But everything down below is bad. The bunks are mildewed; that might sound petty, but when you’re out for fourteen days straight …”
“It doesn’t sound petty,” Cass said.
“Jimmy’s heart is not in it anymore,” John said.
“No, you’re right about that. How’s your life raft?” Cass asked.
John grinned. “Old Jimmy stocked up on survival suits after you lit into him. So we’re all set if we sink. But we won’t.”
“It’s getting cold. You can’t have many trips left to make this year.”
“We’ll be fishing till January,” John said. “She may need some work, but this boat rides through storms like you wouldn’t believe.” The way he scoffed at weather reminded Cass of her husband. In their world, waves couldn’t rock you, boats didn’t capsize, fog didn’t matter as long as you had loran and a radar reflector.
“I wish I could go,” Cass blurted out. She meant it: she had a vision of herself hauling nets full of herring, breathing the cold, fishy air, free from worries about Josie and the business, free from herself.
“You want to come fishing with me?” John asked, standing close again. She felt his breath on the top of her head. If she tilted her face up, he would kiss her. Cass felt the kiss before it started, warming her from the balls of her feet straight into her shoulders. Cass closed her eyes and melted against John’s body.
“Cassie,” John whispered, using the name he used to call her.
Cass tried to say his name, but she couldn’t speak.
“I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have done that,” John said, but didn’t let her go. Outside her jacket, he traced up her backbone with one finger. He reached beneath her hair, held the back of her neck. He was waiting to see if she would push him away; she didn’t. She leaned back, pulling his head down to kiss him again.
John’s hands slid under her jacket, untucking her shirt; they felt rough and cold against her smooth skin. Shivering against him, she felt her whole body shaking, and she knew it wasn’t from the cold.
“I want to make love,” he whispered against her mouth. “I still want you, Cass.”
“John …” she said, confused by how good it felt to hold him, by how much she wanted to go below and lie with him in his bunk.
He stopped kissing her. He held her very tightly, full of tension, waiting for her to make some move. She leaned her head against his chest, trying to catch her breath.
“What is this?” he asked. “Why now?”
Cass shook her head. “It’s not—”
“It is,” he said, touching her face with both hands, drawing her close in a long kiss.
After a moment, reluctantly, she eased back, but he didn’t let go. He gave her a slight shake, as if he knew she had already made up her mind and hoped she would change it.
“I can’t,” she said.
He said nothing, but held her tightly. They hugged for a long time, and Cass didn’t want to let go. She pressed her face into his shoulder, so he couldn’t see her eyes. Then she kissed him again, on the cheek.
“Cass—” he said again, helplessly.
“Have a good trip, John,” she said, pulling away, climbing onto the dock. She hurried down the wharf, into the darkness.
“Cass!” John called out, just as she was about to turn the corner to the parking lot. He waved, and she waved back, then turned away.
She leaned against her car, her eyes closed. Her heart had started to pound again, and she knew it wasn’t because of John. Slowly, she opened her eyes and looked at the sky full of stars. Picking one, she made a wish.
“Make things better,” she said out loud. Then she added on her standard wish suffix, the one that had come automatically since before her wedding day: “Billy, come home safe.”
Josie knew it was late because Barbara, the pretty nurse with glasses, came in with her flashlight. She covered the light with her hand so it wouldn’t wake Josie up. But Josie was lying there with her eyes open, so it didn’t matter. Barbara held Josie’s hand, and from her nice eyes and the way her mouth hardly moved, Josie knew she was saying lullaby things. But Josie didn’t sleep with her hearing aids, so she could only hear “night” … “sleep” … “night.”
“T.J.,” Josie said sadly.
Barbara patted Josie’s head, and then she left.
Josie was going home tomorrow. She knew that should make her happy, but it also gave her a stomachache. T.J. must be very angry with her. He hadn’t come to the hospital once, and Josie had been there for a long time.
&nbs
p; Maybe he didn’t like her anymore. Maybe he was saying bad things about her, the way he did about Belinda. When Josie smashed into the man, she must have looked stupid. Belinda said the lobster had fallen all over her. Josie couldn’t remember, but when she got up she must have looked like a TV cartoon: with lobster claws for hands, and skinny feelers on her head, and red fanned tails instead of her skirt.
Josie liked the hospital. Everything was supposed to be quiet here. You could tell, because people did their jobs without moving their mouths. Nurses looked serious, reading the cardboard at the end of Josie’s bed. Then they would look at her and smile, and still their mouths wouldn’t move. When people asked her questions, they waited for as long as it took her to answer them.
Josie liked Zach. He was funny and nice, and she wondered why her mother didn’t like him. As soon as Josie had told her mother his name, her mother had run out of the room with that busy look on her face. And Zach didn’t come back until after her mother left.
He told her there were lots of things she could say with her hands. He showed Josie some things she already knew: waving hello and goodbye, rubbing her tummy when she felt hungry, blowing kisses to someone she loved. Then he asked her if there was anything special she wanted to learn how to say.
“T.J.,” Josie said.
Both letters began with a fist. Zach showed her how to make a fist with her right hand. For T she poked her thumb between her index and middle fingers, the exact thing her father did when he pretended to steal her nose. For J she kept the fist, then stuck out her pinky finger and made a “J” in the air with it.
Lying in her hospital bed with the lights out, Josie called her brother. “T.J., T.J., T.J., T.J.!” She made the letters with her hand faster and faster, so it felt like she was yelling. No one in the hospital heard her, and no one came, and Josie was glad. The only one she wanted to hear her was T.J.
Alone in her bed, days after she brought Josie home, Cass tossed through a night of dreams. In one she held Josie in her lap, telling her stories. The feeling was so true, she might have been awake. The weight of Josie on her knee, the scent of Josie’s hair, the noise Josie made sucking her thumb. Cass told her the same stories she’d told T.J. and Belinda, the old family tales about fairies at Spray Cove, the good witch who watches over Minturn Ledge Light, the wicked lobster boys. Josie asked to hear the stories over and over, and then she climbed off Cass’s lap.
“I will remember them,” Josie said in a solemn, clear voice, “but I have to leave now.” She walked through a dream-door, into a playground filled with children. The door became glass, a picture window overlooking the scene, and it blocked all sound. Cass could see Josie playing, and Josie smiled at Cass over her shoulder. Then Josie waved and turned away.
Cass wakened with tears on her pillow. She felt as if she had just lost Josie forever. If Josie started to rely on sign language, Josie would move outside Cass’s world.
But since Josie had come home, she’d been asking to see Zach again. Her eyes sparkled when she signed, “Hi, Mommy,” “Hi, T.J.” She’d promised Belinda she would learn how to sign “Belinda” and “Daddy,” too.
Downstairs, a door closed softly. Cass raised herself up on her elbow, listening to footsteps on the stairs. Belinda said T.J. had a girlfriend; remembering herself at his age, she bet he was starting to sneak out late at night. Cass listened, vigilant, ready to pounce. But her door creaked open, and Billy entered the room, moving wearily. He had been gone for six days.
“Hi,” she said.
He jumped. “I didn’t think you’d be awake,” he said.
“I didn’t think you’d be home till tomorrow.”
“We got lucky and filled up early.”
Cass lay on her back, watching him stuff his dirty clothes in the hamper. He’d left his boots downstairs, but he sat on the edge of the bed to take off his socks. He rubbed his feet.
“How’s Josie?” he asked.
“Sleeping in her own bed,” Cass said.
Billy walked barefoot out of the room. After a minute, Cass put on her robe and followed him down the hall. Josie’s door stood ajar. Cass slipped inside, found Billy standing at the foot of Josie’s bed. They stood side by side, their shoulders touching, watching Josie sleep by the glow of her Minnie Mouse night-light.
Billy slid his arm around Cass’s waist. At first his grip was light. But the longer he stared at Josie, the tighter his arm felt around Cass’s waist; suddenly he pulled her all the way around, hugging her hard.
He led her from the room. Instead of going back to bed, they headed for the kitchen. Cass poured two glasses of milk, while Billy pulled out a bag of ginger cookies.
“She looks good,” he said, a little shakily. “Is she okay?”
“Her wrist itches under the cast. This morning I was washing her hair, and some water got inside. So it feels clammy, and she says it smells like a wet sweater.”
Billy shrugged. “Were the other kids so sensitive to smell?” he asked.
“Belinda, when she was little,” Cass said, smiling, watching Billy’s face. He had gotten tan and windburned these last six days, in spite of the chilly fall weather.
“Nothing more serious than her wrist? Her hearing’s the same?”
“As far as we can tell. Oh, there is one new development. Zach.”
“Zach?”
“A speech therapist.”
“Another one? What about Mrs. Kaiser?”
Cass sipped her milk. Her chin tucked down, she watched Billy through her bangs. “He has a different approach. I’m not really sure what I think. He says Josie should learn signs.”
“Major shift here,” Billy said. He ate half a cookie, then polished off the rest. “I thought you were against sign language.”
“I am, I think,” Cass said. “But you should see her signing our names, concentrating on each letter, doing it over and over. I don’t know.”
“She can hear some,” Billy said.
They finished their milk; the lights of a car speeding down Coleridge Avenue played across the ceiling. Billy reached across the table; Cass felt his fingers tracing the back of her hand. She let him continue, trying not to think about kissing John Barnard.
“You could hardly look at me before I left,” Billy said. “I thought about you the whole time.”
“And still came home?” Cass asked, laughing.
“Yeah. I missed you a lot.”
“Me, too.” She always missed him, even when she knew they’d probably be fighting if he were home.
“Want to go back to bed?” he asked, reading her mind.
Cass rose. She reached up to brush a dark curl out of Billy’s eyes. He looked sleepy and full of desire. He took her in his arms, smiling back. They walked out of the kitchen together, up to bed, putting the mysteries of their house down to rest for the night.
16
Thank you for coming,” Cass said, leading Zach to the kitchen table. “We could have come to you.”
“I generally work at hospitals and in people’s homes. I think learning in a familiar environment puts people, especially children, at ease,” Zach said. Then he broke into a wide grin. “Besides, I don’t have an office yet.”
“Did you just graduate?”
“I finished my master’s last summer.”
Cass poured two cups of tea and set out milk, sugar, and a plate of Bonnie’s brownies. Zach sat across the table. He looked so eager, ready to dive right into the tea, or anything else she put in front of him.
“Josie’s been seeing a speech therapist for a while now,” Cass said. “An older woman. She doesn’t encourage using sign language.”
“Conformity is a standard goal of the old school,” Zach said. “’Don’t stand out, be just like everyone else.’ Like the old days, when they used to train lefties to write with their right hands.”
“I want my kids to stand out, but I don’t want them to feel uncomfortable. Or to feel set apart,” she said, thinking how “set apart�
� and “freakish” meant the same thing to her father. And maybe even to her.
“That’s how Josie feels now: set apart. Our goal is to reverse that.”
“She’s in her room,” Cass said, rising.
“I’d like to work alone with Josie today, if you don’t mind,” Zach said. “It’s very helpful for the family to become involved, but first Josie and I have to get comfortable with each other.”
“I want to learn the gestures, so I can know what she’s saying.”
“They’re not gestures, Mrs. Medieros. What Josie is about to learn is a language. A complicated language, like English or French.”
“I never got past French two in high school,” Cass said, leading Zach upstairs to Josie.
“Neither did I,” Zach said.
With his father back in town and the truck parked out front in the driveway, T.J. was back on two wheels. He and Alison would sit together on the school bus home, and the second T.J. got off, he’d hop on his bike and ride up Marcellus to meet her again. All T.J. could think of was Alison.
Today some strange car was parked on the street in front of his house. He walked inside and found his mother standing at the foot of the stairs, looking up.
“Hi, honey,” she said. She seemed really happy to see him. The nicer his mother was to him lately, the more uncomfortable T.J. felt. What he and Alison shared was their miserable families, and the last few days his mother had been messing it up.
“Hey,” T.J. said, heading for the kitchen. She followed him.
“I am so glad you’re home. Zach’s upstairs with Josie, and I’m dying to horn in. But I’m supposed to give them a little time alone. How was school?”
“Crappy. Who’s Zach?”
“The new speech therapist.”
“Oh, yeah. The sign-language dude.”
“Why was school bad? Did something go wrong?”
“Nothing particular.” T.J. dumped his books on the table and grabbed a brownie. He munched it as he looked in the refrigerator. He wished his mom would leave him alone, or, better yet, rag on him, so he wouldn’t have to feel guilty telling Alison that his family sucked.
