Blue Moon

by Luanne Rice

  “Cut loose!” Frank had yelled, heading for the starboard winch.

  But it wasn’t a submarine; it was a sea monster after all. They’d snagged a humpback whale, its tail thrashing in the nets, trying to free itself. It breached, shooting straight out of the sea like a missile from hell, its entire sixty-foot body clearing the water, its tense white flukes just missing the transom. Crashing into the sea, it displaced a wall of water that washed over Cassandra’s decks, draining in a sheet through the trawl doors.

  Billy had held the wheel, feeling his boat cant backward, the stern tipping under. In that instant he’d been sure they’d all drown, be dragged straight to the sea bottom. Tony Domingus, his first mate, grabbed the rifle.

  At the helm, feeling his boat pull backward as he drove forward, Billy knew a shot would be futile. Tony would have to hit the brain on the first shot to kill the whale. Even dead, the creature’s sheer weight would drag them under. But before Tony could clear the cockpit, the whale sounded.

  “We’re sinking!” Jesse shouted. The whale swam straight down, a torpedo to the center of the earth, its great white flukes disappearing in the murk. Billy felt his boat lurch beneath his feet, tipping so the bow arched toward the sky and the stern went under. The cockpit’s rear wall became the floor, and Billy stared through the glass beneath his feet to see Frank and Jesse drop into the sea, their fingers scrabbling across the icy deck, their screams howling through the wind as they vanished.

  Then, suddenly, as if there had been no whale, the Cassandra righted herself. She rode with grace, rolling across the rhythmic waves of a stormless sea. Billy and Tony moved cautiously at first, inching their way out the cockpit door, across the deck. Then they ran for the stern, to look for Frank and Jesse. Tony threw two life rings into the empty current.

  “It freed itself,” Billy said. Two hundred yards off the port quarter he saw the whale blow, arch its massive black back, and dive.

  “What the fuck happened?” Paul Skillin, who’d been off watch, sleeping down below, clambered onto the deck.

  “We snagged a whale,” Tony said, his teeth chattering. “Frank and Jesse. Shit—”

  “What are you talking about?” Paul asked, following Tony’s gaze. Then, “In the water? They went over?”

  “Just look,” Billy said. “Keep looking.”

  “Water’s pouring in,” Paul said, gesturing at the companion ladder, leading below. “It’s bad. The fucker pulled some fittings loose.”

  “They just went over,” Tony said, scanning the surface. “It happened so fast.”

  “Go down and start the hand pump,” Billy directed Paul. “We’ve got maybe five minutes to get those guys onboard.”

  “They’re finished,” Tony said fiercely. “They’re frozen.”

  Billy saw something bright just below the surface. He grabbed the boat hook, plunged it into the sea, and caught Frank’s crimson watch cap. It dangled off the long hook; Billy tried to pull it onboard, but the wind grabbed it away.

  “Haul in the nets,” Billy yelled to Tony. He sprinted to the cockpit, worked the engine through its paces; it didn’t seem to be damaged. Once Tony got the nets onboard, Billy would beat in widening circles until he found the men. They would have cut their boots off; maybe they’d grabbed onto the life rings and could see Cassandra even now, a little distant to hear their calls, but not so far off they’d have lost hope.

  “Hang on, hang on,” Billy said, more to himself, searching the waves with binoculars. He shivered in his warm jacket, his hands numb in their black leather mittens. Icicle daggers hung everywhere, sharks’ teeth in the rigging.

  The winches groaned, hauling in the heavy nets. They had just started dragging a new area, just before they’d caught the whale. Billy turned away, to check his loran position. At that instant, the framed photo of Cass and the kids caught his eye. He focused on Cass, her soft blue eyes telling him to stay steady, not to panic, to keep his head.

  “Cass,” he said, for luck.

  Tony shouted for help, and the words trailed into a high, bloodcurdling scream taken by the wind. Billy turned to run toward him, but what he saw stopped him cold. There, tangled in the nets, were the lifeless bodies of Frank Santos and Jesse Gabriel. Billy stared for perhaps thirty seconds. He turned away, caught sight of Cass’s picture again. His stomach pitched, thinking of the danger they were in. He made a second call to the Coast Guard.

  “Mayday,” he said into the microphone, his voice shaking. “This is the Cassandra again …”

  “Cassandra, we are on the way,” came the voice over the radio.

  23

  Josie didn’t know how to tell time, but she knew T.J. shouldn’t be home from school yet. She sat in the TV room watching cartoons while Belinda slept on the sofa, and she saw T.J. walk down the hall. He had rosy cheeks; he shivered like he’d gone outside without his jacket. Josie sneaked into the hall. She wanted to talk to him, but she was afraid he would be mad. He’d seemed mad ever since she’d had her accident.

  No T.J. in the hall, but the cellar door was open. Josie peeked down the scary stairs into the dark cellar. T.J. had said there was danger down here. She took one step at a time, down all the stairs. She couldn’t hear anything, but she saw a light in the Ping-Pong room.

  T.J. had his head in the danger cupboard. Josie stayed far back, watching him. He took something out and pointed it like a gun at the wall. It was a gun! Maybe he was so mad, he was going to shoot it at Josie. Josie remembered once Mommy had told her never to let someone go away mad. Maybe if you let them, they would come back madder, with a gun.

  She stood against the wall, watching him. He pointed the gun at his own head, then tried to stick in his pocket. It looked just like the guns in cartoons, a big long kill gun. But no matter how scary T.J. looked holding the gun in the shadowy Ping-Pong room, Josie knew he wouldn’t hurt her.

  “Put that down,” she said very loudly.

  T.J. jumped. He hunched over, hiding the gun behind him. “That you, Josie?” he asked, frowning the way he did when he couldn’t understand her. Now he was talking; she wished she could hear everything he was saying, but it had to do with “Bob,” “work,” “cold.”

  “Don’t be mad,” she said. She tried to speak and sign at the same time.

  “I’m not mad at you.”

  Backing up, she bumped her wrist. Her cast had been off for more than a week, but her wrist still felt weak and wobbly. Holding it with her good hand, she stopped signing for a moment.

  T.J. shook his head. He put the gun on the floor and took Josie in his arms. She pressed her hands on both sides of his face. “You cold!” she said.

  “I’m okay,” he said, hugging her. “I’m not mad at you.” Then he said something Josie didn’t get. If he hadn’t been holding her tight to prove he still loved her, Josie would have thought he was saying that he used to love a little girl, but then he got mad and now he hated her. It made her so frustrated, she felt like squirming out of his hug and running in big circles around the cellar. She hated when people, especially T.J., said things she couldn’t understand.

  Josie wriggled away and stared straight at his mouth. “Say again?” she said, trying to stay calm.

  “Alison doesn’t love me anymore,” he said slowly.

  “She doesn’t?”

  T.J. shook his head.

  “Are you going to shoot her?”

  T.J.’s eyes dropped to the gun, as if he’d forgotten about it. “No,” he said.

  “Not kill the girl?”

  “No.” Tears ran down her brother’s cheeks, and he wiped them away. Josie could tell by his quick fingers—wipe, wipe—that he didn’t want Josie to see him crying.

  Josie signed, “I love you, T.J.”

  “I don’t understand, Josie,” T.J. said.

  Josie nodded. She made the sign again. Then she kissed the back of T.J.’s hand. She didn’t let go of his hand right away; he let her hold it. With his other hand, he wiped away more tears. The
y stood there, looking down at the gun. It was as big as T.J.’s foot.

  Like quicksilver, Josie bent down. She picked up the gun. She wished there were a secret trap door that she could throw it down. She wanted it to sail down a chute into the ground, into a secret pit for bad, scary things, which could never get out to hurt you because they would be trapped forever. She wanted to throw all guns, knives, snakes, sharks, and eels into the trap door and lock them away.

  But there wasn’t a trap door. She looked around. She knew a place. The suds hole! She bolted away from T.J. before he could catch her. She carried the gun—she couldn’t believe how heavy, heavier than a puppy—to the place. She heard a sound, loud, that might have been T.J. yelling her name. But she wouldn’t stop. He’d said he wouldn’t kill the girl, but she’d seen him put the gun to his own head, and it might have shot him, and Josie couldn’t imagine how someone with a shot head would look.

  The big washing machine, the clothes dryer. Josie knew a place, the scariest place in the house. When her mother washed their clothes, Josie used to hold on to her leg, never daring to let go, because snakes or a ghost might come out of the deep hole where the soapy water went.

  The light from the Ping-Pong room didn’t go this far, and Josie didn’t know if she could make herself go near the washing machine. But if she didn’t, T.J. would get the gun back, and that thought made her more afraid than the suds hole. So she kept running, the gun out in front, so heavy to hold up, but this way it would get to the hole before she did.

  She knew the spot. Even in the dark she could see the hole’s black mouth, blacker than the dark, wide open and waiting to eat anything that fell inside it. She held out the gun, running fast, and she dropped it into the hole. Then she jumped back.

  T.J. was right behind her. She stood still, waiting for him to say mad things to her.

  “Was a bad gun,” she said in her mad voice, because Josie was at least as mad as T.J.

  He pulled her into the light. She could see his face clearly, and it looked very, very mad. Something else, too—scared, maybe? He had his hands tight on both her arms. He wanted her to see his mouth, because he was going to say something important.

  “You could have gotten killed,” he said to her, giving her a hard, angry shake. He stared at the hole, frowning.

  “You, too!” she said, outraged.

  “That was really stupid, Josie.” Then his eyes went up, to the stairs, and Belinda came flying down, her mouth open in a terrible panic. Josie had never seen her sister so upset, crying so hard her face was bright red.

  Belinda said something that made T.J. drop Josie’s arms and stand up straight. Belinda’s mouth was moving so fast, then T.J.’s, that Josie couldn’t understand. Belinda was grabbing T.J.’s arm, jumping up and down. Josie knew something horrible was happening.

  “What say?” she asked, feeling terrified inside.

  They just kept talking, faster than ever, not even looking at her. She could only make out one word: Bob. Josie jumped up and down, to make them tell her. She clutched Belinda’s hand, yanking it hard. Belinda had a red face and terrible fear in her eyes.

  “Bob?” Josie asked. “Bob okay?”

  “It’s Daddy,” Belinda said, shaking off Josie’s hand. Belinda said some other words, then “boats,” to T.J.

  T.J. looked calm, like everything was going to be all right. He said something to Belinda, then he leaned over to kiss Josie. “Be good,” he said.

  Josie watched him run up the stairs. She looked up at Belinda. She felt a storm in her tummy, and she knew if someone didn’t help her understand she would have a bad fit and she wouldn’t be able to stop. She could taste the fit on the back of her tongue.

  All of a sudden, Belinda began to pay attention. She kneeled down in front of Josie. She signed “Daddy.”

  “Daddy,” Josie signed back.

  “T.J. going to Daddy,” Belinda signed.

  “Why?”

  “To save him,” Belinda said out loud, wiping tears from her eyes. She looked into Josie’s eyes without saying another word. Josie didn’t know exactly what was happening, but she could tell from Belinda’s expression that it was very scary. Maybe T.J. should have taken the gun.

  Cass had to wait forever to have her snow tires put on. Half the town had come to Ledoux’s Garage, just because a little snow was forecast. Well, six inches. But it did seem people couldn’t handle snow anymore. School would be called off before two inches lay on the ground; people drove off the road as if they’d never learned to steer out of a skid. She and Billy had loved to skip school on snowy days. They’d drive out to Minturn Ledge, walk down the rocks, and watch snowflakes fizz as they hit the dark silver water.

  Sitting in the garage waiting room, she enjoyed the sense of being out of touch. No one knew where to find her. Usually she was surrounded by her sisters, her children, her parents; and as much as she loved her life, it felt good to get away. She opened a magazine but didn’t read it.

  Rachel Barnard walked in with Maura Santos. Rachel wore a stylish snow-bunny outfit and a fur-trimmed suede hat. She looked great. Cass felt the old rivalry with Rachel flaring. She compensated for it by overcomplimenting Rachel, acting as klutzy as possible.

  “Wow,” Cass said, eyeing Rachel’s outfit. “I believe you forgot to turn left for St. Moritz, dear. This is the Shell station. Hi, Maura.”

  “Isn’t it a knockout?” Maura asked. Maura, a comfortable, bosomy blond, was one of Cass’s favorite fishing wives. Unfortunately, they saw each other only at PTA meetings, Holy Ghost Society dances, and Ledoux’s Garage.

  “Rachel, when you walk in looking like Bergdorf Goodman, I realize it’s time I hang up the L. L. Bean twenty-four-hour hotline,” Cass said, wishing she could just shut up. She would never in a million years dress like Rachel; Rachel’s tight ski pants would look cute on Belinda and Emma, but they made you think Rachel was trying to recapture her nonexistent pinup years.

  “Not Bergdorf’s,” Rachel said without any irony. “Boston Downhill.”

  “Oh,” Cass said, trying not to meet Maura’s eyes. Maura winked and looked away.

  “Hey, Frank’s fishing with Billy,” Maura said. “The maiden fishing trip.”

  “Must be nice, having a boat named after you,” Rachel said.

  “News travels fast,” Cass said, thrilled.

  “John leaves tomorrow for a week. He’ll be gone for Thanksgiving,” Rachel said wistfully, making Cass feel sorry for her.

  “I hate when they miss holidays,” Cass said. “Billy missed Christmas one year—that was awful.”

  “That would be the worst,” Rachel and Maura agreed.

  “You make more money, fishing this time of year,” Maura said. “Not as many boats going out.”

  “John said the Aurora’s a nice boat,” Rachel said. “One of the best in your father’s fleet.”

  Cass wondered if John had told her about all the ways her father saved money, and she felt a little breath of relief knowing her father would retire soon. Her father bragged that he had the safest fleet in Mount Hope, but Cass would make it even safer. She figured a fisherman’s wife would run the safest fleet in the world.

  “It is,” Cass said. “The Aurora is a very good boat. Do you have plans for Thanksgiving?” She was thinking of her own plans: every year Lobsterville served Thanksgiving dinner from three till eight. The Keatings themselves ate at twelve o’clock, sitting at one long table in the Captain Ed Room, with all the traditional dishes Sheila and Eddie had eaten at their own first Thanksgiving.

  “I guess the kids and I will have dinner with John’s mother in Jamestown,” Rachel said, not sounding quite so forlorn.

  “We’ll be at Lobsterville,” Maura said. “Five o’clock, same as ever. Frank’s parents love it. It’s always a combination Thanksgiving-farewell dinner. They leave the next day for Florida.”

  “Oh, where in Florida?” Cass asked.

  “Naples,” Maura said. “On the Gulf Coast.”
>
  “My father’s been talking about retiring,” Cass said.

  “Jimmy Keating retire?” Maura said, laughing.

  “That’s a hot one,” Rachel said.

  Burton Ledoux, the garage owner, came into the waiting room. He was swarthy, with a pencil-thin mustache and a mysterious manner. He stood in the doorway, waiting for the three women to stop talking and notice him. He eyed them, one at a time, as if he were trying to decide whom he wanted first. With his Grecian Formula black hair, Burton looked more like an international jewel thief than the owner of a gas station. Cass always expected him to speak with a French accent. But when he opened his mouth, the cadence of Mount Hope rolled out.

  “Cass, you’re all set,” he said, squinting through the smoke of his cigarette as if it were a Gauloise instead of a Camel.

  “Merci, Burton,” she said.

  Burton had driven her newly shod Volvo wagon into the parking lot. She checked in back to make sure he’d remembered to send her home with her summer tires, and she pulled on her rag-wool mittens. As she shifted into first, she spied her father’s truck pulling in. She rolled down her window.

  “Hey, I thought you already had yours put on,” she called. Her father climbed out of his truck and walked to her car. He opened the door and made her get out. She stood in Ledoux’s parking lot, suddenly knowing this was bad.

  “Oh, my God,” she said before he spoke. He had a grave expression on his face, and he crushed her roughly against him. Her heart was pounding, her face pressed into his old wool coat. She smelled fish and mothballs.

  “Who is it?” she asked.

  “Billy,” he said.

  “Is he …?” She didn’t know how to finish the sentence.

  “Coast Guard got a call. He’s taking on water. They’ve sent out a spotter plane, and they have boats on the way. The whole Mount Hope fleet is heading out.”

  Cass couldn’t speak. There’s a storm coming, she thought.