Remember Me

by Deborah Bedford

  Aubrey realized she’d much rather be on the beach with Sam, diving into the breakers, hidden by darkness and the pounding of the surf on the sand, than face-to-face in the harsh light of a coffee shop, trying to explain her life. Sam was so familiar to her, yet he’d become a stranger, too. She had no way to know who he’d become, or how she ought to see him.

  “I’m married,” Aubrey told him simply, her hands folded in front of her chin. “I have three kids. I have pictures of them in my purse.”

  She glanced around the booth for her purse before she remembered she’d left it locked in the car.

  “They’re all beautiful. I can’t wait for you to see.”

  “How old are they?”

  “Like stairsteps. Hannah is four. She’s the baby. Channing is the oldest. She’s fifteen, going on twenty.”

  “A four-year-old and a teenager?”

  “And there’s Billy in the middle. He’s eight. His ultimate goal is to be a soccer player and to make it to old age having worn only one pair of underwear. Spiderman underwear.”

  “A typical male.”

  “You got it.” Aubrey had thought she’d never stop shivering. But Sam’s proximity, his body angled toward hers, his wrist aligned next to her elbow, warmed her. “How about you? I want to hear about your family.”

  “Your husband’s name,” Sam said, as she realized he wasn’t going to be easily diverted. “What is it?”

  “Gary.” She couldn’t explain why she hesitated. “Gary Mangelson.”

  “So you’re—?”

  “Aubrey Mangelson.”

  “It’s hard to think of you with a different name.” She saw emotion working Sam’s face, as if it cost him something to process the thought. “How did you meet him? How did you meet this Mr. Gary Mangelson?”

  “At work. Someone introduced us at a Christmas party, he asked me out, and we married a year later. It’s a pretty predicable story.”

  Sam examined the tines of his fork.

  “It was a marine manufacturing company. A company that made upholstery for boats. In Portland. That’s where we both worked.”

  “And now?”

  “I may look for something after Hannah starts school full-time. Gary stayed, moved up through the ranks into management. We’ve done okay on one income.”

  “You’re happy?” he asked, watching her face.

  “I am,” she lied.

  The waitress arrived, carrying their plates. She set a towering burger in front of Sam, a bowl of soup in front of Aubrey. Aubrey unwrapped her silverware and placed the flimsy napkin in her lap. She watched Sam rearrange his pickles and lift his tomato to see what might be underneath. They were both biding their time until the waitress left them alone again.

  “It’s your turn,” she insisted as he reached for the mustard bottle. “I asked you questions first, but you’ve done nothing but interrogate me.”

  Sam ticked subjects off on his fingers. “No kids. Never been married.”

  She nodded.

  “I went to seminary after college and started preaching in a little church with two dozen members. The church I’m in now is much larger.”

  “That’s good, isn’t it?”

  “I spend time with my dad once a week. My mother has Alzheimer’s but we’re dealing with that.”

  “You compartmentalize everything.”

  “Doesn’t everyone when they’re having a conversation like this one? Brenda married a man named Joe. He became a close friend, like the brother I never had.”

  “He’s Hunter’s father. The one who died.”

  Sam fingered his water glass, wiping away moisture. “Yes.”

  “How sad for Brenda.”

  “I keep thinking about that. Maybe I haven’t given her the support I could have.”

  “You have Hunter.”

  “That took a bit of doing.”

  Aubrey found herself gauging him, debating whether or not she ought to ask this next question. She couldn’t turn away from it.

  “You’re in a Protestant church, aren’t you? Does your position keep you from marrying?”

  He set his half-eaten hamburger on his plate and squared his shoulders. “I’m allowed to marry. There’s just never been—”

  He trailed off, unwittingly leaving it open to her imagination.

  “Hasn’t there been someone, Sam? Someone you’ve wanted to spend your life with?”

  “It’s tricky,” he said. “I counseled a woman once who I considered dating. But God had other plans for her. She’d gotten divorced and the Father put her marriage back together again.”

  A jumble of emotions played through her, sorrow that he’d been alone all this time, relief because it meant he was unchanged.

  “That’s an amazing story for her. Miraculous.”

  “I’ve seen a lot of miracles,” he noted glibly.

  “But maybe not in your own life,” she said, pointing at him with her soup spoon, pinning him down.

  “It’s tricky. I said that, didn’t I? Everyone at Covenant Heights is watching.”

  “I can see how it would be difficult.”

  “There’s usually a painful choice to be made. Whatever I do affects other people.”

  “That’s the name of your church? Covenant Heights?”

  “Yes. And your husband’s name is Gary.”

  “Yes.”

  “Look at both of us,” he said. “We were so young, then, do you remember?”

  “Oh, yes. I remember.”

  “I thought I’d always spend my life with you.”

  CHAPTER EIGHTEEN

  Aubrey lay in bed that night, her eyes dry from lack of sleep, her heart aching for what might have been. Sam’s words ran through her mind like a dangerous spring.

  I thought I’d always spend my life with you.

  Her throat went coarse with emotion when the cell phone rang. Aubrey’s heart skipped a beat. Oh, how she wished this would be Gary! Oh, how she needed to hear her husband’s voice on the line. She needed Gary not as he’d become, but different—strong and healthy, wrapping his words around her, strengthening her.

  Even as she flipped open the phone and tried to read the number, Aubrey knew she wouldn’t hear the voice she longed for. That voice didn’t exist. And the treatment center wouldn’t allow Gary to call for 72 hours anyway, not until he made it through detox.

  “Mommy?”

  The moment Aubrey heard the little voice, she came fully awake. “Hannah?” The number she’d read through bleary eyes began to register. Channing’s cell phone. Which meant her two girls were together at Emily’s, taking care of each other.

  “I just can’t sleep without Elephant.”

  Aubrey squeezed her eyes shut, relief and distress filling her in equal measure. “Of course you can’t.”

  “Channing said I could call you on her phone.”

  “I’m glad she did. ”

  “Were you asleep, Mommy?”

  “No,” Aubrey said. “I was awake, too.”

  “Is Daddy asleep? Can I talk to him?”

  “Oh, Sweetie.” She hated herself for the tears that began to come. “He isn’t—” Aubrey stopped herself, remembering the story she and Gary had decided to tell the children. One falsehood leads to so many others. “He isn’t awake.”

  “I miss you. I want to be with you and Daddy.”

  “I know.” With sharp, purposeful movements, Aubrey swiped at her tears. “We miss you, too.”

  “Aunt Emily made us eat Brussels sprouts.”

  “I’m sorry about that.”

  “I put them in my pocket.”

  “Oh, honey.”

  “Mommy, I had to.”

  So difficult, trying to sound stern when she wanted to laugh and cry at the same time. “I’ll tell you what. In the morning when Aunt Emily wakes up, I’ll talk to her and get her to help you pick out a new animal at the store.”

  “No, that isn’t it. I don’t want a different animal. I only want Eleph
ant.”

  “You’ll have to make do, Hannah.” We’re all having to make do with what we’ve been given. “I’m sorry we couldn’t turn around, but you three might have missed the plane.”

  Such a plaintive little voice, it tore at Aubrey’s heart. “I like the way Elephant smells. I like him because he’s blue. I like him because he doesn’t have fur on his ear and he only has one eye.”

  Is this the way life is? Aubrey thought. Do we look for something that isn’t right to replace something we had to leave behind?

  “Hannah, Sweetie. Don’t cry. I can hear you crying.”

  “I c-can’t help it.”

  “Get Channing to give you a big hug for me, okay? Get her to rub your back until you can fall asleep.”

  I have to protect them from Gary’s failure, don’t I? If I don’t, they’ll lose respect for him the same way that I have.

  Hannah’s sniffing was pitiful. “O-okay.”

  “That’s a girl.”

  “Mommy, when can we come home?”

  Aubrey clutched the cell with both hands, longing for something that didn’t exist anymore.

  Oh, Gary, It’s your fault. You’re the one who has broken trust with your family.

  “I don’t know, Sweetie,” she whispered. But she was thinking: Our home may never be the same again.

  The seal pup arrived on the beach the same day that Hunter began to make friends.

  Several hundred yards north of the cottages, a rock escarpment rose from the beach. Powerful breakers had swept it, bashing into it, exploding and flying skyward in a thousand sun-laced drops. Over the years, the falling droplets had carved a broad shell. Above this stood a headland where the soil had washed away, revealing roots knotted like seaman’s ropes. It was in this quiet hollow, this shaded place, where the harbor seal appeared in late afternoon.

  Sam had seen the posted signs even when he’d been a boy, hand scribbled by naturalists or printed off by the motels along Highway 1. SEAL PUPS REST ON SHORE. DO NOT DISTURB THEM! IT’S THE LAW! Or: HARBOR SEALS BRING THEIR YOUNG TO SHORE WHEN THEY TIRE OR WHEN SURF IS ROUGH. REMEMBER: SHARE THE BEACH AND KEEP THE ‘WILD’ IN WILDLIFE!!!

  Sam had longed to stumble upon one of these infant seals when he’d been young. Although he’d vowed never to touch or harm one, Sam had ached for the experience of standing close, just once to examine the placement of whiskers on such a small, wild thing, to read indelible life shining from its round eyes. But he had never been lucky enough for it, or maybe he had just never been chosen.

  Seal pups had been as elusive to him as Aubrey’s magical green phosphorescence that she bragged she often saw flash in the waves at sundown.

  The Pontiac had pulled into the cottage parking space shortly after noon, its grill and its California license plate splattered with bugs from a journey. Sam watched the parents, two boys about Hunter’s age, and a teenage girl with bobbed hair stumble out and stretch and exclaim over the sea. He’d been standing there thinking of Aubrey. What was she doing? Had she talked to her kids, her husband? Was she trying to stay away from him after what he’d said last night? Glad for the diversion, Sam stepped across the lawn.

  He thrust his hand forward in greeting, and exchanged pleasantries. “I’m next door.” “How long you staying?” And to the kids, “I’ve got a nephew about the same age as you. Don’t know where he’s gone off to.”

  If the teens had been the least bit shy, Hunter never would have been invited into the pack. But Sam watched as the careful dance began, adolescents moving in circles around each other, the girl catching Hunter’s eye, one of the boys waving and shouting, “You had any luck fishing off the pier?”

  By three, with the sun growing low enough to cast spiked shadows along the hummocks of grass, the four were chattering like they’d known each other for years and renovating a fire pit on the leeward side of the dunes. Yesterday the spot had been barely visible, full of sand and half-charred trash, rocks coated with soot and shattered from someone else’s bonfire. Today Hunter and his friends carted away the broken stones and carried in new ones. They dug a deep hole, making good use of Aubrey’s shovel. They dragged up lengths of driftwood, worn as smooth as bone by the surf.

  He could not have said when Hunter disappeared down the beach. One of the boys knocked on Sam’s door and asked, “Hey, is Hunter hanging out here? My brother can’t find him.” And Sam shrugged. “I don’t know.”

  “We didn’t want to start the fire without him.”

  “Maybe I’ll have a walk up the beach,” Sam volunteered, grateful for a chance to release his pent-up energy. “If I find him, I’ll tell him you’re looking for him.”

  He set out in search of his nephew, leaving Ginny behind, unable to walk past Aubrey’s cottage without glancing in its direction. What was keeping her away from him? Her lights hadn’t been turned on all day; the curtains were open, her car gone. Aubrey was alone in this place, with no one to notice if anything went wrong, no one to notice if she didn’t turn up.

  He ought to be the one taking care of her!

  Sam was spared this self-indulgence when he caught sight of his nephew. Sam walked faster at first, hurrying to catch up with the boy, but he slowed when he saw Hunter’s stance. The boy wasn’t moving, his silhouette still, reflecting perfect lines in the mirror of wet sand. He gripped the shovel in one hand. The other hand did not clench or stir at his side.

  The pup, dark and sleek, did not lift its head or struggle onto its flippers. It remained in the hollow where its mother had left it, staring at Hunter with curiosity, too young to be afraid.

  Hunter did not even blink. Pieces of his sun-bleached hair lifted in the breeze, fell into place again. The boy must have gone motionless mid-stride, his limbs bent in the act of moving forward, a cat ready to spring.

  The moment seemed to stretch into eternity, yet it couldn’t have lasted a minute, a minute-and-a-half, at most. Sam couldn’t breathe, measuring the expression of trust on the pup’s face with Hunter’s choice not to disturb it. The low sun became diamonds flung across open water. The seal pup adjusted its weight with its winged foot, leaving the imprint of a watery M.

  From one slight change in Hunter’s jaw, Sam could tell his nephew was smiling. Sam backed away, affording his nephew as much distance as the boy afforded the animal. This one moment represented everything he’d brought his nephew to the coast to see.

  To break in and whisper, Look, Hunter. Didn’t I tell you it would be this way? didn’t seem suitable.

  To share it seemed almost to steal it. Best for Hunter not to know he had been there.

  Sunset and fire. Drifting patterns of light being born, and of light being swept away. As the flames took hold of the kindling at their feet, the blaze drew its color from the sky. Brilliant yellows and crimsons burned above the sea.

  When Sam returned, the kids were playing Frisbee in the waning light. He released Ginny and, bursting to freedom, she hurled herself after the plastic disc, too. A good number of cottage guests had drawn lawn chairs into a circle. Others had found perches atop driftwood. Sam joined them.

  The open, dark windows of Aubrey’s cottage stared at him like empty eyes.

  You are mighty, and firm in your purpose.

  Father, why have you reunited me with Aubrey now, when it’s too late?

  Someone brought out a package of wieners to roast over the bonfire. Eventually, as Sam was thinking about getting his guitar, Hunter returned. The California girl tugged at Hunter’s arm, “Where did you go? We looked for you,” and Hunter mumbled something cryptic while he let himself be coaxed into the fold. The boys welcomed him back with a good-natured shoving of shoulders.

  Not until headlights slashed the darkness in the parking lot did Sam realize how concerned he’d become. His shoulders sagged in relief when Aubrey’s lamp turned on. His chest tightened when he saw her drawing the curtains.

  He who walks in wisdom is kept safe.

  Sam made himself wait, knowing he hadn’t a
ny right to care what she’d been doing all day, knowing he had no right to this longing that blindsided him. He detached himself from the others when he saw her step off the patio into the sand. Later he would not remember how he’d come to stand beside her.

  They spoke at the same time. “I had quite a day,” she said.

  “Whatever could have taken you so long?” he said.

  “I didn’t know you were waiting for me.”

  “I wasn’t.” An awkward pause. “But there’s no one here to watch out for you.

  “I talked to the kids. I went antiquing. There’s a shop on Sailor Avenue with antique marbles. I walked the length of town. You didn’t need for anyone to watch out for me.”

  “That’s what I’ve been telling myself all day.”

  The fire cast moving flickers of light on her face and, for the first time, he saw her eyes were red and swollen from crying. “Aubrey, what is it? What’s wrong?”

  “It’s nothing, Sam.”

  “I don’t believe you.”

  “Just let me be.”

  She pulled free of his grasp and strode toward the others. By the time he’d caught up with her, someone had handed her a bag of marshmallows and she’d poked one onto a stick. Sam had a vague notion of her arm extending the branch over heat, the marshmallow pivoting, pivoting like the hands on a clock, as if it might still be measuring the days they’d had, the years they hadn’t.

  “I’ve never seen anyone so careful about roasting a marshmallow.”

  “I saw my father today,” she said, focusing on the fire. “After all these years, you’d think he’d let down his guard with me. You’d think he’d stop shutting me out.”

  “Aubrey—”

  “I expected him to at least ask questions about my family. There were things I wasn’t certain about sharing with him. But he didn’t even want to know.”

  “I’m sorry.”

  “You don’t have to be sorry. I’m the one who decided to see him.”

  I’ve been watching him hurt you since you were twelve years old. All those years when he let you be the shadow and Kenneth be the star.