by Amy Maroney
“I won’t be trapped here. There are plenty of others only too eager to take on the work. I could leave tomorrow, come back a year from now.”
Now it was her turn to snort.
“Your days of following the flocks are over. You see how they look to you every time a decision must be made. Your sister led this family, but not one sibling other than you is capable of following in her footsteps. It’s not hard to see.”
“There are a few who can learn,” he protested. “They just need the right training.”
“But if you leave for a year, who will train them?”
He sighed. “Maybe a year is too much, but a season’s reasonable. Next year I want to go to the coast again and help my cousin with the whale harvest. There’s money to be had in that. We need it.”
Her ears pricked up. “I’ve always wanted to visit the sea.”
He slid his arm around her again, and she settled into the warmth of his neck.
“Marry me, and the sea with all its treasures’ll be yours.”
His hand slipped under her shift, his fingertips lazily following the curve of her hip.
“How can I say no to such a gift?” she whispered, relaxing under his touch.
A gentle rain began to patter on the roof.
5
September, 2015
Amsterdam, Holland
Zari
Wil and Zari wandered through the narrow streets of Amsterdam, the late afternoon sun warm on their faces. Zari cast covert glances at Wil from time to time, taking in the disheveled dark-blond curls that sprang from his head in all directions, his lanky limbs and tall frame, the confident grace of his movements. Being in his presence charged her entire body with delicious anticipation. She reached out, caught his hand in hers, and raised it to her lips.
On the arch of a bridge, they paused to watch a flotilla of swans glide through a canal’s dark waters.
The swans floated to the open window of a small yellow houseboat, where a young girl leaned out with a piece of bread. The first swan snatched it from her hand with the speed of a striking snake. Screams ensued. A woman shooed the bird away with an umbrella and shut the window. Undeterred, it pecked at the glass with demented intensity.
“It’s an attack swan,” Zari whispered. “The most dangerous kind.”
Wil looked at her, his eyes gleaming with amusement, and draped an arm around her shoulders. She leaned into him, breathing the scent of eucalyptus.
“You still smell the same. Thank God.”
He grinned.
Zari’s mobile buzzed with an incoming text. She pulled it from her pocket and scanned the words. “My presence is not required again at the conference until tomorrow,” she announced. “I’m all yours. We can keep watching crazy swans, or...”
Wil pulled her in for a kiss. “I think ‘or’ sounds a lot more interesting.”
At Wil’s apartment building, they climbed the narrow, dimly lit staircase, the sounds of the streets and canal fading away with each step. Zari trailed her fingertips over the wooden bannister. It was so old and worn that it resembled polished stone.
Wil unlocked his apartment door and stepped aside so she could enter. Sunlight streamed in through the skylights, illuminating the centuries-old wooden floor. The white walls were crisp in contrast, and massive dark beams were exposed in the peaked ceiling. A simple kitchen outfitted with white appliances and matte gray wall tiles ran along the opposite wall. A table of rich honey-colored wood that Wil had made himself stood adjacent to the kitchen area.
Zari crossed to the table and ran her hands over the smooth, perfectly planed surface. She shook her head, smiling.
“What’s funny?” Wil asked.
“Your apartment is exactly where I imagined my artist alter ego would live. The attic of a classic brick Amsterdam house, overlooking a canal. All it needs is some giant canvases and panels, maybe a standing desk filled with paints and brushes and charcoal.”
“Your alter ego, whatever that is, is welcome to visit,” he said, padding up next to her. “But even better would be the real you. Here. All the time.”
He slipped his arms around her. Zari luxuriated in the caress of his fingers moving across her collarbone, sliding down each knob of her spine, exploring each indentation of her ribs. Then she took his hand and led him across the room to a door that stood ajar.
“I’m guessing this would be the bedroom.”
He nodded.
“Why don’t I start making myself at home right here in your bed?” She pulled him gently through the doorway.
With a wicked smile, he set about undressing her.
The next morning Zari found herself on a bicycle whizzing along a path behind Wil, feeling extraordinarily Dutch. The sunlight held a trace of summer’s heat, but the wind on her face was cool. A gaggle of tourists clogged the sidewalk ahead, a few of them spilling into the bike lane. Wil rang his bike bell with vigor as they wheeled by the group. Zari kept his pace, coming within a hair’s breadth of a woman wearing a bright red jacket, the familiar blue-and-gold cover of an American guidebook tucked under one arm.
“I could pass for one of you!” she called out to Wil. “No helmet, no light on my bike. Blatant disregard for pedestrians.”
His rich laughter tumbled back at her.
“Why is your laugh so intoxicating?” she demanded.
“It’s a Dutch thing,” he said over his shoulder. “We have addictive laughs.”
They dodged another group of tourists.
Part of her dreaded the meal tonight with Wil’s best friend, Filip. Wil and Filip had once been “adventurists,” working half the year to save money for huge expeditions all over the world. Their lifestyle came to an abrupt end during a disastrous skiing trip in the Arctic, when Filip had fallen into a crevasse and lost the use of his legs. Filip’s sister Hana had been Wil’s girlfriend for nearly a decade; their relationship was a casualty of the accident. Zari couldn’t shake the worry that Wil’s family and friends had written her off as a rebound girlfriend, a temporary distraction on the road back to normalcy and a nice Dutch woman. Maybe even back to Hana again.
Just be yourself, Zari. Her mother’s voice floated into her head. Because everyone else is already taken.
She smiled.
It was as good a mantra as any for the evening to come.
Their meal was nearly finished. The small Indonesian restaurant was emptying. A few last spoonfuls of rice in peanut sauce sat on a plate in front of Wil, and he periodically shoveled a bite into his mouth.
Filip wasn’t much of an eater. His plate was still half-full. He was on his third beer, though. He constantly made small adjustments to his position in the wheelchair, clearly uncomfortable. His dark hair was cut close to his skull and streaked with silver. His fine-boned face was pale and gaunt, with deep-set brown eyes that regarded her with wan detachment.
“How long do you plan to live in Europe, Zari?” he asked.
“I was only supposed to be here a year, but I got a new opportunity.”
“She’s looking for an artist from Renaissance times,” Wil said. “A woman who painted in the Flemish style.”
Filip looked doubtful. “A woman? From that era?”
“Women painted then,” Zari replied, “but most of them were never recognized. They weren’t offered opportunities or were forced to work anonymously.”
A defensive note had crept into her voice. She got emotional too quickly when she talked about this topic. It was a weakness, the kind of character flaw that a person like Dotie Butterfield-Swinton would pounce on and use to his advantage.
“If we can fill the holes in the historical record,” she went on in a more measured tone, “if we can uncover those silenced stories, the question of whether women could and can produce truly great art will lose relevance.”
Under the table Wil leaned his thigh into Zari’s. A slow shiver of pleasure rippled through her.
The server approached and cleared the remaining plates, and talk turned to stories of Wil and Filip in childhood, of antics with siblings and cousins.
Hana came up often in the course of their reminiscing. Apparently she was even more of a thrill-seeker than her brother had once been. She was currently trekking on horseback through the plains of Mongolia, on break from her job as a disaster-relief coordinator for an international humanitarian group.
As the true measure of Wil’s ex-girlfriend took shape, a feeling of uneasiness drifted over Zari. Great, she thought glumly. I’m walking in the shadow of a badass do-gooder.
Wil avoided the topic of the expeditions that had been the cornerstone of his relationship with Filip since their university days, that had defined both of them for a decade. Filip, for his part, was subdued. He occasionally sparred with Wil over a detail in a story, and twice he smiled with genuine delight, his eyes radiating joy. But each time the smile vanished so quickly Zari wondered if she had imagined it.
Watching the men dance around the subject of the adventures that had been their greatest passion, she felt a sudden jolt of despair for Filip. To be a person who reveled in taking his body to the limits of human endurance, trapped in a wheelchair for life—it was devastating.
“My brother Gus has a friend who was paralyzed in a skiing accident too,” she heard herself blurt out.
Filip and Wil stared at her, astonished.
“He still skis. And he sails. He’s going on a sailing trip in Croatia next spring, actually.”
There was a long silence. Filip took a sip of his beer, his eyes unreadable across the table.
“He could be a good resource for you.” Zari’s mouth was suddenly dry.
Wil and Filip exchanged a glance. Filip shifted in his wheelchair again.
She faltered a moment, then found her voice. “I could send an e-mail introduction to you both.”
Zari searched Filip’s solemn face, fearing she had made an unforgivable blunder.
After a moment, he shrugged. “Okay,” he said. “If you want.”
Wil launched into a story about a decrepit houseboat the two men had purchased together and refurbished when they were in their early twenties.
Listening to him, watching Filip’s face relax, Zari felt the tension slowly drain from her body.
6
September, 2015
Amsterdam, Holland
Zari
The bedroom was nearly dark. Zari stared at the stars visible through the skylights, listening to the far-off thrum of engines and the occasional sound of voices in the street below. An emergency vehicle’s siren whined in the distance. She turned over restlessly, her body coursing with energy. Jet lag had her in its clutches once again.
Wil slept on his side, facing away from her. His broad back rose and fell with each breath. She gently placed a hand between his shoulder blades, reveling in the warmth of his skin, the curve of muscle along his spine.
For a moment she was overcome with a desire to wake him, to lose herself in the circle of his arms. It was unsettling to admit, but she was attached to Wil in a way she had never been to any other man.
Instead she rolled out of bed, went into the kitchen, and filled the electric kettle with water. Rummaging through the tea options, she found a foil-wrapped packet of chamomile.
Zari scrolled through the e-mails on her mobile, deleting all the junk. Then her eyes widened.
“Scuba diving?” she whispered.
She calculated the time difference between Amsterdam and California in her head and placed a video call to her mother.
When Portia answered, Zari could tell her mother was in the backyard at Gus’s house, seated at the patio table. The setting sun had streaked the sky behind her with glorious brushstrokes of orange and pink.
“Zari, my girl! How are you? Isn’t it the middle of the night there?”
“It’s nearly morning, actually.” Zari filled a cup with boiling water. “Mom, what’s this about a scuba diving class?”
“So exciting, I know. Obsidian and I are doing it together.”
Portia had a knack for attracting younger men. Obsidian, a mid-forties photographer she had met at a silent meditation retreat last year, had quickly become a fixture in her life.
“You don’t like swimming,” Zari pointed out.
“Scuba diving isn’t swimming.” Portia aimed her mobile’s camera across the table at Gus and his children. “Look, guys,” she said. “It’s Zari!”
A collective roar of “Auntie Z!” rose up.
“Hello, my loves! Where’s Jenny?”
“Mom’s in Tokyo,” Jasper informed her. “Again.”
“But she’s bringing us back presents,” Eva said cheerfully. “She always brings presents.”
“Except for that one time—” Jasper began.
“Chop chop,” Gus interrupted, winking at Zari. “Time to clear the table, kids.”
Jasper and Eva scraped back their chairs and immediately began bickering about the number of objects they each had to carry inside.
“So, mom—the class?” Zari prodded.
Portia turned the mobile’s camera on herself again.
“It meets in San Francisco, but our first dives will be in Monterey Bay.”
“Are the teachers responsible people?” Zari envisioned a self-medicated pothead sending her mother into the Pacific with a nod and a peace sign.
“Of course! Honey, they do this for a living. They’re total pros.”
“Is Obsidian a strong swimmer?”
“He’s a fish.”
“I feel better.” Zari dropped her tea bag into the cup. “How’s the beading world treating you?”
“I don’t want to brag, but—actually, yes, I do. The goddess has spoken. I’m on the road to riches.”
“Seriously?”
“Who knows if this whole thing is a fluke. But my online jewelry sales doubled last month, thanks to your help with my website and social media. It’s nuts. It took me nearly sixty years to become an overnight sensation.”
The pride in Portia’s voice made Zari’s eyes sting with tears. After her parents divorced and her father all but disappeared from their lives, her mother had cobbled together rent payments through pet-sitting and house-sitting gigs combined with part-time jobs in yoga studios and health food stores. She never had fewer than three jobs at a time, and sometimes six or more.
“I’ve been hashtagging your stuff all over the internet, Mom. Anything to help your global empire.”
Portia laughed. “What’s it like there? Idyllic?”
“I don’t want to jinx anything, but...yes.”
Her mother beamed. “Is it the Wil Bandstra effect?”
“He’s pretty great. Amsterdam’s not bad, either.”
“Well, enjoy, sweetie. I’m going to supervise dishwasher loading.” Portia blew Zari a kiss. “Talk to your brother. He has a case of the chats, I can just tell.”
Gus’s grinning face filled the tiny screen of Zari’s mobile. “Sissy boo!”
“How’s the world’s best dad?”
“Can’t complain.”
He began walking around the yard. Zari saw a terra-cotta pot of orchids behind him, its white blooms glowing in the twilight.
“You really are the orchid whisperer,” she said admiringly.
“I have nothing else to do. Being a stay-at-home dad and all. I just sit around, tend my orchids, make smoothies. Pick up stuff.”
He demonstrated by retrieving various kid-related items and piling them on the patio table. She watched him add a hula hoop, a plastic dinosaur, a troll, a tattered pair of fairy wings, and a seemingly endless assortment of Legos to the heap.
“
Look at you tidying up. What a catch you are.”
“What the kids don’t know is that this is a burn pile. Tomorrow, it’ll all be gone. Poof!” He snickered maniacally.
Zari’s shoulders shook with laughter. Even on her darkest days, Gus never failed to make her laugh. It was one of the things she loved best about him.
She collected herself again. “So, Gus? What’s going on with Mom and this scuba diving thing?”
“Just another one of her interests. Hard to keep track of them all.”
“Yeah, but this one is different. She could drown.”
“That’s right, Miss Worst-Case-Scenario. Go straight to the potential disaster. You’re worried about sharks, too, aren’t you? Lots of great whites in Monterey Bay.”
“Mom doesn’t like swimming! Can you imagine her putting on a wetsuit?”
He chuckled. “I know. Those diving wetsuits are so thick you have to add weights to keep from shooting out of the water like a cannon.”
“Thanks for the reminder. Jesus.” Zari imagined her mother floating silently to the bottom of the sea loaded with an assortment of lead weights, while Obsidian and the scuba teacher chatted about New Age topics such as mindfulness, intention, and holding space.
“Reel in your freakish fears, sister,” Gus ordered.
He always had an uncanny talent for reading her thoughts.
“Come on, Gus, don’t tell me you’re happy she’s doing this.”
“Why can’t she have adventures and try new things? She loves to get pushed out of her comfort zone.”
“I know. But it’s just...dangerous,” Zari said lamely.
“Here’s what’ll happen.” Gus lowered his voice to a stage whisper. “She’ll finish the class, do the ocean dives in Monterey, and then never scuba dive again. I bet you a million dollars.”
Zari fought off another attack of laughter. “No way am I betting you,” she said. “I lost a lot of quarters to you back in the day.”
“Whatever. That’s revisionist history.”