by J. J. Murray
This would be the life!
After a lunch of sandwiches, chips, and sodas, Destiny takes over, steering us southeast in a lazy arc towards Smithtown Bay to get us back home.
“Why don’t you bring your daddy up here, get him some sun?” Candace asks.
I think she’s kidding, so I don’t answer.
“I’m serious, Peter. Bring him up.”
She’s not kidding. “Isn’t that a little morbid?” I ask.
“No more morbid than the way you’ve been acting lately,” she says. “Peter, have you really said good-bye to that man?”
How can you say good-bye to a man to whom you barely said hello?
“I had trouble sleeping for years after Ebony’s daddy died. You hear me? I said years, Peter. It wasn’t until I took down that Christmas tree that I could finally get a decent night’s sleep.”
“I don’t think I’m ready.”
Candace squints. “You want to start sleeping again?”
“Of course, but—”
“Then let the man go.”
I look at Ebony. “What should I do?”
“Let’s…let’s let him get off the boat, Peter,” Ebony says. “It’s the perfect day for it, isn’t it?”
It is a beautiful day, but I’m not ready for this. “I’d rather not today.”
“When then?” Candace asks. “There’s no time like the present, I say, to keep us from living in the past. Time to move on and get on with it. Even your daddy would agree with me.”
I look up at the seagulls shadowing us and think of the albatross the Ancient Mariner wore. Are the Captain’s remains my albatross? I look at Ebony. “What do you think?”
“It’s your decision, Peter, but we all feel this has to be done,” Ebony says.
I look at Destiny, who has tears streaming from her eyes. She wipes at them with her free hand, never taking her eyes off the horizon. “Today is a good day, Daddy. We’ve taken him out for one last sail. He’s been waiting a long time for this.”
I look around at the soft swells, the puffy clouds, and the slanting sunlight. It’ll get us there. Is this the place, Captain? Are we finally there? I choke down a sob and go below. I trace his name on the nameplate before using a screwdriver to remove the wooden box from its holder. It’s heavy, heavier than it ought to be. I turn to look up the galley stairs, hesitating. “I know this is what you wanted to happen,” I whisper. “I’m just sorry it took so long.”
Then I kiss the top of the urn, and the sob escapes. “I should have kissed you more.”
“Need any help, Daddy?” Destiny calls.
I’ve had all the help I’ve ever needed, and it’s mainly in this box in my hands and up on deck. “No!” I call up. “Be up in a minute!”
I walk to the Captain’s berth and close the door. I set the box in his chair and stand back. “Captain, Ebony and I are getting married this spring, and if you were still here, you’d be my best man. You’ve always been my best man.” I can’t stop the tears. “I didn’t understand you, Captain, and that was the problem. I couldn’t figure out what made you tick, you know? I was just a kid.” I wipe my eyes on my sleeve. “But I know now that you tried, and I also know that I’m a lot more like you than I’m willing to admit, and I just wanted to…I just wanted to thank you, Captain. Thank you for being my father.”
I pick up the urn and leave the Captain’s berth, trudging up the galley stairs into the sunlight. When Destiny looks at me, she bursts into tears, and I start all over again.
“Should I…should we anchor first?” Destiny asks after she recovers.
I find my voice. “Are you kidding? We have to be doing eighteen, maybe twenty knots. The Captain always loved to race.”
She nods and smiles. “Except we never won any races.”
I exhale deeply. “I think we won every time.”
I walk to the stern and see the water shooting away from us, our wake fierce on both sides. Time to rest, time to rest, I pray in my mind, God give the Captain time to rest. I hear the Navy Hymn from the Captain’s funeral, sung by so many of his shipmates, I feel the wind firm on my back, I taste the salt air, and I see infinity all around me. I unlatch the top of the box and see the dust of my father. You do look like shells, Captain, silver and gray shells. I tip the urn away from me and watch swirls of dust leaping toward Long Island Sound, watch them dance in the air with the seagulls, watch them floating down to the surface of the waves. Rolling you on, rolling you on…home.
“Good-bye, Captain.” I turn into the wind. No. That’s not a proper good-bye for him. I turn back toward the setting sun. “Good-bye…Dad.”
And later, as Destiny guides the Argo home hugging the shoreline, I hug Ebony to me.
And later that night, I sleep like a baby, dreaming of the sea.
23
The following Monday is Veteran’s Day, and because of September 11, it takes on a whole new meaning for us. Since we have nowhere to lay flowers for my father, we go to West Shore Beach instead to throw bread to the seagulls. There’s something so peaceful about it, so simple, that it makes me wonder if the Captain has made it to the Atlantic Ocean yet. He may get to go back to all those places he visited back in the forties.
The next day, though, life comes crashing back as a plane goes down in Rockaway Beach, Queens. “Turn on the TV,” Candace calls to say. “They got another one.”
No wonder I don’t watch TV anymore, I think, as I view the wreckage of a plane, this one in a residential neighborhood not too different from the one I grew up in. Destiny drifts in from the kitchen, and Ebony slips down the stairs, joining me at the couch. No one speaks. Was it a missile? Was it another suicide flight? What possible target is in Queens? Were they aiming for the Statue of Liberty? What’s going on?
“Two hundred and sixty were on board,” the reporter says, fire and rescue crews flying by him, “including five infants held by their parents.”
I feel two sets of hands holding mine.
“We have learned that the pilot sent no distress call, and there are no confirmed terrorist threats, but the FBI has yet to rule anything out at this time.”
Over the next twenty-four hours, we stumble around in a fog. Neither Ebony nor I work on our novel. Destiny stays off the phone. We don’t go out, and we barely eat. Ebony calls Candace, but they really don’t say much to each other. No one seems to be sleeping except me, which is a switch, but the dreams I have—of fire, smoke, and panic—keep me from sleeping the whole night through.
When they examine the voice recorder from the plane and release the news that the plane went down due to wake turbulence, I feel guilty about breathing a sigh of relief that it wasn’t “another” plane. Two hundred and sixty-five souls just left us because of an accident, and I don’t feel the shock or the horror that I felt on September 11. Is this how I’m going to gauge every disaster from here on? I hope not, but now I know how the generation before me felt when JFK was assassinated.
To take our minds off the news from Queens, Destiny, Ebony, and I plan our wedding at Bethel.
“No frills,” Ebony says. “I’m too old for frills.”
“I agree,” I say. “We’ll just keep it simple.”
Destiny doesn’t agree. “You two are no fun.”
“Well, what do you have in mind?” Ebony asks.
“Okay,” Destiny begins, waving her hands, “we’ll dress Mama in a kente cloth dashiki.”
Ebony laughs. “A dashiki?”
“Yes, a dashiki, and you’ll have a huge African headdress on and be barefoot.”
“Oh, Lord, I’ll need a pedicure,” Ebony laughs.
“What’s so funny, Mama?”
“Nothing. Go on.”
“Daddy will wear a pure white linen suit with a tie that matches your dress.”
“Will I be barefoot?” I can’t resist asking.
“Oh, no, Daddy. I’ve seen your feet.” She makes a face. “You’ll have to wear white bucks or something.”
> “With a little kente Swoosh!” Ebony shouts.
Destiny folds her arms. “Mama, I’ve been planning your wedding ever since I was a little girl, so hear me out, okay?”
“Okay,” Ebony says. “As long as there are no elephants. Or giraffes. Bethel isn’t big enough for elephants and giraffes. Or lions. No, they’d tear up the carpet.”
Destiny turns from Ebony to me. “Mama just doesn’t understand, but I know you do. We think alike.”
I doubt it. “So, will there be African drummers?”
Destiny smiles. “Yes! At least fifty, and instead of that crusty old wedding song, they’ll jam to some ancient African rhythms that no one’s heard for centuries. And it won’t be a procession, it’ll be a dance line, like on that old show you two used to watch, what was it called?”
“Soul Train?” Now I’m laughing. “Destiny, please. Remember your grandma and Aunt Wee Wee would have to go dancing down that aisle, too.”
Destiny frowns. “Oh yeah. But Aunt Wee Wee can dance. I’ve seen her. Just not very fast. Hmm. We’ll just have to have some fine African studs carry them! Daddy, you’re a genius.”
Ebony shakes her head. “Look, if you want all that for your wedding, your daddy and I will spring for it, just not in Huntington, okay? Or on Long Island, for that matter. I don’t want folks anywhere talking forever about ‘that African wedding.’ Now, let’s get down to planning the real wedding.”
While Destiny pouts, I pull out that folded, creased, smudged copy of “Original Love,” the poem Ebony wrote me almost twenty years ago. I hand it to Ebony. “Maybe we could use this somewhere in the ceremony.”
She unfolds it with Destiny looking over her shoulder. “You saved it?”
“Yes. I’d even like to start the book with it, if you don’t mind. I think it’s especially fitting.”
She mouths the first stanza. “I can’t believe you kept it all these years.”
“It was something worth holding on to.” It was the only thing worth holding on to at the time. “Maybe you could read it to me sometime during the service.”
Ebony smiles. “Or you could read it to me.”
“Or I could read it to the both of you,” Destiny says. “You know, while you’re standing up there waiting for the kiss part.”
I look at Ebony, and Ebony says, “Okay. Let’s hear you read it.”
Destiny clears her throat and reads: “‘My soul loves you endlessly…my whole life even before I knew you, you were what I wrote and hoped, things my day and night dreams were made of, original love.’” She looks up. “What do you think?”
I get a chill. It’s almost as if Ebony wrote that for our destiny and for our Destiny as well. “I like it. It sounds right.”
“I agree,” Ebony says. “It’s a wonderful idea.”
“Ooh,” Destiny says, “I really like this part: ‘I wrote your name up there…in clouds.’ I used to do that, Daddy. Whenever I was lying on the deck of the boat, I would look for your name in the clouds. Even saw a P once.” She looks back at the poem. “Where was I? Oh, ‘…said it to myself out loud, made you more real to me, again and again and again, I craved you way back then.’” She blinks. “Look at my arms. I’ve got chill bumps.”
Ebony rubs her own arms. “Me, too.”
“Mama, maybe you should have been a writer, too.”
My thoughts exactly, and in a very short while, she’s going to know what I’ve decided.
“Speaking of that,” Ebony says, turning to me, “how’s our Desiree novel coming?”
I shake my head. I’ve been thinking about this for weeks, and it’s about time I let her know. “I haven’t added a word to that book since I got here.”
“What? What have you been doing then, Peter?”
I bite my lip. “Sneaking peeks at what you’ve written.”
Ebony’s eyes pop.
“And I’ve come to the conclusion that our book should be written by you, Ebony. I’ve wanted Desiree to fade away ever since I got here, and with your writing, you’ve given me the perfect opportunity. It’s time for Desiree to retire.”
“Why?” Destiny asks. “Isn’t she what your editor is expecting?”
“And that’s what you have a contract for, right?” Ebony adds.
“True, but I think he’ll understand that the she he really wants is you.”
Ebony drums her fingers on the table. “I don’t know, Peter, I mean, that’s your book.”
I shake my head and take her hands. “No, Ebony. It’s always been your book, right from the very beginning. You inspired it. I’ve just been writing an extended outline based on that inspiration.” I smile. “Besides, with your newfound fame and glory, it will sell, and it will sell well.”
“But, what about—”
I squeeze her hands. “Henry is a practical man, and the publishing industry isn’t exactly cooking right now. He’ll see that Promises to Keep has a much better shot of being successful with your picture on the back flap.”
“But you wrote it! I’m just following along adding things here and there.”
“And I’ll continue to write it, as long as you continue to rewrite it with that strong, pure, crystal-clear voice of yours. Some voices just tell stories better. I hope you understand that.”
“I don’t know whether to be flattered or sad.”
I smile and pull her to me, settling her on my lap. “Be flattered.” I look at Destiny watching us intently. “Destiny, I fell in love with your mama the first moment I ever saw her, and I fell in love with her all over again when I read what she wrote about the first moment I ever saw her.” I kiss Ebony on the lips. “And readers are going to fall in love with your voice from the very first sentence, which I hope will be this poem.”
“I don’t know what to say.” She kisses me tenderly. “You really want it to be this way?”
“It feels right.” I squeeze her thigh, and I whisper, “And so does this.”
“Puh-lease make me a little sister,” Destiny pleads. “I promise I’ll be available to babysit.”
I look at Ebony. “She heard?”
“Evidently.”
Apparently Destiny doesn’t have my inability to hear. “Do we really want another one like her?”
“Do you?”
“Maybe a little boy?”
“I’d settle for a brother,” Destiny says. “As long as I get to dress him, it’s fine by me.”
In early December, Ebony and I have finished a rough draft of Promises to Keep. After a night of trying to make us a son—three times, as a matter of fact—Ebony had convinced me to keep my narrative in the novel. “It has to be written by both of us, Peter,” she had said. “Our story should be written by us.”
So, rough draft in hand, we have a group editing session at Candace’s house with four very willing readers. They sit on the couch in the living room beginning with Gladys and ending with Candace in her wheelchair, Aunt Wee Wee with a magnifying glass and Destiny in between.
Candace, then, has the “last word.” Ebony hovers over her mama, making marks with a red pen, while I sift through what four pairs of eyes have sifted through for mistakes and make corrections to the file on my laptop. Everything is swimming along fine for the first hour or so until Gladys slows down and is the only one reading.
“C’mon, Gladys,” Candace says, “don’t keep us waiting.”
Gladys looks at Ebony. “‘Whoa’ is all I can say.” She hands the page to Aunt Wee Wee.
I look at the last corrected copy to find out what’s causing the holdup. I smile. It’s my first visit to Ebony’s room.
Aunt Wee Wee giggles and scribbles something on the page before handing it to Destiny. “I just knew that’s what happened when it got so quiet.”
“When what just happened?” Candace asks.
“You’ll see,” Aunt Wee Wee says as she snatches the next page from Gladys.
Destiny’s eyes pop, and she looks at Ebony. “For real, Mama?”
&nbs
p; Ebony nods. “For real.”
Destiny hands the page to Candace. “Gross.”
This is what I’m worried about. Ebony and I decided that if Candace has any problem with any part of the novel, we’d either edit it to death or delete it entirely.
“Hmm,” Candace says. She wrinkles up her lips. “Works for me.”
“Really?” Gladys says. “It does?”
“Hell,” Candace says, “it’s only natural.”
Ebony hands the page to me, and I see nothing but a tiny comment from Aunt Wee Wee: “I was never asleep, Pete, and don’t you ever forget it.”
The reading slows down again when we get to the scene under the deck, and after the scene ends, I feel all eyes on me.
“You sure you want that in there, Daddy?” Destiny asks.
“I’m sure.”
Candace nods. “You were a tough kid, Peter.”
“Thank you.”
We intentionally left out the part in the Cave, mainly to spare Candace the expected horror of seeing her daughter’s “first time” in print, so the reading flies along until Gladys gets to my description of Candace as “Foxy Brown.” Gladys spends a solid five minutes adding to Candace’s description, even running her comments on to the back of the page. Aunt Wee Wee asks for more paper, and by the time Destiny’s through, Candace has four pages to read while we try to read her.
At first, Candace blinks. Then she smiles. Eventually, she laughs and nods her head. “You have me down pat, Peter,” she says.
“But you didn’t read what we wrote!” Gladys yells.
“You ain’t the ones writing the book, so why do I have to read what I know are lies? Peter wrote the truth. I am Foxy Brown.”
“Oh, I think he left out an awful lot,” Destiny says.
“He wrote the truth,” Candace says. “And I should know. I’m practically his mama. Now, let’s get on with it.”
When the novel gets to prom night, the room gets silent again, and the pages pass into my hands untouched. After a break for some finger sandwiches—to which I add liberal sprinkles of salt and pepper—our readers begin the part of the novel where Ebony and I part ways. They first read about me in college, sending letters and making phone calls. Then they switch back to Ebony down in Virginia having Destiny.