by fallensea
The statement wasn’t directed at Dermott, but he took it that way. When I reached for another mozzarella stick, eating away my dissatisfaction, he took the plate from me and slammed it into the sink, shattering it into small pieces. “I need to know you’re serious about us,” he roared. “When you leave on these travels of yours, I don’t want to wake up each morning wondering if you’re coming back. I want a future together. I want a family.”
I looked at the shattered plate in the sink. “You’re not coming with me?”
“Not if you’re being stupid.”
I wasn’t being stupid. I was being me. “And what if I don’t want a family? What if I refuse?” I had never actually said that to him before. I had expressed uncertainty about a family, but never refusal.
It disturbed Dermott. He leaned against the counter and ran his hands through his hair. “I don’t know,” he said, filled with misery. “Then maybe it’s not meant to be.”
“Me or the family?”
I expected him to say the family, but he didn’t.
“You.”
How had we come to this so quickly? There was only one explanation—Dermott had doubted me for some time. He’d doubted us. I’d given him plenty of reason to, but he’d promised to stick by me. He’d convinced me that we’d be okay. “You said losing me would be an unforgivable mistake,” I reminded him.
When he said nothing in return, I threw on my black hoodie and ran out into the rain. I ran away from the river and its allurement, refusing to stop until I reached the road. There were no buses this far out on the bayou, so I hitched a ride to the nearest bus station with an elderly woman in her Cadillac.
When I got home, I collapsed on the bed, exhausted by my emotions. Dermott wouldn’t follow, not with the German Shepard and the Rottweiler to look after. I was glad. I needed space to think, but thinking required an energy I didn’t have, so I drifted in and out of sleep, confused about what I wanted.
At work the next day, I watched the kids at the shelter play, trying to kindle my maternal instincts, but there was nothing. I knew women could be good moms and rock the world, but that wasn’t the issue. I wasn’t sure I wanted to be a mom. I didn’t want to raise kids. I wanted to do my own thing. I thought Dermott understood that, but I was starting to wonder if all the times he told me we’d make it work, what he really meant was that I would change my mind.
About a week after our fight, I returned home from work to find Dermott had snuck in and packed a few of his things. On the fridge was a note:
I don’t know what’s happening, but I do know I’m willing to wait for you to decide, one way or another.
***
“April showers bring May flowers,” Laney sang cheerfully, setting a wildflower on my desk in my office, which was buried deep within the halls of the shelter.
“It’s neither April nor May,” I reminded her grimly, but I took the flower and placed it in the vase with the other wildflowers she’d collected. The latest were bluets, the petals wet with raindrops that fell onto the wood of my desk, the tears I would not cry in my wreckage.
Laney wiped the water away with the hem of her scrubs. “You know, when they made you part of the daytime staff, I thought you’d perk up a bit, get some sunshine into those freckles of yours, but you’re still the depressed vampire girl.”
“I’m kinda busy,” I said, in no mood for conversation. “Can we talk later?”
She didn’t budge. “Is it the rain? Has it got you down? Because you know it does this every year.”
“It’s not the rain,” I said, defeated. “I’ve got the hurts. Laney, do you think it’s possible to be happy and not know it?”
“Probably. All this gloom that is melting my petals, is it about Dermott?”
“He wants to start a family.”
“You mean a handsome fella who loves you dearly and is deeply devoted to you wants to make little young’uns?” she teased, pretending to be appalled.
“That’s not fair,” I said to her. “Don’t mock me because what makes me happy is different than what makes you happy. What I’m feeling is real.”
“You’re right,” Laney said apologetically. “I’m sorry. Tell me about it.”
I didn’t usually share myself so openly, but I trusted Laney, the way I trusted the elderly, so I told her about my plans to travel, even if it meant to places not so welcoming, and I told her what Dermott had said during our fight. By the time I was finished, I’d flicked my hood over my dark blonde waves and slumped into my seat, guarding off the torment of my confusion.
Laney sighed. “There’s no easy answer here. I’m not going to tell you there is. Either you both get what you want—Dermott gets his kids, you get your travels—or you move on. Neither of you wants to live in resentment, but that’s what’ll happen if you carry on the way you are.”
It made me uneasy. “I don’t think I could ever resent Dermott. It’s him who would resent me, for not giving him what he wants. I think he already does.”
She patted the hood over my head. “Well, you have been making him wait an awful long time to get hitched. So far, the man has had the patience of a saint. How many years has it been since he proposed to you during your community service?”
I refused to answer that.
“I don’t think it’s an issue of you following your dreams,” she continued. “I know he said you were being stupid for wanting to travel, but I think that was the Papa Bear in him talking. Really, it’s about whether or not you’re willing to give him a family. That’s what he’s worried about. It’s time to decide once and for all if you are.”
“But if I give him a family, I can’t travel.”
“Not necessarily, but let me put it this way—do you have to travel? I mean, everything you told me you want to do, all those noble causes, they can be done from here. Isn’t that the point? Even dainty li’l me, sitting in my scrubs, can do something. I can donate to women running for office in nations where women are considered second-class citizens. I can spread awareness of injustices on my social media. I can put pressure on government, corporations, and anyone in power to create and enforce policies that work towards the advancement of women. I can boycott goods from countries where women have no rights. I can send books to educational programs for women abroad. There’s a lot I can do from here, and so can you. You don’t have to travel to make change. You can make change wearing your slippers and sipping your champagne. You can make change with a crib full of babies screaming at you. You can make change tying a hog and doing the Boot Scootin’ Boogie.”
Laney was spot-on, but she missed one significant point. “I want to travel,” I told her.
“Then decide. Do you want to travel without commitment, or do you want to travel with Dermott and your family waiting for you at home?”
It took me several days to figure it out, days clouded with indecision. For most of those days, I sat on the floor of my studio with my back to my bed and my head in my knees. I didn’t want to be a mom. I’d be lying if I said I did, but I did want Dermott. I loved him. It was not the type of love that would die away, regardless of whether we stayed together or not. He was my forever person. Life without travel was solemn, but life without Dermott was not a life I could endure.
“I can give him a kid or two and still follow my dreams,” I babbled into my knees. “We’ll make it work. I guess that’s what he meant all along.”
***
I navigated around the giant metal containers in the freight yard like a stone cast into a wasteland, lost and overwhelmed. The containers rested on a highway of rail lines like corroded cattle. I could not see beyond the next container, and so I wandered, following the shouts of workmen from an unknown distance until I came upon Dermott leaning somberly against his crane, his orange helmet his only defense against the pouring rain.
I had no defense. Hiding behind a container, spying on the man who made love feasible, I let the rain soak me. It was good to see him. I missed his warmth and
his humor. I missed everything about him. I could watch him all day from my hiding place and be content. Dermott was my happiness. Part of it, at least. It’d taken me a long time to accept it—that I was dependent on another as brutally as I was dependent on him.
When he moved to step back into his crane, his lonely break over, I came forward. “Dermott!” I called through the rain.
He heard me and jogged over to the container. “Ronnie? What are you doing here?”
“I snuck in,” I admitted.
“You little criminal.” Smiling, he removed his helmet and put it over my head.
It was not a smile I could return, not with the distance between us. “You said you wanted me to decide,” I told him. “I’ve decided.”
He stepped back, apprehensive. “And what did you decide?”
“That life has no meaning, no purpose, without you. I’ll give you the family you want. We’ll make it work.”
Dermott replied with a kiss so ardent, I nearly slipped in the mud beneath his weight. Then he took my hand and got down on his knees, uncaring about the rain or the mud, uncaring about anything other than me.
“Ronnie, if you need to travel so you can find fulfillment, I won’t stop you. Hell, I’ll even go with you, so I can protect you. But I do ask one thing.”
“Anything,” I said.
“Be my wifey. When I’m talking about all the great things you’re doing for the world, I want to refer to you as my wife.”
“Yes,” I assented, joyful. “I’ll be your wifey.”
Dermott stood and wrapped his arms tightly around me. His fear over our brief separation was exposed in his embrace. My devotion to him rested within that fear. His love for me was torrential, and I soaked it in. I allowed it to break me.
***
Heaven’s Lair
It was my turn to tell my story, to bargain all that I revered in hope of feeling Dermott’s touch once more. I would be alive, and he would be my husband. We would marry in the meadow, under a harvest moon, surrounded by candy-colored lanterns and fairy lights. Aileen and Emer would be my sisters. Ireland would be my second home. We would make tomorrow work.
Standing in the cove, with the specks of light floating around me like tiny stars and the coral seashells ablaze in the sand, I saw my life, and I was even more convinced Dermott was my happiness, be it in heaven or hell.
Be it in heaven or hell, but not on the earth.
The Trickster spun me around, reading my thoughts once more. “Silence doesn’t win wars,” he prompted. “Speak. Win back your love. Win back your life.”
“I can’t,” I said, crushed with anguish. “Dermott is worth fighting for, but he’s not the only thing worth fighting for. Dermott is my life. He’s everything to me. I never thought a love like ours was possible, not for me. I will love him forever, and I will watch over him, but I can’t go back. I won’t tell my story.”
“Love is eternal,” Haley said, agreeing with me, in what I had not yet said. “It doesn’t have to be won. It always exists. Your love for Dermott is eternal. And so is my love for Bronco.” She turned to Storme. “And your love for your daughter. Love is eternal, and so are we. People want to be immortal. They don't realize we already are.”
With sapphire tears spilling down her cheeks, Storme nodded in a sad surrender. Hayley was equally devastated, but she held her head high, ready to confront our fate with a bravery I could not emulate.
Busana would go back. She had no choice in her death. I had chosen to get on the motorcycle. It was my decision. And Storme had chosen to wed abroad. Hayley... She didn’t really have a choice either, but her death was natural, an act of God. There was nothing natural or godly about the way Busana had died.
I wanted to be covetous. I wanted to plead for my place next to Dermott. Our story was incomplete, our love unfinished. But if I used my love for Dermott to try to persuade Busana out of her right to live, I would be a hypocrite, and I would be cruel. Dermott would not allow it, if he stood next to me. I honored my love for him by honoring Busana. I honored myself by honoring Busana.
I went to the redhead and brushed the anger from her eyes with the sleeve of my hoodie. “Are you ready?”
Busana clenched the long sleeves of her dress, conflicted, either because she did not understand that we had chosen her, or because she was scared that her tragedy would repeat itself.
Hayley was too. “How can she stop the bastards from hurting her again?”
“She will not remember the timeline of what has happened before, but the scars of what happened will carry down,” the Trickster heralded. “She will be taken again, but when she is returned home, she will have the instinct to refuse, no matter what her father says. When she refuses, her family will disown her. She will be lonely, and she will find it difficult to marry, but she’ll survive. And one day, she’ll find her peace.”
“But will she be happy?” Storme asked.
“That’s up to her, but she will be free.”
Storme accepted this. “Then let it be done.”
With great remorse, Busana accepted the gift we offered her. She went to Storme and touched the scar on her cheek with a childlike adoration. To Hayley, she placed a hand on her heart. And to me, in her harsh Kyrgyz language that translated like music, she whispered in my ear, “I will not forget you, ghost-angel.”
The Trickster directed Busana to the middle of the collapsed stone, and he waved his hand in a crescent around her. The wedding dress that had been forced upon her disappeared, and she wore skinny jeans and an oversized orange sweater, rusted, like the fields of the mountains.
“God bless,” Hayley bid her. “We’ll watch over you.”
“We’ll protect you,” I added.
“You’ll never be alone,” Storme promised, wiping away her tears.
And then Busana was gone, returned to a time that existed beyond our own and a place we could no longer reach.
It frightened me to watch her go. Her absence made my death irrefutable. The last of the sleeping brides would not follow her. We were fated for the sea.
Hayley led us to the waves, a peace I did not share shattering her suspicions. I imagined she was summoned by her mother, a ghost-angel only she could see. When she entered the water, a trail of white light followed her, and then she disappeared.
Storme did not move as fast. When her feet met the sea, she stood still, embracing the water with a quiet smile. I wished I could hear her thoughts, to be reassured by them, but then she too was gone, and it was only the Trickster and me.
I hesitated in the beige sands. “I’m afraid,” I admitted to the Trickster. “I’m afraid the beauty of this cove is a ploy, that what lies beyond is lonely and abstract, a chaos that steals who I am.” It was a dark thought, but I could not deny it.
When I turned to seek the Trickster’s reply, he no longer stood behind me, not in the way I knew him. He was war-torn, his dreadlocks replaced by a shaved head, his tunic a disheveled army uniform reminiscent of the camouflage of the sixties. Dark splatters of either dirt or blood were faded into the black of his skin.
“I served in Vietnam,” he explained, drained of his mirth. “I was not a kind man. I was a murderer and a thief. No one instructed me to be that way. I was born coldblooded. Most veterans—they mourn those they kill almost as much as the brethren they leave behind. I never did, not until I died.”
I understood. “Passage,” I murmured. “This is your penitence. You really are helping us.”
“I’m trying to.”
“But why the veneer? Why the spectacle?”
He looked as if a weight dragged him down. I worried the sand would swallow him whole. “One is better than none, but it is a twisted charity. I see you brides, I see how beautiful you are, and I watch you die, over and over again. I can’t stop it. I don’t want to mislead you into believing I can.”
“What is it like?” I asked, looking across the smoky blue waters of the sea once more.
“It is
glorious,” he told. “There is pain, being separated from those you love is always painful, but there is peace and knowledge. You will continue to miss your beloved. You will be drawn to him, but you will not cry. You will wait.”
Death was a frightening thing. It confronted us like a boarded window, hiding the truth of what it was. Perhaps it had to. Perhaps if we were to see beyond the boards, we would disregard everything sacred in our life, either out of anticipation or out of worry of what was to come. As we aged, we would see only the window out, and never the window in.
I evoked what Bronco had said to Hayley their night in the junkyard, and I allowed it to comfort me. The struggle of my life had been my search for fulfillment, but I’d been following a road that had no end. Changes still needed to be made in the world, the lives of innocents, like Busana, had to be fought for. It was our duty, and it was our purpose, but there was more to us. It did not matter how long we spent on the earth, if we were young or old when we died. It did not matter if we danced or if we drowned, if we joined the masses or if we hid away. It did not matter if we revered beauty or were repulsed by it. It was enough that we existed, the same as the stars in the colorless sky.
With this knowledge, I cloaked my mind with memories of Dermott, and I stepped into the water.
Epilogue
Seagulls
Dermott
There was no sovereignty when a person loved someone as much as I loved Ronnie.
Out of breath from the climb, I secured my footing onto the ledge of a mountain, and I pulled myself up to rest. From my rucksack, I took out my water bottle and drenched myself with it. The heat on the mountain was strong, increasing with the altitude. I would stay here for the remainder of the day, under the shade from the rocks above, waiting for the early light of the morning when it was cool enough to climb again.