Coral

by Sara Ella

  Coral stepped out into the sun and found a shady spot on a bench outside the library. When she turned her phone off silent mode, relief expanded her lungs. The text from Merrick nearly made her drop her phone.

  I’m sorry. Can you meet me at Grim’s? I found something.

  Routing the address with her map app, she saw the beach house where Merrick had been staying wasn’t far. She could walk the few miles easy. She could even follow the shoreline there.

  No looking back. Not this time.

  A tower of steps met Coral at the beach below the house. She stared up at the white wood, rolled her shoulders, and unlatched the gate to the stairs. When she reached the door, she focused on all she wanted to say, then knocked, one, two, three times.

  No one answered.

  She checked her phone again. No new texts from Merrick. She looked at the time from the original text. Three hours old? Sent shortly after he left her and now it was after noon. She hadn’t texted him back. Had her idea to surprise him been foolish?

  At first glance, the house seemed empty. Dark. She peered in through the window with her hands cupped around her eyes. Knocked again.

  Nothing.

  A sour feeling in her gut churned. It’s nothing. I’m sure he’s fine.

  Except Merrick wasn’t fine. He was a complete mess. Her heart won over reason and any sense of propriety. She turned the knob and opened the unlocked door.

  She cleared her throat. “Hello? Merrick?”

  Nothing.

  Something stirred upstairs. Footsteps padded across the floor. Had Merrick heard her?

  The sound of a door clicking closed followed by the squeal of pipes sounded. She moved deeper into the house and waited for Merrick to come down.

  Eventually, the water turned off. Any minute Merrick would come downstairs, say something to make her melt, and they would make up. He’d explain and she’d listen as he had listened to her so many times before. She would be for him what he had been for her. She wouldn’t abandon him the moment he needed her most.

  No one came.

  She bit her lower lip and shot him a text. What’s taking so long?

  He responded with a question mark.

  I’m downstairs at the house. Are you coming down?

  It took a minute before he replied. I’m not there. Explain soon. Amaya is home. Check on her for me?

  Despite how awkward it felt to intrude farther into a stranger’s house, Maya wasn’t supposed to be left alone. Coral was surprised Merrick had left her here by herself at all.

  She didn’t want to startle the girl, but she also wanted to make sure she was okay. Coral stepped lightly up the stairs and found herself in a long hallway. Steam seeped under the only closed door. When she neared, she knocked with a single knuckle.

  “Amaya? I’m Coral, your brother’s friend.” No answer. She heard the water from the faucet drip, drip, drip into what sounded like a filled tub. “Maya?”

  She stayed there for a full minute. Waiting. Listening. Coral tried the door handle. “Maya?” Nothing. “Amaya.” Silence. “Amaya, this isn’t funny. Come on.” An emptiness filled the air, so thick Coral could drown in it. “Answer me.”

  For once, the presence of nothing was far from welcome.

  Shoulder braced for impact, Coral shoved her entire body against the door. It only took two tries to get the old thing to open. Steam filled the room. A discarded towel lay in her path between door and tub. The half-closed shower curtain left a scarce opening where Coral could see a hand, just a hand, hanging over the tub’s edge.

  “Amaya?”

  She didn’t move.

  Coral tore the curtain aside. All feeling drained from her face. She’d been here before.

  She was running.

  She was dying.

  She was still here.

  Amaya lay slumped in the tub. Her hair, soaked and matted, covered her face.

  Two words formed on Coral’s dry lips. She forced them out, if only to expel them from her being. “Red. Tide.”

  Several things happened next. Too slow and too fast and completely blurred together.

  Coral dragged Maya from the bloody water, wrapped her wrists in towels. Her clothes stuck to her in soaked bunches of denim and cotton.

  “Stay with me, Maya. Stay with me.” Coral repeated the same phrases over and over and over again. As if they held some magic spell that could bring a person back from where Red Tide had taken them.

  Coral shook and fumbled. Frantic. Her phone rested on the counter downstairs. She looked up at the sink. A phone that had to be Amaya’s sat on the edge. She was able to dial 911 without a password. The operator dispatched an ambulance, then kept Coral on the line.

  Time slowed. She was sure she’d waited a year before they arrived.

  Her arms burned and blood soaked her clothes. She put so much pressure on Amaya’s wrists, Coral believed she might send them both straight through the floor.

  Then the paramedics took over. Pandemonium. Everywhere. When Coral found herself in a sterile-smelling waiting room with a hospital gown draped over her to cover her bloodied clothes, she released a sobbing breath.

  Her hand shook as she hit Call. Merrick’s voice mail. Why didn’t he pick up?

  Coral didn’t leave a message. How could she tell him over a recording that his sister had tried to commit suicide? Again?

  He’d blame himself for leaving her alone.

  Picturing his agony left Coral hollow and broken.

  So she waited.

  And waited.

  And waited.

  Sometimes the waiting was more unbearable than anything that came before.

  Forty-One

  Brooke

  After

  I tuck my phone away and study Hope’s mom.

  Her head hangs and she dabs at her eyes with a tissue. Every now and then, her shoulders shake. About midway through the service, she stands and hurries out the back.

  Her trails of mascara stay with me as my own tears continue to fall. I haven’t cried in over a year. Now I can’t seem to stop.

  The pastor steps down from the podium and an odd couple takes the stage. A tall, gangly guy wearing an oversize beanie and a loose tie over his plain T-shirt stands beside a girl who could pass for a supermodel.

  Nikki?

  She’s the same as the day we met, except now she’s dressed in all black aside from the white silk rose pinned to her ebony hair. Small world doesn’t begin to cover this one.

  “She was a sister to me,” Nikki says.

  I’m impressed by how she refrains from emotion the entire way through. Her flawless speech hits each and every heartstring, snapping them in two.

  Yes, she was my sister.

  Yes, she was wise beyond her years.

  Yes, we lost her too soon.

  But lost seems the wrong word choice. It implies Hope has been misplaced. That she can’t be found. But she’s here, everywhere. She’s in the rafters and in the walls. She’s in the trees and the wind. In the shaking shoulders of her mother and the impossible stillness of her father. She’s in Nikki’s controlled words and in my twisting, turning heart.

  The guy I assume is Nikki’s boyfriend squeezes her shoulders. They exit the stage together, and the pastor leaves the mic open.

  “If anyone would like to say a few words, now is the time.”

  Anxiety grips me as my emotions war. Fear of getting up in front of a room full of strangers. Knowing I’ll inevitably say the wrong thing or do the wrong thing or act totally awkward or cry hysterically and run from the room.

  But I’ll never get this chance again.

  And if I don’t stand now, I know I’ll regret it.

  Jake and Mary sit behind me. I glance backward and Mary offers silent encouragement. She lifts her arm and flashes her tattoo, reminding me all I have to do is breathe.

  Jake leans forward and squeezes my shoulder.

  I rise and make my way to the line around the edge that’s already
forming. A girl gets up and starts spewing off all sorts of things about how Hope was her best friend and this is such a tragedy and she’ll be missed by so many.

  I want to punch this girl for her plastic words and synthetic tears. My gut says she was one of the people who contributed to Hope’s depression. The girl doesn’t even call her Hope but refers to her as classmate or BFF. Hope would have hated that. I straighten because it’s in a single syllable I see I knew her better.

  She let me into her world and I’ll never forget it.

  When it’s my turn, I fan my fingers over my heart, attempting to quiet my shuddering nerves. I try to find Jake at the back of the room, but there are too many faces and they’re all staring at me. My mouth gets too close to the mic and I trip over the cord and why on earth didn’t I write down what I wanted to say?

  “Hi,” I start. Stammer. I feel sick and I forget my line.

  Hope. What would Hope do?

  “You know exactly what I would do,” a memory whispers in my ear.

  Hope hated when things grew too serious. Making light was her defense, and a good one too. Not always fitting, but now?

  Now is precisely the right time to do a very Hope thing.

  I clear my throat and do what I dread. Sing. While writing has become my comfort, my own story, my voice has so much more to give. There are more stories than mine. This is Hope’s story. So I tell it the way she would have wanted it told.

  I find an empty spot in a pew a few rows back and imagine Hope sitting there. She’d wear all the colors, of course, no black or drab for her. I see those colors as they dance and take flight, carrying Hope with them. I keep singing though everyone is staring. I sing because she was my friend and I’ve failed her and hers was a life that could have been saved.

  I missed my chance.

  I lost a friend.

  The sudden playing of an instrument accompanies me, throwing me off for a second. But I find my place and keep going. I don’t stop until I’ve given every last note. She deserved as much. She deserved everything.

  When the song ends, the music fades and I find my words again. “Hope,” I say, imagining her sitting in front of me, “you are not nothing. And neither am I.”

  A sob catches in my throat and my gaze falls on the front row. On her dad. He’s stoic, hard to read. But I think I detect a hint of gratitude in his shining eyes.

  My gaze shifts and, for the first time, I see the boy sitting next to him. A harmonica rests in his lap and sadness shades his dark eyes.

  I gasp and nearly drop the mic.

  How did I miss it? Why didn’t I see?

  “Small world?” I hear Hope ask.

  You have no idea.

  Forty-Two

  Merrick

  The inn was exactly as he remembered. Or hadn’t remembered.

  Now the memory came to life. A black-and-white film restored with color.

  His father had brought them here. Merrick could see it clearly now.

  Cars packed the modest parking lot. Merrick headed inside where he found a vacant registration desk. A hostess stood outside a double door arch that led into the restaurant. She greeted him and asked, “Party of one?”

  “Sure,” he said, too nervous to say anything else. He glanced left and right. He didn’t know what he was looking for yet. But something told him he was about to find out.

  “This way.” The hostess led him to a table at the back of a busy room of families, couples, and groups of women chatting away.

  Merrick sat and the hostess placed the menu on the table. “Can I get you a drink?” She removed a coaster from her apron pocket and tossed it onto the smooth wood.

  “Coffee.”

  “Cream?”

  “No, thanks.”

  She nodded and stepped back to the kitchen.

  Merrick scanned the room. This was where his father proposed? It was so not him. Merrick had pictured them as more of a Gary Danko couple than the mom-and-pop restaurant sort.

  The hostess returned and set a full mug of steaming black coffee before him. “Thank you,” he said.

  “Your waitress will be with you shortly.” The woman wove her way through the full-to-capacity restaurant, greeting the customers who had started to line up by the podium.

  Merrick didn’t bother looking at the menu as he sipped his hot drink. He took in each table, group, family. A little boy with oatmeal all over his face, hair, and high chair banged his spoon on the table. Two old women talked incessantly, their mouths moving a mile a minute and at the same time. A man with a newspaper, Rolex, and fedora sipped at his own black cup of joe, seemingly unbothered by the commotion surrounding him.

  “Can I take your order, hon?”

  He spilled coffee all over the front of his shirt at the question. Merrick scooted back and stood, fanning his chest while pinching his soaked and stained shirt.

  The waitress gasped. “Merrick?”

  “Mom.”

  Several customers stopped to watch the scene unfold. Funny how an entire room could go quiet like that.

  “Merrick,” she said, between her teeth this time. “What are you doing here?”

  “I should ask you the same question.” The statement came out with more severity than he’d intended.

  “Have you ever considered she doesn’t want to be found?”

  He shoved away the question that came to him through Coral’s voice. “Mom. I’ve missed you.”

  This was the part where she would hug him. Tell him she’d been trying to find him and Amaya for months, but their controlling father had kept that from happening.

  Instead, Lyn covered her mouth with her hand and shook her head. “Merrick. I can’t.”

  And for the second time this year, his mother took her leave without so much as a good-bye.

  Leaving a five-dollar bill on the table, he made his way to the hostess stand. “Can you tell me the time, please?”

  She checked her watch. “2:02 p.m.”

  “Thanks.” He was out the front door. His phone vibrated against his leg. A text from Coral lit the screen. She was at the house. Shoot, he’d forgotten he’d asked her to come. His impatience got the better of him. He replied with a quick apology and asked her to check on Maya before pocketing his phone and circling the inn’s wraparound porch.

  Several mismatched chairs occupied the border, some vacant, some hosting quiet vacationers sipping Arnold Palmers. On one end of the inn stood the old abandoned lighthouse that gave the place its name. Out of use for years, it had been transformed into a museum, a tourist trap for anyone who’d never seen one before. An image of his dad with little Maya on his shoulders filled Merrick’s mind. He swatted it away and entered the lighthouse.

  Behind the front desk sat a quiet little man with large eyeglasses, a striped button-down shirt, and a vest. “Welcome to the oldest operating lighthouse on the West Coast.” He went into a spiel about the lighthouse’s history.

  “How much is admission?”

  The man’s expression altered from joyful welcome to baffled and blinking. “Well, it’s free, but we have a suggested donation of—”

  Merrick slammed a ten down on the desk and sprinted up the stairs. More he’d owe Grim later.

  Old framed photos dating back at least a hundred years covered the swirling stairway walls. Lighthouse keepers and their families had kept the place alive for generations, making sure sailors found their way home. This was considered modern technology back then. A beacon of light and hope for the community.

  A few people lingered on the balcony at the top. Taking photos against the railing with the Pacific as their backdrop. Merrick circled the perimeter, finding his mom alone on one side next to a pair of pay-per-view binoculars.

  “Mom.” She’d run out of places to hide and he was out of words.

  She held up a hand and her shoulders shook. Wiped her reddened cheeks.

  He’d struck an emotion. He couldn’t decide if that was good or bad.

  “You
’re a waitress?” Merrick didn’t mean it as a jab, but that was how it sounded.

  “Tryin’ to be.” She shrugged. “I’m not any good.” The breeze tousled her hair. She looked so much like a healthier version of Amaya in that moment.

  “I can’t believe that man would do this to you. That he would send you here to make scraps while he’s in the city in his high-rise office.”

  When she turned to face him, her confused expression sent an explosion of questions across his mind. She dabbed at her eyes and nose with the corner of her apron. “Your father didn’t send me here.” Her lashes lowered and she turned to watch the sea again. “I couldn’t do it anymore. That life with him. I . . . couldn’t. I was suffocating.”

  His hands grasped the railing next to hers. “He’s a jerk. I know. I watched how he treated you.”

  She shook her head.

  “Would you stop defending him? For pity’s sake, Mom. Look where you are!” Merrick gestured at her soiled apron. “If it wasn’t for him—”

  Lyn placed a hand on his, her voice soft and kind. “If it wasn’t for your father, I wouldn’t be able to afford to stay here, bless his heart. He comes once a month to pay my bill and make sure I’m okay. He asks about you. And Maya. He wants to know if I’ve seen you. Every time I have to tell him no. I see so much heartbreak and regret in his eyes.”

  No. This was backward. She was lying, defending the man as she often did.

  “Hiro is rough around the edges. He didn’t know how to be with y’all. His time in the Navy hardened him. He used to be so . . . soft. Sweet, even. All he ever wanted was the best for you both.”

  Merrick’s eyes burned and his throat was closing in. No. No. He gripped the railing tighter.

  “Your great-grandfather was soft on him as a boy. Your daddy didn’t want you to go out into the world unprepared. He had the best intentions.”

  Merrick wanted to tell her to stop. To take back the words that changed his whole perspective. He didn’t want to see his father as a hero. As the good guy. He was not the good guy. He couldn’t be.

  “Mom. What you’re saying. It can’t be true. He wanted to send Amaya away to some facility.”