On a Dark Tide

by Valerie Geary

  “Did he smell like anything, like cologne?”

  “I don’t know.”

  “Anything else? Anything at all that might help us identify him?”

  Elizabeth thought for a second, then shook her head. Her voice trembled when she said, “I’m sorry. I…I…” She wiped at her eyes, glistening now with tears. “I told you everything I can remember. I don’t know, I was trying to, I wanted to disappear, I guess? I went away somewhere. I let myself pretend it was just a dream. A nightmare.”

  She took a shaking breath.

  June rubbed her back. “You’re doing so great. You’re so brave.”

  Elizabeth took another, deeper and more steadying breath and said, “I know it sounds stupid, but I didn’t even realize anything bad had happened until I got to June’s and had a chance to kind of come down from whatever.” She bit the corner of her lip, then gestured to her lap. “It hurt down there, and when I went to the bathroom to check, I realized my underwear was gone. There was blood.” Her voice hitched as she swallowed back a sob.

  Brett’s hands clenched under the table. She took a long, slow breath, then quietly asked, “Can you describe them for me? The underwear you were wearing that night?”

  Elizabeth’s voice was thin and on the verge of breaking when she answered. “There was a little red bow.” She touched below her belly button where the top of her pants met her shirt, then she crumpled in on herself, burying her face in her hands.

  June threw her arm around Elizabeth’s shoulders and cradled her, making shushing sounds like a mother would to an upset child. When she looked at Brett, her eyes simmered with rage. “You believe her, don’t you? You’re going to help us? You’re going to find the asshole who did this to her?”

  Brett had worked with too many young women who’d found themselves in dark rooms with men who believed the word ‘no’ to be nothing more than a suggestion. Few of them had gotten justice. She knew she shouldn’t promise anything to these girls. The odds of them finding the person who raped Elizabeth were small, the odds of prosecuting him even smaller. Still, she found herself turning off the tape recorder, then leaning over the table and grasping tight hold of Elizabeth’s hand. She squeezed hard as if, with enough pressure, she could mend everything that had broken for this girl that terrible night.

  Her voice was a rasping whisper. “I believe you, Elizabeth. And I’m going to do everything in my power to find this creep and lock him up for a long time, okay?”

  The next part was the hardest part. Brett needed to collect whatever physical evidence she could, though she knew there wouldn’t be much. It had been almost three days since the party, and Elizabeth admitted to having taken a shower at June’s that night. Still, if there was even a trace of that bastard left somewhere on Elizabeth’s body, Brett wanted it. June stayed by her friend through the whole terrible ordeal, clutching her hand and talking nonstop about soccer drills and a science teacher who nearly exploded the entire school during a chemistry experiment—anything to distract her. Brett wondered if Elizabeth knew how lucky she was to have a friend like June.

  When it was over, Brett walked the girls out and told them to call her anytime, for any reason. She promised to be in touch soon. After the girls were gone, Brett returned to the interview room. She listened to the tape again, carefully taking notes for her report and trying to figure out her next steps. She needed to talk to more people who had been at that party, find out who was wearing a wolf mask. At some point, Brett found herself getting tired and hungry, her concentration waning. A quick glance at her watch told her that her shift was almost over. She’d come back to this later. For now, it was time to go home, get dinner started, find out how Amma did all day by herself. Brett gathered her notes and turned off the lights.

  As she passed by Interview Room One, making her way back to her desk to grab her keys and jacket, the door flew open, and Danny Cyrus staggered into her. She grabbed on to him to keep from falling.

  “Watch it.” He shook her off and stormed toward the exit.

  She stared after him, rubbing the sore spot on her arm where he’d run into her.

  Irving came out of the interview room a few seconds later. His tie—pink flamingos dotting a purple background—was loosened. Sweat dampened the collar of his shirt.

  “You’re letting Danny go?” she asked.

  Irving flipped through the pages of a notepad he was holding in his hands, then shrugged. “I don’t have much of a choice. He has an alibi.”

  “So, what now?”

  “That’s not really your problem anymore, is it?” Without looking up from his notes, he brushed past her and walked toward the squad room.

  Chapter 13

  Brett heard the sails flapping as soon as she stepped out of the car. There wasn’t much wind left by Tuesday evening. Yesterday’s storm had blown east, leaving behind washed-blue skies and a light breeze that would hardly fill a kite. But Amma had taken the boat out anyway. Brett could see her in the distance, bobbing against a copper sea and watermelon pink sky.

  The fourteen-foot wooden skiff was small enough for Amma to handle the rigging by herself, yet roomy enough to take a couple of friends for a picnic cruise if she wanted company. The boat was a sturdy little daysailer, robust in open water. Though, as far as Brett knew, Amma only ever sailed her around Sculpin Bay. Pop had bought the skiff for Amma on their fiftieth wedding anniversary. He’d named her Anita Horizon—Anita was Amma’s first name—and they’d both had a good laugh over his cleverness.

  It wasn’t until Brett stepped onto the dock that she realized the Anita Horizon wasn’t tacking. The sails flapped loose, continuing their racket, smacking the mast and hull like a woman shaking out wet laundry. Amma sat at the back of the boat, with one hand on the rudder, but from where Brett stood, it didn’t look like she was trying to steer. It didn’t look like she was doing much of anything but sitting and staring into the distance. A stark silhouette against the setting sun, Amma and the Anita Horizon looked like toys upon the vast expanse of water.

  Brett cupped her hands around her mouth and shouted toward the boat, “Amma! Are you all right?”

  Her voice was a foghorn blast that turned Amma’s head. A second passed, the sails still flapping, then Amma lifted one hand and turned back around to watch the sunset.

  “Amma?” Brett shouted again. “Do you need help?”

  Amma and Pop had sailed together often during their marriage. Once, they cruised to Mexico after their only daughter, Brett’s mother, left for college. They spent an entire year sailing from port to port, their skin turning wind-chapped and brown, their hair tangled with salt and seaweed. Amma knew how to sail, and she’d sailed plenty of times alone. She was a woman who loved the wind, water, and chasing the distant horizon, but Brett worried that it wasn’t safe for her to be out there by herself anymore. She could forget how to tack, and the mainsail could fill too quickly, swinging the boom, tipping the boat. Or she could run aground in the many shallow places along the shoreline. Or she could simply get stuck, the way she appeared to be now.

  A sliver of sun hovered above the ink-blot line of the sea. As soon as it disappeared, the light would vanish, and Amma would be swallowed up in shadows.

  Brett trotted back up the dock and hurried to a house down the street, where she knew the neighbor kept his small fishing boat tied to his dock year-round. She pounded on the front door. A man with a huge white beard and a belly to match answered a few seconds later. Glasses were perched on the end of his nose. He held a book in one hand, his thumb pressed against the pages, keeping his place. She only really knew him as the man who lived next door. Sometimes they exchanged waves when they rolled their garbage cans out to the street at the same time. Amma didn’t have much to say about him. His name was Kenny, and he kept to himself. A bit of a hermit, Amma had said, quickly adding that those types of people make the best neighbors.

  “I live next door,” Brett said in case he’d forgo
tten.

  “Yes, I know who you are.”

  “My grandmother seems to have gotten herself into a bit of trouble.” She smiled, so he wouldn’t panic. “Nothing too serious, but would you mind giving us a tow?”

  Kenny was happy to help. It took him only a few minutes to grab his boots, a jacket, and the key to his boat. Before Brett even had time to think about what she was doing, they were on the water, bouncing over small waves, the motor roaring in her ears. Brett clung to the boat’s handrail, fixing her gaze on the shoreline, trying not to get sick.

  Margot was the one who’d liked the open water, always pleading with Pop and Amma to take her on their sailboat whenever the weather was fine. She’d stand against the railing, gripping tight to a rope, her body hanging over the waves, golden hair fluttering behind her, face tilted toward the sun. She’d laugh and gesture for Brett to join her, but it was all Brett could do to keep herself from barfing with each cresting wave. She’d spend entire trips with her back pressed against the cabin of the boat, knuckles white, double and triple-checking that the buckles on her vest were fastened.

  Even years later, the old habit remained. Brett found herself reaching for a buckle that wasn’t there. Her fingers grasped at the flaps of her windbreaker, tugging them tight though she knew the light nylon would be useless to save her if she went overboard.

  Kenny downshifted as they approached the Anita Horizon, slowing to come up alongside her. Amma looked startled to see them and then annoyed. She flapped her hand, motioning them to move away.

  They had to yell to be heard over the chaos of the flapping sails and the guttering engine.

  “I’m fine!” Amma grabbed at a line that was flapping loose.

  Brett couldn’t tell which sail it was connected to, and it didn’t seem like Amma knew either.

  “You don’t look fine!” Brett shouted at her grandmother. Then she pointed toward the vanishing sun. “It’s almost dark!”

  “I was on my way in!”

  But the way she fumbled the ropes, it was clear she had no idea what she was doing.

  “Kenny’s going to tow you!” Brett shouted as the man leaned over the boat’s hull to lash a rope to the Anita Horizon’s bow fitting.

  The whole way to the dock, Amma sat with her back to them, and her arms crossed over her chest. Kenny drove slowly. The Anita Horizon bobbed along behind like a stubborn, pouting duck.

  As soon as they were within reach, Amma leaned over and grabbed the dock railing. With one hand, she steadied the sailboat. With the other, she lashed a rope around a large, metal cleat.

  “Hang on a second, Amma,” Brett called out. “Let me help you.”

  She rose too quickly, and the small fishing boat rocked and dipped beneath her. Brett lost her footing, stumbling a little. Kenny grabbed her elbow, steadying her again before helping her over the gunwale. By the time Brett got to the sailboat, Amma was already out, standing on the dock, lashing a second rope to a second dock cleat, making sure the boat wouldn’t slip its ties in a strong wind.

  Brett tried to take the rope from her, but Amma shoved her away. “I don’t need your help.”

  Amma gave the rope a hard tug to make sure it was secure, then she stalked toward the house without giving their neighbor so much as a wave or a nod in thanks.

  Thinking now that she’d overreacted, that perhaps Amma hadn’t been in any trouble at all and could have made it back on her own, Brett gave Kenny an embarrassed shrug. “Thanks.”

  “Happy to help.” Kenny unhitched the fishing boat from the Anita Horizon and motored away, sticking close to shore, fading into the evening shadows as he made his way back to his own dock.

  Brett found Amma in the kitchen, slamming pans around, moving them from the stove to the cupboard only to pull them out of the cupboard again to set them on the stove.

  “What are you doing?” Brett asked from the doorway.

  “Making dinner.”

  Brett crossed to the stove and tried to take the saucepan from Amma.

  “I told you, I don’t need your help.”

  “Amma—”

  “I can boil water. And I can damn well sail my own boat.”

  She’d never heard her grandmother cuss before. Amma dropped the saucepan onto the stove with a loud clatter. She spun away from Brett and stood staring out the window above the kitchen sink, with her hand gripping the cold water handle, though she didn’t turn it on. She took deep, shuddering breaths, anger trembling her whole body.

  “Amma. I’m here to help you. That’s why I came. To help you. So let me.” Brett brushed her grandmother’s elbow.

  Amma flinched as if Brett had pinched her. She pushed away from the sink, knocking Brett out of the way with the force of her motion. “I didn’t ask you to come here, you know. I never asked for your help.”

  The pounding of her feet up the stairs shook the entire house.

  * * *

  Noises woke Brett in the middle of the night. First, the creak of stairs. Then, the opening of cupboards and a clattering sound as something plastic rolled across the floor. Then came the sound of the back door being opened.

  Brett pulled on a sweatshirt and shuffled downstairs.

  Earlier that night, Brett had eaten her dinner of grilled cheese and canned tomato soup alone in front of the television. She kept listening for Amma, expecting her to come back downstairs, but she never did. Brett had tapped on her grandmother’s door on her way to bed but got no answer. Amma had either been asleep or pretending to be.

  She was wide awake now, a midnight ghost, standing in front of a painting easel she’d set up on the back porch. With a large brush, she smeared large globs of black paint over a new canvas. Her hands worked quickly, almost manically, until there was not a single speck of white left visible. She dunked the large brush in a bucket of water and, from a small jar, picked a finer-tipped, soft-bristled brush. She squeezed white paint onto her palate and, working slowly now, carefully began dabbing stars onto the field of night.

  Brett folded herself into a wicker chair and watched her grandmother’s hand move deftly across the canvas. A flick, a flutter, the black sky came alive with nearly invisible specks of light. Amma bent over the left corner of the canvas and began to paint a slivered moon.

  “This is how it feels,” she said, making tiny strokes, adding a little yellow, a shimmer of pale blue. “Not every day, but more often than I want to admit even to myself.” A gentle curve and the moon began to take shape. “It’s like there’s all this darkness. My memories get swallowed up in the blackest of nights, except for this small bit of light.” She dabbed more paint onto the canvas. “This sliver of moon, these dots of stars, that I know are me. Or the me I used to be, and if I can just get close enough to them, I know I’ll be able to see again. See myself again.”

  She lifted the brush and took a step back to examine the painting. Then she stepped forward again and, with a larger brush, added a wash of navy blue to the lower third of the canvas, turning the night into an ocean.

  “I keep waiting for the sun to rise.” She added the moon’s reflection on the surface of the water. “But it never does. It just seems to be getting darker.”

  A final stroke of white, and she dropped the paintbrush into the bucket of water. She stared at the painting, tilting her head one way, then the other.

  Then she turned toward Brett. “I’m sorry about what I said earlier. I’m glad you’re here. You know I am. It’s just, I never wanted this for you.” She flung her hand at the painting. “I never wanted you to be stuck taking care of me.”

  “I’m not stuck. I’m here because I want to be here.”

  “I’ve always wanted more for you, that’s all. After what happened with your sister, and then your poor mother. Life was always going to be hard for you, and I never wanted to be the one to make it harder. I just want you to be happy, Brett.” Amma wiped her hands on her painting apron and began cleaning her brushes.
>
  “I’m happy, Amma,” Brett said, but the words came out sounding flat.

  She was struck by how the ocean her grandmother painted seemed to ripple like the real one not even twenty feet away. Amma had taken painting classes for a few years through the community college, but mostly she was raw, natural talent. If she could still paint like this, Brett thought, then maybe things weren’t so bad after all. But what would happen if that part of herself slipped into the darkness along with everything else?

  “I think you should see another doctor,” Brett said. “I think we should get a second opinion.”

  “I know you do.” Amma cupped Brett’s cheek in her hand. She smelled like acrylic paint and salt. “Just give me more time, okay? That’s all I need. A little more time.”

  Brett didn’t know how much longer they could wait. But she nodded, agreeing because the sky above them and the one Amma had painted were filled with an infinity of stars.

  Chapter 14

  Clara knew she would marry Marshall when she was fifteen, the very first time they kissed. He’d taken her to see a movie. She thought it might have been The Pink Panther, but honestly, after all this time, it could have been anything. What she remembered was the dark of the theater, the flickering projector, Marshall’s leg bumping against hers, her hand reaching for his, their fingers curling together. When the movie ended, neither of them got up to leave. The credits rolled. The music was a perfect soundtrack for what happened next.

  Marshall leaned closer. He brushed his thumb along her jawline, drawing her face to his. He smelled faintly of licorice from the candy they’d been eating. His lips were soft and dry and lovely beyond anything she could have imagined. Her whole body responded to him, and she knew then that Marshall was her future. In a sticky-floored, discarded-popcorn theater with the film crackling to the end of the reel, and the acne-faced usher waving a flashlight in their faces, telling them to get the hell out, their life together started. As they ran out the exit doors, hands clutched, laughing, Clara thought she would never be happier than she was at that moment.