I cringed when I looked at her. The right side of her face was red and starting to swell. Her green eyes brimmed with the same despair I felt. The same despair I had been running from. That I was still running from. For the first time, she was giving me a glimpse of her own pain. I was a selfish bastard.
“You think I haven’t questioned myself a thousand times? If I could have done anything, said anything differently that would bring them back?”
I fell to the ground. The sand, usually so soft, was gritty under my knees. “I couldn’t find him, Mom,” I choked out the words.
She knelt down beside me and laid a cool hand on my shoulder. “Of course you couldn’t. He’s gone.”
“I’m sorry. I couldn’t find him.” I reared back, face to the clouds and howled my rage like some wild animal. The sound tore from my chest until all my breath was gone and I was gasping and every seagull and sandpiper had taken flight.
“You have nothing to be sorry for. Jamie loved you. Your dad loved you. They would both be so proud of you, just like I am.”
I laughed at her words, at the lie they were.
“No they wouldn’t. I left you here by yourself. Dad made us promise a thousand times if something ever happened to him we would take care of you. I got scared and I let you down. I let Dad down.”
“No, Noah. That’s just not true.”
“I’m sorry. I’m so sorry.” I couldn’t have stopped it if I wanted to. Grief wracked my shoulders until I fell over on my hands and knees, sobbing, uncontrollable and ugly. I could hear my mom crooning words I didn’t understand, her hand light on my back.
I heard them fall, dropping into the sand like so much baggage. Finally, I was empty, totally spent, with a half a dozen pearls dotting the sand beneath me. I caught a movement out of the corner of my eye and heard a startled gasp. I looked up to see Caris standing some twenty yards away, hand held over her mouth.
“I’m… I’m sorry,” she stammered, already retreating.
Heat stole up my neck and shame licked at my festering wounds. No matter what I did, this girl always caught me at my worst. And now she’d heard me wailing in grief, seen me crying like a damn baby, a trail of it bright green in the white sand. I knew my face was tear-streaked and snot dribbled from my nose. I wiped it with the back of my hand and watched as Caris backpedaled the way she had come, head shaking back and forth. Then she turned around and ran. Ran from me and the mess that I was.
“Caris, wait,” my mom called after her. I didn’t stick around to see if she stopped. I couldn’t face her, not yet.
Then I ran too. From my mom and what I had done to her. From the disgusted look on Caris’s face. From Marshall and Maggie and their unwarranted pity, pity that I didn’t want and I didn’t need.
The Deep took me. She always took me.
* * *
The Deep led me here, to the beach behind Caris’s house. The sun made its slow descent, staining the sky pink. Hours of me stewing in self pity and shame. I wondered if I would ever find peace. My mom had somehow found it. So had Erin. What the hell was wrong with me? Was I that weak?
“Noah, how long have you been out here?” Caris’s feet squeaked through the sand. I didn’t turn around as she approached.
“I don’t know.” I kicked at the sand and dug a trench with my toes, afraid to look at her.
“I’m sorry about earlier. I didn’t mean to intrude. Your mom probably thinks I’m a total weirdo, running off like that. That was her, wasn’t it?” She sat down next to me, leaving a small space between us that felt like a chasm.
“Yeah. And no she doesn’t.” She thought she was the weird one when it was me howling at the sky, sprouting jewels in my grief.
“Are you all right?”
“I hit my mom.” Accident or not, I had been angry, seeing nothing but red. I braced myself and waited for her to recoil from me. Instead she scooted closer.
“What happened?”
As if I could explain this need I had to blow up every time I saw Marshall. Like a shark scenting blood, I always saw red when I saw Marshall over something I knew deep down wasn’t his fault.
“It was an accident. I didn’t mean to. But still, I hurt her.” I flinched at the touch of her hand, warm, soft flesh on my shoulder. It settled there like it belonged and something deep in my gut responded, struggling to get out just as hard as I fought to suppress it.
“I know you didn’t. She knows you didn’t.” Her eyes traced the lines of my face and dropped to the pearl at my neck.
I swallowed the rise of humiliation. I had nothing left to hide from her. I wanted to tell her that the times when I heard her voice in my head were the only times lately I felt whole, that I felt right. She laid her head on my shoulder, her sigh nothing I could interpret. I only knew it washed over me in a gentle wave, a precursor of what was to come. Of what I hoped was coming. What I had come to crave.
And then it came, a Song so sweet and so pure, as if she knew without me asking what I wanted. What I needed. I closed my eyes as her Song sank deep under my skin, drawing out that one sore spot that nothing else could touch. I wanted it gone. I’d purged on the beach with my mom, but the seed of it was still there, the weight of it always there. Her Song coaxed it right out of me like drawing a bucket from deep inside a well.
The single tear rolled off my cheek in a hot trail and plopped in the sand between us. I thought now that it was fully uprooted, I’d feel a sense of relief. Funny, I just felt empty. My shame and grief coming out of me in bits and pieces for all the world to see. Caris’s eyes were glued to my face and she lifted her finger and followed the path of the tear, the tip of it stained green.
“Noah?” Her eyes drifted down the smear I knew was on my face, then rested on the pearl in the sand. Her hand hovered over it like she was afraid to touch it.
“Go ahead.”
She lifted it between her fingers, reverent in her handling. “This is beautiful.”
We stared at the pearl she held. I liked the way it looked in her palm, against her skin. Then our eyes met and I knew I could never be just her friend. Not with the way her Song played in my head, telling me more than she probably wanted me to know about her. Not with the pearl she’d sung right out of me, cradled in her palm, resulting in a sense of quiet I hadn’t experienced in months.
“This,” I indicated the pearl with a dip of my chin, “contrary to what you witnessed, is kind of a rare thing. You know the old saying the eyes are mirrors to the soul?”
She nodded in encouragement, her eyes still focused on her hand.
“Well, I’ve cried plenty of times…” I bit my tongue. Could I make myself sound any more like a wuss? “Not plenty of times, a couple of times.” I laughed and Caris smiled when my eyes finally met hers. They were light with teasing, full of acceptance, and instantly put me at ease. She’d seen me at my worst, and yet, here she was, the warmth of her body pressed to mine, and the eagerness in her expression reassuring, and the relief of it felt so damn good.
“I get it Noah, you’re a cry baby.” She bumped my shoulder with hers.
“Most of the time they’re regular tears, but if there’s intense emotion behind them they turn into pearls. It’s very personal. Like creating a solid piece of your soul.”
“So the one on your neck? It came from you?” She reached up and traced the cord that held it, making my heart skitter in response.
“Yes.” I lifted my wrist and separated Jamie’s bracelet from the others I wore. “And this was Jamie’s.”
Our eyes met and held for an endless moment and I couldn’t even breathe. In just a few short weeks this girl had managed to completely own me.
“You know, you’re amazing.” She ducked her head, suddenly shy.
I wanted to argue but decided to take the compliment. A few well-meaning words, a heart-stopping look, and the urge to do what I promised not to was back in full force. Amazing, huh? I could work with amazing.
She tucked her hand in mi
ne, holding the pearl between us, then laid her head on my shoulder. We sat quietly and watched the sunset until the sky turned pewter and the feathery clouds faded from purple to gray.
“Caris?” Erin’s voice echoed over the low rise of dunes.
The second Caris raised her head from my shoulder I felt the absence. She pulled her hand from mine and I let go.
“I’ve got a date with the girls tonight.” She jumped up and brushed the sand off the back of her shorts, looking between me and Erin like we each had her by an arm and were pulling her in different directions.
“So I’ve heard.” I waved at Erin and stood as I closed my hand around the pearl. I knew exactly what I was going to do with it. “You’ll like the band. I’ve heard them before.”
“I guess I’ll see you later then.”
“Have fun. Just…” Don’t drink. Don’t dance with any shit-faced, horny tourists. Don’t wear anything too short. Like she needed another father.
“Just what?”
“Nothing. Have fun.”
I watched her walk toward the house, a half a dozen steps before she turned around and ran back to me. She flung her arms around my neck and hugged me so tight and so quick I didn’t have time to respond. And then she trotted her way up the path to her house and was gone.
I could still smell her though, all over my skin and under it, dreading the swim home that would erase her scent from me.
And because I didn’t want to lose it, I did something I had never done before.
I walked.
Twenty-One
Caris
I sat on a bench on the far side of the green in front of Maggie’s shop, opposite where a crew was working to set up the stage for the concert. Fans had already claimed their spots on the grass with lawn chairs, blankets, and coolers. Venders were setting up along the sidewalks with assorted light-up gadgets, everything from bright neon, glow-in-the-dark necklaces to swords and bubble blowers.
Erin had dropped me off early before going to pick up Ally. I had been eager to be out by myself. A solo flight, so to speak. My first outing into the world all on my own since my dad told me I was someone different, something different. Small as that world had become, the boundary on one side defined by the Gulf, and the other by how far I could get on my bike. Still, it was a big deal. In a lot of ways I still felt like an outsider looking in on someone else’s life. Or an alien secretly inhabiting another world, just waiting to be found out. Any minute now someone would notice, point an accusing finger and scream, “She’s not real.” I felt like an impostor.
No one paid me much attention though. A couple of guys in Ole Miss ball caps had smiled at me when they’d shuffled by, nothing more than the usual appreciative acknowledgment of the opposite sex. No one stared in horror. No finger pointing occurred. Just me and the bench and a warm breeze against my back as the giant cookie moon crawled across the sky.
“Caris?” Maggie called from up the sidewalk. “How are you?”
She was dressed in a flowing frock with all the colors of the rainbow, Felix in tow. His toenails clicked on the concrete as he swagged his stout body forward, tongue lolling between his jowls.
“I’m not sure,” I answered honestly. Something inside me snapped and tears burned my eyes. “You have a few minutes?”
“Of course.” The keys jangled in her hand as she unlocked the door.
“I don’t know what’s wrong with me. I’m usually not a crier.” I wiped my eyes, following her inside the shop. Felix plopped with a satisfied grunt on his pillow.
“Well, you have had a rather startling few weeks.” She left the lights dim, thumping one of the padded stools in invitation.
“You know the whole story then?” I looked into her clear eyes and realized this was just what I needed: someone to talk to who wasn’t somehow emotionally connected to me. I knew she wasn’t a totally disinterested party. When Noah spoke of her it was with genuine affection, but as far as I was concerned she had no real attachment at this point other than professional curiosity. And she was curious, that was plain to see as her eyes danced over me.
“The most important parts.” She stroked my hand, her skin warm, a contrast to the cool metal of the rings she wore. “You’re a brave girl. What’s a few tears in the face of all you’ve discovered about yourself?” The lyrical way she spoke, the soft tone, kind eyes, sitting in her shop with the smells and the lights set to twilight, somehow made this better, bearable.
Tears. I’d never look at them the same way again. I’d been so relieved when I’d found Noah sitting on the beach behind my house, and then he’d created a miracle and I had wanted to keep it, steal is away.
“I would never hurt him. You know that right,” I said to Maggie. “I know what my mother thought. But she was wrong.”
“I know,” she said. “You are not your mother and Noah is not Athen.”
“Noah says you can put a charm in place. Can you tell me? Why did it keep my hair from growing at all until I got here? Why can’t I swim?” The questions tumbled out in a jumble, prompting her to laugh.
“Let me make some tea and we’ll discuss it. I have to admit, I’m very curious. It took more skill than I possess to create such magic.” Maggie waved me to follow her to the back of her shop through a curtain of beads that had a song of their own when I moved through them.
It was like walking through a waterfall and into the place she worked her magic. Vibrant green plants decorated every flat surface that wasn’t dedicated to work space. Some had bright flowering blooms, others with leaves in varying shapes.
“I’m not interrupting anything am I?” I eyed the bottle of champagne chilling in a silver champagne bucket.
“No.” She waved me off. “I’m meeting a client later. A very discerning one. He has an anniversary coming up and needs something special for his wife.” She strode across the small space and opened a cabinet using a key from the ring around her wrist.
Behind the back panel she tripped a door where a small safe was tucked inside the wall. The lock beeped after she entered a code and the door sprang open. Her body blocked my view so what was inside remained a partial mystery. Jewelry, I supposed. When she turned around she had closed the door. She held a deep blue velvet box in her hand, scrolled with a platinum wave-like emblem. She lifted the lid on the box and for the space of a breath the air shifted, the flames of the candles flickered as though someone had opened a door or window and let in a draft of air. A necklace, bracelet, and a pair of earrings rested on the cushy fabric, queenly in their appearance, and different from the pieces she displayed in the cases in the shop. These pearls shimmered with vibrant energy. I stared, trance-like, at the vitality inherent in each one, oddly alive, like they had a story to tell. I knew that they did.
“They’re very beautiful.” My hand hovered over one pale green pearl, my palm warming from the heat it radiated.
“Yes. And quite rare.” She closed the lid and held her hand on the box almost reverent as she placed it back in its hiding place. “And they cost a small fortune.”
She disappeared into her small kitchen and came back with two cups of tea.
“Those should make his wife happy,” she said, curling up on the love seat beside me. “Now about you. The thing you have to remember about magic is that it’s an art, not an exact science. And charms are fickle. They can misfire and have unintended consequences. I doubt it was meant to stunt your hair so absolutely. Usually a charm works as a mask, a very temporary one. Seventeen years is a long time to get it perfectly right. As far as you still not being able to swim, I don’t know. Maybe it’s as simple as you not being ready yet.”
“Or maybe she hates me. Maybe she finds me unworthy,” I said, not wanting to believe it was my fault. She had beckoned me. I’d heard her voice masked in the waves, a silent call in my dreams. I’d heard her all the way from Kentucky.
“Never think that, Caris. The Deep is a goddess dedicated to the protection of your kind. Give it time.
You’ve only been here a few weeks. Seventeen years is a long time to forget who you are.”
I hoped she was right.
“My father came to see me,” I confided in a soft tone, as though somehow I had done something wrong.
“Oh.” She sat back, schooling her expression to passivity. “How do you feel about that?”
A difficult question to answer when there was no simple answer. I stared at my cup.
“I don’t know. Angry, confused.” I stole a glance at her. “Curious.”
“I can understand that, Caris. It’s a natural reaction.”
Her lack of censure relieved me. I had been mostly angry, but that didn’t keep me from beating myself up over the fact that I was curious. I wanted to know more about him. I had even found myself wondering about Sol. It had been just my dad and me forever, and I had always been content with our little family. But to discover I had a brother? I might like having a brother.
“Is it, considering what he did?” An image of Athen Kelley popped into my mind. Standing on the beach like some Greek god with the wind and the rain and the lightning as his backdrop. I couldn’t reconcile the two images of him together. Even in the midst of all that raging energy and time to think about it, I wouldn’t have thought him capable of something so terrible.
“I think what happened between your mother and father was a terrible thing. I also think what your father did says more about what was inside him than anything else. The fault lies with him, not your mother. I hate that she took some of the blame and chose to put that burden on you.”
“Are you saying you think my father is inherently a bad person?”
“I’m saying he was put to a test and failed miserably. Proved not to be the leader he thought he was.”
“Do you think people, even bad people, can change?”
“Caris, I have to believe people can change and decide to become better. Otherwise there wouldn’t be hope for any of us.”
I took another sip of tea and thought about what she was saying in relation to the man I had seen on the beach, the man who wanted my forgiveness. I wanted to believe I was the kind of person who believed in second chances. But to forgive him for raping my mother? It was asking so much. And then there was my dad. It would be the ultimate betrayal of what he had done for me to forgive the man who had stolen his life from him.
Waterborn (The Emerald Series Book 1) Page 21