Spartina

by John D. Casey

  Elsie had her pricks of jealousy against her sister, against her sister’s beauty, against all the cultivation it took to tend the blossoms of her sister’s life. Elsie stuck to her too, imitated her, was working on her own blossoming in a beach-rose way, a wilder imitation of her sister’s flowering.

  And then there was Mary Scanlon, now at home in Elsie’s house. Dick remembered how he’d laughed at the idea of the two of them under one roof—he’d said they’d take the paint off anyone who dared to come in. There was Mary making the place a nest while Elsie was in exile. Elsie complained about Mary’s getting sentimental and holy, but Dick knew she was grateful for every twig and piece of down Mary moved into the nest.

  For all Elsie had explained just now about why she’d stopped him from making love to her—she had good reasons, but he’d felt her blood come up too, reasons wouldn’t have been enough—one thing Elsie didn’t say was she’d taken on more virtue from these three women friends in her recent solitude than she ever had before. He felt them in her, forces as real as those that made her face fuller, her hair glossier. He felt her need of these forces, he felt them balancing her in little ways. Better than anything he could do for her. Just as well, then.

  But it sure as hell was Elsie who’d got his blood up until he was as helpless and fierce as he’d been the first time. Maybe more helpless and wanting. But then it was Elsie, Elsie right here, who’d turned him away with a finger. Good. Good.

  So what would he be for her? Not part of her. Let all the forces in his life run heavy, keep him set. Let Elsie be. Let whatever longings he might have turn into letting her be, as outside him as the salt marsh, let her be herself the way the salt marsh was the salt marsh for all that flowed in and out. His mind swelled that thought—the way the sea was the sea for all the winds across her, for all the pull of the moon and the sun, for all the spinning of the earth under her, for all that sent her rocking from one edge to the other, sliding up sounds and bays, eating at shores, slithering into salt creeks and marshes.…

  He saw how small they were, Elsie and him in this little room. Nothing like the sea. Two dots you couldn’t find in the real sea. Just enough life in them to keep paddling so they could keep drifting with the little colony of dots that’d spawned them.

  He was exhausted now. He sat down by Elsie’s feet. He worked his way carefully onto his end of the sofa. He could just see the lump of her by the light of the fire, he could just make out the purple afghan. A day at sea and now this night. He was back in his tired body all right. Just a few stray notions between him and sleep …

  He’d have to tell May he saw Elsie. He could do that, Elsie had managed him so he could do that.

  Elsie’s forearm slid onto his feet, felt warm.

  He’d get home as tuckered out as he’d been when he brought Spartina in after the hurricane. And on account of about as much foolishness on his part. When he’d got back that time he’d been able to tell May to be glad of Spartina; he didn’t see what he was going to tell her to be glad of this time … Elsie gave me back? Better not go into it all.

  He pulled the blanket up to his neck.

  The sun would wake him through the sea-side window—enough time before Tran and Tony began to worry, enough time to fix the antenna and get back out to haul the rest of the pots, enough time to get home.

  Now he lay down feeling he had enough. He closed his eyes and saw the marsh, the salt pond at high water, brimming up into the spartina. He felt his easy breath on his fingers. Enough time would flood and ebb in him, bringing in and carrying out.…

  He opened his eyes. The log he’d laid had some salt in it—now it was aflame, there was a green sizzle to it, like the Northern Lights, like phosphorescence in the sea.

  He closed his eyes again. It didn’t matter that he didn’t have more to want. It felt like part of his present that it was in him and in the nature of things for him to take in more, give out more before his breath ran out.

  He could forget everything he’d thought here, this night, in the middle of his life. Let it ebb, and it would flow back. He felt like the salt marsh, the salt pond at high water, brimming.