Firefly Beach

by Luanne Rice

  She couldn’t stand her feelings.

  She had just destroyed her mother. She pictured her mother’s face, shadowed with despair. She could sculpt it, the bust of a woman who had just seen into the depths of her youngest daughter’s empty soul. Old news, but it had shocked Augusta. Skye had seen it in her eyes. Vodka was the fastest way out. She sipped her drink and felt everything grow distant.

  But her new piece was filled with love. Although the sisters did not have faces, Skye knew which one was Caroline, which was Clea, and which was Skye. All three had their heads tipped back just slightly, gazing at the sky with exuberance and gratitude. That’s how Skye wanted to feel someday.

  Exuberant and grateful. Skye raised the glass again and drained it.

  The Renwicks had made secret-keeping and lie-telling an art form. What was the alternative? It they had told the truth, they would have fallen apart. Her parents would have gotten divorced, Skye was sure. She wished she could hold on to her picture of them as a couple in love, the way the stories made it sound. They had traveled the world together, always with their children, renting houses in beautiful places for Hugh to paint. They had made a fantasy world, and now it was finally disintegrating.

  Skye’s name came from the place where she had been conceived, the storied Isle of Skye in the west of Scotland. When she was old enough, her parents would hold her tight and tell her about the tiny cottage, just big enough for a couple and their two little girls, with a peat fire burning all day and night. It had been a blissful time, a place where Augusta and the girls walked the sea path while Hugh fished for salmon and painted every day.

  Christmas—nine months later—her father went off with another woman. That woman’s husband came to Firefly Hill with the thought of killing the whole family, and that just about summed up the way of the Renwicks.

  Hearing someone coming up the stairs, she turned to face the door. Simon stood just out of sight. She could see his lanky shadow thrown by the hall light, and she felt relieved it wasn’t her mother. He paused out there for a long while, and she could almost feel him summoning up his courage. She heard him take a deep breath.

  He entered her studio holding one red rose. Apology in his eyes. He wore black jeans, a green tee-shirt, and scuffed work boots. Very slowly, he walked across the big space, his footsteps echoing. When he got to Skye, he knelt before her and handed her the rose.

  “This is for you,” he said.

  “Thank you,” she said. She held the rose to her nose and breathed its sweet scent, trying to be unmoved.

  “I picked it on my way in,” he said with disarming truthfulness. “From the garden outside.”

  “Why?”

  “I wanted to prove I belong here, that I’m part of the family. I am, you know,” he said, burying his head in her lap. Her hands were covered with clay, but she laid them gently on his hair.

  “Your father made mistakes, Skye, and your mother took him back.”

  “Maybe she shouldn’t have.”

  “Didn’t you tell me he planted those roses outside as a symbol? He wanted to undo his mistakes, make things up to her. I’ll be better to you.”

  Again, she smelled the rose. It was musky and sexy, like love and the end of summer. Skye thought of Caroline and Clea; for some reason, she felt tears hot behind her eyelids. She felt herself slipping away. She wanted to believe Simon. More than anything, she wanted to click into love and forget Redhawk and the blue ribbon and Swan Lake and the look in her mother’s eyes.

  “This is wrong,” she said, pushing him away. “I have to be alone right now.”

  “Make love to me,” he said.

  “Simon, no.”

  “What’s the matter?” he asked. “You were never like this before.”

  “I’m tired. I want to sculpt,” she said, the two lies colliding head-on. She wanted to get rid of Simon as quickly as possible so she could get plastered on vodka and sleep the rest of the afternoon away.

  “Which is it?” he asked, grinning as he caught her.

  “The truth is, I need to be alone,” she said, thinking fast. “I had an amazing dream last night, a major inspiration for a new piece, and I really feel like working.” Her desire for isolation made the lie as easy as breathing.

  “Sex,” Simon said, sliding his tongue down her neck, his finger down her jeans. “You need to relax.”

  “Stop,” she said, flinching. She pushed his hand away.

  “I don’t feel like stopping,” he said, his breath hot on her neck.

  The panic came over her. Feeling Simon’s hand on her breasts, his mouth on her throat made her skin crawl.

  “No, Simon. I said no!”

  “You bitch,” he said.

  Skye took a deep breath. She closed her eyes, but only for an instant. She wanted to be completely present, right there for what was happening. She didn’t want to escape into her imagination, into a momentary lapse of reality. Her husband had a vicious look on his face, and he had just called her a bitch. It was almost a relief.

  “If you don’t leave right now,” she said, standing, “I’m going to call the police.”

  “What do you think the police will do?” Simon asked, smacking her so hard across the face that she saw stars. “You’re my wife.”

  “Simon!”

  “You don’t want to make love? Fine. Then we’ll fuck.”

  Shocked, Skye touched her eye, her mouth. The left side of her face stung; she could almost feel it throbbing in the shape of Simon’s hand. He grabbed her by the collar, tearing her shirt. She felt her brain explode, as her eyes went wide with terror.

  The fish were feeding. Caroline stood on deck, her hands on the starboard rail, watching the activity. Bluefish lunged into a school of menhaden, sending the baitfish flying like pellets into the sky. It was a full-blown feeding frenzy, with teeth snapping and half-eaten fish making a slick of oils and blood trailing the currents straight out to sea.

  Caroline wondered what was happening below. A few crew members had stayed on deck to work the winch and stay in radio contact with Joe and the others below. Every so often they would pay out a little more cable. Take a turn on the winch. Crank up the engine. Check the Meteor’s position over the wreck, and back a few meters in reverse.

  She watched the fish, trying to forget the pit in her stomach. The men on deck were talking about Greece, about diving for a treasure off Mykonos, about the warmth of the water and the beauty of the women there.

  “They have it!” the winch operator yelled. “They’ve secured the chest!”

  All the guys converged on deck. The big winch held a spool of wire like a giant’s fishing line. The wire ran through a long, pivoted beam that swung out over the water down to the wreck below.

  “Is this very dangerous?” Caroline asked one of the men.

  “Shit, yeah,” he said. “Once we start pulling, you know how much tension will be on that wire?”

  “Picture the wreck as a house of cards,” said an older man, a cigarette dangling out of his mouth and the tattoo of a battleship on his arm. “The gold is sitting smack inside. We gotta thread the wire through the structure, keep it from touching anything, then wrap it around the chest. We touch one card, the whole house goes down.”

  “It won’t happen,” the operator said. “Joe knows his stuff. We do this all the time.”

  “Gonna do it in Greece next month,” someone else said.

  The operator spoke into the mike. He pressed a finger against the earpiece, trying to hear better. He spoke again, and Caroline heard him say “Roger. Starting the winch.” He punched buttons on the control panel.

  Caroline watched the wire go taut. It was pulling the chest. Thinking of the house of cards, her stomach flipped. She gazed away, out toward the thrashing bluefish. They had moved closer. Something dark was swimming toward them.

  The thing was a shark.

  Inside the wreck, darkness was total. No sun penetrated from the surface. Light shimmered from lanterns illu
minating the chest, and Joe tried to see as he and Dan wrapped the case in cable. They had rigged up a series of metal arches, guiding the wire through the old ship. Designed to keep the cable from chafing and collapsing the wreck, the arches seemed to be holding.

  Joe counted his men. He looked for Sam and felt relieved not to see him. The kid listened, Joe gave him that. Sam had always tagged along, followed Joe like a big puppy, but when Joe told him to back off, he did. I do that too much, Joe thought, yanking on the cable to test it. Tell Sam to back off. Tell everyone to back off. He thought of Caroline waiting on deck, and he moved faster. He gave the signal to start pulling.

  The cable tightened. It scraped against the metal guides and supports. Joe’s heart pounded, and he felt himself wanting to breathe too fast. He was glad Sam was outside the wreck, safe and free. This was the riskiest part of treasure hunting: getting the gold out of the unstable wreck. This was the part where people could get hurt.

  The chest shifted. The wire stretched. The girded chest bumped along the sea bottom. Divers surrounded it, easing the encased old box over broken spars. Dan watched the cable, gauging its tension against the metal guides. He gave Joe a thumbs-up. Joe swam behind the chest, noticing a trail of coins spilling from a crack between the protective straps.

  His main concern was getting the gold to the water’s surface. It was easier going now; the chest was off the sea bottom, being guided through the dark wreck. Bones lay strewn around, the remains of the Cambria’s crew. Clarissa’s mother was among them, but Joe didn’t let himself think of her. He was a pirate now, not a scientist, and he had to get the treasure.

  As he swam out of the wreck, the water seemed bright. Joe felt relief. He searched for Sam, saw him waiting a safe distance away. The worst part was over. One by one his men were coming out, following the chest of gold. It hovered in the water, suspended in the hole in the Cambria’s hull. Half in and half out, it wasn’t moving.

  The cable was snagged.

  Right away Joe saw the problem wasn’t serious. The wire had eased between the metal arch and a ship’s timber. Dan called for some slack, and the winch man let off some tension, unhooking the strap from a broken spar. The cable drooped. Joe swam over. He had just reached up to free the wire, when he saw the shark.

  It was coming fast. Sleek as a jet, black on top with a white underbelly, the shark was headed straight for Sam. The creature twisted, opened its mouth to expose jagged teeth, slashed past Sam. Joe saw the startled look on Sam’s face. Sam’s eyes widened behind his mask. He opened his mouth, and a balloon of air bubbles escaped.

  Joe grabbed a broken spar from the sea bottom. He didn’t have a plan, he didn’t even think. All he wanted was to protect his brother. He lunged toward the shark, trying to scare it away with his useless wooden club.

  Joe’s air hose caught on the metal guide. The cable had tightened up again, tugging the chest. Yanked back, Joe felt his air stop. All he had to do was slip out of his harness, leave his tank hanging where it was caught. But he was distracted by the shark and Sam. He saw Sam holding still, turning in place, watching the shark circle around. The shark flicked its tail and dodged away. Joe followed it with his eyes.

  Fumbling with the harness, Joe smiled at Sam. The kid was a mess, freaked out over the shark and unaccustomed to seeing his older brother agitated. Sam swam forward, taking his regulator out of his mouth, ready to share his air with Joe.

  Joe motioned him back. He had taken a big breath of air; he had plenty to take him to the water’s surface. But Sam kept coming. He knew the buddy system, how you shared your air with a fellow diver in distress. Sam’s eyes were focused on Joe, his mouthpiece held out like a gift.

  Just then the chest swung free. It flew past Joe, on its way up. Snapping loose, the cable shook the wreck. The Cambria trembled, and the shock waves felt like an underwater earthquake. Joe steadied himself. He reached out, trying to push Sam away.

  The wreck came down as if the ground had shifted. It tumbled in on itself, sending timbers everywhere. Divers scattered like baitfish. The school of blues exploded away, the shark had disappeared. Joe felt a timber strike his shoulder with a glancing blow. But Sam got hit hard. Joe saw the cable whip across the back of his head.

  Sam’s blood wafted into the murky water.

  Joe darted toward his younger brother, but he couldn’t swim. His arm wouldn’t work.

  No one had cared when Caroline pointed out the shark. They said they saw sharks all the time out here—it was no big deal, part of the job. Only gullible city people believed Jaws. Caroline had laughed, knowing she should believe them. She had lived by the sea her whole life, had never heard of one shark attack in Black Hall waters. It’s like the hunts, she told herself: We saw bears, we saw wolves, but nothing ever ate us.

  Caroline watched the chest shimmering beneath the surface. It was the size of a dinghy, blackened with time. Coated with green seaweed and raggedy barnacles, it came out of the sea, dangling on the cable, supported on all sides by strapping. The winch man maneuvered it onto the deck, water pouring from its seams.

  Four black heads bobbed into sight. The divers were coming up. She looked for Joe and Sam, thrilled that they would all be able to see the gold together.

  The divers were shouting. Climbing onto the swim platform, leaping onto the deck. Someone radioed for the Coast Guard, for a helicopter. Caroline ran to the rail. She stared at the surface, praying to see Joe and Sam.

  “The shark?” she asked. She was thinking of hunters and prey, her worst fears.

  “The wreck collapsed,” someone told her, running by.

  “Where’s Joe?” she asked, her heart racing. “Where are they?”

  Less than a minute passed, and they came up. Everyone was clustered around Sam. His face was pure white, streaked with blood. His eyes were half closed, rolled back in his head. Blood pumped out of a four-inch wound behind his ear.

  Joe gasped air. He was trying to buoy up Sam, but his left arm was hanging limp at his side. His wetsuit was torn; Caroline saw the gash in his shoulder. Dan swam to his side, held him steady. Caroline held out her arms, tried to help as first Sam and then Joe were hauled onto the deck. People flew to the wheelhouse, then came back with blankets.

  “He was trying to save me,” Joe said, looking from Caroline to Sam. “He was just trying to pull me out of the way.”

  “He’s hurt bad, man,” Dan said, staring at Sam. “Losing blood fast.”

  “Coast Guard’s on the way,” Jeff called. “Sending a helicopter out right now.”

  “Sam,” Joe said, his voice cracking. The sight of his exposed wound shocked Caroline. The jagged wood had plowed through his upper arm, slicing it clear to the bone. His own face was pale, his lips blue. Joe was losing a fair amount of blood himself, but he wouldn’t leave Sam’s side.

  Someone found a towel, dabbed it against Sam’s head. Sam’s blood began pooling on the deck. The crew seemed paralyzed by their captain’s distress.

  “We need a fucking doctor,” Dan said, spitting water. “Out the fuck here at sea, sharks swimming around, and not one of us is a doctor. All these eggheads and not one of them’s a goddamn M.D.”

  “Where’s the helicopter?” a young crewmember asked, scanning the sky.

  Caroline pushed her way into the tight circle of divers. She knew first aid and she crouched down, touched Sam’s face. It felt ice cold. Her throat tightened. She thought of Redhawk Mountain, of Andrew Lockwood. The memories broke her heart, and she knew she couldn’t afford them right now.

  Caroline pulled off her white shirt. She wore a bathing suit underneath, and the breeze chilled her skin. She pressed the shirt to Sam’s head. She held it against the wound as hard as she could, feeling his hot blood soak into the fabric, forcing herself to look at his face so she wouldn’t see Andrew’s.

  “Loosen his wetsuit,” she instructed Dan and Jeff. “Cover him with the blanket and bring some more.” She felt the side of his neck for his pulse and couldn’t
find it. She knew the cut was bad, that it might have scored an artery.

  “Is he going to die?” Joe asked, his eyes red and brimming with tears.

  Caroline looked over at him. The effort of will with which Joe held himself up was enormous. His lips were a tight blue line. He had lost every trace of cool, of toughness. That emotional wariness she had observed ever since meeting him had vanished. It took a certain amount of courage to sit on deck surrounded by his men, tears rolling down his face, without wiping them away. He was hurt himself, close to passing out, but he hung on to Sam.

  The helicopter was coming. Caroline heard the engine beating, far-off and faint like hundreds of birds.

  “Is he going to die?” Joe asked again, never taking his eyes away from Caroline’s face. She had to be careful with her expression. She knew how he felt about the truth. She knew that he wouldn’t want her to lie, but she couldn’t bring herself to say what she had seen once before, what she believed to be true. So she kept her eyes steady, her lips silent.

  The tears in Caroline’s periwinkle blue eyes were the only sign, the only giveaway to tell Joe that she had watched a boy losing blood before, that the answer to his question might very well be yes.

  Breathing heavily, Augusta mounted the stairs to check on Skye. She would have admitted it to no one, not even to Caroline or Clea, but she felt finally and utterly defeated, a total failure as a mother.

  The children had been such happy little girls. She could picture them now, running through the field at twilight, catching fireflies in their cupped hands. They were in constant motion. Augusta could see them perfectly in her mind’s eye. She had sat on the porch steps, so full of love and delight, she thought she would rise like a balloon. Her daughters would dance and leap in arabesques of joy, and Augusta’s eyes would fill with tears for what she had brought to life.

  Whoever would have thought that twenty-five years later she would be checking her youngest, her darling Skye, to make sure she hadn’t harmed herself? That she wasn’t drinking straight from a bottle, that she hadn’t taken an X-acto knife to the blue veins in her delicate arms? Over a death that had occurred so many years ago?