Water Lessons

by Chadwick Wall

  Jim's stare seared into the panorama of dancing waves, soaring gulls, and the two disappearing vessels. He breathed the smells of the Atlantic seaweed and shoreline breeze, brinier and stronger than that of the Pacific.

  Though his ears were vexed every few moments by a taxicab's horn, a tire's screech, or a passerby's chatter, his thoughts drifted inward. His mind returned to that day the August before, a day bright and resplendent. Yet the Seventeenth Street Canal levee had ruptured, yielding to the hideous and ravishing invasion of the coffee-brown waters kept at bay by man's weak hand for decades.

  Jim shuddered, envisioning the brackish waves of Lake Pontchartrain, waters that had been a friend to him in his boyhood, as they gushed into his New Orleans neighborhood with the fierce dark finality of death itself.

  Jim slid open the door. The hiss and spattering of the shower reminded him that his girlfriend was bent on attending the party. Steam wafted into the room, as the bathroom door had swung ajar. Jim walked to his bed and allowed himself to fall backwards onto it. This time no majestic ship appeared in his sights. The fan churned above, and he recalled the National Guard medevac chopper that lifted him off his roof three days after the levees broke. Once more, he saw Freddy Beasley lifeless on the roof below him.

  How far he had come in the last few months toward achieving his new dream to rebuild his life in New England. Working odd jobs in New Hampshire for his move down to Boston, where he landed a nice place. Excelling at his new job as a broker. Meeting Maureen.

  He wondered if he could ever feel completely at home in New England. Would he ever return to Louisiana? Maureen had said on their first date she would consider moving one day to New Orleans. She had attended Tulane after all, though he had never known her in those years.

  Jim descended into a deep sleep. Soon he was sailing somewhere out on the Atlantic on a bright day. Then there was a bright flash of light and he sank down, down, down into the depths of the ocean toward the sea floor like a stone. Death was near as he spied the sailboat far above him in the rays of light piercing the waves.

  CHAPTER EIGHT

  "Jim sells investments at Dad's firm in the Hancock Tower. He's been over there since November. Daddy invited Jim to the Cape one weekend to get him into sails. That's how we met, you might remember."

  Maureen exalted his latest social rank to a young couple he did not recognize, but whom she knew from her lab job at Massachusetts General Hospital. Jim was resigned to let her do most of the talking. In the distance, joggers on the grassy Esplanade headed across the Charles to Cambridge beyond.

  "I've heard of you from Maureen," said the young redheaded woman with a pinched expression, the same look of pity he had often received in his past seven months in New England. Such looks once touched him, but they could often precede some rather bruising Bostonian sarcasm.

  "The Louisiana guy! I'm Heidi," she reached out and shook his hand. Jim's father had taught him as a boy to wait until a woman offered her hand. But in Boston a man tried to shake hands as readily with women as with men. "And this is Chris, my boyfriend."

  Chris was tall and lanky with a droopy-eyed, bloodhound expression. His skin was strikingly pale and his jet-black hair was slicked back neatly. Jim shook his hand. "I like your place, the view!"

  "You were down there for Katrina, weren't you?" Heidi said, her blue eyes narrowing, her chin slightly lifting and then tilting to the side.

  "I was," Jim mumbled.

  Heidi shifted her weight on her feet and took a step forward. "That must have been insane. You rode out the storm there?"

  "Or did you evacuate?" her boyfriend said.

  After a brief pause, Jim stepped into that brutal chill for the thousandth time. Discussing the storm pained him and he abhorred how his eyes would often mist over. Many inquirers had been caring, but some sought merely to quench their curiosity.

  "I was living in New Orleans at the time. I rode it out in the city for various reasons. Actually, I grew up about forty miles north of the city. Li'l town called Folsom. Two weeks after the storm, I bought a one-way ticket from Baton Rouge to New Hampshire. Liam, an old college buddy of mine, lives there."

  "Wow," Chris said. His bloodhound eyes widened down at him.

  "That was surreal, I bet, totally surreal," Heidi said, "even to watch on TV."

  "You could only imagine. One day, I know I'll write it for posterity."

  "Yes, Maureen tells us you are a writer," Heidi said. "You should definitely write—"

  "What I've always wanted to ask, though, for the longest time," Chris said, "honestly, why did you guys live at the bottom of a bowl? Below sea level? I mean, my God!"

  "Yes! That… and what's with… I mean, those scenes at that Convention Center and the Superdome and all," Heidi shook her hands for emphasis, "and people lifted off of roofs. All those African-Americans… how do you phrase it? They aren't even educated down there… or given jobs, which just compounds their desperation."

  Chris said, "I mean, you have to admit, it's like a third world country down there. It's like Haiti or El Salvador… crossed with Savannah. Maybe with some inner city Baltimore thrown in."

  Jim had heard each of these observations before, although Heidi's was slightly more original.

  He looked down at his feet. A hundred scenes from the storm and its wicked aftermath coursed through his mind. For some reason, in the untamable expanse of his imagination, Jim saw his father's face staring at him, with its deep grey-eyed pathos, the brooding brow, and the ruddy liquor-ravaged cheeks, the impression throughout being one of wounded but deeply striving obstinacy. Jim's stomach sank as he then recalled the age-creased face of Freddy Beasley, the bloodshot whites of his eyes bulging with fear as Jim leapt off the roof.

  Jim's knees weakened and his eyes watered. The empty glass of Chardonnay slipped from his clammy grasp and shattered on the balcony floor. He felt the eyes of those behind the open sliding door fix onto him.

  Maureen, silent for the last minute, shot to his side. She put one hand on his chest, one on his back, her usually expressionless dark brown eyes full of deep concern.

  "Jimmy, are you okay? Don't listen to them."

  Jim lunged forward through Maureen's embrace and grabbed the lapels of Chris' sports coat.

  "Hey! Cool off!" Chris said as Heidi tried to wedge herself between the two men. Maureen tried to tug Jim back toward the sliding door.

  "Arrogant pissant!" Jim yelled up at the man's face. A woman screamed inside the apartment, and startled voices got louder behind him.

  Chris shoved back at Jim's shoulders, his once-pale face now flushed, his sad eyes now offended and outraged. Jim stumbled backward, but his western boots regained their footing.

  "Get a hold of yourself, man!" Chris yelled. "Damn! What did I say to you?"

  Maureen shouted for them to stop. She swiveled around and wedged herself along with the shrieking Heidi in front of the two men. Chris had frozen, a puzzled look dominating his features. Jim turned and walked slowly through the crowd.

  "What's your deal, man?" Heidi said. "Psychotic… hick from Louisiana!"

  Jim headed through the door and headed down the stairwell. He thought Maureen uttered an apology or an accusation to the couple, he knew not which. Another female voice, not Maureen's, exclaimed, "post-traumatic stress disorder" as he reached the top of the wooden stairwell. Soon Maureen was behind him as he descended the wooden stairs with long, deep thuds.

  Jim panted as he marched down Marlborough Street between the two rows of brownstones. Maureen caught up to him, her face angled up into his, the eyes of cerulean blue suddenly bloodshot, showing hurt.

  Jim halted and glanced back down the street. Nobody had chosen to pursue them. "I wish you could see your expression, Maureen. Like it's my fault."

  "Those two were being crass, but you didn't have to get physical."

  "Maureen, what do you know? You brought me into that lair, probably knowing they're like that. How hospitable! Your friends
from work ended up insulting me right to my face, and in front of you! Not to mention they meet someone who, they learned from you, almost died down there in that damned hurricane and—and they look me in the face and unload their racially patronizing, skewed views about my city. I'm goddamned sick of hearing people say these things."

  "Oh, Jim. Come—"

  "No mention of the city's world-renowned cuisine, its jazz, the traditions. No, it's only a third-world backwater at the bottom of a bowl. 'At least we educate our African Americans,' your lovely girlfriend tells me! As if she'd say that on national television."

  "I'm sorry, Jim. Look, you're right. Those two can be pretty bad."

  Jim had slowed to a normal pace, cooled by Maureen's conciliation. Her hand grasped his. He closed his eyes and released a deep breath. They had argued and disagreed often as of late but in his heart he knew he still wanted to be with her. It wasn't just the porcelain face with its long lashes and brilliant smile and her five-feet-nine-inches of lean yet womanly curve. It wasn't just that unique mix he loved—the face of some Victorian doll seasoned with a dash of the Native American, especially around the eyes. It wasn't just that visage which reminded him of a masklike yet intriguing face rendered in some Modigliani painting. There was her strong education, her ready wit.

  Maureen Henretty held many of the trappings and qualities of a keeper. She came from an even worldlier background and upbringing than his own. She reminded him he had arrived. And she was open to moving down south.

  "You know, I know most of y'all aren't like that couple up there. There've been many caring New Englanders who never have seen the Gulf Coast and have given so much. I've known several. And I always wanted to live at least for a time in the Northeast, even since I was a boy. It's just I suspect it may be all too different for me up here, as nice as it is. Take that couple—a bit too direct for my taste."

  "I just don't think I could leave my parents and my grandparents, I've been thinking more and more," Maureen said.

  Jim pretended he did not hear. Her comment jarred greatly with what she had repeated in their two months together. He wiped his cheeks with the palms of his hands.

  "You know, Maureen," Jim said, "this is the prettiest street in all of Back Bay. This and a couple of the older ones on Beacon Hill, like Acorn Street, are just amazing. These lanterns and cobblestones remind me of the old French Quarter. The brownstones on this street were built by the Irish twenty years after the Civil War. This used to be all marsh, until they drained it. Gravel was brought in every hour by train to help with the foundation."

  "I know," Maureen gave her frequent reply.

  He hated how self-important she could sound, but to his embarrassment, he often repeated the same stories.

  "You know, James, two of those men were my great-grandfathers."

  He wanted to let a little pomp and seriousness out of her. "Maureen… Irish? But I thought you were a Boston Brahmin through and through."

  She shot him an icy glance.

  "Just joshin' ya, sweet thing." He grabbed her around the shoulders, pulled her to him, and slapped a wet kiss on her baby-skinned cheek.

  "Now I'm hungry.” Maureen sounded like a ruined child.

  Jim laughed.

  "Let's walk up to Legal Sea Foods and have some oysters. I'll have some wine, and you can have some of your beloved Harpoon or Sam Adams or whatever, and we can actually enjoy our Sunday again."

  Jim sighed. "I couldn't argue with that. But I just… I just don't see how you could be friends with a couple like that back there. Maybe we're two very different people."

  Jim and Maureen remained silent as they walked to the restaurant. He wondered if he had made the wrong decision, pursuing her.

  CHAPTER NINE

  Mondays were always particularly trying at the Henretty & Henretty brokerage. From the outset at seven-thirty, Jim slogged through the morning, counting the hours until lunchtime. Then he could enjoy twenty or thirty pleasant minutes, but a building dread of the second half of the workday often filled the remainder of the lunch hour.

  Jim could not let slip this secret, either in his face or by confiding to a fellow broker.

  Maureen's father, Walter, was the chief executive and owner, as Walter's late father had been.

  To reveal his true ennui and disappointment would endanger his employment and his courtship of Walter's daughter. Jim even balked at the thought of showing the slightest ingratitude to the venerable old man.

  Jim had first met Walter on Boylston at Abe and Louie's Steakhouse one Tuesday afternoon after the markets had closed. At the dark-oak-and-mirror-backed bar, Walter introduced himself. The old man posed a thousand questions as to Jim's experiences during and after the great storm. He also learned much about Jim's struggle as a fledgling writer.

  Jim wowed his new friend with the breadth of his knowledge of Scotch whisky and military trivia, unleashing the latter once he learned Walter was a retired Navy Commodore who had served in Korea and Vietnam. After hearing of Jim's certifications and his year at the New Orleans branch of New York Life, Walter offered Jim the new opening at his firm. To his amusement, Jim often wondered which he feared more: disappointing the old man or his daughter.

  Those first few minutes after the market opened were like any of the eighteen or so Mondays Jim had endured since his first day at the brokerage in early November. He had seen all the other twenty brokers and the president/floor manager and the IT tech and the HR lady but still there was no sign of Walter Henretty.

  The old man lived in Osterville on the southern shore of Cape Cod and owned a townhouse in Louisburg Square in Beacon Hill a few doors down from Senator Kerry. But most of Walter's days were spent on the Cape, and he had a driver take him up to check on his brokerage perhaps twice a week. Regardless, Walter always made a point of popping in each Monday.

  The old seafarer rose each Monday long before dawn to inspire his officers and deckhands as they set off into battle. The Commodore would saunter in with some inspiring or even hilarious exclamation, platitude, or dance, and the floor would unleash a cheer every time. But this ritual always occurred before the markets opened. Still there was no sign of Walter and it was nearing eleven o'clock.

  Jim dialed away, trying his utmost to reach a client, all the while staring out the window. Jim had earned one of the cubicles against the glass, the Henretty & Henretty version of a window office. He could take in the broad view of the Boston Common with its famed Frog Pond, the lush Public Gardens, the Financial District and Beacon Hill, some of Boston Harbor, the northern periphery of South Boston and the Four Points Channel.

  Even better was the view belonging to the president and floor boss, Walter's younger brother Dewey. Foremost was the magnificent view in Walter's own office. From inside, one could see the Charles, Cambridge, MIT, the Victorian brownstones, and strolling shoppers of Back Bay, the well-landscaped Esplanade, the Commonwealth Avenue Bridge, and the oldest neighborhood in the city, Beacon Hill.

  As he held the phone's receiver to his ear, Jim stood and pushed his face against the window. His client did not answer. Jim left a message, pondering as to whether he would remain in his recently attained position at the brokerage. While he was not the broker with the greatest book of business or revenue over the last five months, he showed the greatest increase in monthly sales. At this rate, he may very well make partner in the firm, or at least manager, if he didn't burn out soon in sales.

  Jim was searching for another number in the database when his desk phone rang. The caller ID displayed Maureen's number.

  "Hey, sweet girl," Jim said.

  "All right, James Scoresby. Where do I begin?"

  "Should I be sittin' down for this one?"

  "Don't make plans for this weekend. There's a surprise."

  "Ah, surprises, my favorite! Sounds good, baby. I'll count on—"

  "Jim, I told you to stop calling me baby."

  Jim sighed.

  "Anyway, you'll see what I'm talking a
bout. I think this week will end as a good one. Now, gotta run. I've been corralled into grabbing lunch with Yoshi and the girls from the lab."

  At that moment a great laughter-tinged cheer erupted inside the entire fifty-eighth floor of the Hancock Tower. Jim said a quick goodbye to Maureen. He stood and faced with growing expectation the main entrance to the trading floor. Every broker stood. A few clapped as Walter Henretty, two inches over six feet, lithe, and decked in his usual power suit, crossed the threshold with a flourish.

  Walter pumped his arms above him as Jim had seen Mardi Gras kings do on their parade floats. He laughed and extended an index finger on each fist. "Top o' the mornin' to you all, good ladies and gents!" he bellowed in his thick Massachusetts accent.

  The old man carried much charisma. It just flowed out of him, and Walter would be loved and admired by most even if he was not a man of power or position.

  "Okay, you guys!" the old man said. "I just wanted to congratulate everyone for a great March. Now we're well into April and a few of you in particular are still up to a terrific performance. I'd like to give my special congratulations to Jimmy Scoresby for the most accounts opened in the month. Jimmy came all the way from the lazy bayous of Louisiana to remind us Bostonian workaholics how to work our tails off. Keep it up, my boy!" The old man led a round of applause all across the floor.

  Jim looked down at his wingtips. He didn't even notice the next two names mentioned. He had once again begun a round of daydreaming, this time a blissful reverie on his last few months of rebounding and his golden future in New England.

  The old man tied up his rally with a quick history Jim had heard months ago. Walter recounted his retirement from the Navy near the end of the Vietnam War. He had assumed control of the brokerage house from his retiring father and loosely managed it ever since, coaching certain brokers to great wealth.