All for a Sister

by Allison Pittman

  “This is beautiful,” she said, her words increasingly inadequate with each ascending step.

  “Thank you. It is important for me to be able to get away from the city. I keep an apartment close to the studio, but I prefer to be out here most of the time. Lets me think.”

  Ozzie raced back and forth in front, as if tugging them up.

  “And you have a dog.”

  “I do.”

  “I don’t have much experience with them. Is it a boy or a girl?”

  “She’s a she, a Welsh corgi, and always so excited when we have a visitor. I think she gets bored with my company.”

  “I doubt you have any shortage of visitors.” Dana might not have known much of the world, but she was quickly learning, and a man as handsome as Werner with an isolated house on the beach was bound to have his fair share of visitors. The thought of it awakened a sort of privileged fear, making her wonder if she should have been more specific in the note she left for Celeste.

  The walkway ended at a wooden deck that jutted out from the house to a free suspension over the beach below. On it, a table was set with a flapping white cloth, held in place by a feast. A platter of fruit—melon and strawberries arranged around a dish of cream—a platter of scones, and a silver carafe.

  “I made the scones myself,” Werner said. “One of my other many talents. My grandmother’s recipe.”

  Dana fought to hide her amusement. Never had she seen him with anything less than perfected, cool control, and here he was, fidgeting, as if seeking her approval. “It all looks lovely,” she said, allowing him to pull out her chair.

  As they ate, he talked about the house, listing details of history and architecture, seeming to know every stone personally, intimately acquainted with every beam. “We’ll take a tour after we eat. Not much of a tour—it’s not a large house; but you’ll see how the ceiling . . .”

  Distracted by the surf, she heard very little of what he said. Its rhythmic pounding drew her, and she found herself gazing over the railing, food forgotten on her plate.

  Werner’s voice broke through. “It is hypnotic, isn’t it?”

  “I never could have imagined such a thing.”

  “Come.” He stood, wiped imaginary crumbs from his chin with his napkin, and crossed to her seat. “Let me show you something.”

  An instinctual fear gripped her, digging through layers of naiveté, and she reached for her coffee. “I’m not quite finished here. The scones are exquisite. I might like to have another.”

  “They will wait. I promise.”

  Dana gave in to her trust and took his hand as he led her from the table and through a paned-glass door. The room inside looked to be an extension of the ocean itself. The walls were made of stone and wood, left to their natural textures, with abstract paintings of cool blues and grays bringing in an extension of the sky. One wall was pure glass, giving the impression that one could walk right out without the benefit of any open door—an idea she found both fascinating and frightening.

  A spiraling staircase rose right up in the middle of the room, and it was to this that he led her, sending Ozzie scampering up first.

  “Go on,” Werner urged. “I promise that Ozzie will defend your honor.”

  More at ease following the dog than its owner, Dana climbed, arriving at a loft that overlooked the living area below. To the left, she saw a bed—his bed—neatly made with a woven blanket of bright design stretched over its expanse. Masculine, without a hint of lace or ruffle and, to her utter shock and shame, utterly inviting. Pausing, she sent a quick prayer of repentance, followed by one for protection from both her thoughts and his intentions.

  “Other way,” he said from behind her, his voice both reassuring and amused. “Follow Ozzie.”

  The little dog had scampered to a door identical to the one downstairs, to the right of the landing. She stood on her back legs, pawing at the knob, until Dana opened it onto a balcony that wrapped around the corner of the house, stretching higher, and farther still from the one below, where her coffee was growing cold.

  “Go on,” Werner urged. “Step out.”

  She did, and it was like stepping on sky. Only a waist-high railing, formed from uniquely twisted driftwood, stood between Dana and the vastness of creation. The ocean stretched forever. To the left and right, nothing but sand and water. And sky—always and everywhere, the sky.

  “Doesn’t it make you feel small?” Though he stood close by, his words whipped to her on the wind.

  She shook her head. “No. I know what it is to feel small. This . . . I feel as big as creation. Look.” She reached out her hand. “I’m touching the horizon. I’m a titan.”

  “So you’re not afraid?”

  “No.” She didn’t dare turn around. If she looked at him, she would be.

  A gust kicked up and threatened to blow her hat clean off her head, and she clutched at it, laughing. “Well, maybe I should be.”

  He laughed too and held his hand out. “Give it to me.” She did, and to her amazement, he squatted and held it out to Ozzie, who clamped it gently in her mouth, barely able to keep the brim above the ground. Werner snapped his fingers twice and said, “Put it away” in a commanding voice, at which Ozzie ran off, taking Dana’s hat with her.

  “What did you just do? Celeste is going to kill me.”

  He stood. “Relax. It will be safe in a basket with some of her other toys. It was easier to teach her a trick than to run around picking up after her all the time. She’s very tidy.”

  Dana ran her fingers through her hair, imagining how wild she must look now, and turned her attention back to the view, feeling brave enough to brace herself on the railing and lean out a little.

  “There was a woman named Effie,” she said, feeling him take his place beside her, “who used to give me little gifts sometimes. Once, she gave me an alarm clock so I could wind it up and hear the ticking. I used to keep it stuffed between my mattress and the wall to muffle the sound. Not because it bothered me; really it was comforting, somewhat. But to smooth it out, like I was spreading out each tick and tock, running the minutes into each other. Make the time go faster.”

  Werner said nothing, but moved his arm closer to hers. Not touching, but closer. Had she not been watching, she never would have known.

  “Later, she brought me a seashell, this big.” She held out her cupped hand. “Said if I put it to my ear, I could hear the ocean.”

  “And did you?”

  “I tried. But then, how would I know for sure? I’d never heard an ocean before. And from what I could tell, it wasn’t any different from covering my ears with my hands. But I tried.”

  “Now that you’ve heard the ocean, is it the same?”

  “No.”

  “Are you sure? Maybe when you go home, you should get your shell and try again.”

  “I don’t have it anymore.” She opted not to tell him of the drunken prostitute who’d taken it in exchange for silence. It wouldn’t do to introduce such ugliness into this moment.

  “Then perhaps we should go for a walk on the beach and find another for you to take to Celeste. A memento.”

  She looked up to find him studying her profile, filling her vision with nothing but water and sky and him. “I’d like that.”

  It didn’t seem possible, but he moved closer still, aided by the hand he placed at the small of her back. “It is important for you to know how much I have come to care for you, Dana. Do you believe me?”

  She gave a small nod, careful not to bring her lips any closer to his.

  “Whatever happens, after today, understand that you have become something special to me. And I wonder if, at all, you might care for me in the same way?”

  If not for the feeling of the railing in her grip, she might have thought she’d drifted straight off into the sky. She wanted this moment to stretch to the horizon and back while her heart thundered with the surf, but the only truthful answer might bring her clattering to the sand.

 
“I—I don’t honestly know how I feel.” Immediately she felt a change in his embrace. Not a release, but a subtle retreat. “You’re handsome, and interesting. But you know I’ve never—”

  “I know.”

  “Talked to a man. Or driven in a car, or had coffee, or listened to the ocean, or—”

  Her list was silenced by his kiss, soft and salty as the air, but nowhere near endless.

  “I plan to do that again,” he said, drawing away, “when I can be reasonably sure that we are not merely objects of one another’s curiosity. Will that be all right with you?”

  “Yes.” Her heart ticked like the clock, and again she wished for time to speed by.

  “Good.” He seemed genuinely pleased. “Now, how about a swim?”

  She looked down at her dress.

  “I have an abundance of bathing costumes. Go back downstairs—the outside stairs, I mean—and go to the right. There is a small white cabana. The ladies’ side is clearly marked.”

  “I’ve never worn a bathing costume.”

  He bent to look into her eyes. “You have to stop thinking of your life in the light of things you’ve never done. Every step is new until we take it. You are not alone in that. There was a time I’d never held a camera. A time I never spoke English. A time I never kissed a woman. Now I have done all these things.”

  She was left with the lingering wonder of how many women he’d kissed, and suspected the number might lie in the abandoned bathing costumes in the cabana below. Her wan smile invited another kiss, somehow briefer than the one before, and he released her.

  “To the right?” she asked over her shoulder before heading downstairs.

  “If you see Ozzie, just say, ‘Cabana!’ and she’ll lead you right to it.”

  Dana felt a little like Alice in Wonderland, visiting a house that grew from a rock and stretched clear to the sky, let alone talking to the animal that stole her hat. With Ozzie’s help, she managed to find the changing room—a small, white clapboard building with the Ladies and Gents sides clearly marked. Inside, she found four small booths separated by brightly striped curtains, and a row of shelving holding a dozen or more suits. She picked up the first one and held it up. With its red-and-black diamond-print top and black skirt, it looked just like one Celeste had pointed out in a fashion magazine over breakfast the day before.

  She stepped out of her shoes and stripped off her stockings, wondering about Celeste’s insistence that Dana take a razor to her legs and under her arms. “You know,” she’d said, “there comes a time when a girl’s gonna take a swim.” Did she know? Had Werner asked her permission like some gallant suitor? Whatever the prompting, she was grateful as she stepped into the suit, stretching the top over her shoulders. Funny, once she had it on, she didn’t feel any less naked than before. Her legs from midthigh were exposed, as were her shoulders and arms. Moreover, what was covered was sheathed in a fabric that seemed determined to cling to her very skin.

  She tried to imagine herself as one of those women from the magazine, standing with their chests thrust forward, arms confidently behind their backs, legs angled prettily. In fact, she struck that very pose but, certain she looked ridiculous, doubled over in a fit of giggles.

  A knock at the door. “Dana? Are you all right?”

  “Y-yes.” She composed herself. “One minute. I’m looking for socks?” She’d seen them in the magazines too. Dark ones rolled up to the knee. She pawed along the shelves, finding none, but she did discover a ruffled bathing cap hanging on a hook. That was something, at least, and she tugged it over her windblown hair.

  He was waiting when she emerged, wearing a black suit that accentuated the breadth of his shoulders in a way she could never have imagined.

  “Look at you,” he said with almost-parental approval. “You’re a natural.”

  The fear of being exposed disappeared in the pleasure of his approval, and she resisted the urge to wrap her arms around herself and disappear back into the cabana.

  He held up a basket. “I packed the rest of our breakfast, in case we get hungry. Shall we?”

  “Lead on.” She took a tentative step. “Adventure awaits.”

  They walked a little way down the shore, their steps in lazy synchronization. Waves sloshed over their feet and splashed up, cold, and she felt her entire body respond in gooseflesh.

  “It takes some getting used to, I suppose,” Werner said. “And the only way is to run straight in.”

  “I don’t think so—”

  But he’d already dropped the basket, grabbed her hand, and was dragging her at a full-out run into the ocean. Dana squealed in protest, but he would not relent, tightening his grip and lifting his legs higher as the water grew deeper, adding his own splash to the white foam, and soon she had no breath to make any sound at all. Thankfully, the water was no higher than her knees, so drowning seemed unlikely, and when he finally stopped pulling her, he turned and placed his hands on his hips.

  “What do you think?”

  “I th-think I’m f-f-f-freezing.”

  “That is because, look at you. Half in and half out. The ocean is like love, terrifying if you don’t give yourself over.”

  Before she could protest, he’d grabbed her about the waist and pulled her down. Somehow, she managed to keep her head above the water, but as she stood, spluttering, a wave crashed from behind, knocking her down again.

  Werner had the nerve to stand above her, laughing, yet he offered his hand to pull her to her feet.

  “Are you all right?” He was doing a terrible job of appearing concerned.

  She wanted to be angry, even felt like she had good reason to be, but it was far from the first time she’d been cold and wet, and never had she been under such a vast expanse of sun and sky. Here, she knew, warmth was waiting, and knowing that, she not only allowed him to help her up, she brought with her a generous, satisfying scoop of cold salt water that landed square in his face.

  From there it was a game, and Dana, thirty-two years old, found herself playing for the first time since before she could remember. They chased one another, pushed and fell and splashed. At some point, she found the chill diminished, her body warming from within. Breathless now from exertion rather than shock, she communicated in short, gasping, elated sentences until finally, collapsed on the sand, she watched as the tide came in over her toes, lapping clear up to the hem of her suit. It was then the chill came back.

  “Come,” Werner said, offering his hand one more time. He walked her back to the spot where he’d dropped the basket and reached in, producing a thick white robe.

  Effusing gratitude, she thrust her hands into the sleeves and wrapped it tight around her, cinching and tying the belt with a fat, square knot. After donning one of his own, Werner produced a thermos and two tin cups, plopped down in the sand, and commenced pouring coffee.

  “Oh, perfect,” Dana said after the first sip. She felt her body return to a comfortable temperature, aided by the warmth of the sun on her face. They sat side by side, close enough to touch, but neither making any effort to do so.

  “Perfect,” Werner echoed.

  “Where did I leave off?”

  He turned to her. “Excuse me?”

  “My story, last time we talked. Where was I?”

  “Not today.”

  “Then why did you bring me here?”

  He gestured with his coffee cup. “Drink.”

  She did, more and more, until the last drop was gone and a delicious warmth surged through her.

  “Now—” he took the cup from her—“lie back.”

  It crossed her mind to be suspicious, but she complied. He manipulated her hands, resting them on the knot of her robe, and removed the sodden bathing cap, tossing it aside. At his final instruction, she closed her eyes. The sand conformed around her body, and the only sound was the irregular rhythm of the surf, until his voice appeared at the edge of her darkness.

  “I want you to know peace. To have a moment in time whe
re your spirit is free and you are safe. To do something you may never have even dreamed of doing before.”

  “Well, you have achieved that.” Her words were slow and sleepy. “Thank you.”

  “And you will let me know when I might kiss you again?”

  She opened one eye. “I’ll let you know.”

  He heaved a sigh of mock resolve. “Then, I suppose, the only gallant thing to do now is get you back to the house, as this is far, far too tempting a tableau.”

  “Just a few more minutes,” she muttered, about to remind him that he very well knew how many years’ worth of sunshine she had to make up for, when the roar of an automobile invaded the tranquility of the moment.

  Dana sensed rapid movement beside her and heard Werner mutter a mild curse without apology.

  She struggled up to her elbows. “What is it?”

  “Not now,” he said, speaking over her toward the car, a sleek, red-and-tan machine that now sat silent in front of his house.

  “Werner?” She sat up fully and would have stood had he not clasped her hands in his, imploring.

  “Remember what I said to you earlier. That I care for you very, very much.”

  “Yes, of course. What—?”

  “And I would never do anything intentionally to hurt you. Do you believe me, darling?”

  She pulled away, saying, “You’re frightening me,” and stood just as the figure emerged from the automobile.

  Even with the distance of years and sand, she recognized him. If the car was any indication, he must be wearing a far more expensive suit, but the round, dark face hadn’t changed, and as he lifted his hand to shield his eyes from the sun, she noticed the short crop of dark curls hadn’t been allowed to grow an inch.

  “What is he doing here?”

  Werner stood beside her. “I told him one o’clock. Afternoon.”

  “You knew?” She swiveled her head between the traitor of her past and that of this present moment.

  “He has something for you.”

  “He has nothing for me!”