Shining Sea

by Anne Korkeakivi

  Rufus looks up from his fire-ring construction. “I brought the herbs and onions.”

  Katie reappears with an armful of branches. She dumps them onto the ground next to Rufus. Little twigs stick in her jacket and hair. Eamon follows close behind and, adding his branches to her pile, starts snapping them in half, carefully laying them in an intricate pattern within the stone circle.

  He plucks alternating G and C chords, willing his sore fingers to work:

  Across the rolling sea,

  Pulling as one,

  Across the rolling sea

  Day not yet done…

  “What’s that?” Ghislaine says.

  “Just something I was thinking.”

  “You write your own songs?”

  He shrugs.

  Katie sits down on her life preserver on the opposite side of the circle of rocks from him and Ghislaine. She studies Ghislaine.

  “How do you get yer hair so straight?” she says.

  Ghislaine starts opening a tin. “How do you get yours so beautifully curly?”

  “It isnae beautiful,” Katie says. “It’s awful.”

  “Perms are very popular. Lots of girls are getting them in London. They’ll pay fifty quid to get hair like yours.”

  “An’ then yer arse fell aff.” Katie tears the band out of her hair, scrabbles the whole mess up in a hand, and reties it, generally making things worse, not better. “Maybe I should come down to London.”

  Everyone, even Eamon, laughs.

  “Do you like London?” he asks Eamon.

  Eamon shrugs.

  “Do you live there?”

  “Nay,” Eamon says. “Kent.”

  “Eamon works on my parents’ estate,” Rufus says. “He’s on the garden staff.”

  “But your family’s back in Northern Ireland?” he asks.

  “Aye.” Eamon shrugs and stands up. “Gotta take a slash.”

  “Eamon’s father is UVF,” Rufus says once Eamon has lumbered down the road, looking for a shielded spot to pee. “In the Maze, doing a seven-year sentence.”

  “UVF?”

  Ghislaine and Katie look at each other.

  “Ulster Volunteer Force. It’s a loyalist paramilitary group in the north.” Rufus strikes a match and holds it against the driftwood. “Eamon’s father blew up a car driven by a Catholic bringing her kid to visit her granny.”

  “Holy shit.” He stares down the road. “Why’s he here, then?”

  “Because his father blew up a car with a Catholic and her kid in it.”

  The flames grow steadily. Rufus’s red cheeks shine even brighter in its light. Katie’s hair glints even more copper. A piece of driftwood explodes, and he pulls his guitar back. “I thought Eamon was your second Catholic,” he says. “Ghislaine’s not Catholic. Katie’s too young to be an official crew member. Anyhow, she’s representing Iona, not a denomination. Who’s the other so-called Catholic on the boat?”

  “I am,” Rufus says.

  “How can you be Catholic?”

  “What’s that supposed to mean?”

  “Never mind.”

  “There are some of us, Francis. Cromwell didn’t get us all.”

  “I didn’t mean that. Just that…you know, nothing.”

  “Right. Nothing.”

  Ghislaine settles next to him. “Where is your family, Francis?”

  It’s not as though he’s some sort of idiot. Anyone would agree it’s confusing: Ghislaine is French but Protestant; Rufus is a British posh but Catholic. Eamon is Irish but Protestant. At least Katie is what one would expect. She’s sitting on the other side of the fire, chewing off a fingernail, scowling at him. She took offense at his calling her too young to be official, undoubtedly.

  “The States,” he tells Ghislaine.

  “Do you see them often?”

  Six years ago, a girl he was crashing with in Paris suggested they busk in front of the Louvre. C’est parfait. All the world goes there.

  She was right. Even his oldest brother.

  Mike was on his honeymoon. I didn’t know we had family in Europe, his bride said with a heavy Texas accent, looking confused, glancing at his open guitar case with its smattering of francs and the raccoon-eyed girl beside him.

  I didn’t know, either, Mike said. What the hell, Francis? Mom has been going nuts.

  Language, honey, Mike’s bride said.

  Her name was Holly, and she was an army brat, met while Mike was finishing his medical training in Texas after his last tour in Southeast Asia. My daddy was part of the liberation of Paris in 1944, Holly said, babbling, while he and Mike sized each other up. Who knew what she’d been told about him. I grew up looking at the pictures—the big stone arch, all the men spilling over that big avenue. My dad was one of them, told me Paris was so beautiful even after being through the war that someday I needed to go see for myself. I’ll go for my honeymoon, I always said. So here we are!

  Mike folded his arms over his chest. Mom and I thought Canada—with the draft dodgers. Patty Ann said Thailand. Only Sissy thought Europe.

  I didn’t dodge the draft. Remember? I didn’t get called up.

  Exactly. Don’t you think Mom has lost enough family already? Couldn’t you have at least let her know where you were? That you’re alive?

  You’re right, he said, hoping this would be enough, knowing it wouldn’t. Yeah, I should have let her know.

  All she’s got left are me and Sissy.

  This frightened him. What about Patty Ann? What about Ronnie?

  Okay, and Ronnie. God knows what Mom would do without Ronnie. But Patty Ann—forget it. At least she got rid of that bastard. Mike squints and places his hands on either hip. Did you even know she’s divorced again? And had a fourth kid? Hang on. Did you even know she remarried? Goddamn, Francis. Your own sister.

  It was like being buried alive in sand. All this…life, suddenly dumped on top of him.

  Look, let me go put my guitar away and get cleaned up. We’ll talk over dinner.

  Mike unfolded his arms and grabbed his wrist. No fucking way. I’m not letting you out of my sight.

  He couldn’t remember having ever heard Mike curse before. Luke, yes. Patty Ann, always. This was a new, tougher Mike, one whose staid determination had morphed into something steel-like and enduring. Or maybe it was a reflection of just how angry Mike was. His bride’s hands fluttered nervously at her blond ponytail, touched the little gold cross on a chain around her neck, like this was an unknown Mike to her also.

  Dinner—oh, we’ve eaten some strange things since we got here. But the pastries! Holly said to no one in particular.

  He stared down at Mike’s strong hand, wrapped tightly around his arm, stared at it until Mike let go.

  Don’t be ridiculous, he said. I’m a grown man now. You can’t pick me up and carry me home if I don’t want. Why would I run off?

  They made a plan to meet at 8:00 p.m.—They eat so late here! his new sister-in-law said, but it’s okay…y’all know, the jet lag—and in the back of his new sister-in-law’s guidebook he wrote out detailed instructions on how to get from Mike’s hotel to a nice but not too snails-and-frog-legs restaurant he felt sure they would like. Then he kissed the raccoon-eyed girl good-bye and hitched a ride to Spain.

  Ghislaine has piled flatbread on a plate. He helps himself. “Not much,” he says. “I haven’t seen my family in a while. Haven’t those beans jumped around enough in that pot? I’m starving.”

  “Voyez? He can’t wait for that French haute cuisine.” She slaps his hand.

  Rufus pitches a stump at the fire. “Watch out you don’t burn yourself.”

  “You’re going to get ash in our beautiful dinner,” Ghislaine says.

  Rufus sits down on the other side of Ghislaine, a small bottle of whiskey in his hand. Katie looks on with interest as he reaches over Ghislaine for it and takes a sip.

  “Don’t even think about it,” he says to her.

  “What a spoilsport,” Katie says. �
�You of all people.”

  “What’s that supposed to mean?”

  Rufus waves a hand. “Peace, everyone. Francis, you’ve never said how old you are.”

  “Thirty-one. Almost thirty-two.” His birthday will be in less than two weeks.

  “So you were about twelve? Thirteen? When you lost your father, I mean.”

  He takes a second tug from the bottle and hands it back. “I was nine.”

  Ghislaine stops spooning beans onto tin plates. “I’m sorry. That’s young.”

  He shrugs. “I lost a brother, too. In Vietnam. And a friend. My best friend.”

  Rufus nods sympathetically. Ghislaine rests her hand on his shoulder and gently rubs it.

  Here he is on some island off the coast of Scotland—he can’t even remember which one right now—with these people he barely knows, and he’s telling them all this stuff he never tells anyone. He, of all people, doesn’t deserve anyone’s sympathy. Especially not if they knew how he lost his best friend, that he was with him that very night. That maybe, if he were stronger, if he were better, if he had only been listening, he might not have lost his best friend at all.

  “Isn’t anyone else hungry?” he says, moving his shoulder out from under Ghislaine’s hand.

  They gobble down Ghislaine’s meal and brush their teeth at the side of the road. “Right,” Rufus says. “We have another early start tomorrow.”

  The others withdraw into the bothy. But the sky is still light, he had that nap earlier, and talking about his family—just thinking about them—has awakened something long dormant in him that doesn’t want to lie down again. He stays outside, staring at the sea, the rolling waves, the swallowing expanse. Birds fly off into that void, some alone, some in pairs. The odd thing about the sea is, its huge expanse means freedom to some and emptiness to others.

  He extracts the book of Greek mythology from his plastic barrel and opens it to the words his brother Luke penned once, years ago, on the back flap.

  Good luck to you, father stranger; if anything has been said amiss may the winds blow it away with them, and may heaven grant you a safe return…

  Ghislaine appears in the doorway of the bothy. “What are you reading?” She sits down beside him.

  He closes the book. “Nothing.”

  The sun is finally setting, falling over the line of the Atlantic. There are haddock and mackerel and even whales out there, some heading west toward America.

  “I was telling you about my family earlier,” he says.

  “Yes.”

  “Well, my father died of a heart condition from being a prisoner of war during World War II. And my brother—he was killed in Vietnam.”

  “That’s terrible. War is terrible.”

  “But my friend. He killed himself. After he got back from Vietnam.”

  He waits for her to ask why. She doesn’t. Instead she takes his hand. The skin on her fingers is hard and calloused but warm.

  “He said something to me. Before.” He pauses, remembering that gentle late August night, the full moon rising. Eugene in his stupid blue coveralls with GENE written on them when no one had ever called him Gene in his life. “He said: I knew I was going to get called up. And you wouldn’t be. I knew I’d be the one to get a low number.”

  And he recognized, when Eugene said it, that he also had always known this was how it would happen, just like all the good luck that had come his way but not Eugene’s. But he brushed the thought right out of his head. Instead, he said: That’s just stupid, man. You’re just talking bullshit.

  Eugene had lost his one special gift. Hope.

  He lets go of Ghislaine’s hand. “We should get some sleep.”

  He unrolls his sleeping bag inside the bothy and slips inside. The late night sun, the currach, the moon rising over the Hebrides.

  “Bonne nuit,” Ghislaine says softly, sliding into her own bag.

  He pulls the flap of his sleeping bag over his head.

  * * *

  Rufus’s alarm rings before the moon has gone to sleep and the sun has awakened. It’s cold, and in the damp and insinuating air, last night feels like a nasty dream physically stuck to him. His legs itch; the space between them and his crotch, the front of his thighs, his ankles, the back of his neck and hollow of his back. Maybe it’s the salt from his brief swim two days earlier or from the sweat of rowing or the combination. He hasn’t bathed since leaving Iona. No one has. They take their places in the currach under the moon, pick up their oars, and head into the sound. Once so shiny, Ghislaine’s straight hair, in front of him, has self-sectioned into clumps.

  “Don’t get too close to me,” she says from her bench.

  “You’re going to keep your arms down when you row?”

  “Nice.”

  They slip through silky black water. At least it is calm; yesterday’s tempestuous sea is as hard to imagine as winter’s cold is during the summer. An otter paddles by, the struggling fish in its mouth catching silver in the moonshine. They pass an entire colony of seals lined up along a strip of sand, one slick fat body squeezed next to another. Two pups thump their way down into the water.

  “Did you know, Francis,” Rufus says, “that the male Atlantic seal mates with up to ten different females during their mating season?”

  “Oh, for Christ’s sake.”

  “You think you might be a selkie?”

  “Shut up, Rufus.”

  If Rufus keeps this up, their next stop may be his last. Leaving is one of his best-honed skills, after all. They’re supposed to berth in Port Ellen, at the bottom of Islay. There’s bound to be a ferry from there to somewhere. Katie can make the final stretch in his place.

  The sun begins to rise. They enter the Sound of Islay and let the tidal race take hold of the boat. Suddenly, they are moving so quickly the currach is nearly slipping out from under them. The compulsion is strangely exhilarating, half frightening and half thrilling. They speed by the island of Jura on one side and Islay on the other, passing a handful of larger boats whose captains toot their horns.

  The sound throws them out into the sea, and they have to start working again. It’s becoming a fine day; once they are out of the tidal race, the sea is royal blue and slack. Any bad feeling he may have had evaporates with their mutual strokes. Dig and pull, dig and pull. For the moment, there’s only rowing across the water. He unwraps sandwiches with the others, joins Rufus in a string of weirdly chosen songs. They pass Ghislaine’s tube of ChapStick around, smearing it over their burned, broken lips. A pod of dolphins follows them for a while, and Rufus points out an eagle soaring over the water in the distance.

  “You’re dreamin’, man,” Katie says. “That’s a skua.”

  “Come on, Francis,” Rufus says. “You have the eyesight. You tell her.”

  “Tell her what? I wouldn’t know a skua or an eagle if I saw one.”

  “Are its wings straight across and thick like a glider plane or curved?”

  “I dunno. Straight, I guess.”

  “Ha!” Rufus says.

  “He doesn’t know his arse from his elbow,” Katie says. “He wouldna know if it were a sheep flyin’.”

  “I’d know if it were a sheep. It’s not a sheep or a cow. It’s not a goat, either.”

  Slowly the day has become beautiful. His hands are raw, but his body feels awake in a way it hasn’t since longer ago than he can remember.

  His mind feels awake also. He feels strangely, inexplicably free. Inexplicably, because here he is, tied, almost literally, to these others.

  Dig, pull, dig, pull.

  They reach Port Ellen five hours later in a stream of sunshine. The harbor comes into view, low-lying and flat, rimmed with a string of white and gray peaked houses.

  As soon as they hit the shallows, Katie jumps out of the boat. “I’m away for a bath.” She grabs her small barrel and sloshes onto the beach. A border collie runs up to greet her.

  “Where?” Ghislaine calls, tucking her oars along the floor of the c
urrach, grabbing her own barrel and taking off after Katie.

  The rest of them climb out of the currach also. Eamon drags the boat to the edge of the sand and ties it to a low pier. Rufus sorts out the oars, then faces back out over the sea and hoots. “Just one more leg. We’re going to make it by Columba’s Day.”

  “Rufus,” he says.

  “Yes.”

  “Can I ask you something, man?”

  “Fire away.”

  “Why is this so important to you? I mean, why this?”

  Rufus crouches down on his haunches and, removing his rowing gloves, runs his hand over the black coating on the boat’s bottom. “Any war affects all of us. We’re the common family of man.” His short, strong fingers crawl over the bitumen, inspecting its surface, pushing, poking, prodding.

  If it can handle the weather in England, it can handle the sea. Like an advertising slogan.

  “Holy shit,” he says. “The material you got Katie’s father to use on the boat—the bitumen. Are you making money off it? Is this, like, one big advertisement we’re risking our fucking lives for?”

  Rufus continues to explore the state of the bitumen, showing no sign of having heard. “She’s doing just fine, she is.”

  He kicks the side of the boat. “Do you have shares in the company? Are they paying you something to use it?”

  “Francis,” Rufus says, standing, turning now to face him. “What are you going to do with your life to make up for those who have lost theirs? Like your father, your brother, your friend?”

  “Fuck,” he says. “Fuck.”

  The high of the morning comes crashing down on him. Has Rufus been lying to him this whole time? Is he the only one of the others to realize it? Just how much is one person supposed to take? Measure it out, toss the moon, the earth, the sun up in the air and juggle them, throw this person together with that—his whole life has been spent trying to catch balls someone else tossed up when they came tumbling down again. Did he ever say he knew how to catch? Did anyone ever ask him? Why does everyone always expect so much from him?

  He shoves Rufus’s barrel-like chest with both his palms. Rufus flies backwards onto the sand, narrowly missing the side of the boat.

  Eamon’s broad arms swiftly wrap around him. “Enough of that, ye.”