Where Sea Meets Sky: A Novel

by Karina Halle

  “Sure is. Where the Tasman Sea meets the Pacific Ocean. Our ancestors believed it was a very spiritual place, where the spirits jump off from this world to the next. No matter what you believe, it’s very special, very important. Tapu.”

  “Tapu,” I repeat.

  “Sacred,” he says, with a grave look in his eyes. “There is a very, very old pōhutukawa tree there at the end. The roots are where the souls slide down into the afterworld.”

  I nod, wanting to say “cool” but figuring that’s too glib of a statement for something that sounds so serious. “Sounds like we have to go,” I say, meaningfully.

  He nods. I feel like his dark eyes are trying to tell me something else but then he abruptly turns back to the TV and clicks the remote to turn it back on.

  In the end, we decide to stay only one more night at the Henares’ place. The clock is ticking and Gemma and I don’t have much time together. I’m trying to think of some way out of this, some way to lengthen my stay, to return, to take her with me, to do anything rather than let the two of us part ways. I know if we do, I’ll lose her forever.

  Our plan—well, actually, my plan, for once—is to take Mr. Orange to the Karikari Peninsula, a place that looks amazing for a few nights’ stay, all white sand coves, clear blue tropical water, and lots of privacy, then we’ll motor up to Cape Reinga, as far as you can possibly go in New Zealand, then on the way back stop by a ninety-mile beach to do some sandboarding on their massive sand dunes. We’ll come back here on the way back, drop off Mr. Orange, and then get the next bus back down to Auckland.

  It’s a lot packed into a short amount of time, but like Pops Henare said, we have to make it count.

  Even though we know we’ll be seeing them all again in a week, it’s almost an emotional farewell between us, Pops, Robbie, and Shelley. Once again I’m feeling that pang of losing family in the long run.

  The ride up to Maitai Bay on the Karikari Peninsula is markedly different from our other ones. We’re silent. Free blares on the stereo, but after a while Gemma slips in Pink Floyd. When “Comfortably Numb” comes on and she starts staring out the window, mouthing the lyrics, I wonder if she derives any comfort from the song at all, or if it’s an anthem of sorts.

  There’s a heavy tension in the air between us. It’s not necessarily bad, it’s just that we both seem to be caught in our minds, our own little worlds. My fears are of losing this world, of losing her. There’s much left to explore—here, in her. I feel like I’ll be leaving when things are only getting started.

  I wonder how badly I scared her last night by telling her I loved her. The look in her eyes wasn’t of rejection; it was fear. And I don’t have much time to help her overcome it.

  I don’t have much time.

  When we pull down the unsealed road and into the campground, Gemma’s spirits seem to lift. The spot is beautiful—but what hasn’t been beautiful in this country? There are a few other campervans around but it’s not too busy and we’re able to secure a spot.

  We park Mr. Orange and start getting ready for dinner. I want to stay here for at least two nights, just to really feel like I’m here, so we make ourselves at home, airing out clothes that we laundered at her grandpa’s and setting up the table and camping chairs.

  She’s so beautiful here, her face turned to the sun. Sometimes I see her reach for the pastels. She usually just holds them, thinking about the scene, thinking about what she wants to do, but she rarely puts them to use. I think she’s still afraid to create, to open herself up, to put her soul on paper for others—for me—to see. That’s okay, though. That’s a start.

  I want to tell her again that I love her. I had no idea that once you realized you were in love, it was nearly fucking impossible to keep it to yourself. I always thought guys were such chumps for putting themselves out there like that, but now I’m doing the exact same thing. It probably makes me a chump, but the funny thing is, I don’t care. Love whittles the world down into caring about just one thing.

  It’s not that I need her to say it back, though to be honest it’s killing me that she hasn’t, but I can’t keep it inside. I’m thinking it all the time, over everything she does. I’m thinking it when I’m pissing in the outhouse, I’m thinking it when I’m talking to strangers. It’s invaded me, and the longer I try to contain it the more it wants to escape, like an oil spill.

  I try and fuck it into her instead. It always works. In bed she responds to me like she’s an extension of myself, eager for more, eager for me. In bed I can trick myself into thinking she loves me, that she feels the same. It’s so easy to do. So I do it, again and again. It’s the only place that I’ve been able to find my peace.

  Love is a fucking head trip. It’s a bad idea. It’s utterly distracting and, ironically, I think love is bad for your heart.

  In the end, I think it’s going to break mine.

  Two days later we’re doing the drive to Cape Reinga. It’s a desolate, long journey through shack settlements and unchecked bush. There’s a rampant, wild feeling here, a sensation that you’re on the point of no return. We don’t see any beaches, no ocean, just the same untamed forests and unsmiling faces. I think it’s the first place I don’t want to paint, mainly because it feels like I’m capturing something I shouldn’t.

  The weather changes. Gray clouds sit on the horizon like massive alien motherships, moving slowly across the wide expanse of blue sky.

  “Goodbye, blue sky,” I sing as I stare out the windscreen and the long, empty road.

  When we finally reach the cape, there aren’t that many cars in the car park, just a few tour buses. When we step outside, we aren’t surprised why there’s no one here. The wind is vicious, battering into us, turning us around, and rain sporadically whips us in the face.

  We slip on light jackets, grateful that at least it’s not too cold. Grabbing each other’s hands, we make our way down a long path toward the famous lighthouse, which is periodically shrouded in passing mist. Unlike the East Cape Lighthouse, there are others here.

  I’m immediately hit with the foreboding sense of isolation as the path becomes more narrow, sloping off on both sides to wave-beaten beaches. You can’t even see the horizon.

  This is tapu. This is sacred. This is a place where things end.

  We reach the lighthouse and look below to where the land continues onward as a few humps of black rock. That’s the point where Pops told us the spirits leave this world. You can barely see it through the cloud cover and the crashing waves. The water here, where one sea meets an ocean, is violent and rough and loud.

  It seems like a terrifying bridge for the dead.

  I want to leave.

  I want to go back to the sunny, happy-as-fuck place we were in before, but then I’m thinking maybe it’s too late now. Maybe there’s no going back. The sand is almost at the bottom of the hourglass.

  I’m at the end of the country, the end of my stay.

  I have to do something.

  I turn around and see the tall signpost in the middle of the bluff. There are signs pointing to Sydney, London, Tokyo, the Tropic of Capricorn, Los Angeles, and Vancouver.

  Vancouver.

  Eleven thousand two hundred and twenty-two kilometers away.

  I can’t do it.

  I can’t go back there, not without her.

  I face Gemma, who is looking at the sign with apprehension. Her eyes flick to mine, the wind blowing her hair across her face.

  She can feel this coming. She looks ready to run.

  “I’m not going back,” I say to her, my voice raised over the wind.

  She rubs her lips together and shoves her hair behind her ears. “What do you mean?”

  But she knows what I mean. Just because I didn’t bring it up again, what I told her on the beach on New Years still stands. I still love her, and I still don’t want to leave.


  “I mean, I’m not going back to Vancouver.”

  “But you have school. You have to go to school.” She sounds like a broken record.

  I smile at her. “No, I don’t. I don’t have to do anything. I can take courses at a later time. Hell, I can go to school here. I know you have an art school in Auckland, I Googled it.”

  “Josh.” She looks at me with wild, staring eyes. She looks like an animal caught in a trap, about to gnaw her leg off in order to be free.

  I throw up my hands. I don’t understand why this is so hard for her to comprehend. How does this affect her? “What? Why not? If I don’t get in, I can get a working visa and get a job somewhere. I’m twenty-three. This is the time to do this stuff, to try and figure life out, see what works. See what’s worth it.”

  She shakes her head and looks away.

  My lips are moving, can’t she hear what I’m saying?

  “Gemma,” I plead, grabbing her shoulder and making her face me. “What is it?”

  “Why are you doing this?”

  I frown at her. “Because of you, obviously.”

  She smiles but it’s cold. “You can’t do this for me. It has to be for you.”

  “It’s for everything. I love this place, too; it’s imprinted on me as much as you are. But in the end, it’s still for you. I love you. I’m in love with you. I’m not going home. You are my home. I’m staying with you.” I sound desperate, I know I do, but it’s the truth and I can’t stop it from falling from my fucking lips.

  “And if I don’t want you to stay with me?” she asks. It’s quite loud with the wind but I hear her words. I hear them because I feel them stab me like ice picks to the gut.

  “What?” I ask breathlessly. The chill spreads through me.

  “What if I don’t want you to stay here? What then? Will you still want to stay?”

  Her eyes are like black holes in the sky.

  “I don’t understand, Gemma. Please. Just . . .” Something inside is starting to sink. It’s growing. Dread. “You don’t want me here?”

  “This was only supposed to be a temporary thing.”

  My eyes nearly fall out as anger rushes through me. “What the fuck are you talking about?”

  She steps back, away from me, and looks around her at the few people who have looked our way. “Let’s go talk somewhere else.”

  “Fuck that,” I sneer, grabbing her. “We’re talking here. Temporary?”

  She yanks out of my grasp, her eyes pained. “Yes! You came to visit and now you’re leaving. That’s the way it’s supposed to be. It’s what we agreed on.”

  “I didn’t agree to anything!” I yell. “I just wanted to be with you.”

  “You don’t belong here!” she yells back.

  My jaw drops. “I don’t belong here?” I feel like everything she’s saying is a lie. It makes no sense. It can’t be real, can’t be happening.

  She exhales and covers her face in her hands. I’m breathing hard, my chest squeezed so impossibly tight I’m afraid I might collapse. “This isn’t your home, Josh,” she mutters into her hands. “And you’ll see that. You’ll realize it when you stay.”

  I don’t fucking understand her. I never will. “Home isn’t a country or a place,” I say. “It’s where you belong. I thought I belonged with you.” I suck back the pain. “I guess I don’t.”

  She takes her hand away and looks me dead in the eye. “No, you don’t.” Her face is impassive, a stony mask. It gives me nothing.

  She never gave me anything but my shattering heart in my chest.

  “You know what your problem is,” I tell her, having a hard time keeping my voice calm. “You don’t know when to stop being such a stone cold bitch.”

  Gemma flinches like she’s been slapped. That got a reaction.

  She blinks a few times and says, “You’re right. I don’t know when. I don’t know how.”

  “It’s called fucking trying to be a nice, caring person,” I tell her. “You should try it one day when you pull your head out of your fucking ass.”

  I whip around and march through the violent wind, back to Mr. Orange. But I’m not going back with her.

  I can hear her running after me. But I’m done caring. I’m done bleeding.

  She grabs my hand and yanks at me to stop.

  “Josh,” she cries out, and for once I see some emotion in her eyes—the fear, the panic, and maybe pain. But it’s too late. The damage is already done. “Josh please,” she begs, “I’m not trying to hurt you. I’m trying to prevent you from being hurt. You know how I am, you just said so yourself. If you stay here for me, I’ll fuck up. I’ll ruin things because that’s all I know how to do. I’ll only end up breaking your heart.”

  I lean in close to her, close enough to kiss her. But that’s the last thing on my mind.

  “You’ve already broken my heart,” I tell her, my voice rough with anger and pain.

  Then I walk away, fast, up the hill back to the car park. I’m going to run like hell.

  I take out the car keys and open Mr. Orange’s back door. I grab everything I can see that’s mine, everything of importance. Most of my stuff is already in my backpack, including my passport. Everything else I can buy at home.

  I swing it on my back and take out my wallet from my jeans. I have about five hundred dollars in cash that I took out the other day and I place it in the cutlery drawer. I won’t owe her anything after that.

  I look up and see the sketchbook on the counter. I have no use for it now.

  I pick it up, feeling its weight in my hands just as Gemma comes running up to the door.

  “What are you doing?” she cries out in horror.

  “Everything I owe you is in the drawer.” I shove the sketchbook in her hands. “This was supposed to be your Christmas present,” I tell her. “Feel free to toss it in the fire.”

  Then I’m brushing past her and heading over to one of the buses loading wet and weary sightseers. I climb on board, and with a wad of cash and pained eyes, convince the driver to drive me as far as he can.

  I take my seat at the back and avoid looking out the window, at the faint outline of Mr. Orange as the rain against the window blurs the image.

  It’s over.

  It’s not until the bus gets farther south and the sky turns blue again that I start to cry. It’s beautiful again.

  And it’s all over.

  I’m going home.

  Chapter Twenty-Three

  GEMMA

  “Excuse me miss? Are you all right?”

  I barely hear the voice. I only clue in when someone touches my shoulder. I slowly raise my head and see a Department of Conservation officer staring at me quizzically. He appraises me and then folds his arms. “Do you need help?”

  I do need help. I need all the help in the world.

  The gray, stormy sea beckons me. I wish to be a dead soul, to have a soul, to slip through the roots and shed this world behind me.

  I’ve broken Josh’s heart.

  I’ve smashed my own.

  The pieces are jagged and lodged deep in my chest. My heart needs a tourniquet. Every breath I take hurts. The pain is so physical, so real. It’s like when my father died and I was just this lost, wounded creature for days, weeks . . . years.

  At the time, I only had my friend Robin, who later became my boyfriend. He was there before the accident and he was there after, but he never changed. I changed. I let the pain define who I was. I let pain ruin me, hold me down to the earth with an iron fist. I let pain scare me.

  I thought burning my paintings would help. And it did. For a time. I wouldn’t let myself grieve for them, though, for the art. What was the point? Why should I let myself feel over and over again when I have the choice to not feel anything at all?

  I never understood why anyone woul
d choose to go out into the world without armor on, to feel all the stabs, punches, and stings of life. That’s not how I wanted to live. I wanted to be free from pain, from loss, from broken dreams.

  Art was a dream—but it’s fine, I don’t want it anymore.

  My father was everything to me—but it’s fine, I don’t grieve him anymore.

  Life isn’t what I want it to be—but that’s fine, I don’t deserve a better one.

  That’s everything I tell myself, just to keep going on each day. I’m good at stressing, testing, building my body, so I do that instead. Being a personal trainer is a good job. It’s fine. It’s okay. It’s good enough for me. With this armor, I can’t do much more than the things I’m already doing, things I don’t care that deeply about. I can’t involve myself with people other than the ones I don’t care deeply about.

  It’s not living—I know that. But that’s the point. It’s not living.

  It’s a wall.

  And now I’m standing at Cape Reinga, long after the crowds have gone home, frozen to the bone, staring at the sea. My wall has come down. And I threw the bricks at Josh. To maim, to kill.

  It worked. He’s gone.

  He’s gone.

  I burst into tears.

  The D.O.C. officer doesn’t know what to do. “Miss?” he says, softer now, and that bit of pity, of empathy for someone like me, does me in.

  I start bawling.

  He awkwardly puts his hand on my shoulder. He’s probably frightened to death. But I don’t care. I don’t deserve comfort, but any amount will do. I lean into him and sob on his department-regulated uniform.

  I never deserved him and he never deserved to be treated the way I treated him. But it was all the truth because he doesn’t belong here. He doesn’t belong with me. He called me a stone cold bitch and it hurt because it’s true. He needs to be with someone less selfish, more open, warmer, nicer, better.

  He needs someone else.

  But I need him. I need him to keep pushing me. To keep believing in me. I need him to make me better.

  I need him.

  I lift my head off the officer’s soaked chest and look around. It’s nearly dark. This is a wild, heavy place. The mist is thicker, faster, swallowing things whole. The wind is stabbing. It matches my mood, my bleeding heart. But I can’t stay up here. I can’t do this all over again.