Where Sea Meets Sky: A Novel

by Karina Halle

  “Sorry,” I mumble to the man, wiping my nose on the sleeve of my jacket.

  He stares at me with kind eyes. “Are you going to be all right? It’s getting late, I’m about to close the car park.”

  I shake my head, too tired to feel embarrassed. “I don’t know if I’ll be all right. But I’ll be on my way.”

  I take the windblown path back to Mr. Orange, and as I sit in the driver’s seat I’m demolished by the emptiness inside. His stuff is gone. His sketchbook remains on the backseat where I put it.

  I want to curl up inside my body to find warmth. I’m so cold.

  Mr. Orange starts with a rough purr. The sound echoes across the empty bus, emphasizing how alone I am. I turn on the heaters full blast, and with a deep breath pull the bus out of the car park, the D.O.C. officer waving at me as I go.

  I drive south, through desolate villages and past darkening trees. The night is coming and I want to escape. But there’s nowhere to go.

  It’s late when I end up at my grandfather’s place. I wanted to make it to Auckland, but I knew I couldn’t bear to be alone in the house with my roommate out, probably working. My whānau is what I need. I pull Mr. Orange to a stop and sit for a few moments, the engine ticking down, sounding hollow.

  Eventually the front door opens and I see Auntie Shelley coming out, a shawl wrapped around her and billowing in the breeze. It seems the clouds and wind have chased me down here.

  She comes to the window, peering in at me. “What are you doing here?” She looks in the back. “Where’s Josh?”

  I close my eyes and the tears start again. I’m afraid I’m compromised now, the wall destroyed, the damage too deep.

  I feel everything. Every little horrible thing.

  Auntie Shelley opens the door and I practically fall into her arms. She leads me into the warm house and sits me down on the couch. I can’t stop shivering so she wraps me in blankets and bustles off to the kitchen to make tea.

  My grandfather is staring at me but I avoid his eyes. I could tell he liked Josh. He’s going to be mad at me for ruining things.

  But he doesn’t say anything. No one has asked anything because everyone knows. I’m crying. Josh is gone. That’s the whole story.

  When I start to warm up a bit, the hot tea coursing through my veins, Pops switches off the telly.

  “Do you want to talk about it?” he asks. He’s neither inquisitive nor curious, just courteous.

  My instincts tell me they wouldn’t understand, to keep it bottled up inside, rebuild the wall. This would be the first step, the first brick. But my instincts aren’t my own. They are of the person I told myself to be. They are conditioned reflexes. They don’t come from my heart.

  I take in a long, shaky breath. I tell them everything, from our start in Vancouver (leaving out the sordid details, of course) to him appearing in Auckland, to traveling with him and Nick and Amber, to the way he got under my skin, to Christmastime, to finally painting at East Cape, to getting tattoos and jumping out of airplanes, to New Year’s Eve when he told me he loved me, and to the Cape Reinga, where he told me he would stay and I told him he should go.

  It’s been a crazy seven weeks, and when I’m done speaking I’m utterly exhausted and feeling brittle to the bone. We had gone through so much and I had just thrown it on the fire.

  The whole time Pops just listened. Only now he nods slowly, studying me, thinking. I fear what he’s going to say; I respect him so much that if he tells me I’m a terrible, irredeemable person, I will believe it.

  “I think you were right in telling him to leave,” he says finally, and the sentence drops between us like a bomb.

  My jaw comes unhinged. “What? I thought you liked him.”

  “From what I saw of him, yes. I liked him very much. I think he’s very good for you. And I think you have been good for him. You have pushed his boundaries and made him brave. He would have never come here, seen all that he saw, if he hadn’t met you.”

  “Then why do you think it’s good he left?”

  A wisp of a smile traces his lips. “You were right in thinking you would hurt him. You would have. Not because you mean to. You’re a good girl, Gemma. You have a good heart. But it’s all you know how to do: push people away.”

  I stare at the ground, knowing how right he is.

  He continues, “He would have stayed here for you, just for you, and there would’ve been a lot of pressure from that. New relationships shouldn’t have that kind of weight on their shoulders. If you weren’t stable enough, open enough, selfless enough to shoulder that weight with him, you would crumble.”

  “So we were doomed from the start,” I say wearily.

  “No,” he says quickly. “You aren’t doomed. This is a blessing, for both of you. If he hadn’t left, you wouldn’t be here, opening up like you never have before. At least not to me. Sometimes you have to bulldoze something to the ground before you can rebuild. Do you know what I mean?”

  I swallow. “I thought I did that back when . . . when . . .”

  I don’t have to finish. He knows when he lost his son. “You didn’t, Gemma. That was not building. There was no rebirth from those ashes. You just stood in them for a very, very long time. You have to make a conscious choice to become better, do better. It’s scary, opening yourself up to be hurt, I know. But even if you don’t, you’ll hurt anyway. You’re hurting right now, aren’t you?” I meet his gaze. He only needs to look at me to see. “So you are,” he says gravely. “Then you know. You can’t escape everything in the end, so you might as well open yourself up to the good stuff along the way. You know, after your father passed away, I turned to the drink. I know you were busy dealing with your own stuff, as was your mother, and we didn’t see each other much. That was for the best. I was a mess. I did everything to numb the pain, and it worked. For a while. But then I missed things like Kam’s birth, your aunt and uncle renewing their vows, and I missed you. With Robbie’s help, he pulled me out of it, even though my boy was hurting, too. I vowed not to hide anymore. And sure, it hurts. Losing your son hurts. Losing your father hurts. But don’t let that pain color your whole life.” He sighs, thinking I’m not getting it. But I am.

  I get up out of the pile of blankets and go to give him a hug. A big hug. I bury my head in his neck and let out a few tears. “I miss Dad,” I whisper before I break down again. He holds me tight and cries, too.

  I break many times over the next few days. But each time, my whānau lifts me back up.

  It’s January eighth when I bring myself out of my stupor. I feel worn down, naked, raw. But the sun is shining. The air is fresh. The world hurts but it’s beautiful, even with the pain.

  I pick up Josh’s sketchbook and the pastels he left in the bus and start roaming over the peninsula around my grandfather’s place. I sit in three different places and draw, paint, smudge the landscapes. It’s so messy and imperfect, but life is messy and imperfect.

  I put myself on the paper, bare for the world to see.

  I paint and paint and paint.

  “What are you going to do now?” my grandfather asks. He, Auntie Shelley, Uncle Robbie, Barker, and I are taking Mr. Orange to Paihia to catch the bus back to Auckland.

  “I have ideas,” I say. I’m going back to my apartment, taking stock of my life, and then figuring out the next scary step. I’ll probably have to move back to my mother’s for a while to save money, to make money, but that doesn’t bother me. I need her at a time like this.

  We say goodbye at the bus depot and I promise to call them, e-mail them, visit them more. I promise to reach out and reach in. I’m going to miss them to pieces.

  But after I get on the coach bus for the journey back home, I notice that the ache I thought would multiply in their absence feels like it’s getting smaller. It’s healing.

  There is of course, the pain I feel for Josh. The
pain I caused myself. That hasn’t gone away. It hasn’t left me. It’s weird going back to a city that I know he’s still in. I wonder if I’ll run into him somewhere. I wonder what I’d say.

  I know what I’d say. I’d tell him I’m sorry. I’d tell him I didn’t mean to hurt him. I’d tell him what he means to me in the big, bad world, how his arms are the ones that kept me safe, that his eyes are what still coax me out of my shell. He gave me the courage to try again, to create, to lay myself bare, and that won’t stop, even after he’s gone.

  I want to tell him that I love him. So deeply that I’m afraid I’ll never be able to remove it, that I’ll have to carry it with me forever, like a badge. And I want to tell him that’s not a bad thing. It’s an honor to love him.

  When I get back to my apartment, it’s just after dinner. Of course it’s empty except for the cat. I busy myself, cleaning even though Nyla is a neat freak. It’s weird to be back home after all this time. It doesn’t feel like home anymore. It feels cold and impersonal. Then I think, maybe it’s always been this way.

  Maybe now I’m finally realizing that I need more than that.

  I pour myself a glass of wine, sit down at the kitchen table, and watch Pink Floyd YouTube videos on my phone. The music stirs my sensitive heart, making me feel unbelievably restless inside.

  I don’t know how long I sit there for, with Chairman Meow snaking around my legs, but I’m almost done with the whole bottle of wine when Nyla comes home.

  “Gemma?” she asks in surprise as she places her messenger bag on the kitchen counter. I barely look at her. She smells like the hospital, her pale, freckled face looking tired from her shift, her red bun a mess. “I didn’t know you were coming home today.”

  I nod. “Plans changed.”

  She chews on her lip and says, “Okay. Well, I’m glad you’re home.”

  She turns around, ready to head to her room, but I speak up.

  “Hey, um, do you want to have a glass of wine with me?”

  I rarely drink wine and never ask her to drink with me so she looks a bit stunned. But maybe she reads something on my face because she says, “That sounds great. Let me just change out of my scrubs and freshen up.”

  Moments later, she’s back and I pour her a glass, and with it my soul. I tell her everything that happened, from beginning to end, with painful emphasis on everything that went wrong with Josh. She’s speechless the whole entire time.

  Eventually she says, “Well, I suppose I should tell you that Nick came by yesterday.”

  I raise my brows. “What?”

  “Yeah.” She gets up and grabs another bottle off the rack. Naturally, they’re mostly all Henare wines. She pours us both another glass and sits back down. “He told me about the breakup. He dropped off a box of your stuff. It’s in the closet.”

  “Oh.”

  “He said don’t worry about the stuff he left behind, you can keep it. And he said if you still want a job at the gym, you’ve got it.”

  Now I’m really surprised. “Seriously?”

  She shrugs. “It’s what he said. Now that I’ve heard your side, maybe he realized he had been an overreacting asshole.”

  “Did he say he was sorry?”

  She smiles. “No. But he looked sorry. Like a mutt looking for scraps. I was tempted to slam the door in his face since you know how I feel about him, but I was very cordial. You would have been proud.” She sips her wine while I absently twirl a piece of my hair. “So, are you going to take the job?”

  Now I shrug. “I don’t know.” I had come to peace with the idea that the world had better things for me. If I didn’t take the job, it would mean I’d have to move back in with my mother. If I did take the job, it meant I’d stay here. And my life would stay the same.

  But I don’t want it to stay the same.

  I know what I want.

  Realization slams into me like a heated fist. I nearly knock over my glass of wine before I quickly fish out my phone and Google the number of the hostel that I knew Josh was staying at before. Sky Tower Backpackers.

  “What are you doing?” Nyla asks, but I ignore her.

  I get a woman on the third ring. “Good evening, Sky Tower Backpackers.”

  “Hi,” I say, feeling flustered. “I have a friend staying with you. Josh Miles. He’s Canadian. Can you tell me if he’s there right now or . . .”

  “Oh, Josh,” the woman says brightly. “He was here. He left this morning.”

  The words get caught in my throat but I choke them out. “To go to another backpackers?”

  “No, he went to the airport. I called the shuttle for him.”

  I shake my head violently. “No, no, no. His flight to Vancouver is on the tenth. It’s the eighth.”

  “I’m sorry,” she says. “I guess he caught an earlier flight. He had to work in the kitchen the last night just to pay for his room. Maybe he ran out of money.”

  Maybe he ran away.

  “Is there anything else I can help you with?”

  “No, thank you,” I whisper and hang up the phone.

  Now he’s really gone.

  “He left?” Nyla asks.

  “Yes,” I manage to say. I can hear the emptiness in my voice, like an echo in a dark room.

  She reaches across the table and puts her hand on mine. “I’m sorry. Really, Gemma. That sucks.”

  It does suck. I literally feel like my heart has been sucked from my body and there’s nothing but a gaping hole in my chest.

  I nod, swallowing hard. “Thanks.” I exhale loudly, like I’ve been holding in air all day. “I think I’m going to go to bed.”

  “Why don’t you and I go out for lunch tomorrow?” she asks, something else we’ve never really done together. I’m starting to realize we were living together without knowing each other. But how could she know me when I didn’t even know myself?

  It’s not too late to change both of those things.

  “I’d like that,” I say gratefully and manage to give her a small smile before I shuffle away to my room.

  I walk over to my bed and collapse on it. Chairman Meow, as if knowing I need quiet comfort, lies by my head, curled up. I tell myself it’s okay to cry, it’s okay to break down, that I can rebuild. Maybe not a wall, but a window.

  The tears don’t come, though. I’m all cried out.

  The ache returns, and for days it stays. Empty, throbbing cold. Nyla and I start hanging out together more, which helps soothe the pain, and soon I start driving out to Piha Beach in the late afternoons. It’s the only thing I want to do, the only thing I think will help me. I sit at sunset and paint the horizon, where sea meets sky. I paint the infinity, the melding of the two elements. I paint the messy beauty that changes from day to day, from dark and dramatic to bright and colorful.

  It’s beautiful.

  Chapter Twenty-Four

  VANCOUVER, CANADA

  JOSH

  “Tell me more about New Zealand,” Katy says from across the table. She’s staring at me with those big blue eyes of hers, twirling her dark blond hair around her finger.

  “I’ve told you everything there is to tell,” I tell her, leaning back in my chair and sipping a beer. “Nice people, beautiful scenery.”

  “But there’s more to it, isn’t there?”

  I shake my head and pick up the dessert menu. “Nope.”

  We’re at a Cactus Club restaurant in downtown Vancouver. It’s our third date. I’m putting on the charm but it’s halfhearted. She slept with me on the first date already. It was the first time I’d had sex since New Zealand. It wasn’t bad. Good enough to warrant another date. And a third.

  But I’m not sure about a fourth. Katy is pretty and funny and she makes me laugh. But she bores me to tears. There’s no depth to her, no substance. She is who she says she is. And I guess that’s
refreshing, the lack of mystery, but I just don’t find myself intrigued by the real her.

  I want more. I always want more.

  I had a lot more at one point. But that’s neither here nor there.

  It’s been three months since I left. They’ve been the hardest three months of my life. After Gemma told me to leave, I went straight back to Auckland and switched my plane to the next flight out. I couldn’t stand being in that city anymore, knowing she was out there. I couldn’t stand being in the country.

  Thankfully, Air New Zealand was able to find me a flight two days early, but of course there was a hefty fee for the switch. It was worth all my money. It was worth having to work at the hostel to pay for my stay.

  When I got home, I was more angry than hurt. The weather here was dark and gray and inhospitable. It rained every day. It made me a miserable person to be around, even though I was just starting school. I had to throw myself into my studies to try and bring myself out of it.

  Gemma tried to contact me once, on Facebook, not long after I left. I never read the message; I just saw it there. I blocked her account. I didn’t need any reminders of her. If I heard Pink Floyd playing anywhere, anywhere, I had to get up and leave. Once I left a Foo Fighters concert because the band started covering “Have a Cigar.”

  After some time, though, the anger started to fade. Sadness filled in those cracks. I’d never been in love and never had my heart broken. Now I’d experienced both in a very short amount of time. And when I let myself breathe a bit, I realized just how badly Gemma had affected me.

  Vera had said I went after Gemma because she reminded me of my mother. It was a disturbing thought, that’s for sure. But maybe Gemma was more of a challenge to me because of that, a lock that needed a key.

  I thought I’d found the key. I thought if I kept pushing at Gemma, again and again, she would let me in. But maybe she needed the time to do that on her own, without me breathing down her neck, needing her to love me. Or maybe she was welded shut, and no matter what I did, no matter what happened to her, she would never change.