20. Goodbyes
Now we were standing unencumbered in a very close and sacred space. He swept his eyes over the surroundings, lingering on the door to my cabin, a yearning in his eyes. He made a move toward the stairs, but I reached out to stop him. I didn’t want him to leave. I wanted him to remember me.
“Wait. I want to give you something.” My thoughts lingered on our hands during Izzy’s wedding, how I’d longed to have a physical representation of our commitment. It wouldn’t be the same, but I wanted him to have a token of mine.
I opened the door to my cabin and rummaged in a drawer till I found what I wanted. High school had not been an easy time in my life. I was very lonely and angry for most of it. When I finally graduated, I remembered wishing Andrews was there to celebrate with me. I held the heavy silver ring with the onyx stone and the St. Christopher's Academy shield stamped into it and a date some 400 years in the future staring up at me from the ring. I threaded a length of leather thong through it and turned to find Andrews.
He was in the doorway. His hands braced himself against my small cabin door and his eyes soaked in every detail of my room. How many endless nights had I wished for him to be right here? I approached him slowly and wrapped my arms around his neck, tying the thin leather into a necklace. He wrapped his arms around me and held me close.
“I have nothing for you.” He put his forehead to mine.
He was wrong; he’d given me his life. I picked the hat off his head and placed it on my own.
“There.” I smiled as the brim dipped over my eyes. He lifted it off my head and tossed it on my dresser.
“First thing tomorrow I’ll find you something. I’ll have it waiting when you return.” His eyes burned, and I kept my hurt trapped in my heart. I was not returning this time. I just nodded.
It was time for him to leave this place. Without words, I led Graham off the ship, down the dock, and to the sloping sandy beach that led up to the house. It was time. It was time for goodbye.
It was a dark night, no moon, cloudy. The mist was already rolling in, obscuring sea and land alike. Andrews took my shoulders and squeezed. I reached up and held onto his hands.
“Not so long this time, Nanette, yes?” His voice was rough and heavy with all the other words he wished he could say.
I couldn’t answer. This was really it for us. In less than a year I’d be dead or branded the plaything of the devil in the eyes of every soul on this island.
“Not long at all,” I choked out. Less than a year and a younger me would be riding those waves back here.
“Liar.” He moved his hands from my shoulder to my face and brushed his thumbs along the base of my bruises. Neither of us could move. We were trapped on this little strip of beach, this piece of shared custody between the land and the sea, the only place we could belong to each other and still be true to who we were.
“Graham?” He needed no more of an invitation and brought his lips to mine. I wrapped my arms around him, kissing him back, stupid tears in my eyes. After a minute we took a breath and held each other forehead to forehead.
“You were right. Goodbyes are terrible.” He could barely get the words out. We kissed again, nervous about going much farther.
Graham eventually stepped back, took his coat off and spread it out on the sand and extended his hand in invitation. This was a terrible, terrible idea. I should turn around and get back on that boat. I should get in my own bed, on my own ship, and attempt to get some sleep before the sun rose. I should not allow Andrews to waste any more of his time on me.
I pulled off my shirt.
He took off his.
He took off his boots.
I took off mine.
And so it went until we stood naked before each other in the misty night. Only then did I take his hand and let him guide me onto the makeshift blanket.
Graham lay back and I straddled him. He sat up to massage my breasts, circling them. I ran my hands down his chest, memorizing him with my fingertips. I leaned over to kiss him, and he divided his time between my lips and my nipples, finding welcome and purchase each place he chose. As his lips left mine, I was warm and ready and wanting him.
He was more than ready for me. He lay back again and, using firm hands, guided me, easing me onto him, pushing up and into me in one strong movement. My breath caught at Graham’s sudden presence within me. Our eyes didn’t leave each other.
“There you are, Nanette,” he said and flexed his hips to hear me gasp.
I sat up, forcing him deeper within me, I looked up to the heavens. Graham looked up at me, breathing hard as I rocked over him. He reached one hand up and stroked down my face then brought me to his lips. I cried out, he was so deep in me. Out of instinct I moved up and away from the extremes, but Graham held me fast.
“No, Nanette, come back to me.” Graham pulled me over him once more, thrusting into me, manipulating me until I came, crying out wordless emotion into the fog. Graham encircled me carefully and rolled us over so he was above now. He wasn’t done with me yet.
“Say it again,” he instructed.
“Yes,” I said, opening my legs for him.
He entered me again and stayed steadfastly between my open knees, stroking in and out of me. His lips found my breasts again, and he used his tongue until a second wave of warmth flooded between my legs. I wrapped around him, and he eased in again and again, reaching new places within. He moved strong and steady like the tide. I pulled his weight onto me and opened his mouth with my lips. He shuddered and groaned, holding himself back from his peak in order to extend the time between our being locked together here and when he’d have to let me go.
“I’m here, Graham,” I crooned. “I’m here with you.”
He moaned and couldn’t resist any longer. His steady strokes picked up pace, he was a runaway train now, and I was completely out of control. My legs thrashed as he had his way with me. He called my name in desperation over and over, “Anne. Mine Anne. Nan. Oh, Nanette.” Until his body rocked one final time.
We lay there, drenched in sweat, unwilling to move, breathing together, marveling at each other and the torrent of emotion we experienced together.
When finally I could string two thoughts together, I took his hand and led him into the cool Atlantic waters. I let the water wash over me and scrub the sweat off. His hands found me again, fingertips attempting to memorize every curve, pausing between my legs just for the pleasure of being allowed to let his fingers explore freely.
“Say yes again?” he asked.
“Yes,” I said and felt his fingers slide into me. I put my head against his shoulder and let him hold me. This was not a gesture of pure sexual desire. He wanted to be close, and I wanted him closer. Graham was gentle inside me. Small movements stroking me, teasing me.
“I don’t want to let you go,” he said, fingers slowly slipping in and out.
I kissed him. Graham brought his thumb into use and held me tight against him as he brought me to climax a third time.
“Don’t forget me.” He spoke against my lips as I quaked against him.
I looked him square in the eyes. “I wouldn’t dare.”
Eventually we got back to the beach, dried off and dressed, and held each other close. The sun was starting to rise in the gray sky. We lay against each other and watched the fog begin to burn off. Andrews was quiet for a while, and I turned over to see him breathing peacefully. He looked young to me even though he was every inch the tall, muscular wildcat I’d known for years. Let him rest, I told myself. I allowed myself one more minute to commit his face to memory. I brushed his hair back from his face, wrapped his coat around his shoulders, and lightly kissed him goodbye.
I had one stop to make before boarding my ship and heading away from this island for good. It was early and damp, and my boots were soaked by the time I got to her cabin. What I was about to do was dangerous, but it didn’t matter anymore. I was leaving. I knocked softly, knowing the woman would hear it anyway. She opened the door. No greeting. Just an eyebrow raise, waiting for an explanation.
“I’d like a word if you don’t mind.” I attempted to look as disarmed and nonthreatening as possible. Helene stepped out and closed the door. We walked a little ways to an area overlooking the sea.
“Well?” she finally asked as the sun began to break in the foggy dawn.
“Take care of him for me. Do a better job of it than I have, if you don’t mind.”
“Do not speak in riddles to me, Anne.”
“I’m leaving. I’m trying to say goodbye to you.” The woman just watched me warily, waiting for the other shoe to drop. She was a wise lady. “And while I am leaving, and this is goodbye – about a year from now I’ll be sailing into St. George’s Bay. There, a mob will haul me off my boat, beat me, and burn me at the stake.”
She scoffed. “You cannot know the future.”
I took off my boot.
“What are you doing?” She moved forward as if to stop me.
“Just look.” I took off my sock. The extensive scars covered my toes. I lifted my loose pant leg, raising it over my ankle, my calf, my knee. Up and up I went until the fabric was at the top of my thigh and Helene’s eyes were wide and frightened. “This happens next April.”
“A witch,” she mused. She wasn’t scared. Helene wasn’t bred on those prejudices of Christianity which eclipsed the possibilities of power in the world. As I understood it, the woman had never considered me wholly human and feminine.
“No, not a witch. But I know my future. And yours.” The image of her headstone loomed large behind my eyes. “I tried to let him go. He’s hard to let go.”
“Yes,” she agreed. I’m sure her mind was swirling. Helene tentatively reached out a hand and felt the scars, perhaps to ascertain whether I was a specter or not. “Not a witch. But close.”
“Perhaps.” I dropped the pant leg and replaced my sock and boot. “I wanted you to know – I need you to know so that when the time comes—” My throat closed.
“He’ll be destroyed.” She looked at me like I was a monster. Only a cruel, scheming, devious monster could perpetrate such devastation on a person she loved. I swallowed and vowed to myself I would feel it later. I would deal with it later.
“Not if you’re there.” I shook my head to clear the image of what a grieving Andrews might look like. “Not if you’ll help him. Please,” I begged.
“Why did you never say yes to him? All these years...I never understood you.” Helene appraised me, and I came up wanting yet again. To her, I had it all...or at least most, and I threw it away time and time and time again.
“Hard to say yes when you know what’s written on that gravestone.” Helene Andrews. Beloved Wife. Beloved Mother.
“Yours?” She raised her eyebrows, wondering just how strong my magic was.
“Yours.” I looked at her and didn’t blink. Did she get it? Did she understand now? Did she understand now how I’d stolen their years like a thief in the night?
Helene backed away. She opened her mouth and closed it again, starting and stopping a long list of questions. Finally, she turned to look out at the view of my ship in dock for the final time.
“You will truly die next summer?” she asked as the fog rolled along the small shore.
“No,” I answered truthfully. “But everyone must think I’m dead. As you said, I won’t visit a hurricane on these lands, this family.”
Over our long association Helene had viewed me with suspicion, anger, judgment, fury, and hate. She was a hard person to meet one on one and come away unscathed. I would have chosen any of those aggressive stares over what I saw creeping into her eyes now: pity.
“This is a terrible life you lead.” She shook her head and for a moment it looked like she wanted to move closer to me.
“Yes,” I agreed and turned to face the horizon with her.
“Why live this way at all?”
“I’ve lived like this for so long…not sure I know of a different way.” My life was a tangled knot that I alone knew how to navigate. As awful as the awful parts were, I loved how I lived. There were wonderful and interesting times to accompany the lows. For instance, here I was, standing on a hilltop with a woman I’d shared the most complicated relationship of my life with, telling her the absolute truth about myself because she deserved the truth. I’d never told anyone this much about myself in such clear language. Fascinating.
We enjoyed the view together here at the end of our relationship. She was relaxed now. She believed me.
“He will not be able to move on from you. He has never managed it before.” We were both looking at the sleeping figure on the beach below.
“He will this time. This time he does move on.” Helene Andrews. Beloved Wife. Beloved Mother.
“I regret the friendship we lost.” She turned to me, no aggression, no pity. It was the face I’d eaten with, drank with, and sang with in our early years together when the complications were few.
“I regret that too. I hope you’ll forgive me someday.”
“Perhaps. I hope you will forgive me as well.” She had never said such a thing to me before.
“I’m glad to have met you.” There was nothing to forgive.
The sun finally broke the horizon fully, and I took a deep breath. It was time to go. Time to leave this island and this complicated family and home and life that I loved. I cleared my throat and wiped my face.
“Goodbye, Helene. Throw just… the biggest, best hurricane party ever next year.”
“Goodbye, Anne.”
I nodded to her and set myself in motion for that ship. No more goodbyes. No more. I put my hat on my head and ignored the tears blurring the periphery of my vision. No more. No more. I strode across the dock and refused any last looks at the land, the house, or the beloved sleeping form of the man I would have cherished as my husband and family. None of this was for me and it was finally time to release my hold.
I wished I could die.
My ship was quiet, full of scared, mourning women. A small baby’s cry from belowdecks was the only evidence there were any living creatures around. I untied the ropes and threw them aboard, following right behind them.
Don’t think.
Don’t think.
Don’t be miles away. Be here.
One foot in front of the other. One task at a time.
Don’t think.
Do.
I hoisted the mainsail then poled us away from the dock. The blessed wind filled the canvas right away, and we were off. The sudden motion of the ship brought Bessie out of her hammock to watch the island disappear.
We were well away when I heard yelling from the shore. Andrews, his blond hair flashing through the fog, hollering and waving, was calling for me.
I flashed back to another time on this island long ago when the fog wasn’t fog but smoke. Another blond head had run through the crowds and smoke, pushing and shoving the masses aside.
My heart froze. No. No! I hadn’t recognized the name that unknown man had yelled so desperately as he attempted to make it through. “Nanette!” that man had called out, over and over...just like this man here at the edge of the dock. I couldn’t breathe. The wind carried me farther from him and his cries.
“No,” I whispered. “No!” I shouted with all my might. I left the helm and ran aft to yell and wave to him. “Don’t go! Don’t go to me! Graham, don’t go! Graham, no!” But we were too far for him to hear me.
Next year, as I stood tied to a stake and accused of witchcraft and the crowds sang for my death and lit the tinder beneath my feet, there had been one man who tried to break through. But I hadn't met him yet. He called for me. Next year, Graham would be in St. George’s, and he’d watch me burn. I couldn’t see him anymore. His dwindling form was obscured by the smoke.
I felt like Helene had sucker-punched me in the gut. I gasped and choked and almost jumped into the sea to swim back and warn him.
Bessie came up behind me. “Captain?” I couldn’t get enough air. I grabbed Bessie by her shirt, partly to bring her with me to the helm, partly so I didn’t fall down. I placed her hands on the wheel and pointed at the embedded compass.
“N. North. Keep it that way.” Then went to my cabin and collapsed.
****
“This is supposed to be a vacation, Anne.” My mother yawned as I dragged her and Izzy to yet another historical setting on Bermuda. My mother and sister were bored and annoyed with me. “You’ve graduated! No more school. Let’s go to the beach!” She gave up as I charged through the grounds of the ancient estate. Izzy found a bench and pulled out a book; she’d rather be at a beach too. I found it then. The sea-spray-eroded headstone of the old master of this estate.
Graham Caspar Andrews
1609-1677
Beloved Husband
Beloved Father
I traced his name with my fingers. “Bye, old friend.”
****
“Captain?” There was a tentative knock at my door. It was Bessie. “Captain, we need you.”
I collected myself and left my cabin. I nodded to Bessie and went up to steer. We weren’t far out from my buoy, and I was half tempted not to stop but did so anyway. I dropped anchor and rowed out to it. On a fresh sheet of paper I drew a giant black X and cast the rig into the water. Goodbye, Bermuda.
Back on the ship Izzy was waiting for me. “What did you write?”
“A warning.” I have no idea what she made of this statement. “Hey,” I perked up, “want to see something cool?”
Izzy was fairly listless. She shrugged noncommittally.
“See that land? That stretch from that hill there all around the corner to the tip of the island?”
“Yeah?”
“That’s yours,” I told her. The sun was showing off now, gilding the place in a mockery of the shit show that it was.
“That’s all yours.”
Izzy approached the rail and stood agape at the sheer amount of property she owned.
“Someday you’ll have to tell me how you did it,” I said in admiration.
“Did what?” she asked.
“How you sold the British back their own guns and used the money to buy land they already owned.” I shook my head trying to guess how she’d masterminded that one.
Izzy looked aghast.
I looked ahead.
No more looking back.
No more.
