Christian and the regatta may have evicted me from my original hideaway, but all my pensive wandering seemed always to lead back to her, my queen of possibilities, and the following morning I found myself stretched out in a familiar spot.
Lemon had donated some outdoor cushions she’d had in her garden shed, significantly less musty than the ones we’d tossed from the Vega, and I set them up in the saloon and berth. I crawled in on top of them, content to be alone with my endless thoughts.
But when the boat rocked with Christian’s steps an hour later, my stomach fizzed.
Hope and desire. Anticipation.
Christian hopped down through the companionway, looked at me across the saloon. “Oh,” he said softly, a dim smile sliding across his lips. “There you are.”
He handed me his sweatshirt, the one I’d abandoned last night, though it wasn’t cold today.
All of last night’s awkwardness vanished. Maybe it had never existed. Maybe I’d only imagined it. Feared it.
“I texted you to meet up for breakfast, but when I didn’t hear back, I figured you were doing your own thing.”
I checked my pockets, realized I’d left my phone at home.
“Scoot over,” he said, slipping off his shoes.
I sat up and shifted over in the small bed as he climbed in next to me. We sat with our backs against the shelving, heads bent, and he took my hand, warm and comforting. Solid.
After a long silence, he nodded toward my old poem and said, “I’ve been thinking about plans. A and B and everything after. You never told me your B.”
I shrugged. Singing was everything to me. It was hard, turning a passion into a profession—I’d only gotten a glimpse of that, and already the competition was getting stiffer, the rehearsals more grueling, the disappointments sharper. But I was ready to work for it with Natalie by my side. We’d always given each other strength.
I knew there would be setbacks and letdowns. But I’d never considered the possibility that it wouldn’t happen.
I reached for the seashell at my throat, tugged it gently. The doctors had warned me that the physical recovery would be slow, that I’d still feel rawness and discomfort in my throat, maybe for years. They were right; I had felt that. I’d learned to mitigate it with hot tea and honey, with relaxation, with rest.
But there was no mitigating treatment for the deeper wounds.
What happened when the one thing you loved, the song of your soul, was taken from you? What pieces of your old life were you left with, and how could you begin to put them back together? How could you find your way back to the people who’d hurt you the most?
Outside, the ocean churned and hissed, continued its endless dance.
Still, I couldn’t answer.
Christian squeezed my hand. “I wish I had the words for this.”
I squeezed back. He’d never had a big dream like this—he’d said as much. So he couldn’t imagine what it was like to have his dream taken from him, to know that no matter how hard he worked or what sacrifices he made, he’d never get it back.
I tried to tell him as much, in so many silent words and gestures, all the expression I had left.
“You’re right,” he said softly. “I wouldn’t know. Couldn’t. I’ve never had any dream. Never looked for it, never found it, never followed it.”
Dreamless, I mouthed, more because that’s the word that came to me than because it was right. His story felt like the before to my after, and I thought I’d understood him.
But he shook his head, eyes brightening with some new thought. “No, not like that. More like, limitless.”
The ocean shushed before us. I don’t know when the tide came in, but it was there, rocking the boat with more urgency. Farther out, I heard the gulls crying, searching for fish, and I thought about that word. Limitless. Without limit. All potential, destiny unmapped.
“You probably thought I was crazy,” Christian said, “agreeing to race when my father made the bet.”
I didn’t disagree.
“It was crazy. Winning . . . at first, it was all about sticking it to my father. Watching him eat his words. He doesn’t think I can do it without Noah. But there was this other part of me that thought maybe, if I could actually win, he might . . . he’d look at me with something other than . . .” He waved the words away, and I watched his whispers turn to dust.
Why does he? I asked.
Christian’s gaze slipped away, settled on a point beyond the starboard window, and I let my hand curl on his knee in a gesture that I hoped said it was okay, that he didn’t have to explain.
He spoke anyway. “I almost wasn’t his.”
The regret in Christian’s voice was nearly too much too bear, too raw and revealing in the tiny space of the V-berth. Beneath my hand the muscles in his leg tightened, and I knew he was wrestling with what to say, how much to reveal of his own personal tragedy to the girl who couldn’t talk about her own, even if she wanted to.
When our eyes met again, his glazed with emotion. Quickly he scrubbed his hands over his face, erasing it all.
“I meant what I said to your aunt. I don’t want them to sell the houses. Dad might not get it, but it’s the one place that’s been constant in my life. No matter how much money he makes or where they relocate, the Cove has always been ours. Some of my best memories were here.” He held my gaze. “Are here.”
Me too, I told him. And his smile turned, for just a moment, shy.
“It’s your fault, you know. That word, limitless.” He shook his head, still smiling. It was hard for him to admit, whatever was coming next, but I knew he’d do it. He leaned in, kissed me softly. Still close, he whispered against my lips. “You make me think things are possible. You make me want things.”
I waited for the joke, the playful tease about these “things” I made him want. But when it didn’t come, when his gaze remained on my eyes, intense and serious, I knew he wasn’t talking about the kisses, our half-naked bodies tangling on his bed last night.
He was making me want things too. The kinds of things I didn’t think I could have anymore. Ideas. Plans. Opportunities.
Dreams.
Love.
My heart hammered inside, thrumming with energy.
“Last night,” he said, still holding my gaze, “I didn’t . . . I don’t want you to think it’s . . . I didn’t mean to—”
I pressed my fingers against his lips, gently silencing him. I already knew what he meant; his eyes said all the things his words were fumbling.
He nodded silently then, kissed my fingers and held them warm in his hand again.
For all of Kirby’s warnings, for all of Vanessa’s defending, for all of the women who looked at Christian with longing and history in their eyes, none of them seemed to really know him, to see beyond the obvious.
I felt like he’d given me a rare gift, this precious glimpse.
Being with Christian was like nothing I’d ever experienced. Back home, there had always been boys after the shows, older boys who drove fast and kissed even faster, who talked smoothly with just the right words to leave us bewildered.
I’d met Julien at a lime at Crown Point, caught up in the way he played the steel pan. It was an informal thing, one of the all-night summer parties the island was famous for, and Natalie and I had wandered over to the music tent to sing along. We hadn’t meant to attract attention, but the band heard us, invited us to perform with them. Soon we had the whole crowd dancing to our Caribbean grooves, everyone laughing and having a great time. I thought they’d riot when the band took a break, but then the limbo dancers started to perform, and there was enough homemade crafts, food, and rum to keep everyone satisfied. Julien, cocky and confident as all the rest, handed me a drink and said, in a deep voice that rattled every inch of me, “Me gyal, you have a sweet voice there.”
I dragged Natalie back to the beach every weekend that summer, and the night he pressed his lips to mine in a kiss that made my toes curl, we were official.
Almost two years we were together. And even though I thought I loved him, now I wondered if I just loved the fact that he loved me. That he’d always talked about our future, about how he couldn’t breathe without me, about how my voice drove him crazy. I loved that he couldn’t keep his hands off me, that he’d look at me with such hunger in his eyes. When I stood naked before him, I felt powerful, alive. Adored.
It was intoxicating.
Until I went dark after I lost my voice, and the magic between us fizzled out in a month. He said he just couldn’t handle the anger in me, the raw pain so close to the surface. Granna had warned me about him months earlier. “You think it’s love, but it’s desire. Fair-weather boy, that one. First sign of the storm, you watch him run for cover.”
Back then I shrugged her off. So many nights I’d stared up at the Tobago moon and wondered if she even knew what she was saying. Love and desire? Was there a difference?
Now, here, Christian and I were on equal footing, each of us scared and vulnerable in turn, each of us strong and triumphant in our own ways. He looked at me with want, so intense it sent shockwaves through my belly, but it wasn’t desperation. Making him smile, kissing him, it didn’t feel like manipulation, like some favor I’d be cashing in on later.
It simply felt right.
I grabbed the Sharpie and notebook from my pocket.
I wanted him to know me. All of me, all the things I hadn’t been able to tell him before.
But the instant I set the tip against the paper, the mood sobered. Putting a thing to words gave it power; it pulled the maybe from the mist and gave it form, solid and black.
I took a breath. Wrote.
You asked about my Plan B
And how I ended up at the Cove.
Well, once upon a time, on an island far away,
I used to sing with my sister.
And we had a chance to go on tour
To record an album
Connections already made
But then I lost everything
He read it, his eyes drifting from the final word to my scar. I confirmed with a nod. Doctors say permanent. Irreversible.
Ever since I’d heard those damning words, I’d been fighting it. But deep down, I’d always known the truth. The doctors in Port of Spain were top-notch. Dad even consulted vocal injury specialists from around the world, but the prognosis was always the same. They may, in six months or a year, be able to do another surgery, possibly restore minimum vocal function. But given the nature of the injuries, surgery could make things worse. I could end up with a marginally stronger voice, but unable to breathe. Unable to swallow food.
And still I would be songless.
It was, by some cruel twist, my fate.
With the marker still pressed to the page, I went on.
Ashes to ashes, and all the old ghosts
Gathering on the seashore
They waited for me with eyes on fire
Accusing, burning, haunting.
I thought that if I pretended I couldn’t see them,
Maybe they’d blow away
Remnants, lost forever to time
But they didn’t, and I couldn’t pretend.
I couldn’t stay in Tobago another minute.
So Lemon brought me here on a visa.
A place to linger, to catch my breath
However long I needed
It felt like an escape, a perfect hideaway
To flee, to forget
It wasn’t supposed to start feeling like home.
Lemon had said I’d always have a home with her and Kirby, no matter what happened with the houses in Atargatis Cove. I knew she’d meant it, even if we lost the regatta and they had to move. But it wasn’t realistic, me following them to some new place, setting up a new life again. Trying to fit in. Trying to help her come to terms with a loss I might’ve been able to prevent. I knew, and I sensed that she did too, that if Lemon lost the house, I’d be heading back to Tobago by the end of the summer.
But it does feel like home. It IS home.
I capped the marker and tossed it on the bed.
And my sister, I mouthed, unable to write her name. Natalie?
Christian watched me in silence, the boat swaying beneath us.
I closed my eyes, lips forming words too fast to follow.
She saved my life.
She made me breathe again.
Fucking breathe.
I never forgave her.
Never thanked her.
Never got over her.
Never stopped missing her, even now, when she’s going without me.
Behind my eyelids the image of my sister faded. I felt the familiar slice of pain at my throat, but I knew it wasn’t real. Like so many memories, it was just a ghost from that day in March, a spirit with unresolved business who refused to move on because I wouldn’t let it.
“Elyse,” Christian whispered, his fingers gently touching the scar on my throat. I opened my eyes, lost myself in the sea of his gaze. “What happened to you in—”
“Hope y’all are decent in there.” Vanessa’s voice cut through the somber air. She and Kirby climbed down through the companionway just as Christian and I hopped out of the berth, looking rumpled and supremely guilty.
“This boat needs a security system,” Christian grumbled, running a hand over his hair.
Kirby was glaring at us, eyes wide with accusation.
Vanessa dropped onto the saloon bench, head in her hands. “Sorry, guys,” she said, “but we just got some seriously shitty news.”