Diana
1975
Her daughter was gone. She felt it the same way she’d felt it the morning the letter arrived telling them David was missing. Just because the cord was cut didn’t mean a mother quit feeling her children. Harry told her she was being ridiculous, that Judith was a teenager. It was normal for teenagers these days to take off without telling anyone, that they always came back in a day or two. She was being insane. Hysterical.
If she was hysterical, then Harry was a coward, head buried perpetually in the sand.
But who was she to talk?
As a parent, there had been many things Diana had done wrong. Too many. She didn’t count the little things, like making Judith cry it out when they were trying to get her to sleep on her own as a baby. She counted the stuff that mattered. Those were the things she’d messed up the most. Like when David’s number was pulled. She should’ve hidden him. Sent him to Canada. To Mexico. To the moon. Like when Judith started talking about the voice in the water and Diana said nothing. Told Judith she was insane. Hysterical.
She should have said something then. Done something. Instead she’d pushed her daughter away, hoping, praying, that the curse would pass her by. She should have known they couldn’t hide forever.
Whatever happened next, Diana deserved it.
***
One in the morning and Diana couldn’t sleep. The red light from the lighthouse brushed her bedroom windowsill. Rose petals and blood. She’d never understood the red. She supposed her ancestors thought red was softer on the eyes. After all, it was them who had to sleep with the light’s constant touch. She turned over, away from the window, but Harry’s face was too close, breathing her air, touching her body. Suddenly she couldn’t stand to be in the room with him, with the red light, with the shadows. Everything was all too loud, all too quiet.
She climbed out of bed, not bothering with a robe or shoes. It was that damned light. If she shut it off, maybe she would get some sleep. There was no reason to keep it on now her children were gone, out of the realm of her protection.
It was a cool night. She hugged her arms around herself, suddenly wondering if, wherever Judith was, she had a sweater. She’d seen Judith walking around wearing David’s old jean jacket. It suited her. They would have been good friends, Diana’s kids, if they’d been allowed to be the grown versions of themselves together. She should have known better. She’d been selfish, thinking she could have her life, their lives. And now she was being punished for it.
David. Jon. Now Judith.
The stone steps were cold under her bare feet, sand and salt rubbing between her toes. A sudden memory came of her mother, that day in the gray room. How different might her life have been if she’d changed her mind and continued to visit? How many fewer lies would she have told? How much sooner would she have seen the girl’s wraithlike face in the waves and discovered the danger plaguing her, her child, was so much more than she thought?
At the top of the stairs, Diana let herself into the light room. The red light brushed over her brighter, louder here, and she flinched away from it. A shadow streaked across the corner of her vision, and for a moment, she forgot why she came up.
She peered through the window, watching the waves lap the beach and the rocks. She hated the way the red light made it all look so sinister. She remembered when she was little, when the beach was just the beach and shells didn’t speak and she could open her bedroom window without fear.
When she spoke, her breath fogged the glass. “Do you even know what you’ve done?”
God, the light. All she could see was red.
At the control panel, she flicked a switch and the mechanism died with a groan, shadows of the red light lingering in the corners of her eyes.
There, she thought. That’s better.
But she didn’t head down the stairs, back to her bed to lay in the dark.
She went to the window, to the catwalk.
The air was dense, tinged with a scent like sour wine. It was like a shroud had been draped over the stars, their muted light dissipating in the hungry dark. She could hardly see the water, the waves rippling shadows, but the rush and pull was hypnotic, and she felt herself leaning slightly over the rail to better hear it.
From this height, she felt like she could reach out and touch the edge of the world. She used to dream about sailing the ocean, skirting the edge of the horizon and peering over the side to see water fall into space. Silly, but the thought used to make her smile. There’d been so much she was going to do. So much she was going to see. But the cape, and her children, had kept her rooted.
Now?
Now the ocean was an oversized tub of water with ugly things lurking beneath. The edge of the world was farther, more impossible to reach. And her kids? What would she do now that there was nothing—almost nothing—to root her? She was an untethered balloon, full of hot air and fit to burst.
She closed her eyes and rocked to the sound of the waves until a small voice broke through, a tickle in her ear.
I’m scared, Mommy.
It was like the wind had broken open her daughter’s voice and tried it on, but it was too big, flopping and slapping. Like being covered in a blanket, everything seemed to fall away and her body felt heavy. Like that moment just before falling into a deep, restful sleep. That’s it, she thought. I’m asleep. I must be dreaming.
“Don’t be scared,” Diana said. “I’m here.”
The voice had sounded so far away, farther than the edge of the horizon. She needed to get higher. She needed to see her.
She climbed up on the rail, gripping steel lines to keep steady.
“Should we sing a song?” The metal rail digging in her feet and the sand shifting below, Diana started to hum. She wasn’t a good singer, but she’d always sung to her kids. The usual childish melodies but also whatever was popular on the radio. She sang to them to soothe their ouchies and comfort them when they discovered how unfair the world could be. She sang so they would know she would always be there for them.
Not-Judith sang too, but it was the wrong song with wrong words, and Diana hummed louder, shaking her head when she got caught up in the other melody. The wind picked up, pushing her precariously forward, but she held tight to the lines even as they wobbled.
This isn’t real, she thought suddenly. It’s all in my head. I’m not here. I’m in my bed and the wind is my husband’s breath and my daughter is asleep in the other room, and somewhere, someway, my son is sleeping too.
Like magic words, as soon as she thought them, the singing stopped and the breeze stilled. Diana closed her eyes and smiled. There, she thought. That’s better.
She stepped forward.
And fell.