A dark ocean writhes under slate-gray clouds lit from within by white shocks of lightning. The tumultuous waves crest and swell, nothing to beat against but each other…and one ship. A blunt, long tanker of some kind. The type of vessel designed to ride these immense waves.
The ship crests a swell, rising out of the water so high that the bottom breaches, hovering in empty space for a brief, unreal moment, before falling, almost in slow motion, sliding down the back side of the wave. The bow hits the valley between the monstrous rollers and dives below the surface, disappearing into the frothing chaos. The water consumes the ship, devouring the front half, before it pulls free, bobbing to the surface and climbing the next wave.
Thunder rumbles, barely louder than the howling wind and crashing surf. Rain pings against the metal hull, the percussion in the ocean’s orchestra.
Lightning sizzles free from the cloud bank and strikes the sea, a blast of power so intense that the ocean breaks into a rough boil. Water molecules tear apart—the oxygen and hydrogen ionized by the intensity.
The ship’s hull absorbs the electricity, passing it over the surface of the vessel as fast as thought travels through the quickest of minds. Compasses spin and computer screens flash.
It’s over in the same instant it begins, the symphony of the storm dulled in the wake of that crack of power.
I see the scene from within the ship—from the bridge, viewed through the rain-spattered windows, the drenching too intense for the desperate swiping of the windshield wipers. I see it from the point of the bow, rising to stare at the swirling storm before diving to plunge into the churning sea.
I see the scene from the surface of the water and from its depths—one a tempest, the other a cold, steady blackness.
I see the scene from within the storm—the swirling moisture, the crackling electricity, the ionized air scenting the world with ozone.
I lurch to a sitting position. Sweat slicks my back and adrenaline urges my heartbeat into a rapid staccato.
Blue lies at the end of the bed, head raised, watching me—his eyes reflecting green in the darkness. My breath comes in harsh pants. James stirs next to me, rolling, reaching out an arm.
I take his hand, rubbing my thumb over the back of it, and he stills. Frank lies on his other side—all four paws in the air, looking like a giant, furry, dead bug. Nila is just below him, curled into a tight ball, his opposite in almost every way except their parentage.
“It’s okay,” I tell the shadowed room. Just a dream. Just a dream. The adrenaline in my system aches, pushing me to move, trying to convince me I can’t just lie here. My feet touch the cool tiles.
As I stand, Nila shifts to take my spot, James now flanked by the large protective dogs. I pull on a white T-shirt—one of Mulberry’s. It smells like him and falls to my hips, slipping off one shoulder. Blue leaps off the bed, following me into the bathroom. I let him trail me into the large space.
The Costa Rican compound of Joyful Justice is a former luxury eco resort, and the bathrooms reflect that. There is a rain shower with a skylight in it, a tub made of local wood, and double sinks set into stone quarried from the jungle. I’m not sure how eco it is to cut down trees and rip up the earth for rocks, but I guess it’s better than doing that someplace else, then putting it all on a plane and burning fossil fuels to haul it out here to the depths of the jungle.
The isolated location was supposed to be a part of the appeal, but the enterprise never took off—its opening coincided with a startling downturn in the economy where even the rich got worried about how much they should spend on peace and quiet…not that it’s quiet here.
Even with the bathroom door closed I can hear the orchestra of insects singing their songs. The loud braw of a howler monkey breaks through the cacophony, warning of the sun’s imminent arrival.
I turn on the cold tap and lean forward to splash water on my heated skin. The tips of my bangs get wet, lengthening them so that they tickle my lashes. Pulling a pair of small scissors out of the drawer, I snip the ends quickly.
I can hear Robert Maxim tutting at me. You deserve better. He’d want me to get a fancy professional haircut. But that’s not my definition of self-worth. I’m not cutting my own hair because I think I don’t deserve better. It’s convenience, not inadequacy.
Nervous energy still zings through me. It’s as if my body knows something is coming and is trying to warn my brain but…we are safe here. Well, as safe as possible for our corporeal bodies. I pad silently back into the bedroom and then out into the dark living room.
The door to the villa is to my left, the couch and chairs in front of me. The open kitchen is beyond the seating area. A clip-on high chair is attached to the bar that separates the two spaces. I circle the couch and head to the balcony door next to the kitchen. The villa is built on a rise so while the front door meets a flat path, the back side hangs off a slope, the elevation affording a view of wave-like wilderness.
The glass door slides almost silently, a rush of morning air whooshing into the room, cooling my sweat-sheened skin and easily passing through the T-shirt’s thin material. I step out into the predawn darkness, into a charcoal drawing done in shades of gray and black. The jungle is crosshatch lines of movement, the horizon a contour line of pewter, the sky smudged ebony punctuated by stars twinkling close.
I sit down in one of the two Adirondack chairs on the narrow balcony, leaning back and pulling my legs up on the wide seat. Blue sits in front of me, ears pricked forward, gaze straight to the horizon.
The resonant roar of a howler monkey rises over the symphony of insects, answered by another. They sound like they are a few miles away, their call loud but not painful. The troops travel their territories, foraging leaves. They move every few days, staying within about a fifty-acre zone—enough space to avoid getting into fights with other clans while providing a good variety of leaves.
Apparently, one of the trees behind this house belongs to a clan and you need to be real quiet when they are here or they get pissed—which is the exact kind of irony I like. The loudest mammal on the planet doesn’t accept noise from others.
At the horizon, the slash of pewter yields to a stripe of silver. Birds start to twill and twerp. The conductor of the insect orchestra shifts her attention and the tune changes, the nocturnal bugs ceding the spotlight to the dawn’s symphony.
Blue stands and turns to face the door behind me. I crane my neck to see a dark figure behind the glass. Mulberry. My lips pull into a soft smile, my body relaxing as he pulls the door open. “Hey,” he says, his morning rasp deep and rumbly.
“Hey,” I say back.
He’s wearing loose shorts and a T-shirt that is the twin to mine. It fits him the way it’s supposed to, molding over his shoulders and falling off the lines of his chest to just below his waistband. Mulberry doesn’t take the other seat; instead he moves in front of me.
Tilting my chin, I look at him. His broad shoulders create a new black line in the charcoal drawing. The curls of his hair twirl into silhouettes against the slowly brightening sky. “Sit on my lap?” he asks in that morning timbre of his.
“Sure.” I smile. Sitting on Mulberry’s lap is something we’ve never done. It’s too settled for us. Our thing has always been a clashing intimacy. A mutual release from our chains. But there is a groundedness between us now, some kind of resolution, and sitting on Mulberry’s lap makes a wonderful kind of sense.
I stand and Mulberry puts one arm around my waist and cups my cheek, leaning down for a gentle kiss, just a brush of his lips against mine, so light I don’t even feel the scratch of his stubble. Mulberry looks down at me—he’s not that much taller but so much broader.
The silver at the horizon transmutes to pale blue and caresses the scars on Mulberry’s jaw, gently illuminating the hills and valleys of ravaged skin on his neck. I lean forward and place a kiss on those healed wounds. Evidence of how much he’s willing to sacrifice for me and our son. For the ones he loves. For the greater good.
It’s his instinct to protect. Lightning started a fire in one of the battery rooms at Joyful Justice’s island compound, shorting out the automatic locking system. After helping others escape, Mulberry stayed behind, and locked himself in with the devastating flames.
He barely survived. Managed to climb into a vent and fell, breaking bones on top of his dangerous burns. Then he lay there for days, fading in and out of consciousness. His survival is a miracle.
If only I had known. How different would our lives be now?
I mourned Mulberry, the pain a veil that hangs over my memories of James’s early life. That time was such a potent mix of pure joy, bone deep love, and heavy sorrow. I regret none of it and…Mulberry turns us, spinning like dancers, and I let out a small laugh of surprise. Mulberry sits, pulling me down with him. His stubbled chin rests on my bared shoulder, his breath brushing my collarbone. “Bad dream?” he asks, as if he knows me so well.
I chuckle, and his arm around my waist shakes with my amusement. Leaning my head more firmly against him I sigh. “Yeah…it’s as if my body knows something really bad is coming but my brain can’t catch on to what it is.”
“Do you remember anything from the dream?”
I close my eyes, the scene of the ship in the storm seen through a screen of dust—its vividness hazing out the longer I’m awake. “There was a boat, a tanker kind of thing, in a storm.” I pause, swallow, trying to figure out how to go on. Mulberry waits, his breath even and warm against my skin. “I was everything. The captain, the hull, the sea, the storm…the lightning and the thunder.”
“Hmmm,” Mulberry hums, the rumble in his chest vibrating against my back. “Sounds familiar.”
“It does?”
Mulberry nods against my shoulder, his chin digging into my muscle for a brief moment. “Before I was found, while I lay in excruciating pain—my mind did some strange things. I lived a thousand lives in a way. And something that burst across my mind is that I am everything in my life.” He exhales like that came out wrong. “Remember when we were talking about self-trust—that you trust you and I’ll trust me and we’ll be safe together.”
“Yeah.”
“It’s sort of like that—we are the storm in our lives. We are the ship and the sea.” I tense, not loving the implications of his words. Mulberry’s arm around my waist gives a little squeeze. “I’m not saying that the outside world doesn’t affect us—just that our interior lives are all our own. And we can choose the calm seas or the tempest.”
Mulberry kisses my shoulder, his stubble a wonderful scratch soothed by silky lips. Peach bleeds into the pale blue. Then a golden blaze snakes across the horizon line and the day breaks. Birds cry, insects rattle. Mulberry and I hold each other.