Tonight the paradise
dream woke him again. Mel sometimes cried out as he emerged from its
depths, and Kate, who rarely slept deeply anymore, woke too.
" What is it?"
" Nothing. It's all right. Go back to sleep."
" Nightmares?" That was all she had
because of the drugs she took for pain. Mel said no, his wife sighed
and rustled under the blankets for a while; her shallow ragged breathing
resumed.
Mel loved the nights when Kate didn't
wake, when he could linger in half-sleep and reconstruct the dream in
his barely wakened mind. The camera panning fields of early morning
stars, faint in a slowly brightening tropical sky, then zooming across
miles of ocean. Like a soundtrack fading in, voices grew louder. Mel
saw himself on a boat, dressed for scuba diving, standing beside the
same dark-haired woman. As the boat rocked in a swell, it threw her
slightly against him, and he breathed the fragrance of her hair.
The smell haunted him, vivid and exotic, the
essence of health and vigor missing since the antiseptic hospital odor
took up residence in their house. The scent reminded him of the early
years before their marriage, when Kate was in her twenties, getting
her pilot’s license, going to cooking school. She laughed loudly
back then, wore her blond hair past her shoulders, a waterfall of shimmery
light. He loved to stand behind her, slowly stroking the waves with
a big wood-handled brush.
He thought of the fragrance of hair, how long
it had been, and his eyes stung.
 The
luminescent display on the bedside clock said 3:15. He knew from her
breathing that Kate was still awake. Finally she spoke from the darkness.
" You said we could get away. Take a last
trip. I'd like that."
Mel tried to slip back into the dream, but he was too alert. He turned
toward her, reluctant.
" Someplace out of this cold and wind,"
she said. The Adirondacks were frozen in deep winter, the farm blanketed
with snow drifts, cold cutting the land like a knife edge. "I'm
always shivering. I want to bake in the heat."
" Ellen doesn’t want you to travel
far."
His wife reached out under the wool blankets
and found his hand. "It's my life, what's left of it. I need some
new memories. Something I can take with me that's not pain meds and
people in white jackets."
" OK," Mel said. "Do you want
to bring Molly?” Their daughter was deep into college classes.
“ Just us,” Kate said.
“ Anything you want specially to do?"
" I want . . ." He heard her take
a big breath then blow it out carefully. He thought of a child poised
over a birthday cake making a wish. "To be free of all this.”
She paused, as if she was going to say more but couldn’t.
 Wind
buffeted the house, and cold air leaked into the room. Mel burrowed
deeper under the comforter. In the dark warmth, the dream surfaced again.
He could feel the warm caress of ocean-scented air, hear sharp cries
of seabirds, see the endless white sand.
" Do you want me to surprise you?”
he said finally. “Find a place?"
" I'd like that. Surprise me." He
heard her smile, visualizing it. "Not Australia, but maybe an island
somewhere. You could dive again. You used to love that."
" And money?"
" Oh, Mel," she said. "Let's
not bother with that, after all we've been through. Just once, OK?"
Mel lightly squeezed Kate's bony fingers. Thinking
about diving gave him the same relaxed and limitless feeling as the
dream, a sensation that began in his chest and oozed like lotion soothing
parched skin. He imagined being under water, self-contained, feeling
the powerful push of his fins through the ocean. As he closed his eyes
and listened to his wife's breathing, he knew he could find them the
perfect place.
• •
•
Click Here to
continue to top of next column
2005 Mary Carroll
Moore. All rights reserved.
|
The morning they arrived on the tiny island called Bonaire, part of
a trio off the coast of Venezuela, Mel was swept by déjà
vu. White beaches wove like ribbons along the shoreline, the harsh tropical
light glinting pink and gold on azure water. He saw fish as colorful
as flowers beneath the slow waves; he imagined the layers of green and
blue that would capture their movement on paper.
The déjà vu continued when they
were ushered into their suite: the view out the double glass doors was
strangely familiar. Even the scent of the breeze wafting up the beach
onto their sheltered stone terrace was something he had smelled before.
 He
settled Kate in bed with a book, her thin hairless body wrapped in the
hotel’s white robe, the cotton cap stretched over her bare head
to keep off the chill. He opened the curtains so she could see the glimmer
of blue water, then went in search of the dive shop to book for the
next morning.
He walked slowly, squinting against the glare
of the tropical sunlight. Mounds of hot sand on the wooden boardwalk
stung the bottoms of his bare feet; his heavy mesh bag of scuba gear
bumped against one leg. A couple was standing against the weathered
wooden railing of the pier, their backs to him. He studied the way the
light fell on the dark-haired woman, her shiny hair against tanned shoulders.
The movement of her hand, lifting slowly to brush her hair behind her
ears, was familiar
. Mel felt a quick surge of envy as her carefree laugh
rang out. It'd been a couple of years since he'd laughed that way. He
paused, unsure now, setting down the bag which felt intolerably heavy,
squinting at the shop near the end of the pier, its wooden door wide
open. Perhaps he should wait to book the first dive. Practice a bit
in the pool. Get stronger, more sure of his skills. He could go back
to the room now, read to Kate, try again tomorrow.
The woman pivoted toward him, smiled. Her even
teeth glinted in the sunlight. Mel's bag slid to the wooden boardwalk.
It was Rose Stewart.
Compared to the woman in real life, her photograph
had been almost colorless. Maybe why it had been such a hard painting.
Impossible to capture the vibrancy of skin and hair. He had given up,
never returned the photograph she had sent, never even billed her for
the portrait time.
The woman’s companion came over. "Need
some help, mate?" The accent was unmistakably Australian. "Booking
for tomorrow's dive, are you? We're on as well. The boat's supposed
to be here at ten sharp. They have lockers at the shop.” He hoisted
Mel's gear bag onto one shoulder. “Check this lot if you'd like."
Mel nodded and began walking behind him. As
the two men approached her, Rose held out her hand. "I'm Rose Stewart
and that’s Scotty. We're from Sydney."
"I know," Mel said.
Rose looked startled then her face cleared.
"The painter. Martin?”
“Melvin Fisher.”
“From Heron Island." Rose was smiling
broadly now. “Two years ago. We were on the same dive boat.”
“Diving’s a small world, eh?”
Scotty clapped Mel's shoulder with a huge tanned hand. "You saw
that reef shark we were all keen on finding. Wasn’t it brilliant!
Not so good here—at least while that storm's stuck over the mainland.
Visibility’s about ninety. Bommies all over the place."
"Coral reefs," Rose translated.
"I remember," Mel said. "This
is my first time out since Heron. At least in warm water." He noticed
his hand, held up to shade his eyes, was trembling. He quickly lowered
it to rest in his shorts' pocket.
"Where’s your dive buddy?"
Scotty looked past Mel down the pier.
"Diving alone this trip. My wife . . ."
He cleared his throat. There seemed to be no way to begin telling these
people. "My wife's not well."
"You can buddy with us tomorrow."
Rose patted Mel's arm in a friendly way, then left her hand there for
a moment. "We're all experienced."
 Mel
looked down at the slender hand against his skin. Rose's nails were
long, a pale shimmery pink color. She shone with vitality; her bare
arms, tanned and freckled, glowed against the wetsuit's short sleeve,
strong and ready to reach for the next experience. He thought of Kate’s
hands nestled safely under the wool blanket as they fell asleep at home.
He would reach out and take one, holding it carefully so he wouldn't
crush the tiny-boned fingers.
• •
•
Read
the complete story (239kb PDF file)
|
