The sun was on its final descent, and although the rain had stopped, heavy clouds hung dark and threatening as I parked my car along the street outside the church and raced in through the gates. Raindrops clung to the junipers, sycamores, and sculpted myrtle branches that hovered over the graves, a storm-scented wind shaking them loose until they fell like tears onto the stones and sodden earth.
The last rays of sun escaped through the winding paths between graves as I found my way to the mound of dirt marking the interment site. It was still covered with wreaths and bouquets, the ground raw and fragrant like the suitcase had been when Gibbes had pulled it from the hole.
No bike, no tracks, no sign whatsoever that Owen had been there. The full panic that I’d managed to hold at bay so far threatened to engulf me, to take me back to the helpless woman I’d been while married to Cal.
Think. Think. Loralee would have known what to do. But Loralee isn’t here. I stumbled blindly out of the cemetery, watching as dark clouds obliterated what was left of the sunset and everything turned to gray.
I made it back behind the steering wheel before the sky opened up and rain pelted down, thudding against the metal roof and windshield. My hands were shaking as I picked up the phone and hit “redial” to call Gibbes’s number. It wasn’t until his voice mail picked up and I heard his voice that I remembered he wasn’t there. That he was “off the grid” and would be checking in only a couple of times a day.
I threw my phone onto the passenger seat, then pressed my forehead against the steering wheel hard enough that it hurt. Think. Think. Lightning flashed, illuminating the world for a brief second, the limbs of the oak trees lining the road stark against the angry sky.
I thought of Owen, out in the storm by himself somewhere. Missing his mother. Maybe wondering where I was and why I wasn’t coming to get him.
“Owen!” I yelled inside my car as the sky went black again. And that was when I knew where he was. I saw him so clearly, standing on the dock watching the dolphin sluice through the water, feeling the ripples beneath my feet. And I heard Owen’s voice. We should always find a happy place—kind of like “base” in a game of tag, where you can go and all of your problems and worries can’t touch you.
I immediately turned the car around and headed toward Bay Street. I’d been to Gibbes’s house only twice, but each time I’d spent so much time studying the road that I was sure I could find it again. It was only a few turns, and then a long dirt drive to his house. And a bridge. My foot nearly slipped from the accelerator, but I moved it back again, gently pressing on it as I neared the bridge, which was lit up clearly against the night sky.
What if it’s open to let boats go through and I have to stop in the middle? I pushed the thought away, telling myself I’d think about it later, feeling a little like Scarlett O’Hara.
I thought of calling Gibbes again, and then as quickly as I dismissed that idea, I thought of Deborah. Deborah would come immediately; I knew that. But Owen was my brother, and he needed me now.
I flicked on my signal to turn right onto the bridge, hesitating long enough that the person behind me felt compelled to tap his horn. Slowly I moved forward onto the foot of the bridge, my hands gripping the wheel so tightly that I could barely feel them. My body shook while bile rose in the back of my throat. Breathe. Breathe. Breathe.
The rain had abated slightly, but the wipers continued at high speed, my hand refusing to let go of the steering wheel long enough to change the setting. Thump, thump, thump. I hated the sound, hated the way it reminded me of the sound a car made as it slid against the side of a bridge, the sound it made right before the car plunged over the side into icy cold water.
Breathe. Breathe. I was almost at the midpoint of the bridge, and it was closed, so I didn’t have to stop. Because if I had to, I wasn’t sure whether I could go forward again. There was a lot of traffic on the bridge, moving slowly, but as I approached the second half I wanted to get off now. Move, I said in my head to the white SUV in front of me. “Move,” I said out loud, my voice trembling, my forehead drenched in sweat.
You are so much stronger and braver than you think you are. The sob broke from my throat unexpectedly, my tears hot and sudden on my skin. “Move,” I whispered to the car in front, my foot slipping from the accelerator again and then punching on the brake. The vehicle behind me honked and I wanted to stop then. To park my car and get out and run back the way I’d come.