“I can’t!” he screamed. “I just want to be left alone. Leave me to drown in this misery, and get the hell out of my life.”
Connie’s eyes hardened, and at last the frustration in her burst over the walls that had dammed it. Her face twisted into an angry snarl and she planted her hands in the middle of Blake’s chest and pushed him backwards with all of her might.
The surf was churning along the shore, waves hissing and tugging at their feet as they were sucked back into the ocean so that the sand beneath them seemed to melt away. Blake staggered off balance and his arms flailed wildly for a handhold that was not there. He fell back into the surf and the sea came crashing down upon him, so that he rolled, helpless, out into deeper water.
He came to his knees, water streaming from his head and chest, his face a mask of fear and panic. The next wave was larger than the first. It erupted over his back, pushed him forward and then dragged him away again so that he went down below the churning surface, gasping and heaving for breath.
Salt water filled his mouth and scalded the back of his throat. He clawed his way, lost, until at last his head broke the surface. He could feel the sand beneath his feet, the beach shoaling quickly away into deep water. He swung his arms, flailed and thrashed, gulping huge lungsful of air before the next wave dashed over him and he was pounded back below the surging maelstrom.
He was fifty feet offshore, carried by the rip of the current until he could not feel the bottom and his terror became white and blinding.
“Help!” he screamed, his head bobbing like a cork for a moment before another rolling swell washed over him. “Connie! Help me!”
“No!” Connie stood on the shore, creeping out into the surf until it was washing around her hips, but refusing to go further. She could feel the relentless tug of the ocean like tentacles clawing at her. “Come to me!” she cried out, screaming and crying at the same time so that the words were tortured and desperate.
“Help me!’ Blake retched. He could feel himself being drawn out to sea. “Please!”
“No!” Connie sobbed. “Find your way back to me, Blake! Listen to my voice and come to me.”
“Connie!”
“Find me, Blake! Listen to my voice, and come back to me!”
The pain in Connie’s chest was deep and as sharp as a piercing knife, so that she could feel herself bleeding with the terror and fear that clutched at her. She was trembling with panic, and the horror of all she had risked. She hovered in the waist-deep water, torn to pieces by the desperation of his pleas and fretted whether she should go to him – if she should swim out to Blake and help him back to shore. But she knew too that if she did, they would be doomed.
“Listen to my voice, and come back to me!” she called again with rising dread.
And then she whispered, “Please!”
Blake struggled to the surface and heard the cry of Connie’s voice. He had time just to fill his lungs once more before another wave crashed over his head and sent him tumbling and disoriented back into the darkened churning depths. He felt himself falling, felt the icy embrace of the water, and then the burning pain in his lungs began slowly to go as numb as a fatal wound. A sense of creeping tranquility draped itself over him. The water clawed and tugged at him, the unseen current like strong fingers, until he stopped struggling and finally allowed himself to surrender. He let his last breath trickle from the corner of his mouth in a shimmering hiss of bubbles, and then the energy-sapping desperation melted from his body, and he began to float and drift.
Behind his blind eyes, visions started to swirl, vaporous as the mist but slowly filling with detail until they were so real he reached out a torpid hand, as if to grasp at them. He saw Chloe, his beautiful daughter. She was running along the sand with her ponytails bobbing at the back of her head, a shrill childish squeal of delight in her voice as he chased after her. She was laughing, her eyes enormous and filled with a child’s adoration and trust. He scooped her up into his arms and kissed her, and the vision was so real he could smell the scent of her, the blossom of her breath as she nuzzled against his chest.
Then the vision vanished, replaced by other moments, each one a delight or a dread – a life played out before his eyes that ended abruptly, back in the darkness, back in the shivering embrace of the ocean.
He seemed to come alert again – cast off the shackles of creeping lethargy and his mind became urgent, his instincts for survival suddenly drumming like an insistent beat. He didn’t want to die. He wasn’t ready to give up. Blake thrashed in the ocean with the desperation of a man who had peered into the precipice of death – and it was there at last that he found his will to live.
His head burst through the ice-green surface of the ocean and he gasped and sobbed for breath. He flailed his arms, struck out once, and then the next wave came up behind him and he could feel the pressure of the swell as it rolled in from the ocean. He kicked his legs, his ears filled with the hissing seethe of the ocean and his face slapped by the punch of the breeze. The wave swept up and he rose above it, the pain in his lungs burning like a fire as he sucked in agonizing gulps of air.
Connie’s voice came at first like a whisper, like a lover’s call in the middle of a dream. He turned his face toward it, strained to concentrate. Another wave came up beneath him, but it was smaller than the first. Blake swung his arms, stayed above the surface and then Connie’s voice was a little louder, a little more to his left, a little more pleading and urgent.
“Come to me. Blake!” she cried.
He began to swim, fighting to move, struggling against the clinging anchor-like weight of his jeans, his legs weary with fatigue, his body aching with exhaustion. He caught the momentum of the next wave and it carried him closer to the shore. He felt his foot scrape sand. He groped for the beach, his arms now too heavy to move and his legs like lead. Another wave picked him up and sent him tumbling and swirling towards the sand.
He came to his feet like a castaway who had survived disaster at sea. He dragged himself to his feet, stumbled on legs that would no longer move. He felt himself swaying, his arms useless by his sides. Another, smaller wave washed around him and he teetered, but held himself upright.
He took a step, then another. Connie’s voice was close, rising with hope and relief.
“Come to me Blake!” she called to him. “I’m here, and I’m waiting for you.” She held out her hand. He was just a few feet away yet still she resisted the agonizing urge to rescue him – to lead him to the shore. “Come to me and leave the tragedy and the past behind, Blake. Remember Chloe, but come to me free of the debilitating sadness.”
He turned his face to her voice, heard the hope and desperation in her words, and wanted her with the same yearning need – the need to begin again and to be rid of the sadness but not his memories.
His fingers touched hers and she wrapped her hand in his and then went gasping and crying to him, entangled in his arms and sobbing with relief and joy. He felt her warm against him, squirming with energy and vitality and he realized at last, that her love was everything he wanted, and more than he ever deserved.
“How did you get to be so tough?” he croaked, for his throat was raw and the rasp of salt water was still heavy in his lungs and on his chest.
Connie clung to him, weeping uncontrollably. She looked up into his face, touched the sallow, ravaged hollows of his cheeks with a tender finger.
“I didn’t know I was,” she cried and laughed, “Until I found you and knew that you were worth fighting for.”
“I love you,” Blake said softly.
“I know,” Connie wrapped him in her arms and held him like she might never let him go. “And I love you too, Blake. With all of my heart.”
They clung to each other for a very long time, the waves lapping around them, the ocean unable to tear them apart. Over their shoulder the sun rose like a renewed promise, burning through the cloud and lighting the morning with warmth.
At last Connie leaned back i
n Blake’s arms and gazed into his face seeking some reassurance. “Are we going to be okay?” she asked in a whisper of hope.
“Yes,” Blake said. “I just need to say the one thing to Chloe that I could never bring myself to say,” he husked. “I just need to tell her goodbye.”
48.
At the going down of the sun, Blake and Ned walked forlorn to the beach. Clutched in Blake’s hand was the last red rose. He walked stiffly, the big dog at his side, nudging him with his shoulder when he veered, until they were standing alone on the edge of the ocean.
For a long time Blake stood still, did not move. The last fading warmth of the sun spread across his back, and the cold wind that would come with the darkness was still just a soft breath.
He listened to the rhythm of the surf – the ebbing sounds of the lonely sea – and it seemed to Blake as though his heartbeat began to slow until he and the ocean were in harmony.
He kissed the rose, pouring all of his love and lament into the brush of his lips. He inhaled the fragrance of it as though to sear the scent into his memory forever.
And then he threw the flower into the foaming waves.
“Goodbye my darling girl,” he said softly, feeling awkward and self-conscious until the emotion overcame him and the halting words began to spill from his soul. “Always know that daddy loves you. Always know that you are beautiful, and I have loved you deeply – loved you with all my heart.”
The surf seemed to give a great sigh of sorrow, as if the words were somehow were carried on the breeze and then lifted towards the heavens. Blake felt the scald of the first tears in his eyes and he let them run down his cheeks, unashamed and somehow unrestrained by the realization that this would be the last farewell.
“You are a painting in my heart – a masterpiece made perfect by my memory – and I know one day, when we’re together again in the arms of God, that you will be waiting for me and I will have another life in which to love and adore you just as desperately as I do now.
“I have cried enough tears to fill an ocean, wept over the broken pieces of my heart, but I know it’s a path to darkness. And I can’t grieve any more. So I’m not going to wait for you any more, Chloe. Instead I’m going to celebrate your smile in the sunshine and listen for your laughter on the wind, until we can be together again.”
He paused suddenly, the lump of emotion swelling in his chest until he thought it might burst and he would not be able to continue. He took one last breath, lifted his head to the sky and imagined it was a night filled with glittering stars.
“Goodbye, Chloe. I love you – and you will always be daddy’s darling girl. My little girl lost.”
When it was done – when there was nothing left in his heart, Blake walked slowly back up the beach. Connie was waiting for him on the porch. She hugged him and they wept quietly together, drawing strength from the shared sadness.
Then they went inside, and one by one, Connie slowly turned off the lights until at last the old home slept, and the light house was no more.
49.
Connie came bustling through the screen door, her face flustered and her eyes just a little crazy with panic.
“Blake!” she called out, snapping another glance at her watch. “Are you dressed? The exhibition opens in two hours.”
“I’m in here,” he called from the bedroom.
She came down the hallway, her mind a whirl. She had been at the gallery all morning, working with caterers, ensuring all the canvases were hung and attending to a million other minor things that had demanded her attention. Now she had just enough time to change, before heading back to Hoyt Harbor to greet guests as they arrived, and the doors of her gallery were thrown open for the first time.
Blake was in the bedroom, standing, waiting for her. He was wearing a pale green dress shirt and his only good pair of jeans. Connie looked at him aghast.
“Blake, the white shirt,” she said. “I pulled out the white shirt for you. I even laid it out on the bed.”
Blake grunted. “I felt it, felt the collar. It felt blue to me, not white. I don’t like blue shirts.”
Connie almost laughed, but she was too strung out, too stressed, to see the humor. “It felt blue? How on earth can a shirt feel blue?”
“I have an instinct,” Blake declared, like it was some cosmic gift given to him as an artist. “I understand color. So I hung it back up in the closet and picked this dark grey one instead.”
Connie felt herself smile, despite herself. “Okay,” she nodded. “The ‘grey’ one you are wearing looks fine.”
She kicked off her heels, changed as fast as a woman was capable, and was ready to leave again just thirty minutes after arriving. Blake had found his way along the corridor to the studio. She chased after him, herded him out to the car with his hand on her arm.
Ned followed them to the driveway. Connie gave him a pat. “Mind the house, Ned,” she said gently. “I’ll take care of Blake tonight.”
The big dog dropped to the ground, his head down between his front paws, and prepared himself with stoic resignation for the wait until they returned.
It was an hour-long drive to Hoyt Harbor on a good day. Connie made the journey in a little over fifty minutes, talking incessantly about the minor problems that had plagued her during the day. Blake sat tensely in the passenger seat, sensing they were driving too fast, and imagining Connie waving her arms in gestures every time she spoke.
He decided it was a good thing he was blind.
When they arrived at the gallery, the catering staff were waiting for her. Connie led Blake up the steps and into the art space. He had his cane in his hand and he went around the walls slowly and carefully, counting out paces, memorizing distances while in the background he could hear Connie arguing with a man in broken English about the food that had been prepared.
He heard the click of Connie’s heels and turned his face towards the sound. “Everything all right?”
Connie muttered unlady-like words under her breath, then forced a smile onto her face. “Sure,” she said.
“Where are the main paintings?”
Connie led him around the room, guiding him with a hand on her elbow so Blake could fix the location of the portrait and his best seascapes. He wished he could see the space – being in unfamiliar places like this gave him no memory reference to draw on. All he had was his recollection of the map Connie had drawn in the sand when she had first discovered the shop was available, and a couple of photographs she had shown him as the tradesmen had begun to renovate.
He wasn’t yet confident with his blindness, so that his steps were shuffling and almost meek – expecting to bump into forgotten objects or unremembered walls. Connie took him around the perimeter of the gallery twice, willfully ignoring everything else that needed to be attended to until she was certain he was oriented. Then she stole another glance at her watch and squealed.
“They’ll be here any minute!” she gasped.
“What about your mother and sister?”
“A little later,” Connie said. Her mother and Jean were staying overnight at a local motel, and had arrived just a few hours ago. In fact it was the first time in over twenty years that locals could ever remember the town’s lodging being entirely booked out, well beyond the summer tourist season. There was not a room available for miles, and Connie was expecting almost two hundred invited guests… within a matter of minutes.
Reluctantly, she left Blake and drove the last of the catering staff out through the door with frantic waves of her arms like she was herding a small flock of chickens. She had time for a surreptitious gulp of wine – and when she looked up again, she could see faces pressed against the front window glass.
The Connie Dixon Gallery of Fine Art was about to open for business.
They surged through the open door, a hundred people at least who had flown in from the four corners of the globe, followed by more collectors and investors that spilled out onto the sidewalk. One by one Connie greeted t
hem and Blake shook their hands until he was numb and reeling.
There were many people who had invested in Blake’s paintings through the years of his career. Most of the big art money now came from Asia and Europe, and as the people introduced themselves to him, he recalled names that were familiar echoes of the past. By the time everyone had arrived, the gallery was a press of bodies, almost shoulder-to-shoulder, moving like molasses from one beautiful image to the next like adoring worshippers.
Blake stood in the middle of the gallery space with Connie close beside him. She was clinging tightly to his hand and humming with excitement. She leaned close to his ear, told him which paintings were attracting the most attention, and fended off a dozen offers to purchase within the first few minutes.
“It’s the portrait that is stopping them, Blake. They can’t seem to move past it. They are four deep around the painting, just staring at it like they’re hypnotized.”
“And the old seascapes?”
“How many do you want to sell?” she was smiling, her heart pounding with excitement. It was the ultimate culmination of her dream. The gallery was a hit.
Blake lost track of time. He felt faces pressing close to him, the enthusiasm of the collectors as thick and tangible as the stuffy air around them. They were glowing with admiration and congratulations, and Blake was filled with a sense of vindication and satisfaction. Connie’s excitement was a princely reward for him agreeing to offer the paintings for show, and now he was glad he had relented. She had been right, of course. The paintings were dead objects without an audience. Now they had come to life in the eyes and minds and imaginations of all these people who had traveled thousands of miles to see what he had been capable of creating. He felt a sudden twinge of regret that his days of painting were over – the energy in the room and overwhelming approval was like a magic carpet that uplifted him, and stirred within him that hunger for art that he thought had dried and withered in his heart.