I STARED A LONG TIME. With my eyes and without. I took a deep breath, closed my eyes, held it a long time, found the one thing that made me want to look again and started.
Slowly, the image took shape. A charcoal outline on canvas. Like heavy fog lifting off the ocean after a storm. The sun burned it off. The way her toes curled into the sand, the right foot turned slightly in more than the left, the slim legs, long calves, knotty knees, drawn thighs, hollow hips, the hand clasped around a bloody tissue, the scars that barbwired around her chest, the yellowed, thin skin draped across her collar bone, the throbbing vine-thick vein on her neck, the flaky and cracked flaring nostrils, the purplish-blue vein pulsating on her temple, the white head, deep eyes, gray skin, the fatigue. Silhouetted against a backdrop of storm clouds, thunder and the river.
The hours passed.
I’d been painting long enough to know that each piece, if made well, can take on a life of its own. This piece had done something I’d not intended. It etched both her smallness—her shrunken, pale, sickly frame, the protrusion of her collar bone and the indentation of every rib, the matching cavities in her chest—while also capturing her enormity and her magnificence. Her larger-than-lifeness. Her I-am-not-my-cancerness. I sat back and looked at my sketch—the structure of what would become the one piece she’d always thought I could make. And there, beneath the tears, beneath the realization of what she’d just given me, it came to me. She whispered it from the canvas—the word that is my wife.
Indomitable.
At dusk, I carried her from the bench. She glanced at the canvas. “Took you long enough.”
“Sorry. Couldn’t get my subject to sit still.”
She tied the scarf back around her head. “Gee, that’s sort of a letdown. I thought you were just enjoying seeing me naked.”
“Well…”
Her breathing was labored and raspy. I set her on my seat, my feet sinking into the sand. She stared at herself, following each stroke, each shadow with her finger. After a minute, she nodded. “Not even Rembrandt…”
Her eyes were slits. She cracked a smile and fought the pain, pushing her lids upward. I asked, “Scale of one to ten?”
Her eyelids fell and she leaned against me as the rain began to smack the river.
45
JUNE 10, DUSK
Abbie lay on her back, her stomach rising and falling with short, shallow breaths. Posing had wiped her out. Her face was white and pale. Eyes rolled back and forth behind her lids. Bob sat with a shot glass in one hand and a bottle of tequila in the other. I stared out over the river. Bob said, “You don’t owe me anything and you have every right to your own privacy, but…how’d you two get here? Really?”
I started at the beginning and told him the story of us. Of jogging along the Battery. Of Rosalia. Of asking the senator’s permission to marry, eloping and buying our house in Charleston. I told him about our nearly year-long trip. I told him about finding the lump, and of the last four years. Every detail. The surgeries, treatments, hopes and discoveries. Finally, I told him about Heather.
While I talked, Annie rolled through in gentle sheets beyond the glass. She had weakened to a tropical storm, but every few minutes, we felt a gust followed by the muted pop of a pine tree snapping in half. Toward dark, the river had swelled with debris—muddying the water.
I stared through the window, speaking softly. “Growing up on the river, we found rope swings at every bend. Climbing and swinging were just part of what we did. A paper mill, located about a mile or so through the woods behind our trailer park, used to pipe their discharge into a pond behind the mill. In times of heavy rain, the pond would fill up and any discharge would overflow into these concrete holding tanks which would then ‘spill’ the water down into the river. The tanks helped reduce the erosion on the river’s bank. To prevent kids like me from playing in them, they welded metal grates over the holes. Problem was, the temptation was too great. Being an asthmatic, I was relatively small, so I tied my rope to a grate, climbed through the hole and started swinging around like Tarzan. It was all fun and games until I slipped, the rope burned my hands, and I let go. I splashed in the chest-high water, set my feet on the bottom and reached for the rope. The hole was about eight feet deep, which was about two feet too much for a four-foot boy with a two-foot reach. Fortunately, the water flushed itself every day so it wasn’t like I was swimming in an Indiana Jones den of snakes or a malaria melting pot. Other than stand there and shiver, I could not do a single thing to help myself. To compound the problem, I had no inhaler. My own fear was clamping down on my lungs, cutting off my air and my head was growing light. If I passed out, I’d collapse into the water and drown. I stood there for hours, concentrating on one thing. That next breath.
“After quitting time, the paper mill blew a huge Flintstones-like whistle, signaling both a shift change and the let-off of its discharge, which overflowed the lake which poured into the hole. I stood off to one side until it climbed high enough to float me, which was only a couple of minutes. Then it floated me some more and I grabbed the rope. I pulled myself up, crawled out and stood there scratching my head.
“That feeling of helplessness doesn’t hold a candle to sitting next to a hospital bed watching chemical poisons drip into your bald, pale, chestless, gaunt, sickly, vomiting wife.”
I was quiet for a while. “I don’t understand how a God who”—I waved my hand across the river and Abbie—“can do all this…can let something so bad happen to her.” I sat shaking my head. “I mean, why?”
Moments passed. He turned up the bottle and polished off all but the last sip. His eyes were red and tequila dripped off his chin. He walked across the floor to where Abbie lay. He knelt next to her, placed his hand on her forehead and whispered, “Do I wonder why God is silent?” He nodded. “Can I explain the existence of suffering and evil?” He shook his head. “Do I sometimes despair at this world?” He was quiet a moment. “You damn right.” He turned up the bottle, grabbed the worm with his tongue, held it between his front teeth, bit it in half and swallowed. He turned to me. “Nevertheless, I believe.”
I stared at the river. The night was clear, and the moon had returned. The river stared back at me. Forty-six miles to go. A day and a half if I gave all of me. I wanted to finish, to steal back time.
I placed my hand across Abbie’s tummy. “Can I ask a favor?”
He nodded. “Name it.”
“You’ll need your collar.”
I shook Abbie and her eyes cracked. Heavy and hazy. It took her a second to come back. “Hi,” she managed.
“Hey. You feel like checking off something that’s not on the list?”
“Anything.”
“Will you marry me…again?” I pointed at Bob. “Properly?”
She lifted her head. “Love to.”
WE WADED THROUGH the swirling current. Walked up what was once the creek and into the old pond where the old wooden building sat. I pushed open the door and carried her through. Where the boards beneath me once creaked under my weight, now they were silent. Currently, the water was pew-high and rising. I waded up the narrow center aisle while Bob set Rocket on top of the altar and then pushed open a few windows to let in some light and air. The old building swayed on its foundation—one strong wind or current from crumbling. A house of cards. Next stop would be the ocean. Rocket walked around the altar considering his options while Petey stood on Bob’s shoulder studying the glassy floor below him. He said, “Hell in a basket. Hell in a basket.”
The rear of the church had been demolished by the storm. And there had been nothing delicate about it. A tree limb had fallen across the supporting timber where I’d traced the letters with my fingers. Both the tree limb and the old timber were gone. Downriver. It had taken part of the roof with it. Every few seconds, the breeze would peel up several loose cedar shingles and then let them go, where they’d flap several times before falling quiet.
Bob stood before us. Dressed in a white robe t
ied with a white cord and draped with a purple vestment that looked like a poncho. A large cross hung down to his stomach. Petey hopped onto his right shoulder. Bob was sweating and the skin of his neck had slightly folded over his collar. He ran his finger along the inside to loosen it, tucking the skin inside as he went. Bob looked around and laughed to himself. “Fitting.”
The river shone all around us. In the time we’d been standing there, it’d risen another few inches.
Abbie rested her head on my shoulder, her arms around my neck. She came to and whispered, “I can stand.”
“You sure?”
She nodded, so I set her down. I unfolded the sheet I’d carried down from the house, folded it in half then wrapped it around her and tucked it inside itself like a towel. The blue bandana hung loose around her head so she retied the knot then looped her arm inside mine. Her sheet-train floated behind her. We made a motley crew.
Bob held a small red leather-bound book. He turned a few pages, stared at us, then back at the book. Finally, he closed the book and set it on the altar behind him. Rocket stared at it, then sat obediently.
I nodded at the book. “Don’t you need that?”
He shook his head. “I remember.”
Bob cleared his throat. “You have come here today to seek the blessing of God and”—he looked around the dim room—“his Church upon your marriage. I require, therefore, that you promise, with the help of God, to fulfill the obligations which Christian marriage demands.”
He turned to me. “Doss, you took Abbie to be your wife.” He whispered out the side of his mouth. “How long ago?”
I leaned forward. “Fourteen years.”
Bob cleared his throat a second time. “Fourteen years ago. Having here expressed a wish to recommit your vows, do you promise here in the presence of God and”—he glanced over his shoulder at Rocket and Petey—“these witnesses, to love her, comfort her, honor and keep her…” I saw his lips moving but his words sounded somewhere down deep within me. I watched Abbie out of the corner of my eye. She had straightened. Chin high, her face reflected the light off the river. He paused, then continued, “In sickness and in health, and forsaking all others, to be faithful to her as long as you both shall live?”
I rewound the tape of the last four years. Playing and replaying the video in my mind. It was difficult to watch. We’d known good, bad and the unthinkable. His echo disappeared off down the river.
I grabbed both of Abbie’s hands. “For as long as I shall live.”
Abbie exhaled, leaned against me and tucked her arms inside mine. Bob nodded. “That works, too.”
Petey fluttered his wings and began bobbing his head up and down. “Hell yes. Hell yes.”
Bob looked at Abbie. “Abbie, you have taken Doss to be your husband. Do you promise to love him, comfort him, honor and keep him, in sickness and in health, and forsaking all others, to be faithful to him as long as you both shall live?”
She nodded. “I do.”
Bob crossed us and raised his hands. “Lord, please bless…” He started to say something else, but shook his head. He tried to recover and couldn’t. Finally, he closed his eyes, squeezing tears out each side. He whispered, “Amen. You may kiss your wife.”
Petey flapped his wings and settled back on Bob’s shoulder. “Kiss the bride. Kiss the bride.”
Abbie stared up at me. There was a lot I wanted to say and do. A lot I still wished for. But none of that would come out of my mouth. She nodded and said, “I know.” I placed her narrow cheeks in my palms and pressed my trembling lips to hers.
Abbie turned in the water and spoke to the empty pews. “I’d like to thank you all for coming. Especially on such short notice.” A lizard on the windowsill bobbed its head up and down. Then she turned to me and poked me in the chest. “After fourteen years, I finally got married in a church.” She stared through the hole in the roof and laughed. “At least, what’s left of one.” She looped her arm inside mine, hanging as much as standing. “Come on. You owe me a honeymoon.”
We waded out through the front doors and swam back through the trees to the cabin, where we spent the evening wrapped up in a blanket, staring out the window at the rising water.
Annie floundered north of us, dumping her guts and unloading more than four inches of rain—per hour—across the “First Coast.” During her five-knot crawl, counties from Tallahassee to Jacksonville to Savannah averaged twenty inches of rain. The Weather Channel said that even in the Smoky foothills of Tennessee and Georgia, mountaintop outposts recorded record rainfall. Reaching the East Coast, Annie hugged the shoreline and moved north again. By midnight on the tenth, Annie dissipated along the northeast coastline and faded back into the North Atlantic Ocean where she finally took a swan dive and disappeared.
The problem left in her wake was not the wind, downed trees or erased homes, or the tornadoes that spun angrily off her heels or the cost of the damage. No, it was the several million cubic feet of rain that had rolled off her shoulders as she sauntered across land.
And all that rain had to go somewhere.
MIDNIGHT BROUGHT CALM, clear skies and the brightest moon that had ever shone. Bob’s canoe was sixteen feet, made of aluminum and had been painted dark green somewhere in the past. It wasn’t the most comfortable thing, nor was it forgiving, but she was fast and we needed speed more than comfort. I rolled up Indomitable and slid her into a PVC tube with watertight screw caps. Bob handed me a rainbow-colored umbrella and said, “To keep the sun off her.” I wedged both next to the seat and then laid Abbie on a foam pad along the bottom of the canoe.
Dressed in fraying cutoffs and half a bikini, Abbie looked like she did the first time we made this trip. Bob was still dressed. He lifted off his purple robe and laid it across Abbie like a blanket. I extended my hand. “Thank you.”
He nodded. “You know they’ve probably got people camped out on all the bridges.”
“Yeah.”
“Can you get around them?”
“Don’t know.”
“I don’t think you’ll get very far.”
“Never thought we’d get this far.”
Bob said, “Call me anytime. I can land her on a dime.” He pushed us off the bank, I reached deep into the water and pulled, staring forty-six miles and a lifetime in the face.
46
JUNE 11, 1 A.M.—THE LAST DAY
On the Florida side, the river had overflowed its bank by a wide margin. What was once a hundred feet across might stretch out a half mile now through pine trees and palmettos. It reminded me of pictures I’d seen of the Everglades. Given my experience with the river, and limited knowledge of how it drained, most of that rain had yet to hit the river. It would do so in the next twenty-four hours. By morning, the river would be unrecognizable. Even to me. The further we went, the faster it would flow. That meant I couldn’t necessarily judge our progress by known landmarks. Some yes, but I’d have to rely on the flow.
With enough flow, we could average as much as eight miles an hour. In a canoe on the river, that’s like breaking the sound barrier. The good news was knowing that much water would shut down the bridge at Highway 17. That only left the overpass at I-95. If we could slip beneath that, or around it, we had a shot. I knew they’d have people looking for us, but I’d worry about that when we got there. We could always travel under the cover of night, and with enough debris in the water, maybe we had a chance.
’Course, the debris could slow us, too. With the water rising to new levels every minute, it was picking up limbs and trash and sucking it all into the main flow of the river. In some places, where the water circled and swirled, the trash would accumulate, forming a mangled patchwork the size of a football field. Or several. While it might camouflage us, it could also hide the surface of the water. And if we ever got turned over—swamped—I wasn’t sure that we’d ever get it right again.
We’d been in the water two hours when I heard the motors coming. Along the Georgia side, somebody had
planted eight palm trees in a row. They were older, mature and their fronds dragged the surface of the water. I ducked in behind the fronds, pulled hard and snapped two of them in half, letting them fall behind us. Two Pathfinders, moving at a good clip, raced upriver, spotlighting the banks and water in front of them. Their light washed over us, but the palms broke our outline. They disappeared, their wake shook the canoe and I backed us out. Things just grew more complicated.
An hour before daylight, we passed what I thought was Coopers Neck Road, but between the darkness and the water, it was difficult to tell for sure. We slipped beyond the roofline at Mount Horeb Baptist Church. It, too, was underwater. Oddly enough, the baptismal was not. Painted white, made of cement blocks stacked eight high and surrounded with a lead pipe railing, it sat on a higher grassy hill. Currently three wood ducks floated in circles behind the railing.
The last several hours I’d paddled at close to ninety percent. The river had transformed overnight and flowed unlike anything I’d ever known. I did what I could to keep the bow pointed downriver, but the constancy of that spent me. In paddling terms, I was cooked.
Before daylight, we reached Brickyard Landing and slipped by on the other side—recapturing the sixteen miles we lost when Bob took us back to his place. The increased flow of the river had negated the incoming tide. I couldn’t tell if it was coming in or going out because so much water was flowing out. Normally, along this part of the river, a black stain registers along the marsh grass indicating how high or low the tide had risen or fallen, but the water was several feet above what was once considered high tide.
While I felt we could slip by White Oak and its seven miles of shoreline, we still had two remaining hurdles. The bridge at Highway 17 and the bridge at I-95. The senator was no dummy. He’d have people on both bridges. Probably news cameras, too. If we got lucky and slipped beneath the first bridge, we had only five miles to go before we reached the bigger bridge—and bigger problem—at I-95. The interstate bridge was tall, giving them a clear view upriver long before we got there. Further, the water was wide and the bank was muck, marsh and oyster bed, allowing no place to hide and no place to rest. To make it, we’d have to shoot the center, which meant we’d be silhouetted against the reflection. A lot like those ducks circling the inside of the baptismal pool.