I park on the side street that runs beside Ellen’s house, and let the truck idle a while. Andie’s sound asleep, slumped against the window, her mouth slack and making sleepy wheezing sounds. When I woke her before daybreak this morning, explaining that we were going to leave Casey’s place and make a trip up the coast to Grandma Richardson’s house, she didn’t even question me. All the things she’s had to endure from me in the past year—the instability that’s come with my shaky mental state—it amazes me how smoothly she’s handled most of them.
So I’m letting her rest while she can, especially since I’ve got to be back at my job in the morning. Besides, it’s easier to stare at the palm trees lining this road than deal with the reality of facing what I’m about to do today. But it’s part of my plan for making Rebecca truly believe my intentions; in order to win her back, I’ve got to come clean. Not just with Laurel, but in a lot of aspects of my life.
And Laurel—along with our secrets—are first on my agenda. She’s here in Santa Cruz, home visiting her mother for the week. I know this because she told me she’d be flying in from Santa Fe for a long Fourth of July weekend here with Ellen. Makes it perfect timing for this conversation we need to have, but my stomach still swashes nervously. I kill the truck’s engine and try gathering my nerve.
A background headache pulsates behind my eyes, begging to become a full-blown migraine. Leaning back in the seat, I rub the bridge of my nose, and watch a pack of surfer boys walk by, salty boards in hand and cocky grins spread across their faces. My mind wanders to Al’s childhood here, how he was nurtured on the ocean life, even as he was inspired to be something far more—to use his brilliant mind to help those kids of his. It was a strange blend, so many aspects in one man. I’ll never meet another guy like him, that’s for damn sure.
For the first time that thought isn’t automatically chased by stifling pain. It’s more an objective realization; an appreciation of his uniqueness, and that even though he had a twin, there will never be another human being precisely like him. There’s just the realization that life is a gift, and Alex was part of life’s gift to me.
Watching a gaggle of young kids speed down the sidewalk on their skateboards, sun-bleached hair flying, laughing and being crazy, they could be Alex and Casey and Marti, back twenty-five years ago, they’re that familiar. The wheel keeps on turning, another season upon us.
Smiling as they pass my open truck window, I have a thought. Maybe the thing is, the gift means more precisely because it is always passing away, like the waves or the sand or the sun tracking across the open sky.
Maybe that’s what Alex has wanted me to know.
Laurel pops out the backdoor of the house, tracking right toward me. Bustling purposefully down the sidewalk with a box in her arms, she doesn’t see me at first, but then something makes her glance my way. The cool clear eyes widen, the delicate mouth opens.
She steps around the front of my truck, half-smiling and half-staring at me. “Michael? What’s going on?” she asks in an uncertain voice, as my Nikes hit the pavement. “Is everything okay?” She looks past me, toward the truck, and seeing Andrea she visibly panics.
“Andrea’s fine,” I rush to assure her. “Don’t worry, nothing’s wrong.”
“Oh. Good.” Her smile opens up, the restraint fading away. Her joy that we’re here begins to fill her eyes. Looking from me to our daughter, again she asks, “What’s going on?”
“I need to talk to you.” I glance back at Andie, still asleep. “Later, after Andrea wakes up.”
“Of course, Michael.” She nods her head, as if this is the most ordinary situation in the world, me appearing here without so much as a warning call. “You’re sure you’re okay, though?”
Leaning up against the truck, my shoulders slump and I feel all the strength drain right out of my body. In one quick moment I’m finally done in, deflated of energy like the week after Alex’s death, all the exhaustion of the past year overtaking me at once.
“Nah, Laurel, I’m not okay. I haven’t been okay for a long damn time.” Tears burn my eyes, and I stare at my shoes. “But that’s why I’ve come here,” I explain, feeling as naked here on the sidewalk as I did the other night with Rebecca in bed. “Because it’s time I squared away my mess.”
***
It’s dusk, the sun poised low on the Pacific horizon. Laurel and I are strolling together on the sidewalk near Lighthouse Point, having left Andrea in Ellen’s attentive care. At this time of day, everyone is out: the joggers, the walkers, the surfers, the skateboarders. Santa Cruz’s ocean-side culture is always an amalgam.
As we approach the lighthouse, she indicates the strip of rocks stretching like gnarled fingers out into the ocean. “Let’s walk out there.” She points to a cordon that’s meant to keep visitors off the rocks. A large sign warns of possible drowning or death should one slip into the angry churning waters below. The surfers aren’t worried about that—we’re overlooking world-famous Steamer Lane, a spot I surfed with Alex plenty of times.
She swings a long leg over the chain. “Come on,” she beckons me.
Holding up my hands, I laugh off her invitation. “Maybe not.”