When they reached the lighthouse door, Memphis drew a wrench from his pocket and hit at the lock till it fell open. He grinned. “Told ya I knew the password.”
He led Theta up the narrow iron steps, around and around, until they came out in the lighthouse’s lantern room. Theta gasped when she saw the water lapping at the bumpy shoreline of Manhattan, the distant, twinkling shore of New Jersey, and the dark river in between, aglow with the occasional sweep of the lighthouse’s far reach. It was just a lighthouse, but it felt like the top of the world.
“They say they’re gonna build a big bridge right here, going from Manhattan over to New Jersey,” Memphis said. “So we oughta enjoy the view while we can.”
Memphis stood behind Theta and wrapped his arms around her, resting his head beside hers. “Watch the light now,” he said, and they held their breath while the bright beam shone out a welcome into the world, guiding ships confidently up the river. It seemed for a moment as if the light were coming from the two of them, as if they’d already steered themselves to a safe place.
“A mighty river ribbons through the light Sing hey to the nightingale, sweet song of night Sing hey to the tower that shines so bright / Sing hey to the stars and she who mourns their light.”
“Gee, that’s pretty. Who wrote that?”
“I guess I did. I said light too many times, though.”
“I didn’t notice,” Theta said.
“I sent some of my poems to the Crisis today,” Memphis said, handing Theta his flask.
She took a sip, wincing as the alcohol burned her throat, then handed it back to Memphis. “What’s the Crisis?”
“Just the most important journal in Harlem. It’s edited by Mr. W.E.B. Du Bois himself. Lots of people have had their work published there—Langston Hughes, Countee Cullen, Zora Neale Hurston.”
“Memphis Campbell,” Theta said, grinning.
“Maybe,” Memphis said wistfully. “May… be.”
“You found anything new on that crazy eye symbol?” Theta asked.
“Nothing yet. I swear, I’ve searched every book I can find about symbols and eyes. I don’t know where it comes from, but it’s got to have an origin. Everything comes from somewhere, and somewhere is everywhere. Everything is connected, my mama used to say,” Memphis quoted, imitating the gentle rise and fall of his mother’s musical Caribbean accent. “Gonna take you back to my homeland sometime, and then you’ll know. You’ll see the thread that stretches across the ocean.”
“Did she ever take you?” Theta asked.
Memphis stopped smiling. “Naw. But she used to tell Isaiah and me all sorts of tales about Haiti’s history and all kinds of African folklore, about our family and where we’d come from and how we got here. Origin stories. I tell you, my mother had a story for everything.”
Theta hugged her knees to her chest. “You miss her?”
“Yes,” Memphis said, keeping his eyes on the shadowy hills. He drank from the flask. “Yes, I surely do.”
“You got a lot of nice stories,” Theta said softly. “I don’t have that. I don’t have an origin story. Just fuzzy memories and this one dream that’s like a memory, but I can’t really see it, not all the way.”
“Tell me what you do see, then.” Memphis offered Theta the flask again, but she shook her head.
“It’s white, like… like miles of snow. And there are funny red flowers in the snow, spreading everywhere. I hear screaming and horses whinnying and there’s smoke and then there’s nothing. I wake up.” She shrugged. “That’s the only story I got.”
“We could make our own stories,” Memphis said. “You and me.”
For a week, Memphis had been rehearsing this speech in the bathroom mirror. But now all his words failed him. So he took Theta’s hands in his, watching the light sweep across the room. “Theta…” He cleared his throat, started over. “Theta, I love you.”
Theta’s smile vanished. She didn’t answer.
“That wasn’t quite the response I was hoping for,” Memphis joked, but his stomach was as tight as piano wire.