“Thank you for doing this,” I say, “for bringing them back to life.”
He nods and I touch my index finger, now wrapped with a Band-Aid. The stinging is gone, the cut almost healed. But it will probably leave a tiny scar. My gaze slides to Bo, to the scar beneath his left eye, and I have to ask, “How did you get that?” I nod to the smooth, waxy line of skin.
He blinks, the scar puckering together, as if he feels the pain of it again. “I jumped out of a tree when I was nine. A branch cut me open.”
“Did you get stitches?”
“Five. I remember it hurting like hell.”
“Why’d you jump out of a tree?”
“My brother dared me. For a week he had been trying to convince me that I could fly if I had enough speed.” His eyes smile at the memory. “I believed him. And I also probably just wanted to impress him since he was my older brother. So I jumped.”
He tilts his head back to look up at the sky, sewn together with stars.
“Maybe you didn’t have enough speed,” I suggest, smiling and craning my head back to look up at the same stars.
“Probably not. But I don’t think I’ll test the theory again.” His smile fades. “My brother felt terrible,” he goes on. “He carried me all the way back to our house while I sobbed. And after I got stitches, he sat beside my bed and read me comics for a week. You’d think I lost a leg, he felt so guilty.”
“He sounds like a good brother,” I say.
“Yeah. He was.”
A breath of silence weaves between us.
Sparks swirl up from the charred tree trunk into the dark. Bo clears his throat, still staring into the flames. “How long has that sailboat been sitting down by the dock?”
The question surprises me. I wasn’t expecting it. “A few years, I guess.”
“Who does it belong to?” His tone is careful, as though he’s unsure if he should be asking. The focus has quickly shifted from him to me. From one loss to another.
I let the words tumble around inside my skull before I answer, conjuring up a past that lies dormant in my mind. “My father.”
He waits before he speaks again, sensing that he’s venturing into delicate territory. “Does it still sail?”
“I think so.”
I stare down into the mug held between my palms, absorbing its warmth.
“I’d like to take it out sometime,” Bo says cautiously, “see if it still sails.”
“You know how to sail?”
His lips part open—a gentle smile—and he looks down at his feet like he’s about to reveal a secret. “I spent almost every summer sailing on Lake Washington growing up.”
“Did you live in Seattle?” I ask, hoping to narrow down the city where he’s from.
“Near there.” His answer is just as vague as the last time I asked. “But a much smaller town.”
“You realize I have more questions about you than answers.” He was built to conceal secrets, his face revealing not even a hint of what’s buried inside. It’s both intriguing and infuriating.
“I can say the same about you.”
I draw my lips to one side and squeeze the mug tighter between my hands. He’s right. We’re deadlocked in a strange battle of secrecy. Neither of us is willing to tell the truth. Neither of us is willing to let the other one in. “You can take the sailboat out if you want,” I say, standing up and tucking a loose strand of hair back behind my ear. “It’s late. I think I’ll head up to the house.” The flames burning in each stump have been reduced to hot embers, slowly chewing through the last of the wood.
“I’ll stay up and make sure the fires are out completely.”
“Good night,” I say, pausing to look back at him.
“Night.”
EIGHT
The orchard looks different. Pruned and tidy, like a manicured English garden. It reminds me of how it used to be in summers past, when ripe fruit would hang bright and vibrant beneath the sun, beckoning the birds to pick at the ones that had fallen to the ground. The air always smelled of sweet and salt. Fruit and sea.
In the early morning I walk down the rows. The three burned stumps send out thin strands of smoke even though they are now nothing but piles of ash.
I wonder how late Bo stayed up, watching the last of the embers turn black. I wonder if he slept at all. I walk to his cottage and stand facing the door. I lift my fist, about to knock, when the door swings open, and I suck in a startled breath.
“Hey,” he says reflexively.
“Hi . . . sorry. I was just about to knock,” I stammer. “I came to say . . . good morning.” A dumb explanation. I’m not even sure why I’ve come.
His eyebrows screw into a confused line, but his lips form an easy half grin. He’s wearing a plain white shirt and jeans that sag low over his hips, and his hair is pressed to one side like he’s just woken up. “I was coming out to check on the trees,” he says. “Make sure they didn’t reignite in the last couple hours.”
“They’re only smoldering,” I tell him. “I was just up there.”
He nods then extends his arm to open the door wider. “You want to come inside? I can make coffee.”
I step past him, feeling the warmth of the cottage fold over me.
Otis and Olga are already inside, curled up on the couch as if this was their new home. As if they now belonged to Bo. There is no fire, but the windows are all open, a warm breeze purring through the cottage. The weather has shifted, turned mild and buoyant—the air blowing in from the sea stirs up the dust motes and scares away the ghosts. Every day that he’s here on the island, in the cottage, I can feel the space changing, becoming brighter.
Bo stands in the kitchen, his back to me, and turns on the faucet in the sink, filling the coffeepot with water. He’s tan after a week outside under the sun. And the muscles in his shoulders flex beneath the thin cotton of his shirt.
“How do you like your coffee?” he asks, turning around to face me, and I quickly flick my eyes away so he doesn’t catch me staring.
“Black is fine.”
“Good . . . because I don’t have anything else.” I wonder if he bought coffee grounds in town before I invited him out to the island. Brought it with him in his backpack? Since I doubt there was coffee here when he moved in.
A stack of books sits on the low table in front of the couch and more books are lined up on the floor, all pulled from the shelves. I pick up a book resting on the arm of the couch. Encyclopedia: Celtic Myths and Fables Vol. 2.
“What are all these?” I ask.
Bo dries his hands on a kitchen towel then walks into the living room. Otis wakes up and begins rubbing a paw over one ear.
“All the books in here are about legends and folklore,” he answers.