In the distance, the dark sky bulged like a heavy hammock of water above the Golden Gate Bridge, its famous span and cables now the color of a ripe, purple plum. The wind was strangely warm, tropical and blustery as it rushed like a river through the trees. As Lindsey and Michael walked from the residential area toward the sandy bluff of Ocean Beach, they gazed at the water between the shadowed Marin Headlands and Angel Island. Staring ahead, Lindsey thought briefly of all the Chinese immigrants who had been detained there, and their collective, forgotten sadness seemed palpable as she stared off into the milky bay, an opaque powder blue that mirrored the moody sky.
Holding her hand, Michael tilted his head and gave her a look that made her wonder if he suspected anything. Maybe it was her imagination, but she thought he looked a little unsure, as if he sensed she had drifted slightly away from him. She hoped that any whiff of deceit was hopefully covered up by the fragrant air, which smelled heavily of orange blossoms and impending rain.
Lindsey was aware that somehow her friendly flirtation with Dustin had crept into a corner of her heart, and had slithered into a pinhole where it now lodged. She had not completely ferreted out that wayward desire, but imagined dripping sealing wax over the tiny perforation where the delectable poison had pricked her skin. Walking, she felt a pain in her stomach. A lump of guilt rolled around the empty cavity of her belly like a marble, causing her a slight feeling of unbalance. The residual exhilaration of her flirtation with Dustin was still humming softly through her cells, but she could only hope that the once-jubilant fizz of infatuation might eventually fade, like carbona-tion in spring water that went flat over time.
Somewhere in the distance, crisply outlined skyscrapers met the static-crackly air with sleek angles and glassy facades. But as Lindsey and Michael made their way down the sidewalk within sight of the Pacific Ocean, she felt they could be in Hawaii. The temperate wind now carried a more pronounced scent of honeysuckle, and Lindsey imagined the blossoms in the trees imperceptibly opening their teardrop, eyecup petals to catch the rain that was about to come at any moment.
She and Michael stopped at a viewing wall and looked out to the water. With the Chagall-painted sky, today Lindsey could believe that the world was just a shoebox diorama in a schoolboy's lap. Could she kick through a dark blue cloud to find a cardboard backing? Was the swaying wind and jostling ocean simply a result of their creator tripping on a stone, skipping over a fence, or enduring a turbulent ride in a carpool?
She checked her watch and was surprised that, despite the early hour, the ominous storm was bringing night to the daytime. Lights flickered on across the hill, and little by little, San Francisco became a box of stars.
The landscape was all dark gray and white, drawn of alternately dull, charcoal smudges and gleaming, reflected light. The city seemed to be waiting, taking a deep breath before the rain dropped like a satin curtain, or silver fringe on a flapper's hem.
Down a ramp behind the Cliff House, they approached a modest shack with a blue-peaked stovepipe hat for a roof. The tiny shelter was painted to resemble a giant camera, and a plaque promised amazing sights within. Paying two dollars and walking inside behind black curtains, Lindsey and Michael entered the Camera Obscura.
As their eyes adjusted to the room's seance dimness, they could hear a
pit-pit-pat
against the roof—the rain, finally. Lindsey walked to the center of the room and approached a concave disk. It was a screen shaped like a horizontal satellite dish that reflected a rotating picture of the live ocean view below, optically cast by a periscope above. An invention of Leonardo da Vinci, the device illuminated the otherworldly reflection of the stormy waves outside, and as watery cascades drifted across the expanse, Lindsey hovered at the edge of the tumultuous ocean moon.
Michael came behind her and kissed her hair, the palms of his hands resting gently against her neck and shoulders. Lindsey could smell the faint scent of his shaving gel mixed with the sweat of his skin and ocean salt. Her face resting against his neck, with her cheek she could feel the tightening and release of his throat as he swallowed.
Holding her close, he whispered in her ear, "Is there anything you need to say before I say what I'm gonna say?"
The wind outside had picked up, and she could hear it howling like a roaring crowd. Playland at the Beach was gone, but Lindsey could almost sense the crushed memory of past revelers. Beyond the walls and through the rain, she heard a faint bicycle bell and she could almost pretend the tinkling chime was a distant carnival noise, a gentleman winning a stuffed toy for his sweetheart lover.
She turned to face Michael. "No," she said. After a moment, she added, "Except that… I love you."
Their breathing syncopated, she realized that his coming somewhat easily to her made her almost take his warmth for granted. She remembered that he once told her that as a child he suffered from night terrors, and as recently as last year he still used to wake up drenched in sweat and would sometimes sleepwalk, finding himself in the kitchen and wondering how he got there. He said he was never able to sleep through the night until he met her. He spent his twenties constantly moving from town to town, but when they met he knew San Francisco would be his home. Standing still now and hugging him, she could feel his heartbeat and was reminded that even a dirt-brown sparrow puts itself at risk to nest with another, settling in low brush where predators were never very far.
They exited the dark curtains into a ray of sepia-toned sunlight. It had momentarily stopped raining. The sounds of the city were muffled by the rolling cotton clouds overhead, and although the sky was dark and heavy, the air was strangely clear and crisp. Maybe it was the peculiar light or maybe the brief rain shower had cleansed the atmosphere, but looking out at the horizon, Lindsey could see details that weren't usually apparent. At the foot of the hills across the bay, she could just make out the lapping whitecaps and the curlicue eyelashes of saltwater following the ocean currents like metallic threads. She could see the stick-legs of shorebirds as they drifted in the distance. Down below on the sand, she watched a snowy plover as it bounced like a Ping Pong ball to meet up with its skittering flock, and for the first time in a long while, she felt calm.
A footpath led them through a maze of overgrown foliage and down to the ruins of the Sutro Baths. After descending, they climbed the twisting path steadily upward until they had trudged high up the face of the cliff. As the incline leveled off, they looked below to the pounding surf, swelling and crashing as the tide churned in and out. They walked onto a precarious cement platform on a rocky crag that jutted out over the Pacific and stepped to the safety rail. Holding each other tightly they watched as curling Whitewater threw itself against the land, soaking the emerald iceplants that clung to the steep, sandy slope just below.
Michael smiled and when their eyes met, Lindsey recognized the look she loved. Not the least self-conscious, he rested his brown eyes upon her in a steady, soulful gaze, and his clear and bright expression conveyed his total affection and deep love for her. In his presence she felt guileless. His confident gaze made her feel forgiven for the things she hadn't done but had nonetheless thought about. His love made her feel stronger, and in that moment, her worries melted away.
"I think this is the perfect place to officially ask my girl the big question," he said. "Shut your eyes for a second, okay?"
Lindsey's heart soared. With her eyes shut, she was acutely aware of all the ocean sounds, and she listened attentively to the quiet sounds of Michael sifting through his jacket pockets. She could tell he was doing something elaborate as she could hear the incidental sounds of several objects being placed on the guardrail. She recognized a couple of electronic beeps as that of their camera, and opening her left eyelid ever so slightly, she could see that he was nimbly attempting to adjust the settings. She offered, "You have to remember to push the green button first."
"Stop looking!" he scolded. Then, over the sound of the crashing waves he said, "I'm setting up the remote so we'll have a photo to remember this moment." She heard him step a few paces away and assumed he was perching the camera somewhere and setting the timer.
Her eyes still closed, she was suddenly startled to hear his voice so close when he said, "Okay, open your eyes!" At the same moment, a huge wave whooshed up and sent seafoam flying overhead. She opened her eyes and stumbled back a bit, grabbing for the rail to catch her footing.
As she reached out her arm, she felt her hand brush against something, but as she balanced herself and looked to the ledge, nothing was there. Glancing over her shoulder she saw a quick, black dot bouncing down the rocks to the cliff below. She caught a look of sheer panic on Michael's face, and stood back, confused, as he lunged over the rail in a futile attempt to stop gravity.
Bombarded so suddenly with the sensation of almost falling, the spray of saltwater on her face, and then the sight of Michael's terrified expression, it took her a moment to realize she had inadvertently done something very wrong. Glancing from Michael's face back to the rocks and waves below, her eye managed to catch the black speck just as it blinked out of sight.
Michael grabbed his own face, his palm covering his mouth while his fingers gripped his cheek and jaw. It was something Lindsey had only seen him do a few times, like the time he failed to block the winning goal during a soccer match or once when they saw a humongous rat one morning on Kearny Street. Lindsey knew it was a gesture inspired only by instances of fairly severe anguish, as if he needed the grip of his hand over his face to forcibly keep himself from screaming like a girl. Hence, she knew that whatever just happened was bad.
The wind picked up and the clouds rushed in thick and dark above their heads. Michael was still staring down the cliff below with his hand across his face, but eventually managed to mumble, "That… was… the… ring."
A light sprinkling of rain speckled Lindsey's cheeks. She didn't know whether to cry for joy that Michael was so romantic, or cry because she just knocked an excruciatingly expensive rock into the Pacific Ocean. Suddenly, the rain began to fall in bigger drops. Their airspeed increased by the second until, moments later, it was pouring.
A short distance away, their camera flashed and caught their wrecked faces for posterity.
"What should we do?" she screamed. Looking below to the rocky cliff, she knew there was no way they could climb down.
"We'll have to climb down!" Michael said, as if the horrifying thought had floated directly out of her head and into his and then past his lips, the idea morphing from an impossibility into a necessity in the short process.
Michael wasted no time swinging himself under the railing and planting his feet on the nearest rock before helping Lindsey down. The hillside was muddy and slippery, and although they were slowly inching their way down the cliff, she still thought they were crazy to think they could find a ring box smaller than a cookie in this weather and on this terrain.
"I can't go any farther!" she yelled, the sandy soil giving way under her feet as she slid toward a rain-pelted boulder.
Michael yelled from ten feet below her, "Don't think too much. Just keep moving forward!"
Above, Lindsey stood for two minutes while feelings of despair swirled around her. Meanwhile, Michael scrambled down to an outcropping of iceplants where bright magenta flowers punctuated the green spears. Holding onto tree roots jutting from the rocks, he lowered himself down the steep incline. The rain was coming down hard now. Lindsey watched with utter fright as Michael briefly slipped on an unreliable foothold, then climbed from one grouping of weeds to a section of downtrodden wildflowers, finally pouncing on a patch that, from Lindseys view, appeared indistinguishable from the other clumps of greenery.
Unbelievably, a minute later Michael exclaimed from below, "I see it!"
He scrambled sideways and headed toward a rocky area. A few seconds later, clutching the box in his hand, he held it up triumphantly for a brief second before attempting the treacherous ascent.
By the time he climbed up to where Lindsey was clinging to a boulder, the quick and heavy raindrops had dwindled to a light pattering. They gazed at each other and saw that they were both covered in mud, drenched to the skin. Gazing at Michael, Lindsey noted that he was the dirtiest she had ever seen him. His pants were smeared with mud, his shoes caked, and the heaviest rain from a moment ago was still trickling down his neck, disappearing under his jacket and shirt. His shoulders were streaked with particle matter from the shrubs and trees.
"Boy, are you filthy," she said, somewhat gleefully.
"No Handi Wipes are gonna help us now," he replied with a smile.
From above, the pattering gave way to a sprinkle, and in another second, the rain completely stopped. As if on cue, a sunbeam cut through the clouds, shining on them like a spotlight.
Michael managed to get down on one knee without falling off the cliff. He took Lindseys hand, looked at her rain-streaked face, and said,
"Hey, Babykins. Wanna get married?"
Standing in the sunlight with Michael, her heart was no longer a flat rock skipping along the placid surface of a pond. Although she had always been afraid to swim in the ocean, with Michael she trusted they could plunge into cold water and find the warm currents. Together they would endure choppy waves, storms, and high seas, and where other lovers might be blindsided, she would be a stronghold for Michael as he would be hers. They would light the darkness for each other in the lowest depths, and protect each other like coral surrounding guppies.
She suspected there would be days when they would be like dolphins at play, and at other times, there would be days of bare survival. No matter the years, love was a vulnerable moon jelly of membrane. She was willing to bet that theirs would stretch with amazing elasticity and not break. She vowed to encircle Michael like a soft-bellied anemone, and through fresh, salt, or brackish water, she would stay with him however the tides in their particular ocean swayed.