Packing Up
Her sister Cara is OCD at the best of times, and never more so than when she is packing up for a trip. While there is a lot less to pack up on the return leg back to Ohio there is still enough to make whichever neurons are in charge of the obsessively compulsive fire obsessively and compulsively. Clorox wipes are passed over everything that is being taken home. And then the items are stored in Ziploc bags of all sizes and shapes, acquired for just this reason. The husbands and cousins take it all in stride, having witnessed it year after year, and loving her enough to accommodate her quirk.
A regular production line of rinsing and drying and wiping and packing has been organized and is making short work of the few remaining items that are to be returned. Each year the beach house has acquired more and more things that simply stay at the beach house. And Shannon refuses to allow Cara to clean those things.
“
It’s my house, and even though you are my sister and I love you, I will not be told, in my house, what to clean or how to clean it,” she has told Cara.
And thus much of the house is off-limits. Which only makes those things that are on Cara’s list that much more precious for cleaning and receiving of much more focused attention.
All her workers were incentivized to move quickly because this year, during their last night bonfire, Cara has arranged for fireworks to be fired from the beach out over the ocean. She has invited a few of the North Topsail regulars, and has arranged for donations to be made to the police department, the fire department, the local clinic on the island, the hospital on the mainland, the coast guard, the turtle rescue hospital, the bird sanctuary, and to the dune preservation society. In short, she has greased every palm that needs greasing to make this once in a lifetime event happen. The police have strung hurricane fence from the water’s edge to the dune a couple of hundred yards on both sides of the house, and they have stationed a few reserve officers to move along anyone who tries to cross the barriers. The fireworks will be brief, maybe fifteen minutes, but they will be spectacular as only fireworks over water can be.
She has planned this as part of her campaign to make every July in Topsail unique and memorable in everyone’s minds. To help make the last day at the beach one that they will treasure forever. It is part of her theory that every day is pretty much like every other day and that all these similar days simply blend together into one forgettable montage or routine and that the things that we remember are the outliers, the things that are different. Too often the only things that are different are the profound and unexpected sadnesses. Car accidents, illnesses, divorces. And Cara will have none of that. She wants there to be spectacularly good shared memories in everyone’s minds.
Therefore every year at the beach house she tries to create a landmark event. And her theory has been proven correct. Part of the family lore and part of the family vocabulary revolve around how the different years are identified. There was the pig roast year, the sailboat year, the tree planting year, the deep sea fishing year, the paragliding year, and on and on. Each year has had its signature event. This year will be remembered by the entire family as the fireworks year. And this year will also be remembered by Shannon and Joe as the year that Shannon met Joe.
Cara thinks back to earlier that day when Shannon had asked her if it was okay if Joe came over for the fireworks. Cara recalled her answer that it was Shannon’s house after all and she could invite whoever she wanted to her own house. She had chosen the words carefully to parrot back Shannon’s words about not being told what or how to clean in her own house.
Her attempt at humor was met with a screeching cat noise accompanied by an imaginary swipe of an imaginary paw. It was their private code that had stopped many a fight before it had begun.
She recalled how Shannon had told her that she was asking because she wanted her opinion on whether Joe being there would upset the family and distract them from a spectacular fireworks show. Then Cara got what Shannon was asking. She thought back on telling Shannon that it might be confusing for some of the kids who had only known her ex in her life, and had known no other man.
“
Maybe next year would be better,” Cara had said.
“
I think you’re right,” Shannon had answered.
Joe
I am not invited to the bonfire and to the beach house for fireworks. Everyone in North Topsail, practically everyone in Sneads Ferry, and even some people in Wilmington know about the fireworks. I am not upset about not being invited tonight. I have been invited for tomorrow morning.
The rumor is that a senator or famous actor or someone “special” has been invited and that’s why there are going to be fireworks and security when there are never fireworks or security, except for when they are filming at the house with the green metal roof.
There is only one place where I have ever been completely at peace. It is on the beach, at sunrise. Not home alone like this, thinking about Shannon, thinking about how quickly I have come to know her, and how quickly I have come to miss her. Tonight I am alone again, and this time the alone is no good.
The alone was perfect when I was a child. Perfect on the long runs on the beach and the longer swims in the ocean. Perfect as the endless repetition of tides and sunrises rolled along beside me and washed over me and made me the boy and then man that I am.
The alone had been imperfect when I had gone off to college. And in these moments of imperfection that I count as moments of weakness, the absence and imperfection of the alone had led to Colleen. She was a mistake. There is no question about that now. My sister told me so before, but I hadn’t listened. Everyone who knew me as the child and young man on the island knew that she was a mistake for me. That she would ruin my alone. Because everyone knew that the alone is who I am. That I could intersect or overlap and revel in those rare moments of intersection, but that ultimately I am supposed to be alone, and that for me that was the right thing.
My alone had been good and then it had been not so good and Colleen had been a mistake. Our child had been the only good thing to come from that mistake. But our child had also been our tragedy. Through her terrible childhood leukemia, the days and nights in the hospital, the days and nights at home, the pain, the suffering, and the ultimate conclusion.
The alone had been nearly impossible right after my daughter Caitlin had died. And then completely unbearable after Colleen had taken her own life. So I filled the alone with my sister and with my business and with all the things that make alone not seem so alone. I moved out of our house and moved to a small quiet place on the sound, remote from town. My habits were honed and refined and ritualized and became like another presence, something that made the alone not so alone, and that made the alone first bearable, and then comfortable again.
Which had brought me back to the beach, to the Atlantic, the runs at sunrise, and thus ultimately to Shannon. Who was with her family tonight, and then who would be with me tomorrow morning. When she would be alone, the most alone, in the moments right after her family had departed.
Was that why she’d invited me for tomorrow morning but not for tonight? Was I supposed to be a replacement? I don’t think that she is looking for a replacement. I don’t think that she is looking for anything. And just when she had not been looking, I ran her over and spilled half her coffee and then poured out the rest of it.
But she said she had seen me earlier in the week, and the week before. So maybe she had been looking after all....
Fireworks
Shannon sits in the powdery sand surrounded by her family in the cool late evening breeze. The three foot tall sea oats on the dune sway gently behind them in their makeshift amphitheater. Cara is in her element, providing a never to be forgotten moment for her entire family. She rises to speak, and everyone quiets to hear her. Her voice barely carries over the waves, even as small as they are.
“
Thank you everyone for another great July. We treasure that you are all able to come every year. We’ve never done fireworks before, so I don’t know what to expect, but I know that we’ll all remember our night of fireworks at the beach house.”
She signals to the volunteer firemen who are with the fireworks man who reminds everyone of a “carney”.
She moves quickly to sit beside Shannon, taking her hand in hers.
The show begins.
First one shell arcs up into the star filled sky and then another. After an impossibly long pause the shells burst, one white, one blazing red. Shell after shell reach up into the sub-tropical air that hangs pregnant over the nearly still Atlantic.
Their small group oohs and ahhs, never having seen fireworks so close.
The fireworks man finds his rhythm and range and adjusts the arcs after watching his first tentative ranging shots. Soon three and four shells are arcing up and bursting together. Then a different type of attraction, a brick of shells that fire one right after another sending a constant stream of smaller red, white, and blue blazes fifty feet into the air. Then there is a pause. The small group looks at each other, wondering whether the show is over.
And then they hear a deeper thump, then several more thumps, and crane their necks skyward to follow the paths of these different shells. While they watch, more and more thumps echo from the launching pad. Suddenly the entire sky is ablaze with fireworks of every color. Incredibly loud booms follow one after another. Cara turns away from the bursting shells to watch the faces of her family, seeing smiles of wonder filling every face. She lives for these moments.
Her eyes catch Shannon’s.
“
I love you,” Shannon mouths.
“
I love you too,” Cara says.
Joe
Like many others who live here on the island and who knew about the fireworks I have parked in the public access down the beach from her house and have walked up close to the security fence. I have brought a beach chair so I can sit and watch this unusual event.
I recognize nearly all the people here, and I recognize my friend Bill the policeman. I can see that he is not too busy, that the small crowd is well behaved and that the row of chairs has added an extra layer to his security fence. So I walk over and shake hands.
“
Quite a show,” I say.
“
Yes,” he says.
“
I know the two women who are putting on the show,” I say.
“
I know the homeowner, and I’ve met some others in her family. They seem like a nice family. And the homeowner, well, she’s something special.”
“
Yes she is,” I answer.
Bill detects the change in tone in my voice.
“
Oh?” he asks.
“
Yeah.”
“
Well then,” he says.
I detect the change in his voice.
“
She has quite a following,” Bill says in his professional voice.
Now it is my turn to say “Oh?”
“
Yeah. There was a man here earlier asking about her.”
“
A man?”
“
Big guy. Ohio plates. Kinda felt like a stalker.”
“
Wow. You know she’s rich right? I mean richer than me?”
“
No shit?” Bill asks.
“
Yeah. She’s a geologist and she literally struck oil on her dad’s farm, and a couple of other places too.”
“
Maybe I ought to put a watch on that guy’s plates?” Bill says.
“
Might not be a bad idea. Cause she’s going to be alone here for the next week or two.”
“
Completely alone?” Bill asks.
“
Mostly alone,” I say. “I don’t know. We’re not there yet. And I don’t even know if that’s where we’re headed. But we’ve been walking and jogging and having coffee. So who knows.”
“
It’s about time Joe,” Bill says.
I consider my friend, and feel the friendship in his voice that had momentarily been tinged with something when we first started talking about Shannon. Maybe Bill had a crush on her? It’s understandable, I feel like I have a crush.
“
Thanks Bill,” I say.
After the fireworks are done, Shannon takes her sister’s hand and starts walking up the beach with her. The husbands and cousins know that this also is a tradition, the sisters going for one last walk, by themselves, on the night before the family heads home.
Shannon
“
It was so beautiful,” Shannon says.
“
Thanks. I had no idea it would be so loud,” Cara says.