John Casey - Compass Rose

“I eat after. And yes, I have a ride back, and no, I won’t make any noise coming in.”

Once Rose was out the door, Elsie got rid of the people in her mind. By the time the sun was behind the treetops they were gone. It wasn’t just a matter of knowing Rose would be onstage, Mary Scanlon in the Sawtooth kitchen, Charlie at sea, everybody else in bed by ten. Elsie sealed off their presences, shuttered them. She let the house grow dim. She moved through the light from the sky coming in the south window and the softer light coming up from the dark mirror of the pond. She brushed her hair in front of the bathroom mirror, watching her hands in the half-darkness. She would be a shadow on her way to find Dick.

The sky was still bright in the west. Under the trees it was dusk. She noticed nothing but her white sneakers finding their way down the hill, through Miss Perry’s garden, up and around the school, onto Ministerial Road. She stopped short of Eddie’s driveway, picked her way through the scrub pine, angled toward the back of the yard. The tractor shed was dark. Beyond it there was a glow in the back window of the work shed. She went around to the front, stood outside the spill of light through the open double doors. She combed her hair with her fingers, smoothed her skirt over her hips, surprised by her own touch. She called his name. His shadow moved across the square of light. She said his name again.

He said, “Jesus, Elsie.”

She laughed. “That’s what you always say.”

She moved backward into the dark. She tapped her hand on the top plank of a pile of lumber to give him a bearing. He took a few steps. She saw his white T-shirt moving in starts, like frames of an old silent movie. She took a step forward, and he stumbled into her. She held on, pressing her mouth into his shoulder. She shuddered, hard enough to loosen his grip. He let his hands fall to his sides.

She was too much for him, she was a sudden squall, he didn’t know what to do. She’d fallen out of the sky. She’d been falling from noon to dusk, imagining herself, not him, not him standing there, night-blind.

Now they were both standing stupidly. She was stupid. She would feel even stupider stumbling back through the woods. She said, “You can give me a ride home.” She walked toward him, into him. She said, “A ride home,” into his face.

He put his hands on her shoulders. She pushed one hand away with the back of her forearm. She grabbed his other hand by the wrist, tugged it off her shoulder. It slid across her collarbone onto her breast.

She stood still while he touched her through her dress. She let herself lean a little. When she thought he couldn’t stop, she began to move. When she knew he couldn’t stop, she did what had taken his breath away years ago — she stood on tiptoe and hooked her knee around his thigh, her bare skin climbing the rough bark of his jeans.

Afterward she was glad it was dark enough not to see his jeans and jockey shorts around his knees, his work shoes still on, her dress pulled up to her armpits, her white sneakers back on the ground after waggling in the air.

The evening star was over the top of the trees on the other side of Ministerial Road.

She didn’t want either of them to start worrying yet. She moved her hip closer to his and said, “I haven’t seen so many stars in a long time. Too many trees at my place.”

“Even more stars, you get out to sea.”

“You find another boat?”

“I got my eye on one.”

“Good.”

“Needs work.”

She laughed. He lifted his head to look at her. She said, “We’re going all clipped Yankee. Next thing you say better be a long sentence.” He laughed. He settled on his side, made himself comfortable against her, as if they lay like this in ordinary life. Now that she’d fallen out of the sky, she saw that this was what she really wanted.

She pulled herself closer to him. “I had to come see you. I was thinking about you all day. I think about you a lot; this time I couldn’t stop.” She touched his back. “Lie down again. Just for a bit.” He lay on his back, looked straight up. She said, “Don’t worry, everything’s all right.”

“Funny you say that. I have this dream every so often. Last thing in it is somebody saying that. A woman’s voice.”

“Maybe it’s me.”

Dick laughed. Elsie hit him on the shoulder. He said, “You can’t be everything. Anyway, this was a voice I don’t know. Maybe just a thought. The idea of the place, some place I’ve never been. Looked like pictures I’ve seen of fjords. I was in a skiff. I wasn’t rowing, I was standing in the stern looking forward, but she was somehow moving up the fjord. The water was calm. The hills were steep, covered with trees, came right down to the water. There was this breath of wind; maybe that moved the boat. Maybe the voice was mixed up with the wind.” He let out a long breath. “Mostly when I dream, something’s wrong and I got to fix it. But every so often I get this calm dream.”

“Oh, I don’t know about that. You want me to tell you what I think this dream’s about?”

“I guess you’re going to.”

“It doesn’t exactly defy interpretation. Your boat sticking out in front of you, sliding into this lush fjord.”

Dick held his hand up, thumb and forefinger apart, maybe measuring the distance between two stars. He said, “So you figure you get to be the fjord. I was figuring it was just me finally getting to take a vacation.”

“No reason it can’t be both.”

Dick let his hand fall. “Trouble is, you’re not some far-off place I’ve never been to. You’re here. You’re part of here; we’re part of here.”

“Yes, I am,” she said. “We are.” She held his shoulder and kissed him. She let herself roll onto her back. “I’ve thought that all along. The way we know things. The way you know the sea, the way I know the woods, the way we both know the salt marsh. The way we live in the natural world. Our sense of—”

“That’s not what I was getting at. Okay, we both get out in what you call the natural world, but we live in South County. It isn’t some big city, everyone coming and going, everything up in the air.” Dick blew out a breath. “Forget the big city. What the hell do I know about that? I know the people here; we both know the people here. We’re in Eddie’s backyard.”

“Eddie. I wouldn’t worry—”

“No. It’s not just Eddie.”

Elsie said, “All right, then. May.”

“I won’t say anything about May. But it’s something else. I haven’t got to it yet.” He closed his eyes, took a breath. “It’s Rose. I’m kind of an awkward father, anyway. May and Rose get along great, Mary Scanlon and Rose get along great, you and Rose … I hear you scrap some, desn’t mean you don’t love each other.” Dick touched her head, slid his fingers through her hair so gently she was surprised when he said, “But I don’t think any of you women spend a minute thinking about Rose and me.”

“Of course we do,” Elsie said. “At least I do.”

Dick said, “You don’t need to jump. Far as I’m concerned, it’s just as well. Suits Rose and me fine. After I made that miscue, told her she’d get thin if she took up rowing … Rose came around. Not right away. Said she wanted me to go out in her skiff with her, teach her stuff. We went out a lot, still do often enough. We don’t make a secret of it. Just that nobody notices.”

“Well, I’m glad. I want things to be good between you and Rose.”

“Now you show up and it’s like I’m being tumbled by a wave. I’m not saying I haven’t thought about it. I have. I do. And okay, right now we’re drifting in that fjord, and you’re saying, ‘Everything’s all right.’ But in just a bit we’re going to get in my truck and I’m going to drop you at the bottom of your driveway because Rose might be waiting up for you.”