Blue Moon (36 page)

Parrots. Hundreds of parrots, emerald-green with orange throats, filled the rigging. They clung to shrouds and halyards with scarlet claws, chattering in a language Billy didn’t understand. He made out the words “Havana” and “
isola.
” They’d ridden the tropical air currents northward from Cuba and come to rest on Billy’s boat. More and more settled on the mast, the radar scanner.

Billy opened his mouth, to yell for Tony and Paul. There were hundreds of parrots roosting in his rigging, and he wanted them to see. But before he could make any sound, all at once, in a clamorous green cloud, the parrots flew away.

For a moment Billy blinked, wondered if it could all be a dream. But there was the mike in his hand, the speaker crackling back at him, “We read you,
Cassandra.
”

“We’re abandoning ship,” Billy said into the mike, reporting their loran position. “We have survival suits and a life raft, flares …”

“Our plane is closing in on your area,” the voice said. “They’ll spot your flares. Hang tight, Billy. We’re on the way.”

Billy didn’t want the transmission to stop. He didn’t want to lose touch with dry land. He gripped the mike, afraid to hang up.

“How much longer?” he asked.

“The plane will get there within the hour. Keep your eyes peeled.”

“I think we’re in the Gulf Stream,” Billy said, to keep her on the phone. Tony and Paul were on deck now, looking stocky and foreshortened in their orange survival suits. They reminded Billy of his
kids in their snowsuits when they were little, like Michelin men.

“I’ll report that to the plane,” the voice said through static. The cockpit lights flickered. Billy knew they were losing power.

“You’re fading,” the voice said. Billy could tell she was speaking loudly. “Is there anything else?”

“Yes,” he said. “Call my wife. Cass. Call Cass and tell her I love her. Over and out,” Billy said as the mike went dead. Then he took the framed picture of Cass and the kids, stuck it under his arm, and went out to put on his survival suit. To abandon his ship.

“It’s not fair T.J. got to go,” Belinda said. “I wanted to, but I was stuck here. Someone had to stay with her.” She flung her hand in Josie’s direction.

“Thank you for staying,” Cass said. “I know it’s frustrating.” She sat at the kitchen table, Josie on her lap. Belinda had schoolbooks open in front of her, but she wasn’t reading.

“How am I supposed to take a stupid test tomorrow?” she asked, whining in a voice Cass hadn’t heard since Belinda was a baby.

“You don’t have to,” Cass said. “The teacher will understand.”

“Daddy’s really missing?”

The word “missing” made Cass’s heart skitter. She nodded. “He called in his position to the Coast Guard, so they’ll head straight out. He knows where he is, or was, but we don’t, exactly. But he’s going to come home safe.”

“Do you actually believe T.J. is helping? I mean, what chance does a Mount Hope fishing boat have of finding Daddy?”

“The more boats looking, the better,” Cass said. She was thinking of the plane; the Coast Guard had said it was in Billy’s area. Any second the telephone would ring, and it would be Billy, being patched through from the rescue ship.

“I can’t stand waiting,” Belinda said, exploding out of her seat.

“What doin’?” Josie asked, frowning.

“Shut up!” Belinda screeched.

Josie’s lower lip stuck out, but she didn’t cry. Her eyes met Cass’s, and Cass shrugged. “Leave her alone,” she said to Josie.

“Me and Bob,” Josie said quietly, snuggling her bottom deeper
into Cass’s lap. Cass felt amazed by Josie’s behavior. Josie understood that everyone was worried about Billy, that he was in danger, but somehow she had decided to comfort Cass, to stay close and very calm. Cass gave her a long hug.

“Mom,” Belinda said, bursting back into the room. “I need to get on a boat. I can’t stand being here for one more second.”

“All the boats have left,” Cass said. “You can help Daddy a lot more by staying with me.”

Belinda just stared angrily. “I hate this. Why did he get a new boat, anyway? Is Daddy going to die?”

Cass had been asking herself the same questions, with the same level of fury and panic. But one thing about having children, it forced you to keep your head.

“Daddy is not going to die,” Cass said.

“Why’d he get a new boat? I’d like to kill that old fart Mr. Magnano. Something was probably wrong with it, and he sold it to Daddy anyway.”

“Mr. Magnano would never, never do that,” Cass said sternly, hiding the fact that she had been entertaining homicidal thoughts of George herself.

“Can I call Emma?”

“Belinda, you know we have to keep the phone open. But I’ll tell you what. Would you like to sleep over there?”

“At Emma’s?”

“Yes. I’m sure Bonnie would pick you up.”

Belinda’s expression turned doubtful, guilty. “I shouldn’t leave you with Josie.”

“Josie and I will be fine,” Cass said. But already she was dreading the moment when Josie would fall asleep. She didn’t want to be alone, unable to call her sisters, listening for the phone. She shivered, knowing she couldn’t go to bed that night.

“If you’re sure,” Belinda said, watching Cass’s face with skepticism.

Cass nodded. She grabbed the receiver, speed-dialed Bonnie’s number.

“Bon, can you pick up Belinda so she can sleep over? Thanks, bye.”

“That was the fastest I’ve ever heard you talk,” Belinda said admiringly. “There’s no way you missed a call.”

Cass just smiled, feeling exhausted. Belinda went upstairs to pack. When she came down, she kissed Josie sweetly. She signed a quick message, and Josie signed back. Cass listened for the phone and for Bonnie’s car.

Moments later she heard Bonnie drive up. Going to the door, she saw that snow had started to fall. Fine flakes, slanting from the north, glowed like a golden mist in the porch light.

“Any news?” Bonnie asked, coming to the door.

Cass shook her head.

“Would you like Belinda to stay? Emma could sleep here instead. We all could.”

“I don’t think so. But thanks.”

“Nora has her hands full with Mom,” Bonnie said. “Mom wants to pack up Dad and Granny and move right in here. She tried to recruit Nora and Willis, me and the kids.”

“Gavin’s not home?”

“He’s out looking,” Bonnie said. “On board Derek’s boat. Did you think he wouldn’t be?”

“Of course he would be,” Cass said, hugging herself. Snow gusted through the open door.

“Hi, Aunt Bonnie,” Belinda said. “Night, Mom. Call me? If there’s anything?”

“I promise. You’ll be the first person I call,” Cass said. She kissed her daughter goodnight, and Belinda ran ahead to the car.

“How are you holding up?” Bonnie asked.

“Okay.”

“Call if you want me here.”

Bonnie backed out the driveway. Inside the kitchen, Cass listened to her drive away, down Coleridge Avenue. Then she turned her attention to the phone. The plane had to be over Billy; the phone would ring any second. Now. It will ring now.

It didn’t. The phone didn’t ring then, and it didn’t ring all night.

Sheila held on to her glass locket and thought of her boys. She considered her granddaughters’ husbands to be her boys as much
as Jimmy and Ward, her own sons. She thought of the girls—the women—in her family. Everyone imagined girls needed protecting, extra care, shielding from danger, while boys just skated along, thin ice or not, ready for anything.

But Sheila knew that Ward, hardly twenty years old, hadn’t been ready to go down in flames. And Billy wasn’t ready to die at sea. The old grandfather clock across the room ticked along, every second bringing Billy closer to death. Sheila stared at it, the brass pendulum swinging blurrily.

She would never forget the day she heard about Ward. Such a sunny day, quiet in the garden, with just a few sea gulls crying overhead. She had been on edge ever since Ward had gone overseas, constantly uneasy, praying for his safety. But there was something about that day—the peace, the bright sky—that had reassured her.

She’d been planting the window boxes. She could see the flowers now: red geraniums, white petunias. She could smell the damp loam, feel the warmth of it as she buried the roots. Then the doorbell rang. In her haste to answer it, she knocked over a geranium, breaking its thick stem.

The mail woman, her buttons gleaming. Sheila couldn’t see her face now, she wasn’t their usual mail woman, but she could picture those brass buttons. The raised eagles, polished to catch the sunlight. Sheila had stared at those buttons, accepting the telegram. Still, she hadn’t believed it. The sunlight, the sea gulls. The dirt under her fingernails.

Sheila had read the message.

“I’m sorry,” the woman had said. “So sorry.”

Sheila had sat down in the dark living room, the curtains drawn to keep the bright sun from fading the slipcovers. She had held the telegram in her hand, and then smoothed it over her knee. She had gotten dirt on it. She had tried to brush it off, but it stayed dirty. She had stared at it, trying to figure how long it had taken to reach her. She had held it on her lap, wondering what she had been doing at the exact minute her son had been shot down. She had wondered how she could have lived her life, enjoying the sunshine, not knowing her son was dead.

That was the difference between Ward and Billy. All the family,
everyone who loved him, was watching the clock tick by, imagining his terror, helpless to save him. Sheila knew how his own parents would feel, if they had still been alive. She thought of Cass, her favorite granddaughter; Sheila would give her own life if it would save Billy.

Now her eyes traveled to Ward’s painting, behind which she kept all the important family documents. She took a deep breath and forced herself out of her chair. She held on to the chair arms for a minute, getting her balance. Her chest felt tight.

She eased the picture off the wall and opened the envelope taped to its back. With her fingers shaking, she took out the telegram. It was still smudged with dirt from the window boxes after all these years.

She blinked. For a second, she thought she saw Eddie. Lately he had been haunting this corner of her room where Ward’s painting hung. She squinted, trying to make Eddie come into focus.

“I’d do it, Eddie. If it would bring Billy home. He can’t die, Eddie. He can’t leave Cass alone.”

“The way I left you?”

Had she really heard it? She was wide awake, and she was sure she had heard Eddie’s voice. She felt so shocked, she sat back down in her chair.

“Yes, the way you left me,” she said. “Cass isn’t ready.”

She sat very still, listening. But Eddie didn’t reply. Sheila shook her locket, watching the pearl rattle. In her other hand she held the telegram. She prayed for Billy, and she prayed to fall asleep. Sleep was the only sure way she’d see Eddie again.

Every wave was a mountain. You’d ride up one side, then fall off the other. Ride up, fall off. Ride up, fall off. You couldn’t see anything, the night was so black and the snow so thick.

“This is crazy,” some smelly fat guy said to John. “You can’t see nothin’.”

“Watch for flares,” John said, staring straight ahead. He gripped the wheel.

“Crazy,” the fat guy said again.

T.J. had his corner of the wheelhouse. John had assigned him
one area of sea to watch, from nine to twelve o’clock. T.J.’s eyes roved the quadrant, ticking back and forth. He concentrated on not throwing up.

“We’re not there yet,” John said. “You won’t see him for a while. But look anyway.”

T.J. kept watching.

“You hear me?” John asked.

“Huh? Me?” T.J. said, so surprised, he turned toward John for one second.

“Yeah, you.”

“I hear you.”

“We’ll find your father. Boats go down all the time. We haven’t lost a Mount Hope guy in years.”

“Mac Pearson,” the fat guy said.

“Explosions at the dock are different. They’re always killers,” John said.

“Boats go down all the time?” T.J. asked. “And the guys are okay?”

“Sure,” John said. “Especially someone as smart as your father. He and I sank one time.”

“You did?”

“Yeah. Off Block Island. We got rescued ten minutes after shooting off the first flare.”

“Block Island’s not like this,” T.J. said as the boat pitched off another wave. This was way out, and T.J. knew that the farther offshore a boat sank, the worse the chances. He’d heard his father say that.

“I’ve been in bigger storms than this off Block Island,” John said.

“What did you mean before, when you said we’re not there yet?” T.J. asked, his eyes covering his area. “You sound like you know where we’re going. Even the Coast Guard doesn’t know, and my dad called them.”

T.J. had been listening when John radioed the Coast Guard. The Coast Guard lady had sounded royally pissed to hear that John was joining the search. “Next we’ll be searching for you,” she’d said in a really snide tone.

“You never know with the Coast Guard,” John said, his eyes
focused dead ahead. “With all their classes and training you’d expect them to be smarter than they usually are. It proves one of my favorite points.”

“What?”

“Put brass and a uniform on a guy and watch him go brain-dead.”

“So what makes you think you know where my dad is?”

“Because your dad and I have fished together, and I know his spots. I know exactly where he was when he bailed out, and I know his raft is setting for Bermuda. Here—take the wheel.” He walked to the chart table; T.J. just stood there.

“You want us to roll over?” John asked sharply. “Take the wheel.”

T.J. left his post. He’d steered his father’s boat plenty of times, but not in waves like this. Clamping his hands on the wheel, he felt it try to twist his arms off.

“Steer for a compass heading of ninety-six,” John ordered. He flipped on a greenish light that cast reflections on all the wheelhouse windows, and he began reading the chart.

“John, man,” the fat guy said, “I’m losing it. I need an hour to sleep.”

“Okay, Sid,” John said without looking up. “We’ll call you when we get close.”

No one spoke for a while. T.J. fought the wheel. First he turned it way to the left, and just as the bow seemed to be heading straight for ninety-six, the compass swung past, and he had to pull right. Finally he got the boat on course. Waves continued to pound the hull.