(2006) When Crickets Cry (43 page)

Sal walked away, climbed into his Cadillac, and drove off.

I dangled my legs over the bulkhead and looked across the finger of the lake where Georgia lay sunning herself just outside Charlie's front door. Her sprawling across the doormat was akin to a DO NOT DISTURB sign on a hotel door. Charlie had found Georgia useful, but not in all the ways I had anticipated. His new sleep schedule had been difficult to get used to, and made training for next week's Burton Rally all the more difficult. Some days we were lucky if we got on the lake by noon. Occasionally I went alone. Although, I'm not sure I've ever been truly alone on the lake.

Around ten, Cindy tiptoed down to the lake and dangled her legs beside mine. She was staying in a house up the road a couple hundred yards. My neighbor, a broker from New York, had rented it to me for the next couple of months. At least until we could find Cindy someone who would grant her a mortgage to buy someplace else. The process had been working more smoothly since I called the bank and told them I'd cosign.

Ever since the surgery, she had come down here daily about this time to check on me. In a sense, she was taking my pulsechecking to make sure I still had one. She seldom said much, but neither did I. She'd dangle a few minutes, soak in the sun, breathe deeply, and then disappear. We shared something now that few others did or could. I'd often spot her down here at night as well, walking along the bulkhead. I guess the quiet soothed her. We both needed some of that.

After a few minutes, she turned to me and said, "Your turn or mine?"

"Mine," I said, smiling, knowing full well that she knew whose turn it was.

She nodded, hid her smile, and leaned her head back, closing her eyes behind the sunglasses that had been propped on top of her head. I walked up the stone walk and out the gravel road that led from where my house used to stand, and would one day stand again.

At the neighbor's doorstep I took off my shoes and crept silently to the door of the master bedroom on the first floor. The windows all around the house were open, and a gentle breeze brought fresh air into the house. I pushed open the door, and there, propped in bed, eyes closed, and face flush under the warmth of too many blankets, lay Annie.

I knelt next to the bed, and her eyes opened. "Is it time?" she asked.

I nodded.

She opened her mouth, I placed the two pills on her tongue and held the glass of water for her to swallow. She blinked lazily and whispered, "I had a dream."

I leaned closer.

"I met your wife. She was walking along the lake."

I nodded. "It was one of her favorite places."

"Then she did the strangest thing."

"What's that?" I said, taking her temperature and counting her pulse.

"She knelt down next to the water, lifted out a little boat, and gave it to me."

"That's not so strange."

"No, that wasn't the strange part. It was the sail. It was made from a letter. One she'd written to you."

I had never told Annie about Emma's letters. Other than Charlie, no one knew about them.

I checked Annie's bandages, pulled the covers up around her neck, and tucked her in. I kissed her on the forehead, crept out, and pulled the door behind me. Walking down the back steps, I bumped into Charlie coming to read to Annie. He had Eloise in one hand and was feeling his way up the steps.

When he heard me, he stepped out of the way and said, "Been looking for you."

"Yeah?" I said doubtfully, knowing by the look of his hair that he'd just woken up.

"Yeah," he said. He reached up, ran his fingers across my face, held them there for a moment, and then squeezed my cheeks in an attempt to point my face and eyes toward his. When he was sure he had my attention, he cracked the book he was carrying and slipped an envelope from inside. "She said I'd know when to give this to you. Best I can figure, it's time."

Emma's handwriting was unmistakable. I snatched it out of his hand. "She gave this to you?" I said in disbelief.

Charlie nodded.

"When?"

"'Bout the time she and I drove to town and opened that safedeposit box."

"You knew about that all along?"

"Yup

"When were you going to tell me?"

Charlie shrugged. "I wasn't."

I stared at the envelope. "You got any more secrets I need to know about?"

Charlie smiled. "Not at this time, but I'll keep you posted."

I ripped open the envelope and unfolded the letter.

Dear Reese, If Charlie's given you this letter, then you've met someone.

I looked at Charlie in disbelief.

I asked him to hold it until he saw you wanting to offer that tender heart of yours to someone else. Don't worry. There's enough love in your heart for two women, and when you get here, we'll let God sort it out. Whoever she is, she is blessed and better for it. Reese, never forget that you were born, and sent ... to bind up broken hearts. I know. I've always known.

I looked out across the lake and heard Emma's whisper.

Reese, don't hold it in. Please don't live any longer in pain and loss. Remember, I'm better now. I'm me. When you get here, you 71 see. But between now and then, offer the gift that is you.

I was thinking yesterday of how the water looks whenever we go rowing. The wake disappears, the ripples from the oars fade into the shore and are erased forever. Life on the water, there's never any past. And upfront, the view is all future.

I love you. Always will. Death can't take that away. Now, go. And live where the life flows.

Ever yours, Emma

Charlie looked at me. "Well?" He raised his eyebrows and searched the sky for flashes of light. Waving his head back and forth, he asked, "What's it say?"

I smiled, tucked the letter inside my shirt, and held his hand up to my face, where his fingers traced the lines of my smile and felt the slippery tracks of tears cascading down the cracks. I whispered, "Charlie ... I can see."

I jumped off the porch, landing on a pad of evergreen needles, and ran flat out. I flew through the woods, the tree branches pulling at me, and jumped over the downed trees like hurdles. I slid down a small hill and felt the earth give beneath me. Somewhere above me, I flushed a mourning dove that rocketed through the treetops like a jet. I reached what used to be the dock and would be again and dropped the shell into the water. I zipped up my shirt, the letter pressing against me, strapped in my feet, and pulled hard on the oars.

The shell jumped forward. I pulled again. Three more long, deep pulls and the Tallulah caught me. I dug in, arching my back against the water. The water pulled back, but I dug in deeper and pressed hard in with my legs. Lighter without a second person, I glided atop the water like the breeze. Within minutes, sweat stuck the letter to my chest.

Crouching into a spring, my knees tucked into my chest with arms extended, having sucked in as much air as my lungs would allow-I dug in. Pushing with my legs and starting the long pull with my arms, I exhaled. Fully extended, body bloated on lactic acid, I gorged on air as deeply as my lungs would allow. At the top of my pull, I lifted the blades and pulled my knees into my chest, once again sucking in air the entire way back down the boat. With each pull, I emptied myself, again and again and again.

On the water with Emma, one last time.

In our wake, circles appeared. They grew outward, overlapped, then disappeared completely. The sun warmed our backs, sweat stung my eyes, and the breeze pressed against us. Over my shoulder, the water spread out like polished ebony. I saw all future and a fading, and forgiving, past. And on the air, I heard the echoing whisper of Emma's laughter and felt the gentle touch of her fingers on my face.

I turned around at the dam, my head caked with sweat that trickled down my face, stung my eyes, and sat salty on my lips. The sun sat low and painfully bright. No man is an island. I pulled against the current and pushed my back into the breeze that would slow me. Three hours later, I returned, spent and clean.

With Charlie's help, Annie-wearing a hat, the yellow ribbon trailing behind her-had walked down the hill. They stood on the bank, focused on her cricket box. After the surgery, Charlie and Termite had transported it and placed it on the porch just outside her window. Given the pain of her surgery and the strangeness of a new house and bed, we thought maybe it'd help her sleep better.

Now, at Annie's request, Cindy and Charlie had moved the box down to the bank. Annie stood next to the box while Charlie leaned it on its side. Slowly at first, then all at once, the crickets started hopping and crawling out. Pretty soon the box was empty, and around us the earth moved like drops of water on a sizzling stove as fifty thousand crickets headed for the safety of the trees.

I listened closely, as did Annie. She looked at me, smiled, and whispered, "Shhhh."

In seconds, the crickets had ascended the trees and were singing. Annie closed her eyes, smiled, then danced like a ballerina, being careful where she stepped. When I looked down on the beach, I saw the imprint of her small foot alongside mine.

Charlie stood and headed for the Suburban. "Last one to the truck buys dinner!"

Annie looped her arm around Cindy's as the three of them made their way to the Suburban. That meant I was buying dinner-five Transplants. I said five because I was pretty sure Termite would show about the time we put in our orders.

Charlie shouted out the driver's-side window, "Come on, Stitch! Hurry up, or I'm driving!"

I stood looking out over the lake, not wanting to say good-bye. A moment later, I felt a tug on my arm. It was Annie. "Reese? You coming?"

I nodded. For a minute, we stood watching the water ripple beneath the wind.

Then she arched her back, stood on her tiptoes, and whispered in my ear, "You said you'd tell me today. You promised."

I nodded again, and hollered to Charlie and Cindy that we'd be there in a minute.

Annie pulled on my hand, and we sat down on the bulkhead and dangled our legs.

"The trick to transplanting hearts," I said, "is getting them going again." I paused, trying to figure out how to say what I needed to say.

Annie tapped me on the thigh. "It's okay, you can tell me. I'm a big girl now. I turn eight next week."

Tiger's heart in a china-doll body.

"No matter how much I studied, how much I prepared, or how good a doctor folks say I am, the difficult part is knowing that, in truth, I am powerless to get it going again. It is ... a miracle ... that I do not understand."

Annie leaned against me and listened. The sunlight reflected off the water, lit the blonde fuzz on her legs and the smile on her face.

I pointed over my shoulder, toward Rabun County Hospital. "That night ... I couldn't get your heart going. We had done everything, medically speaking, that we knew to do. Royer, that big crying teddy bear, shook his head and recorded the time as 11:11 p.m."

Annie nodded, remembering her mother's dream.

"He was waiting for me to agree with him. It's something doctors do when somebody dies. But I couldn't. Or wouldn't. I just knew you weren't supposed to die on that table. I'd die first." I tapped Annie gently on the chest. "I leaned over and whispered to your heart, speaking aloud the one thing I had not said in a long, long time. And, when I did, your heart heard me."

Annie smiled and pressed her hands to her heart.

"It was as if it'd been waiting for me to simply speak the words, and remind it. Because when I did, for reasons I cannot and never will explain, it filled like a balloon, swelled a bright, healthy red, and then, as if it had never stopped, it beat. Hard, powerful, and rhythmic."

Annie looked out across the lake, her whole life before her. "Do you think it'll stop again?"

I nodded. "Yes ... but not until you're finished here. All hearts stop, Annie. What matters is what you do with it while it's still pumping."

Annie wrapped her arms around my waist and pressed her cheek to my chest. Her arms had strengthened, giving greater expression to the bubbling inside her.

"How long do I have?"

I looked at her, her big round eyes, her melting smile, the tender shoots of hope showing beneath the surface. I brushed the now-growing and healthy hair out of her face and said, "Long enough to turn gray."

Annie looked over her shoulder at the Suburban, then tugged gently on my arm. "Reese? What did you whisper?"

It was time. I lifted Emma's medallion over my head, watched it spin, dangle, and mirror the sun's reflection off the water. I held it in my palm and ran my fingers along the worn engraving. When the tear finally broke from the corner of my eye and sped down my face, I spread the chain, hung it around Annie's neck, and watched it come to rest just above the scar on her chest.