Sharing Sam (16 page)

Four days later Izzy slipped into a coma. A week and a half after that, she died. They had a traditional service at a church, but afterward we all went down to the beach and Lauren and Miguel scattered her ashes there.

They hadn’t wanted to. Sam and I had had to convince them that was what Izzy had wanted. In the end they relented, and I was glad we could do something for Izzy even when she was gone. Rosa said it was sacrilegious, but even she came down to the beach with us.

I picked up Sam in the car, now repaired, so he could bring Morgan along. He wasn’t sure Morgan would understand, but he’d been fond of Izzy, so it seemed like the right thing to do.

The day was hot and thick and overcast. Every so often there would be the slightest wind, a sigh and nothing more.

I led the group—friends and relatives, a few teachers—to the right spot on the sand. We looked silly in our stiff, formal clothes while fifty feet away on the beach, people lay on Budweiser towels, slathering on coconut oil and praying for sun.

Miguel stood on a slight rise, waiting for a breeze. In his hands he clasped a small blue glass urn. Grasses teased our legs, sand swamped our shoes. Some people sobbed, but no one spoke. We’d already done all the singing and praying and crying we could do.

We waited. The surf churned listlessly. Morgan shifted, Rosa moaned, Gail blew her nose.

Suddenly the grasses began to whisper and move. Two stubby screw pines rocked. A cool wind came to us, blowing our skirts and ties and tangling our hair. Miguel opened the little urn and swooped out his arm and Izzy’s ashes caught on the breeze.

We watched, silent and hopeful. I guess we all wanted one
of those TV-movie miracles where the clouds open up and the sun pours forth, something nice and symbolic to put a period on the moment. But after a few seconds we realized we were going to have to settle for that halfhearted gust of wind.

Slowly the group dispersed. Sara took Morgan down to the beach to look for shark teeth. Sam came over to me, looking uncomfortable in his suit and tie. “Are you ready to go?” he asked.

“I want to say good-bye to Lauren and Miguel.”

“Can you give me a little more time? I was going to see if I could talk to Rosa for a minute.”

“Sure.”

I watched Sam cross the sand. It was sweet of him to go console Rosa, I thought, and then I remembered that she worked at a nursing home. I wondered if maybe he and his mom had come to some kind of decision about Morgan. We’d barely spoken since that night at the hospital.

Lauren and Miguel and my parents talked for a long time, and then Lauren came over to me. She pulled a manila envelope from her purse. “Izzy wanted me to give you this.”

I gave her a hug and then I went to sit at a quiet place near the waves. Inside the envelope was the map of Paris I’d given her. There was a note paper-clipped to the top.

I stared at the note for a very long time. She’d known. She might even have known all along. All my worrying about what to tell her, and she’d known.

I laughed out loud. It figured. Iz was way smarter than the rest of us mere mortals.

I searched the beach for Sam. Rosa was writing something on a business card, handing it to him. She patted him on the back, nodding firmly.

“Alison?” My mom was coming, sandals in her hand, bare feet carving holes in the sand. “You okay?”

“Fine,” I said, slipping the map into the envelope.

“We’re going to go on home, then. Where’s Sara?”

“She and Morgan are beachcombing. She can go home with us.”

My mom kicked at a shell. “He’s a sweet old man, isn’t he?”

“Real sweet.” I fingered the envelope. “Mom, how would you feel about another pet? Or two?”

She nudged me with her foot. “Please. Like we don’t have enough already?”

“I suppose you’re right. Of course, Sara could help.”

“I believe this is my cue to leave,” my mom said. She leaned down and gave me a kiss on the head.

“Just tell me this, then. How do you feel about parrots?”

She took off quickly, hands over her ears. “I can’t hear you,” she called.

I stood, shading my eyes. Sam was striding across the sand toward Morgan and Sara. Rosa’s little white card was in his hand.

“Sara!” I called. “Come here a sec. I’ve got a proposition for you.”

She ran to me and we talked for a while, and then we caught up with Sam and Morgan and made our way across the warm sand. Most of the mourners were already gone. A few stood in the parking lot, talking in low, respectful voices or laughing softly.

I heard someone call my name and turned. Rosa was waving to me from her car. She pulled something from the front seat and joined me on the sand.

“Here,” she said, pushing a white sweater into my arms. “I made it for Izzy. I know it’s too hot, but next winter, maybe …” Her voice fell away.

“It’s beautiful, Rosa. Really. Thank you.”

She gazed at the beach. Her dark eyes were swollen. Her mouth sagged.

“I hope it was okay,” I said. “Coming here, the ashes and everything. It’s what Izzy wanted.”

“If Izzy wanted to be here—” She fingered her rosary uneasily. “If Izzy wanted it, then it’s okay.”

I watched her go, then headed to the lot. At the edge of the beach I stopped and turned. I stared at the spot where we had gathered, where Miguel had opened the urn to the wind and Izzy’s ashes had taken flight.

I’d been so sure it was important, this ending Izzy had chosen. But now I realized it was just a symbol, a ritual for us, not for her. That wasn’t Izzy flying on an updraft, nestled in a clump of sea grass, melting into the waves. We weren’t leaving her behind here on the sand.

She was going home with us, where she belonged.

O
N A MIDSUMMER
night three months later, the kind where the moon is so bright that sleeping is out of the question, Sam and I went back to Turtle Beach. Many of the loggerhead nests had already hatched, but the one near Izzy’s spot was still quiet. We spread out an old blanket I’d brought. I sat between Sam’s legs, leaning against his broad chest as if it were a chair, and he put his arms around me and we waited.

I ran my hands along his hard arms and laced my fingers through his. “Maybe tonight,” I said. “Most of the others have hatched already.”

“Could be a dud,” he said, just to provoke me.

“Not here. Not on Izzy’s beach.”

He parted my hair and trailed kisses down my neck, soft as first rain, and I shivered. I felt like I’d been sitting there all my life. Like nothing on the planet mattered in the least except for the fact that I could feel the steady surge of his heart against my back.

“What did your mom say this morning when she left?” I asked.

“She still wants me to come back to Detroit, but if I want to stay with Jane, it’s okay with her. We can work out the school transfer and stuff. Mom told me she understands that I want to stick around and visit Morgan.”

“What did you say?”

He brushed his lips against my hair. “I told her that’s not the only reason I want to stick around.”

“The great beaches, you mean.”

He laughed. “Actually, I meant I have to finish up summer school if I intend to be a senior this fall.”

I elbowed him and tried to get away and then he was on top of me, kissing me so tenderly I thought I would melt right into the sand and be lost forever. After a while we rolled onto our sides, cupped into each other’s warmth, his arms cradling me.

Suddenly Sam jerked up. “What?” I asked.

“The nest.”

I sat up on my knees. The spot, carefully marked with stakes to keep out trespassers, was smooth and silent.

“You’re hallucinating,” I said.

“No, I swear I saw something.”

I gave him a dubious look. “You think this is crazy, don’t you?”

“Hey, I liked the manatees, remember?”

“You never saw any manatees.”

“I saw a milk bottle that bore an amazing resemblance to a manatee.”

We lay down again, our eyes on the nest, waiting.

“That time last summer when Iz and I saw them hatch, it was great,” I said. “They just pop out of the sand, dozens of these little guys, and go sprinting off to the water. It’s amazing.”

Sam trailed his fingers down my bare arm. “I miss her,” he said.

“Me too,” I whispered. “Did you ever come here with Izzy? Like this, at night?”

“No.” He stroked my cheek with rough fingertips. “Just you.”

“I wish you had,” I said. “She would have liked it.”

He smiled. “We are one very strange couple, aren’t we?”

I turned to him and kissed him, slowly, lingeringly, my hands running over the hard, smooth curves and angles of his body. It wasn’t like that first kiss so many months before. This one was big and complicated and full of colors and textures. It held stories in it, and memories, and that made it even better.

Suddenly Sam clutched my arm. “Look. The sand. It’s moving.”

“Oh, my God, you’re right.”

“Told you,” he said. “Now what?”

“Now we wait some more.”

Sam took my hand and kissed my fingers, slowly, tenderly.

“I love you,” I said.

“I love you too,” he said. “I loved you from that first day you rescued me. And I never stopped.”

I smiled. “Have you ever been to Paris, Sam?” I asked, but he didn’t have time to answer, because all at once the turtle hatchlings were erupting from the sand as if they were being spewed from a tiny volcano.

They darted toward the water, crazed with life. Their wet, soft shells caught the moonlight and were turned into scampering stars. We watched, laughing, as they made their way across the beach, Izzy’s beach, to the dark, vast mystery beyond.