Echoes From a Darkened Shore by Cherie Wilkerson

Death has a way of pointing out to us temporary survivors how fragile this life really is, so we cling to whatever represents security and seek a simpler time. When my husband Jim died, I was no exception. I returned to Cuymar with my six-year-old daughter, Jenny, for the first time since I'd married. Despite the town's dilapidated buildings, the blistered paint of the playground equipment, and its general air of having been forgotten by the rest of the world, I found I still loved the place.

Every summer of my childhood, my parents and I had vacationed in Cuymar. As soon as we arrived, I would rush out to look for what had changed. One year all the playground equipment had been painted a shiny dark green. Another year a wall of cinder blocks with seats to seaward appeared. And once, a winter storm had tossed up onto the beach a huge tree trunk as white as the sand, bleached by the sun and the sea. I used that trunk as a playground. I leaped over it and off it. I balanced on it as if I were on a tightrope. Often I just sat on it watching the waves roll in.

That summer I met the Captain. His white hair showed beneath his blue captain's hat and he carried a cane of gnarled driftwood. One day he sat down beside me on the log and we talked about the ocean and many other things now forgotten. All that summer we'd meet on the log and stroll along the water's edge, stopping now and then to examine some shell or bit of wood unearthed by his cane.

Although the shells of scallops and jackknife clams have a special meaning for me for having been revealed by the old man's cane, nothing we did or said was especially memorable. Yet everything was special. Neither of us fitted into the world around us; I was too young and he too old. For the first time in my life I felt needed.

After that summer we never again had long conversations or morning walks along the beach. I was too busy with my new friends; but each year I'd see him sitting on the steps near the pier and would stop to say hello. After many years had passed, I walked by the Captain sitting in his usual place and again said hello. He only glanced at me and nodded his head once. As I walked away I saw him talking animatedly with a group of small children. I realized then that his eyes had become blinded with age - my age, not his. I was too old. I had grown up.

My return as an adult differed from when I was a child. This time I revisited the places of my memories, seeking not what had changed but rather all that had remained the same, as if to assure myself that there was some constancy in the world. I soon had the proof I sought. Before a week had passed, Jenny found the Captain. She came home so excited it took some minutes before I could figure out what had happened. Her joyous enthusiasm brought back bittersweet memories.

One day near the end of summer, after telling Jenny about my lost friendship with the Captain, I reached down to brush a wisp of tawny hair from her face and discovered a frown.

"What's wrong, Jenny?"

Her frown deepened. "I don't want to lose the Captain. He's my only friend."

"Honey," I said, "you'll find other friends besides the Captain."

She looked at me earnestly. "How old were you when the Captain couldn't see you? Am I getting too old?"

I laughed. "Don't worry. You've got a few years left. Besides, if you and the Captain are true friends, you'll be friends forever. Age won't make a bit of difference."

She looked at me with less than acceptance but seemed to think it over before asking, "Can we have spaghetti for dinner?"

"Certainly," I answered solemnly, "unless you think you've gotten too old for spaghetti." She lowered her head and gave me her mock-indignant stare that told me she knew I was teasing.

School started, finally, and Jenny delighted in the change from summer activities. Getting ready for school, she looked like a ragamuffin in her favorite outfit of jeans and T-shirt. She absolutely refused to wear the new dress I had picked out for her first day.

"You know, you're just like your father," I said.

She looked at me solemnly. "I am?"

"I could never get him to dress up either. In fact, his friends stole all his clothing before our wedding so he'd have to wear his tuxedo."

"Am I just like him?"

"Well, you look just like me, but you're just like him on the inside." I smiled at her, but Jenny remained pensive. I shook my head in amusement. I'd never been able to figure out what Jim was thinking, either.

All that morning I had Jim on my mind, so I headed for the tide pools I'd always visited as a child. It seemed the only way to clear my thoughts of the memories of Jim was to replace them with much earlier memories.

The sun had not yet burned off the morning mist and the beach was deserted. No children built castles in the sand; no elderly couples sat on the benches. I liked this time of day for its solitude. The empty carapace of a rock crab gleamed on the shore, inviting me to pick it up. Inside, where the body had been, was smooth and silky. The exterior felt rough and hard to the touch. Like me, I thought and grinned, knowing it wasn't true. I returned it to the sand.

By the time I reached the tide pools, the sun was coming out and the mist was retreating. To my dismay, they were buried under high tide. Sighing, I settled back onto the sand and dug my heels through the warm top layer to the chill of the damp sand below. I drew figures in the sand and pretended that it didn't matter, that I didn't care anymore that I was alone.

One day, soon after I had started working in a hospital again, Jenny came home in tears.

"What happened?" I asked, my imagination fearing the worst. But I could see nothing worse than wet, sandy blue jeans from the knees down and playground dirt from the knees up, something she brought home every day.

"He called me names!" she blurted out and her tears began again.

"Who called you names?"

"Bobby," she sniffled. "Bobby did. He called me a baby." That didn't sound like Jenny; she wasn't afraid of anything.

"Why did he call you a baby?"

Jenny hung her head and dug a toe into the dirt by the front step. " 'Cause I'm little," she said, so quietly I could barely hear her. I knew Jenny was shorter than her classmates, but it had never seemed to bother her before. Then her expression turned fierce. "They don't understand. They laugh at him!" Her anger melted into a pool of bewildered tears and she hurled herself against me, arms wrapped tightly around my legs. "They laugh, Mommy!"

Dropping to the step, I cradled her in my arms and waited. When her crying had ceased, I asked, "Do you want to talk about it?"

"The big kids laugh and say I'm a baby. They say he's crazy. The Captain's not crazy, is he, Mom? Is he?"

"No," I said, "he's different. Being different isn't the same as being crazy."

She buried her head in my lap and whispered, "I'm different, too."

"You'll grow, Jenny. Don't worry." I gave her a reassuring hug.

"I don't want to grow up and be like them." She pouted.

"You don't have to be like them, but everybody has to grow up."

"I won't," she cried petulantly and began struggling out of my arms. "I'll never grow up!"

"Oh, Jennifer, knock it off." I was in no mood to put up with a temper tantrum. Earlier today, a boy Jenny's age had been admitted to the hospital with leukemia. The other nurses had stood around whispering about it and laying odds as to when he would die.

Jenny glared at me. "You can't make me grow up and I won't!"

"Oh honestly, Jennifer! You are acting like a baby and I'm tired of all this foolishness!"

"I hate you! Nobody understands me but the Captain!" She ran down the driveway, then whirled to face me, her hands clenched in fists at her sides. "I hate you," she screamed. "I hate you and wish you were dead!" She turned and ran toward the beach.

"Jennifer, come back here this minute!" I shouted, but she ignored me. I sat down on the steps and began to cry for the first time since Jim died of leukemia, just as the boy was going to do.

When it started getting dark early and Jenny had not come home for dinner, I began searching the beach for her. I knew I wouldn't have to look far. I found her sitting silently on the steps near the pier with the Captain. Without a word to either of them, I took Jenny by the hand and marched her home. We made it just before the rain started. That night, as the storm battered the house, I could not sleep.

The next morning, Jenny said she wasn't feeling well. Her temperature was normal but she acted unusually sluggish. Just to be safe, I sent her back to bed. I was angry with her for having stayed out so late and gotten chilled. She was doing that too often lately.

"Why do you insist on sending her to school in her condition?" her teacher asked after I called to explain Jenny's absence.

"I beg your pardon?"

"I'm referring to your daughter's leukemia."

"My daughter's what? She doesn't have leukemia. What on earth gave you an idea like that?"

It was her turn to be indignant. "Your daughter has been telling everybody since the day she arrived in school that she has leukemia and is going to die soon. At first I brushed it off as a childish fantasy since it's not in her health records, but after her repeated illnesses . . ."

I was stunned. I hadn't had any idea that Jenny thought she had her father's disease. I had felt that I needed to talk to her about Jim's death to help her understand, but she had been so stoic through it all that I hadn't known where to begin.

Then I heard her teacher say, "And if I were you, I wouldn't let her spend so much time with that man."

"What man?" I'd lost track of the conversation.

"I wouldn't let my daughter near him. You're not from around here and you don't know him. Take my advice and keep your little girl away from him." I slammed down the receiver when I realized she meant the Captain. I had more important things to worry about than idle gossip.

Hesitantly, I looked in to see whether Jenny was awake and received a wan smile. I shivered and walked to the partly open window. It wasn't open wide enough to let in the rain, but the room was chillier than I liked. I tugged at the sash, but dampness has swollen the wood so that if I jerked hard enough I could open it wider but could not close it all the way. Giving up, I sat down on Jenny's bed and tucked the covers tightly around her.

"Are you cold?" Jenny shook her head, so I plunged right into my planned conversation. "Your teacher tells me you think you have what Daddy died of."

She squirmed a little under the blankets and avoided looking at me. "I do have it," she whispered, then looked up at me. "I don't want to die."

"Oh, Jenny, you don't have leukemia. You're perfectly normal."

She fingered the edge of the blanket and said, "You told me I was like Daddy on the inside."

"I only meant that you have a personality like Daddy's. You don't have any disease like Daddy had. Neither of us does." I hugged her in relief.

Her voice seemed more hopeful but she asked, "Then why am I sick all the time?"

"Well, why do you run around at night without a jacket?" She made a wry face. "Why do you go swimming when there're icicles on the swings?"

She looked indignant. "There's never been any icicles on the swings!"

I laughed. "Well, almost." She grinned shyly and snuggled up to me.

"I'm really O.K.?"

"You're really O.K."

After promising her that I would bring her something, I went outside to see what the storm had brought to the shore. Piles of kelp tossed up onto the beach lay damply in the morning mist. The sun, like a bright cold pearl, hung in the gray sky and offered no warmth as I walked along the water's edge. The gray-green darkness of the sea was beautiful.

Stepping over the snarled heaps of kelp, I looked for something to take back. As I uncovered fragments of a shell in the sand, a driftwood cane pointed to a spot several inches over and I heard the Captain say in an offhand manner, "You'll find one there, I think." He continued down the beach as I dug in the sand and found an amber cowrie shell.

I caught up with the Captain and studied him covertly as he ignored me. The man seemed ageless, just as he had seemed when I was a child. I wondered how old he really was. Polishing the cowrie on my jeans, I said, "Jenny likes you very much."

"She's a sweet little thing but sad, too."

"Sad?"

"Her illness - she's sick all the time."

I looked at him for a moment before speaking. "I do everything I can, but she won't take care of herself," I said slowly.

The Captain flashed a look of anger at me which startled me by its unexpectedness. "The people here, they don't understand. I mean nothing but good for your little girl; nothing but good and they call me evil. Shortsighted is what they are." His cane indicated another shell for my collection: a jackknife clam with both halves intact.

"I guess people are more suspicious nowadays," I said, trying to read the expression on his weathered face. He walked at a fast pace, staring straight ahead. The feeling that he was no longer aware of my existence made me uneasy.

"If ever a child is sickly they blame me," he muttered. "They come to me ill and I help them be happy."

I stopped and stared. "The townspeople think you make children ill?" I could not believe what the old man was saying. There was no reply; the Captain walked on. I watched as he shuffled rapidly down the beach, not as if he were crippled, but rather as if he had been a long time at sea and had not yet become reacquainted with land. Nervously, I tumbled the shells in my pockets until they were warm from my touch. On the way home I dropped them onto the beach.

As winter progressed, Jenny's illnesses became more frequent and prolonged. One evening she came home and collapsed in a listless heap on the couch. The doctor could find nothing definitely wrong and recommended vitamins and rest.

Not long after I had put her to bed, I heard a soft scratching at the door. Puzzled, I opened the door and saw the Captain. He seemed almost apologetic as he stood with his cap tucked under his arm. He ran his gnarled fingers over the equally gnarled handle of his cane and said, "I just wanted to look in on Jenny and see how she's doing." His voice was like the whisper of waves against the sand. I hesitated, then led him to her room. Gently he reached out his hand to stroke her forehead as she slept. There was such compassion and sorrow in his face and in that gesture that any reservations I'd had earlier disappeared.

In the days that followed, there was no improvement in Jenny's condition no matter what doctor's advice I took. Every night there was the familiar scratching at the door; every night I let the Captain in to sit for a time at her bedside. In the silence as Jenny slept and the Captain rested his hand against her cheek, the ticking of the clock seemed abnormally loud, drowning even the roar of the ocean. The Captain and Jenny seemed frozen in time, a tableau painted by an expert artist.

Watching them one evening, I caught myself biting the inside of my cheek but refused to listen to my irrational thoughts. "How long has it been since you've been to sea?"

"A long time," he said without glancing up. I stared at him and felt my scalp trying to lift from my skull.

"Did you ever have children?"

The Captain nodded slowly. "My grandson was about her age when he died."

"I don't want you to touch her," I said, trying unsuccessfully to control the quiver in my voice.

"I've said the wrong thing," the Captain said. "I'm sorry. Don't let the gossip frighten you."

"Please leave," I said. He looked at me for a moment, then slowly got to his feet and left. I was trembling as I slid the bolt home. When I looked at Jenny more closely, I knew it wasn't my imagination; she seemed even more pale and listless than before. After I turned out the light, I remembered the window that was stuck. I stretched out beside Jenny. Before I fell asleep, I placed my arm over her in the only protection I could offer.

I awoke to hear the clock ticking and Jenny breathing unevenly. Carefully, I listened to the sounds she made and tried to see her face in the darkness. I must have been asleep longer than I'd thought, for the moonlight no longer illuminated the room. Just then light flowed across the bed; I jerked upright, but I was not quick enough to make out the form that had blocked the window and then slid past. Too frightened to get up and look outside, I stared out the window from the bed, but could see nothing. I vowed to leave Cuymar when morning came.

The next day, my fears did not seem so reasonable as they had at midnight. As the days went by and Jenny got better, happiness pushed the fears into the back of my mind and I forgot about leaving Cuymar. The Captain never came back to the house.

As Jenny left for her first day back in school in months, I was struck by how tiny she looked. The doctors had remarked on her lack of height, but assured me she would catch up with her classmates before long. That evening as I tucked her in bed, I again noticed how slight she was; she hadn't grown an inch since the day we'd arrived in Cuymar.

A familiar scratching at the door startled me. Annoyed more than anything else, I turned out the light to discourage any visitors. I heard someone on the steps outside, then Jenny getting out of bed. Although I knew the door was secure, I checked the bolt anyway. Jenny came padding in, half asleep.

"Is it the Captain?" she murmured happily.

"You'd better get back to bed, young lady. It's past your bedtime." I started to scoot her off in that direction when I again remembered the window. Determined to get it closed, I grabbed a screwdriver from the kitchen. "Stay here, Jenny, and don't open the door for anyone. Not anyone, you understand?" She nodded, yawning, and curled up on the couch.

I struggled with the window, chipping away the paint and cursing. Finally it came down with a bang and I pushed the latches closed. As I turned around, I heard a sound in the other room.

"Jenny?" I called as I ran into the room. All I could see when I entered was the bolt thrown back and Jenny standing at the door with one hand on the doorknob. As she turned the knob, there was that faint scratching sound. I pushed her away from the door. The door swung open.

A scrawny puppy sat on the doorstep. "Poor little thing," I said, laughing in relief. "Look Jenny, it's only a puppy." I turned and found the Captain standing with both hands on Jenny's shoulders.

"She let me in."

I grabbed Jenny away from him and held her tightly against me. She struggled weakly and began to cry, a soft, mewling sound. "You're not welcome here," I said. I still held the screwdriver in my hand. "Get out."

"I just want her last days to be happy ones."

"What?" I stared at him dumbfounded until I remembered that Jenny had told everyone she had leukemia. "She's not dying; there's nothing wrong with her. Nothing!" The Captain shook his head sadly. I tried to edge away from him and backed up against the door.

"You're not facing facts. Everyone knows she has a blood disease."

I felt calm suddenly as my hand grasped the doorknob behind me. "You're wrong," I said quietly. "Everybody's wrong. She doesn't have leukemia. She doesn't have anything organically wrong with her. I've been to enough doctors to know."

The Captain looked bewildered. "You can't be telling the truth," he said, but I could hear the doubt behind his words.

"I keep telling you: she's not dying. And she can't stay a little girl forever."

"You don't understand," he whispered and looked down at Jenny.

"I do understand," I said, for suddenly I did. "It's her obsessive desire to remain little so she won't lose your friendship that's done this. If you want to do something for her, then get out!"

"You don't understand," he repeated.

"You selfish old man! Leave her alone!"

"I made a mistake but there's no taking it back," he said slowly.

Fear made me furious. "If you don't leave her alone, you'll never live to see another child."

The Captain slowly shook his head. "And so it has continued since God knows when. We fear death but we easily give it to others; that's why we are so lonely."

"You're not lonely; you're evil. The people of this town know what you are and no one would miss you."

"I'm damned," he stated matter-of-factly, "for being afraid of death. It's the universal sin."

"Don't give me that pseudo-Christian pious attitude!" I turned the doorknob and the Captain stepped toward Jenny.

"You can't run from this!"

I thrust the screwdriver at him. "Get away!"

"You're not a murderer," he said, but he did not come any closer. When I did not respond, he took another step, smiling. I threw the screwdriver at him and ran outside, dragging Jenny with me. She was as oblivious of what was happening around her as if she were made of cloth and straw.

"No, you can't take her away! She's mine. It's no use; give her to me!" the Captain called after me.

By the time I realized I was heading for the beach and away from town, the Captain was already between me and the main road. By this route, the town was far away, too far away, and the beach was deserted. I thought I spotted people standing at the end of the pier and yelled for help, but there was no response. I was too far from them. We struggled to run in the sand to the pier. Twice Jenny fell and couldn't get up, and each time the Captain came closer. When I reached the pier, Jenny could go no farther. I half-carried, half-dragged her along.

The fog was beginning to roll in, muffling the clang of the buoys and causing weird echoes of my flight down the wooden timbers. When I reached the end, there was no one there, only the shadows cast by the lights in the mist. I turned in circles like a trapped animal and began to cry. Already the fog was so thick that I could not see the shore and I had no idea where the old man was. I crouched down behind the building housing the boat winches and held Jenny in my arms. Salt mist beaded my face with dampness and I shivered. Jenny did not move. Frightened, I shook her. She frowned and rolled her head back against my shoulder. Behind me through the railing, I could see the black ocean swelling and tugging at the tangled seaweed wrapped around the pilings.

I heard footsteps approaching and cautiously peered around the corner of the shed. The Captain stepped into a yellow circle of light and stopped. He seemed ancient in that light, older than he had ever appeared before.

"Jenny?" he called. I placed my hand over Jenny's mouth. "Jenny?" She stirred and called out weakly despite my hand. I froze, not knowing whether or not he had heard. I could feel the boards move as the Captain walked. The movement stopped. I looked up and I was staring directly into the Captain's face.

"It's not fair," he said. He seemed to be talking to himself. "It's not fair; only children. Why not the old ones, the evil ones?" He bent and took hold of my wrist and the touch of his cold, calloused hand made my skin crawl. I jerked away. He spoke harshly. "Accept what you can't change, woman! Let me at least get some use out of what little life is left in her!"

I felt drained and tired. "There's nothing I can do, is there?"

"No," he said and tried to reach past me to touch Jenny. I threw myself at him as hard as I could and he fell against the railing.

"Don't do it," he pleaded. Off-balance, he struggled to regain his footing. "Think of yourself. 'Let him who is blameless cast the first stone.' " I pushed him once more. He balanced on the edge of the pier for a long moment, long enough for him to have called out for help and for me to have given it.

The fog muffled the sound of his fall into the ocean. I watched as he slowly sank without a struggle, his white hair floating around him like a halo in the darkness; then he disappeared from sight. I stared at the spot where he had been until my eyes burned with tears. I turned back to Jenny. Gently, I brushed the hair from her face and kissed her cold cheek. "It's all right now, Jenny. Everything's going to be different now. You wait and see." I struggled to my feet with her in my arms. As I staggered down the pier, carrying my daughter's limp body, I thought I heard a voice from the direction I'd just come. But when I stopped to listen, there was only silence.

Fate honored the vows Jenny and I made: she never grew older and was buried long before the Captain's body was washed ashore and interred without an investigation. And I never returned to Cuymar. I know now that the Captain lied: it is possible to get away if you leave soon enough.

I don't have that problem, however. I have a long, full future ahead of me in my work at the hospital. And when I decide it best to move on, I'll always be able to find a job. There are not many who have the compassion, strength, and understanding to work in a children's hospital. It really is a sad job, particularly in the incurable wards, but it has its compensations.