Farewell

She stops a moment putting on her left sock, looks out the third-floor window at the South Sea, looks for the storm that will bring unwanted rain. She has heard it for four years now—these are the waters that bring pearls, riches, elegance. But around her cluttered room nothing has changed—movie posters on the wall: angelic dolls in lace and saints staring at crowds of dead faces; father’s unopened gifts; letters from Caleb.

Out of the woods behind the house a green garter snake slithers toward the Gothic Revival mansion, compass in its belly, shadows of the chilly blocks of grey stone safer than the morning sky’s dark clouds.

In the murky sky she sees life crawling. Called by voices that mean little to her. And dressed to their liking, she moves down the stairs, steps wobbly as the butler holds open the heavy steel door decorated with crystals and gold mined in distant hills, far away from the water. The Mercedes’ engine runs in front of the house. Her chauffeur stands at the car’s open door in gloves and scally cap.

Inside she sits, thinking of the puddles that will form and linger once the thunderstorms are gone—little seas trapped by soil, concrete. Tadpoles, coming from some unknown place, somewhere beyond their equations, will squirm and squiggle, will swim in a race against the dry. The car’s engine revs; the driver pulls away. In the back seat she feels the pull of the tide, hears the smooth slithering of the snake. Diagnosis not her own, brine rises in her chest.

And at the end of the long driveway where the estate ends, the long road begins its gouging away from the sea, through acres of woodland, leading to their city, and more cities. But this day, one the tadpoles knew would come, the car door opens without waiting for a stop. And she is out, slithering, neck-turned. Away from the city. Away from the trees. In blue tears. Then floating.