She first spotted Patrick straddling a log at Sugar Beach beating a coconut against a rock. Clear waves lapped and a light breeze moved palm fronds. Patrick’s beach bum affectation first attracted her. Later, a boyish charm that could roll over into deep thoughtfulness. A penchant for possession gave her pause, but mostly, Patrick seemed a fitting candidate to rescue her from the decade long cycle she could not escape.
***
To celebrate their six-week anniversary, they dined on cornmeal, okra and salt fish on the terrace at The Inn on Mt. Eagle. They toasted rum. Dusk spread orange and lavender streaks like icing across the sky. Sugar Beach was visible a thousand feet below. The white dots of sailboats retreated to shore as a thunderstorm, its entire area visible from above, moved in from the sea. Whitecaps slammed against black rocks, rain steamed as it hit the water, yet where they sat, the sky remained clear.
***
Happy for the first time in years she invited her oldest and most enabling friend, Blake to visit. She met Blake, a philandering lawyer, in New Orleans helping to rebuild after the storm. The half-abandoned city proved a worthy canvas for their exploits. Vodka was their vice, and they drank it any way.
Her second stint resulted.
During Blake’s visit, Patrick created strange tension. One afternoon they visited the lagoons and Patrick pulled an air soft pistol on a tourist before returning his wallet and claiming it a joke. Patrick was convinced they shared a past they would not admit.
***
The night things disintegrated Blake drank a Cuba Libre on the veranda. The sun slid across the sea and sank below the treetops. Hearing screams, he tiptoed to the window. Patrick clutched a wrench and dodged flying objects. As she pleaded, he landed a crippling blow. Blake called the police and hid behind a Calabash tree on the property’s edge until cruisers arrived with sirens wailing.
Patrick flew to Dallas and checked himself into an institution. She awoke hospitalized, tubes coursing wrist to nose. She tugged bandages and cried out for Patrick. A nurse popped in to tell her there was no Patrick there.
***
As she healed, listening to her vitals beep, her mind soared back in time. There she was, born wealthy in Philadelphia. Bundled in pink, riding a bicycle on an icy street. Her father’s dark beard and smile of pride. His outstretched arms when she graduated Temple. Her mom’s uncharacteristic dinner toast. The handshake when she graduated Villanova law, her dad’s beard salted gray. The tears sliding down her mother’s cheeks.
The early years at the firm. Living in Rittenhouse. Bounding toward a golden future. Until the alcohol claws. Before one became three. Three, six. Before counting became impossible.
Seeking a new start, she found a job online at a resort. She purchased a plane ticket and disappeared to St. Croix.
Wilson Koewing is a writer from South Carolina. His work is forthcoming in Wigleaf, Hobart, Gargoyle and The Harpy Hybrid Review.