Merlyn shook her head. “The only thing special about me was him.” She looked back to the boat. “I was special because he was special. Now he’s gone … and so is whatever part of him made me special.”
I was shaking my head. “No, Merlyn. No.” I caught her chin and made her look back at me. “Jason would be telling you ‘Bullshit’ right now and I’ll tell you the same.”
She pulled her chin from my fingers and swam away. It took a second to realize she was swimming for the beach. I followed. When we got to the shallows, she slipped off her fins and walked a bit shaky legged up onto the black sand. By the time I got there, a line of footprints up the beach and behind some rocks was all there was to see of her. Tossing my fins on top of hers I followed after her tracks.
“Merlyn!”
“Go away.” I heard her voice drift back to me from up ahead. “Just go away on your beautiful boat and leave me here. I’ll be fine.”
Walking around the side of a large boulder, I saw her sitting by a clump of tall grass.
“Merlyn … I won’t leave you here,” I scoffed. “That has to be the most stupid thing you have ever said. This island has no fresh water and nothing for food that you don’t have to catch out the sea. Both of which are beside the point. There is no way I would leave you here.”
She sighed. “Ben … I don’t want to go back. There is nothing for me back there. An empty house. An empty life. The life I had is gone. Jason was my life, and he’s gone”
I knelt down in the sand in front of her. “I know that, Merlyn. I know it all too well. But just because that part of your life has ended doesn’t mean you can’t have a new life. Jason wouldn’t want you to spend your years like this. He would want you to move on, to find something new.” I took her hand in mine.
Her eyes never looked up from my fingers.
“I wouldn’t know where to start. There are too many pieces to pick up. Too much was shattered to even make a start at it.” She gave my hand a squeeze then tried to turn them loose. I caught her back.
“Then let me help. I’m good at picking up pieces of shattered lives. I had to do it with mine twice already. Please, Merlyn … let me help.”
“Ben ….” She shook her head. “I don’t even know if I want to bother. What would be the point? I’m past the middle of my life. All that effort for a few more years, then what? To watch another man grow old? Get sick before my eyes? To see it all happen again?”
Reaching up, I brushed a tear from her eye. “Merlyn … that is only one possible future. How about one where you live happily for years and years together. Where you see the world together.” She looked up at me sadly. I couldn’t tell if I was getting through or not. “Imagine all that you might never see.”
“Like what? Huh? Like what? Some building in some strange land where no one understands a word I say. Some bit of nature that man might not have spoiled yet.” She waved her hand to the untouched cove surrounding us. “None of it is worth the pain of remembering.”
“Love.” I leaned down a bit till our eyes met “You could very well fall in love again. True love, heart soaring love. Passion to make you … well, not forget Jason, but let him rest knowing that you’re looked after … maybe even a bit happy.”
She chuckled and shook her head. “Love is for poets.”
“Love is for lovers,” I countered. “Words of love are for poets. Please, Merlyn–” I fell silent.
“Please what?” she asked, after a moment.
I swallowed. “Please, realize that someone can love you as much as you loved Jason.” I looked at the black sand under my knees, the little shells I felt pressing into my knee cap. “Seeing you like this is agony.”
She looked up at my face, suddenly, hearing the tone in my voice. I saw a surprise in her eyes, then a soft smile. A hint of a blush, and then a sad smile followed.
“I’m sorry,” she said. “I hadn’t realized that you felt anything for me.” Her hand came around to my hair, brushing it back from my face. “It’s flattering to know that a man as young as you can look at an old woman like me and think he’s in love.” She sniffled. “Thank you.”
“I don’t think I’m in love with you Merlyn I kn–“
“No.” she placed her fingers over my mouth. “That’s all it is, or could be, just a thought. A fantasy of an idea given to a dream.” Merlyn smiled then, truly smiled. “A very flattering one for me … but nothing more than that.”
“You are beautiful when you’re wrong.” I said, and then I laughed. “You are even more beautiful when you’re not wrong. I guess that means you’re always beautiful. I’ve always thought so. Jason knew … how I felt. How I feel.”
She smiled after a moment of surprise. “Did he?” She chuckled. “He was always one for a laugh at my expense. He must have been chuckling in his sleeve the whole time knowing that I had a young admirer.”
“I love you, Merlyn,” I said, softly. I started to say more but her fingers were on my lips again.
“No, Ben! No. I can’t hear words of love from another man. Not right now … if … ever. I gave my heart to one man. Jason. And even though he’s gone he still has it.” Her hand tightened in the back of my hair. She gave my head a bit of a shake. “Now listen to me … my beautiful young man. I want you to put this all away. Just lock it away and let it vanish with time. You need to find someone your own age. Fall in love with her and live every moment with her like it’s your last.”
I caught her hand as she moved it away from my mouth. I brought the fingers back to my lips and kissed the tips.
She blinked away her tears. “Because you never know when it may very well be your last,” she said, sadly as she watched me kissing her fingers for a moment, and then sighed. She slipped her fingers from my hand. “I’m sorry, Ben. Sorry that you fell in love with someone not worth loving.”
Stunned, I felt her leg brush my shoulder as she got up and walked past me. Turning on my knees, I winced as I felt the small shells dig even deeper into my knee cap. I jumped to my feet and went after her. When I caught up to Merlyn she was wading out into the water about to put her fins back on. I plunged into the surf next to her and grabbed her by the elbow, turning her to me.
“Ben!”
I pulled her to me. My lips slammed into hers. Feeling her struggling in my arms, I held her tighter to me. My hands caressed her back as I kissed her. The next wave came in and rocked us enough to move my lips from hers.
“Ben, no … No! I can’t do this.” Then she suddenly pulled away from me and swam into the sea. I tried to follow. After a few feet, she dived under the surf, and I couldn’t see her. The next wave slapped me in the chest. I ducked under.
Looking in the clear water, eyes stinging, with the sound of stirred sand hissing in my ears, I saw her swimming deep. Her powerful legs kicked her down towards the reef. Lifting myself, I body surfed the next wave back to the beach. I grabbed up my fins and mask and stumbling I more or less fell back into the water. With everything my legs could give, I swam out above the reef, till I was over her. Then, turning down, I kicked with all my strength towards the bottom.
As I got closer to her I saw a thin trail of bubbles leaking from the side of her mouth. She was wrapped around the bottom of the anchor chain, holding herself to it as hard as she could.
Her eyes were closed.
When I settled in next to her, her eyes popped open, and she clutched tightly to the chain. I saw her mouth start to open; I pressed mine to hers and kissed my last breath into her lungs. Her eyes wide, they stared into mine as I took hold of the chain and just floated next to her, waiting to drown.
She started to frantically shake her head at me. I softly smiled. As I felt the burning getting harder to take, I looked into her eyes. My lips mouthed the words.
“I love you.”
I felt her hands leave the chain and grab onto me even as my mouth opened and water rushed in. I felt terrible panic as my throat closed to keep it out. The world started to drift in waves of panic and chest pain. I felt myself falling into blackness. I tried to claw my way out of it, even as I felt myself being lifted. Then darkness covered my sight.
“Ben! Ben!”
Coughing out water, I tried to turn and get the salty slime from my mouth. Hacking it out, I heard crying. Then I was being hit all around my shoulders and back.
“God damn you, Ben! Damn You!” Then I was being held by her as she cried. I slowly managed to turn into her and hold her. Minutes passed, and then the incoming tide surged around my feet. Resting my head on the top of her wet hair I took a deep breath that rattled in my chest.
“Merlyn … please make up your mind. Are we living or dying? I’m willing to do either one with you today but this back and forth has got to stop.”
“Damn you. Why won’t you listen?” She gave my chest a little pop, but there was nothing behind it. “I told you. I gave my heart to one man. Jason! I can’t give it to you.”
“I understand that,” I said softly. It hurts to draw the breath to speak. “I do. I understand that because I’ve given mine to you.”
She loosened her grip then sat back looking at me.
“You don’t have to love me,” I told her. “I can live with that. But, what I can’t live without is you.” I tried to not flinch as water brushed almost to my knees. I was freezing suddenly. “And I don’t intend to. I love you Merlyn … even if you can’t love me.”
She sat looking down into my face, her expression going through dozens of emotions every second. The next wave came in all the way to our waist. I shivered.
“Come on. Let’s go up the breach,” she said, getting to her knees. Her hand took mine, and she started to pull me up. When I got to my knees, I was all but in her face. She smiled at me then brushed her face, clearing away the tears. “I guess we’re living. For today at least.”
I nodded, accepting that.
“Good enough,” I said. Getting the rest of the way to my feet, I had to lean on her a bit as we walked up the shore. Settling myself next to a random clump of grass, I watched her as she sat down next to me. I wrapped my arm around her for warmth, and she leaned into me after a moment.
With my boat silhouetted in front of it, we watched the sun starting to sink towards the sea.
“Ben?”
“Yes, Merlyn?”
“What do you want from me?” she asked.
When I looked down at her face I saw it was lit red from the light of the setting sun.
“What do you mean?” I asked reaching up to brush dried sand from her cheek. It was clinging to tear tracks across her face.