windshield lay on the gravel and flashed in the rain. Inside the cab, unharmed but in a kind of shock, as if they’d just been dropped from outer space, were Daphne, Nova, and Star with Caine tight against her chest, laughing themselves silly.
It took a moment to figure it out. Daphne must have braked hard when she saw the parked car and the jolt, along with inertia, had broken the rusted cab loose from the body and sent them flying. They were more than lucky. Willie was laughing with them, probably to keep from crying. He was trying to help Daphne out and she finally stopped laughing long enough to let him. I ran to help Star, whose jacket and hair were covered with glass. Nova hopped out in front where the windshield had been and was the first to see Carolina. She said not a word.
“Well, there is no quarantine,” Daphne said as she got to her feet. “But, my goodness, there is no more milk truck either.” Then she saw Carolina and smiled. Once again, her blue eyes shone bright right through the rain. “Welcome,” she said casually. “You must certainly be Carolina.”
Wishes may or may not come true, I’ve never been sure about wishes, and I’ve never been certain about anything in doubt coming true simply because we “trust” it will. Reality does not work that way. There is a truth, however, a place, a feeling, a moment, who knows what to call it? It does not go by names. It travels though, and stops occasionally in the middle of our lives, if we’re lucky. It happens when the longest-standing hope finds the most distant dream. and it lights the world.
At the mention of Carolina’s name, Star raised her head and looked into her mother’s eyes for the first time since she was a child. Carolina stared back and for an instant I felt something pass through me I had not felt since my papa found my mama’s eyes in the moment before the moment that killed them. I felt the weight of their lives. But it didn’t frighten or overwhelm me as it had before. The feeling that passed between Star and Carolina, and somehow through me, was only surrender. surrender to something in time and yet out of time. something in the center of life realized at the moment it is being lived. It is the most peaceful and powerful feeling on earth.
“Mama?” Star asked.
“Yes,” Carolina said and knelt down next to Star. She was crying, but her tears were drowned in the rain. She put her hands on her daughter’s face and ran her fingers over her lips, then she saw Caine peeping out of Star’s jacket and bent to kiss his dark curls. She turned and looked at me.
“It’s a miracle, Z.”
“No, Carolina. It’s your family.”
She was laughing, crying, trying to wipe her nose and hug Star all at once.
“Are you all right?” I asked.
She reached under her soaking sweater and pulled out what she’d run back into the house to get. “I guess I won’t need this,” she said.
I took it from her and put my hand inside and pounded the pocket.
“What on earth is that?” Daphne asked. She stood straight and tall and the rain seemed not to bother her.
“It’s called a baseball glove, Daphne. I’ll have to teach you how to play.”
“My goodness, yes,” she said. “I love American games, but let’s do it on a slightly nicer day, shall we, Z?”
“For God’s sake, Z, she’s right,” Willie broke in. “Let’s get everyone inside. I’ll take care of this mess later.”
“Quite right, Willie,” I said and with everyone helping everyone else through the broken glass, we all made our way back to the path that led to the house.
I hung back at one point and let the rest walk on ahead. I don’t know why, I suppose I just wanted to watch them all walk together and listen to the small talk and, of course, the laughter. It was a wonderful feeling, a kind of nudge in the ribs, a wink from somewhere that suggested life was working. That’s when I knew Nova really could “see things.” She turned around at that very moment and gave me a real wink, a wink as clever and knowing as any Cleopatra ever gave.
I laughed and started to catch up, but I only took a step or two before I heard another laugh, a laugh I knew as well as my own. I turned and found Opari walking right behind me and Geaxi right behind her. I had never heard them approach.
“It is seeming you are always in the rain, my love, while others always take shelter. I hope the desert has not touched you permanently.”
“Me?” I asked. “Where have you two been all night and day? And how long have you been back?”
“Long enough to see a miracle, no?” Geaxi said with a grin.
Opari took one of my hands and Geaxi took the other. They led me like a schoolboy up the path and toward the house. They were both wet, but neither was soaked nor looked the worse for being outside nearly twenty-four hours. “No, tell me,” I said. “Where have you been?”
“In a shelter that is older than I,” Opari said.
“A shelter?”
“Yes, Geaxi will take you there, or I will.”
“But. what is it? I mean, why did you go?”
“You will see it soon enough, Zianno,” Geaxi said. “When Sailor arrives. It has many long names in several languages; ‘Lullyon Coit’ is the Cornish name. It is made of granite, prehistoric granite, and we are not sure of its purpose. I like to call it ‘the slabs.’ ”
“Is it far?”
“No,” Opari answered. “It is quite near.”
“At the highest point of Caitlin’s Ruby,” Geaxi added.
None of it made sense to me, but I felt too good to worry about it. I turned to Opari and said, “Come on, there’s someone I want you to meet.”
“I know,” she said. “I saw her and now I am knowing the answer.”
“The answer? To what?” I tried to stop walking, but they both kept pulling me on.
“I never knew,” Opari said and glanced over at Geaxi, “I never knew why you left China. now I do.” She leaned forward and looked into my eyes. I loved her more than I ever thought I could and I was only beginning.
“Good,” I said. “Then you also know why it will not be possible ever to leave you again.”
Suddenly Geaxi pulled me to a halt.
“What?” I asked. “What did I say?”
She dropped my hand and stood staring at me, her eyes bearing down like black bullets.
“I have heard some sorry attempts,” Geaxi began, then drew in a deep breath and waited a moment. “I have seen some sorry attempts, Zezen, many, many times in my long, long life at grand professions of profound love, but. ” She paused and let out a slow, lingering sigh that ended, “That was the worst.”
I had to agree and we walked the rest of the way in laughing like children coming home from school.
Captain Woodget was the first to teach me about knots — knots of all kinds and complexities. Solomon taught me how to untie and slip out of many things, but not knots.
To Captain Woodget, knots had power and purpose. He had a sailor’s knowledge of knots and a working relationship with the mysteries of strength and coiled tension. A length of rope, resting in the corner and wound around itself, had the potential for many things with the proper knots. It could sail a ship, save a life, raise and lower cargo, pull a woman on board, secure a chest left behind, hold a man at the stake, hang a sailor at sea — if the mind could dream it up, the rope could carry it out. If you knew your knots, it could be done.
The Meq are fascinated with knots and their secrets of tensions and strengths. Ours are just harder to see. They are learned in the blood more than the mind. They are learned on a rope of time and with trust that each will remain unbroken. But, of course, there is always a key to unraveling any knot. For the Meq, it always seems to be a simple twist of fate.
That first night together, we began telling our stories and connecting times, people, places, and events that only those in the room would understand. It was an impossible knot of hopes, dreams, and circumstance that ended in a bond only felt through blood and trust — the sense of family. Everyone there welcomed it, nourished it, let themselves come out of themselves and be a part of it. It was healing, it was spontaneous, and it lasted through to the next day and the next until the end of December and the end of the year, 1918. We did what the Meq do well.
