The Language of Sand

Abigail knew he was kidding, but he wouldn’t drop it. Paul dragged her into the tiny shop and dug a pointed hand into his pocket, pretending to conceal a weapon. “Follow my lead.”

“Paul,” Abigail protested.

When she wrestled his hand from his coat pocket, he produced a velvet ring box. Paul got on one knee and opened the box, revealing a delicate engagement ring.

“I could never love anyone more than I love you, Abigail. Never. Will you marry me?”

The cooks and clerks looked on expectantly. Abigail was speechless. She wiped her eyes and managed to get out a single word: yes.

Paul was everything she wasn’t—spirited, fearless, unflappable. He was capable of the unexpected, and being with him made her feel as if, maybe, someday she might do something unexpected herself.

Abigail would never hear her husband’s voice again, a fact that echoed in her heart as she clung to the iron handrail and allowed her gaze to fall into the well of the lighthouse, disregarding her earlier warning. The stairs wound downward, uncoiling away from her like her memory.

She climbed the remaining steps to the top of the lighthouse, which was crowned by the lamp room, a circular turret walled with windows that created an enormous lantern. Access to the lamp room was gained through a trapdoor-style hatch. The massive lamp squatted in the middle of the room, encased in thick plates of glass, each covered in raised concentric grooves, similar to those of a record. While running her hand along the glass and circling the lamp’s pedestal, Abigail tripped over a tin pail she hadn’t noticed, sending it clattering around the room cacophonously.

“If I wasn’t awake before, I am now,” she said, righting the pail and setting it aside.

The view from the lamp room was breathtaking. The ocean stretched infinitely to the east while the silhouette of the island’s trees and marshes sprawled to the west. As the sun bulged over the horizon, it radiated golden light into the clouds, tinting the undersides pink. This was the quintessence of a sunrise.

Abigail stepped onto the parapet, mindful not to let the door to the lamp room close, in case it locked. She couldn’t afford to get trapped out here. She was a newcomer on Chapel Isle, and hardly anyone was aware she’d taken up residence at the lighthouse. Who would think to look for her? Who would miss her?

The sentiment of missing was constant for Abigail. She missed her husband. She missed her son. She missed the life she was going to have with them. She was already beginning to miss the person she’d left behind on the mainland, the woman she had been before she went from Abigail to Abby.

A low railing encircled the lighthouse’s parapet, too low to hold. She skimmed it with her fingertips, grappling with the impulse to categorize the sunrise, to apply adjectives to it, sculpting it into a class and rank. She wished she had a camera.

“A picture is worth a thousand words.”

Abigail detested that cliche, the implication being that language was insufficient, imperfect. For her, it was the ultimate insult. However, during the fire, she had seen that the adage could hold true. It wounded her to admit there were instances when words were heartrendingly inadequate.

Descending the spiral staircase, she realized it was far scarier going down than coming up. Some of the steps whimpered under her weight, others yowled, iron gritting against iron. Abigail counted the noisy stairs to maintain her composure. By the bottom, the total numbered more than one hundred. Woozy, she flopped onto the couch in the living room, which expelled a puff of dust.

“Charming,” she said as she choked.

The house was in dire need of a thorough cleaning. But Abigail firmly believed Lottie ought to have taken care of that. It was still too early to go into town and haggle with her for another discount on the rent or to request a complimentary maid service. Even if Lottie agreed to compensate her somehow, who knew when she would get around to it? Abigail couldn’t handle another night’s sleep on towels and decided to tackle the laundry before she unpacked. Lottie had mentioned a washer and dryer. There was only one place they could be.

The basement door was under the staircase. Lottie hadn’t unlocked it as she had the one to the lighthouse, so Abigail spent ten minutes sorting through the panoply of keys on the key ring. It struck her that an inordinate amount of her time was being consumed by locked doors.

“This is turning into a full-time job.”

Once she got the basement door open, she was walloped by an unsavory smell—a potpourri of must, mold, and another scent she couldn’t quite discern. She flipped the light switch.

“At least this works.”

If there was a short somewhere in the house, the bulbs might illuminate or snuff out at will. Getting caught in an unfamiliar basement in the dark was not an ideal way to start the morning.

“Please stay on,” Abigail implored, taking a tentative step. “Please stay on.”

The stairs creaked beneath her in turn.

“Does everything in this house squeak?”

The next riser screeched in reply.

“It was a rhetorical question.”

Two light fixtures bracketed each end of the basement, and there was a small window, but years of grime acted as a shade. The first light was by the stairs. The second was at the far side of the house, under the kitchen, creating a forest of murky shadows in between. A pale square form was glowing dimly from the opposite corner of the basement. Abigail thought it must be the washer. While navigating through the darkness, she hit something, knocking her shin hard. She had to squint to see that she’d walked into a stack of dust-coated crates.

“More dust. How lucky can a girl get?”

Feeling her way along the wall, Abigail inched forward. The stone was cool and gritty to the touch. The unusual