Larry cracked a nut. It fell into his hand, gleaming and white.
“Your parents were never told about him?” he asked.
“No. I guess this kind of thing happens a lot in private adoptions.”
He grunted, brushing crumbs from his lap.
“I tried to learn more about him. This was all I found.”
She reached inside her jacket and pulled out a piece of paper, folded in half.
Larry hesitated, then put down his nutcracker next to his beer. He wiped his fingers carefully on his trousers and reached for the paper.
It was a copy of a newspaper article from theCoastal Herald. “BoySwept Out to Sea.” The article was very brief. Dennis Owen, age nine, was presumed dead from accidental drowning. He had been a resident of a place called Brightwood. Larry had never heard of it.
“I looked it up,” Amanda said. “It was a home for troubled boys.”
“It makes more sense now,” he said. “The memorial.”
“How so?” She looked curious.
“No parents listed. No quotes from loved ones.”
“The home closed the year after he died.”
Larry looked at the date on the article and did the math. Had he lived, Dennis Owen would have been twenty-nine. That meant Amanda Dufresne was twenty-six.
Outside, the thunder cracked, and the wind screamed. The sea itself was like a background monster, growling at the sand. It sounded like it wanted to climb up the hill to them.
“It’s hard to lose someone you never met,” he said.
He could see the emotions in her face.
“Is it normal to feel so sad?”
“Yes.” He said it immediately, without hesitation, and Amanda Dufresne looked up, deep into his eyes. Larry looked away.
“What did you hope to get out of coming here?”
She stretched out her jean-clad legs in front of the fire. “I guess I want to know who he was. If he was okay. If he had any happy times. I want to know how he died.”
The storm stopped as abruptly as it had begun. Larry followed Amanda outside, her shoes squishing in the wet sand, and they walked back down the road to her car. The car itself looked fine, but the road was covered with fallen trees.
“Jeez,” she whispered.
He walked a bit farther down the road, toward the tumultuousocean. The sea roiled as if considering its next move. The pavement was covered with large tree limbs. Down the street, an entire pine had collapsed, its needles shrouding the wet asphalt. The road was completely blocked.
“They’ll send someone out to clear this,” he tried to reassure her.
She glanced at the thick gray sky. Night came early on the Oregon Coast.
“How far is it to town?” she asked.
“It’s not far. I’ll walk you to the hotel. They keep a room or two ready for when this happens.”
“Are they expensive? The rooms.”
“Here? Not at all.”
