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He stumbles at the words. “What? What do you mean? Since when?”
The salty air stings my face as we walk toward the sea. A brilliant blue butterfly flits across our path. Normally I would admire it, but not today. I don’t want to be here. I don’t know what we’re going to find, but my gut tells me it can’t be good. We reach the end of the walkway and turn right toward the sweet shop Jake headed to. “He went out late last night, well, early this morning. At 2 a.m.—"
“Wait, he insisted on going out in the middle of the night, after everything you all just went through?”
“He went out for the kids, to get them candy, to soften the blow of us leaving early,” I say through gritted teeth.
George cocks an eyebrow and opens his mouth, but when I clench my fist and tears blur my eyes, he bites his tongue. He doesn’t have to tell me what he’s thinking, how foolish Jake was, how foolish I was.
“We killed her, George.Ikilled her,” I say, more to convince myself than him. “She’s not a threat to us anymore.”
George nods, but he starts walking faster while trying to not run ahead of me.
We enter the populated part of the boardwalk. I take a deep breath and consciously force myself to put one foot in front of the other, over and over again. The sweet shop is on my right, just past the aquarium. I start to angle my course so I can get to the shop without pushing through the lines already forming at the entrance to the beach, even at this early hour. Most of the people who lined up talk animatedly, looking over one another toward the ocean.
I shake my head as I open the door to the candy store and murmur, “Tourists…,” under my breath.
“Jake?” I call his name before I even think about it. He’s not in the aisle ahead of me, so I head toward the back of the store. I yell his name at every aisle I pass. As I pass the second to last, my foot kicks an abandoned shopping basket. I stumble backward as the basket tumble away from me. “Jesus! Who is so care—”
My sight zooms in. Salt water taffy. Cotton candy. Those big swirly spiral lollipops…each our kids’ favorites. This was Jake’s basket.
“George!” I scream. My voice is high pitched and yet scratchy, a combination of a fire alarm and a broken clock.
I don’t know if George was behind me the whole time, but he’s there to catch me as I collapse. He guides me to the ground and then let’s me go. While I stare at the pile of candy, at the basket I know my husband once held, I hear George’s voice from a few feet away.
More accurately, I hear people chatting, but all of their words sound like muted trombones. Then he’s back, his hands press hard into my underarms as he heaves me to my feet, letting me lean on him as he guides me out the door again.
Across the boardwalk, people still crowd around and watch the beach while more of those blue butterflies hover around them, glowing in the morning sunlight. Everything I see appears hazy, and everything I hear sounds like I have cotton stuffed in my ears.
I force my lungs to breathe, but every breath feels full of glass shards instead of oxygen. I fall more than walk over to join the crowd of would-be beachgoers waiting at the dead end created by some cops standing guard. I start to call again.
“Jake? Jake? Jake?” The crowd quiets and splits to let me through to the railing. The beach is closed with police tape. Out near the water’s edge stands a group of people in navy blue with shiny brass badges pinned to their chests. Something, someone, lies on the ground at their feet. A tussled mess of brown hair. Sunlight bouncing off a wedding band. That stupid shirt with pineapples and palm trees.
Time stops. My hands are shaking as they reach up and grab at the roots of my hair. Tourists are stepping back and looking away, no longer gawking at the commotion keeping them from their beach vacations. Visions bombard me, the kids singing Jake happy birthday, Jake tousling Sammy’s hair in line for the fun slide, our wedding day.
“Jake!” The scream is blood-curdling as it tears through my body. I will never stop screaming.
The sounds of the people around me flood back into my consciousness as time resumes its normal pace. I push under the tape, leaving George behind. I run past the ramp, past the cops who try to stop me but know they can’t, that they shouldn’t. I stumble in the sand and fall to my knees, still screaming Jake’s name. No. No. No. No. No.
The faces above the navy-blue clothes turn toward me, but I can’t make out any of their features. I focus only on the person at their feet. The body at their feet. That stupid yellow Hawaiian shirt at their feet.
I crawl through the sand until I climb on top of him. His beautiful face is pale and bloated and caked in sand. That face that I looked into as I gave birth to our children. That face that looks at me like I’m the only woman in the world. That face that is always so animated as he reads the children funny stories. Now it is so still. His hair is plastered across his forehead. I use my finger tips to swipe it out of his face and gently call to him as I straighten his crooked collar, “Baby, wake up. Wake up, Jake. Wake up. How did this happen? She’s gone. She’s gone! We are all supposed to be safe now.”
I press my eyes closed. When I open them, he’ll be full of life again. I twist my fingers in the fabric of his shirt, pulling him to me and me to him. I collapse on top on him and sob and scream. Something scratches my cheek through the wet fabric. A voice calls to me, but I know that only I can hear it.
“Guardian. I am sorry I wasn’t here. I tried but I was too far away when I realized he was in danger. I couldn’t make it back in time.”
Mazu. Mazu what happened to him? How? We killed Beatrice!
“Beatrice is not the only of her kind, I told you that. That thing that you felt through his pocket…Don’t leave it there. You’ll never see it again and youneedto see it. Trust me.”
I did trust you.
“Trust me one more time.”
I place my hand over his breast pocket and feel a piece of paper inside, something meant for me. I know it. As I wail again, I move my face over Jake’s chest and palm the note. My heart feels cold inside my chest, maybe that’s my fate as the Guardian. No matter, I can’t let my Jake’s death be in vain.
An hour later, I’m still on the beach, wrapped in the blankets the cops use for victims of major catastrophes like shootings, bombings, and finding the love of your life washed up dead on the beach. The victims that have to stick around and stare at their greatest traumas so they can give their statements.
