Chapter 10 - The Boat on the WallWe walked down the corridor to room 114 together. The facility smelled of cabbage and floor wax, but as we neared the end of the hall, the sea breeze from the open window at the sunroom cut through the heaviness.
My father was sitting in his wheelchair today, dressed in a clean blue shirt Brent had brought from the house. He didn't have the brass cleat anymore. He was staring at a framed print of an old troller boat that hung on the wall opposite his bed.
"The Sarah B," he muttered as we entered.
I looked at the print. It was just a generic picture of a New England fishing boat, but to him, it was the old wooden hull he had spent his youth repairing at the Coos Bay marina.
Nora stepped into the room first. She didn't stay in the doorway this time. She walked right up to the side of his chair, her boots quiet on the linoleum. She stood over him for a long moment, looking down at the white stubble on his jaw, the liver spots on his forehead, the smallness of the shoulders that used to carry fifty-pound bags of salt down to the docks.
"Owen," she said.
My father slowly turned his head. His eyes were very blue today, cleared of the grey storm that had been there on Thursday. He looked at her face, his gaze tracing the vertical line between her brows, the sharp curve of her jaw—the features she had inherited directly from him.
He didn't call her Sarah. He didn't ask about the boats or the south swell.
He reached out his right hand, his fingers curved and stiff with the years, and touched the sleeve of her cream-colored sweater.
"You grew up," he whispered.
"Yeah, Dad," Nora said, her voice dropping into a soft, steady cadence I had never heard her use before. She reached down and took his hand, her chemical-burned knuckles smoothing over his wrinkled skin. "I grew up. I had to."
"The Subaru," he muttered, his mind starting to drift again, the clarity slipping away like the tide through the mudflats. "The alternator..."
"I replaced it," Nora said, sitting on the edge of his bed, never letting go of his hand. "In 2001. I bought a rebuilt one from the yard in Reedsport. It ran for another eighty thousand miles, Dad. It got the kids to school every single day."
Dad let out a long, slow breath, his head sinking back against the cushion of his chair. He looked down at their joined hands, his thumb moving in a small, instinctive circle against her palm—the exact same signal Chloé used to give her mother in the stories we tell to remind ourselves we are loved.
May you like
"Good," he said. "That's good."
Miles and I stood by the window, watching the grey water of the bay chop under the afternoon wind. The fishing boats were coming in through the jetty, their white outriggers lowered against the swell, their engines humming a low, rhythmic bass line that vibrated through the glass.
