Beyond the Sea (4 page)

‘
WHAT THE FUCK
are you doing
there
?' Marta's voice, approaching a shriek, competed with the crackle and fizz on the line.

Freya removed the receiver from her ear for a second before speaking. ‘I thought it would be good for me.'

There was a momentary pause. ‘And why did you think that?'

In spite of having to defend herself, Freya couldn't help smiling. Marta was always like this – direct, foul-mouthed, uncompromising – and the familiarity of it was reassuring. ‘Because wherever I've been in the last year, wherever I've gone, simply to avoid being here, it hasn't helped. So I thought I might as well come back. Grasp the nettle, you know. I thought it would be good for me,' she said again.

There was another, longer, pause on the line. ‘But it doesn't feel right for you to be there – so … close to everything that happened.'

‘Perhaps that's what I need.'

‘But to be alone there?'

‘I think I need that too.'

‘You sound very certain of yourself all of a sudden,' said Marta tartly, and they both started to laugh. ‘Are you sure you don't want me to come up and keep you company?'

‘Really, I'm OK,' said Freya, hoping to imbue the words with more certainty than she felt.

‘Suit yourself. There was a time, you know, when you couldn't get enough of me.'

Her tone was light, mocking. But Freya was silent, thinking of the seemingly endless dark nights not so long ago when Marta had stayed up with her, through the tears, the despair, the agony. Without Marta, she was sure, she wouldn't have made it.

‘Are you still there, Frey?'

‘Yes, I'm here. Just thinking. You know …' She stopped. ‘I never thanked you properly … not really …'

‘Forget it. We're not going there. Not with you so far away and me on my own here. You'll have me weeping into my Chablis.'

Freya smiled again as the line renewed its fizzing, and for a moment the sisters were silent.

‘But, how is it to be back, really?'

Freya took a breath. ‘Memories everywhere, of course. But there were memories everywhere even when I wasn't here.' She closed her eyes. ‘I haven't been able to go into Sam's room yet. But I will. Soon.'

Marta was quiet but Freya could imagine her nodding at the other end of the line. After a moment she asked, ‘And are you dreaming there?'

‘Uh-huh.' Freya paused. Going to bed was like reliving her life with her family. A steady replay of all her memories. Everything she and her family did together. Was it a blessing? Perhaps. And then there was the other thing.

Marta read her mind. ‘You haven't had the nightmare, have you?'

‘No, not yet.' But Freya knew that sooner or later it would come.

‘The doc said that would fade, become more and more infrequent, the longer it is.'

Freya nodded. ‘As everything works itself through.'

‘And you're still taking the pills?'

‘Yep.'

‘And avoiding the booze?'

‘Of course.' Freya looked at the glass of red wine standing on the table beside the sofa. It was just the odd glass now and then to calm her nerves, make her sleep. And God knew she needed help with those things. But it wasn't worth telling Marta about. It would only worry her.

‘Have you been for a swim yet?'

Freya had always loved the water; just after the news of Jack and Sam, it had become a lifebuoy to her sanity. She had swum almost every day, mile after mile, until she was so exhausted she couldn't think any more, couldn't feel anything. It had become a salvation, a dulling oblivion. ‘No, I haven't been able to. The water's too cold. But before long I'll get out into it. Still, Marta, I'm OK. I think the really bad days are behind me.'

There was a short silence on the line, during which Freya knew Marta would be assessing whether her older sister really was okay or just placating her. Not for the first time in their recent history, she wanted everything to be different. She settled for changing the subject.

‘So how's work?'

‘Same as. Depending on the mood of that cock of a partner I work for.' Marta sighed and then started to laugh. ‘Fortunately he's quite a cock in other departments.'

‘Oh no. Tell me that isn't still going on?'

‘'Fraid so. Try not to judge me. At least I'm single, so it's not double adultery.'

As Freya laughed, she felt a lightness she only rarely experienced these days. As if, for a split second, the events of the past year had never happened and she was her old self again. But then Marta, suddenly serious, went on. ‘Claude's been asking about you, you know. She's phoned me a couple of times lately.'

‘Oh yeah,' said Freya, the heaviness pressing around her once again. It had been her boss, Claude, who had suggested that Freya accompany her on that trip to the south of France over Easter. She hadn't wanted to go, especially over the holidays, but then she had changed her mind. After all, it would be good to play such a prominent role in the marketing campaign for their new client's perfume. So she had departed for two weeks with Claude, reluctant but smiling. It was the day before she was due to come home that she got the news from Scotland. A boating accident. They had found the boat but not the bodies. She had left immediately, the scent of night jasmine still thick in her nostrils. Now she always associated that smell with death. And sometimes she could sense it, she thought, heavy, on the air of her dreams. She swallowed, her throat suddenly dry, and reached for the glass of wine.

‘Anyway, I think she'd like to talk to you. When you're up to it.' Marta's tone was breezy, the way it became when she knew she'd strayed into dangerous territory.

Freya said nothing. She had now, more or less, stopped blaming Claude for the theft of those last weeks with her family. She knew it was irrational. But it didn't mean she wanted to speak to her. For the second time in the conversation, Freya changed the subject. ‘You know I'm thinking of selling the flat.'

‘Mmm. Mum told me.'

Freya groaned. ‘Oh God. Did she ask you to try and talk me out of it?'

‘Of course.' Marta laughed. ‘But I hope you know me better than that.'

‘I hope so too.' Freya took a sip of wine. ‘I just didn't want to be there any more. And I don't have a job in London now, so I don't need it.' Freya thought of the life insurance money sitting in a bank account, as yet untouched. Perhaps if she ignored it for long enough it would disappear, cease to have ever existed. She would do anything to have it gone, to have her family back in its place. She closed her eyes and tried to banish the thought. ‘Anyway, I know I've only just got here, but I already feel better, more right. Or less
not right
, at least. Does that make sense?'

‘I guess. Just think it over for a while. Don't make any hasty decisions.'

‘I won't.' Pause. ‘How is Mum?'

‘Fraught. Nothing new there, eh? But I sense she's really trying. She's worried about you, Frey, that's all. And she doesn't know how not to be a cold fish. So it just comes across as criticism rather than concern. Go on, make her day. Give her a call and try not to get mad at her.'

Freya smiled. Marta was always the one who could manage their mother best. ‘And Dad?'

‘Worried sick. But he'd never say it.'

‘Yeah. I know. Don't worry, I'll call. I promise.'

For a few moments the static crackled down the line as the two women sat in silence. Freya stretched out her long legs on the sofa and scrutinised her bare feet sticking out of the end of her jeans. The red nail varnish on her left big toe was chipped, a sudden absent chunk of colour. Something about it struck her as intensely sad. Then she felt her insides twist.

‘You know, it's funny,' she said at last. ‘Sometimes when I wake up, for the first few moments, maybe a minute sometimes, I don't remember what's happened. And in those moments, I'm floating, blissful, without memories.' She paused. ‘I just don't remember that they're gone,' she said, incredulity in her tone. ‘And then it crashes in on me all over again, new and fresh and devastating every time. It's like torture, the morning ritual of feeling like my body is free-falling from a great height, my heart ripping out.'

She let out a hard little bark of a laugh, and the line, suddenly free of static, was quiet, as if embarrassed by her outburst. Marta said nothing, but Freya could hear her breath, heavy at the other end. Suddenly, more than anything in the world, she wanted to cry out. What had happened to them? While she was away, Jack had told her that he and Sam had been out a lot on the boat. But she remembered only fragments of conversations, interrupted snippets told as the phone was passed excitedly between her husband and son. What she didn't know is where they had been heading on that last day. What had they been doing when they disappeared? Why hadn't they radioed for help when they got into trouble? Had they been too far from land? Where were they now? These were questions she had asked a hundred times a day. But no one knew. And now she mostly asked the questions only to herself. It drove her mad, the not knowing, pricked hotly at her brain; sent her into a downward spiral of imagining. Now, thinking of it in this moment, she wanted to let out loud, racking sobs of grief, uncontrolled and unabashed. But, for once with Marta, she held it in. ‘I'm sorry,' was all she said, her voice muffled with emotion. ‘I'm sorry.'

‘Don't be sorry. It's okay. You can say whatever you like to me.'

‘I love you. You know that, don't you?'

‘Sure I do. I love you too.'

They both lapsed into silence once more. Freya waited but she could no longer feel the tight black clutch of grief around her heart. She had ridden the tide of her emotion and not been entirely swallowed by its darkness. Perhaps she was making progress. She looked at her watch. It was still early but she didn't want to talk any more. ‘So. Much as I'd like to stay on the phone all night to you, I must go to bed. And, after all, you've got a cock to serve in the morning.'

Marta laughed out loud. ‘Don't remind me.' She hesitated, as if there was something else she wanted to say. But when her voice came again it was final and light. ‘Sleep tight and call me often. Okay?'

‘Okay. Good night.' And Freya hung up.

IT BEGAN AS
always.

‘Dark Queen Beira, the mother of all the deities of Scotland, was old and wild and fierce. When she was angry she was as biting as the wind and as terrifying as a storm-filled sea.'

Freya paused, resting the book in her lap for a moment, and looked down at Sam, who was half sitting, half lying under the bedcovers. It was night-time and they were leaning against each other on Sam's bed, both propped up by pillows. The lamp gave off a warm yellow light and, through the open window, Freya could hear the soft sound of waves breaking upon the shore. It was her favourite part of the day – a time of late summer sunsets, wishes and possibilities. She raised the book and continued reading.

‘Beira had lived for hundreds of years. But she never died of old age because, at the onset of every spring, she drank the magic waters of the Well of Youth on the Green Island of the West, a place where it was always summer and where the trees were always full of fruit. The island drifted on the Atlantic, and sometimes, it is said, appeared close to the Hebrides. Many sailors have searched the ocean looking for it in vain – for often it was just beyond their vision, hidden by mist or having sunk beneath the waves.'

‘Is that true, Mum?' Sam craned his head to look at her. He was wide-eyed, puzzled – his literal father's literal son.

‘Perhaps,' said Freya, gazing back at him. ‘But more likely it's just a myth.'

‘What's a myth?'

‘A story, a legend. Something that might not be fact, that can't be proved.' She paused. ‘But it still might be something we choose to believe in.'

‘So the Green Island might not actually exist?'

‘No, perhaps not. But then again, perhaps it's just that no one ever finds it.'

‘Maybe you and Dad and I will find it when we're out in the boat sometime.'

‘Yes, maybe.'

Sam was silent for a few moments, perhaps thinking of a voyage over the waves. ‘But Beira always knew how to find the Green Island, didn't she?'

‘Yes, she did.' Freya smiled and kissed the top of his head. ‘And what happened when she got there and tasted the magic water of the Well of Youth?'

‘She grew young again. Then she came back to Scotland, where she was a beautiful girl once more with long, flowing hair.'

Freya nodded. ‘That's right. But with each passing month, Beira aged fast. And by the time winter returned, she was an old woman again, beginning her reign as fierce Queen Beira.'

Sam turned to Freya once more and pulled a face. ‘But that can't be true, can it, Mum? That must be a myth.'

‘Yes, I think perhaps it is.'

‘Although certain things can undergo a metamorphosis. Like flies and other insects. Crustaceans and molluscs.'

‘That's right,' said Freya, slightly taken aback. ‘Have you been talking to Granddad again?'

‘Uh-huh. He called Dad the other day.'

Freya nodded. ‘I see. Yes. But Beira's was more of a magical transformation. Rather than the change of a caterpillar into a butterfly.'

‘Do you believe in magic, Mum?'

Freya looked at him. ‘Perhaps.'

‘Well, I don't believe it. Beira couldn't grow old that quickly and then become young again. I think it's really just a story about the seasons.'

Freya suppressed a laugh and dropped the book onto the bed. ‘Yes, most likely, Sam. Your father would certainly agree.' And
his
father would be shocked at the mere contemplation of anything out of the ordinary. She kissed Sam's head again then stood, gazing at him for a few moments, before turning out the light.

The dusk of summer cast a shadowy light through the windows. Freya heard Sam shift his head down into the pillows, getting comfortable in anticipation of sleep. ‘Sing that song, Mum.'

She smiled. ‘The one about the storm?'

‘Hmm. I like that one.'

Because even though it came from a magical tale, it was about a shipwreck and all things below the sea fascinated him. So in the half-light, beside her son, watching his small body lying safely in bed, she sang:

Full fathom five thy father lies;

Of his bones are coral made;

Those are pearls that were his eyes;

Nothing of him that doth fade,

But doth suffer a sea-change

Into something rich and strange.

But then the room began to fill with water. Quietly, innocently almost, as it always did. And, as always, she couldn't tell where the water was coming from. She heard its low trickle and then watched it climb slowly up the legs of the chest of drawers, over the tops of Sam's small shoes lying haphazardly across the floor where he had just pulled them off and left them, urgently moving on to the next thing.

She saw the water rise gradually over her own feet, up to her ankles and beyond, ever rising. She watched it soak the dirty clothes piled in the corner, saw it rising inexorably upwards. She was powerless to stop it. She felt that clearly. She looked towards the window, saw the pale light gaining access there, spilling over the rising tide within the room, the water inching its way up the walls. Where was it coming from? She couldn't understand it. Before long it spilled over the bed and covered the sleeping form of her son. She tried to move towards him but she couldn't; her feet were cemented to the floor. She felt a flash of fear move through her body, and still the water flowed into the room, rising ever upwards. Now it was approaching her neck, and before long it would rise over her head.

The water continued to creep. Freya took a deep breath and held it as her body became entirely submerged. For a moment she stayed stock still, then she opened her eyes and looked. They were no longer within the confines of the bedroom. Instead it had given way to a vast watery expanse. Beyond the edge of her vision, there was something, she was sure. Something in the darkness. In front of her, she could no longer see Sam's silhouette, his sleeping form, and fear bolted through her again. She looked deeper. There was someone, or something there – watching her. She opened her mouth to speak but no words came. Only the escape of breath. She wanted to call out to Sam, to say ‘Goodbye.' For she knew that this was goodbye. But no words came out of her mouth. And then she knew that there was no breath left in her. But it didn't feel like death. She closed her eyes and surrendered. ‘Goodbye my son,' she said.

Then she woke up.

Freya opened her eyes. She felt the pillow wet with tears. It took her a moment to remember, to realise that she had had the nightmare again. But it took her turning over in the empty bed, feeling the cold absence on Jack's side, to remember everything. To feel the sickening reality claw its way out of the dark. Those are pearls that were his eyes.

Freya lay still for a few moments. She was always drained after the dream. More than that, she felt it was trying to tell her something. But quite what it was, its meaning, always eluded her. Finally she looked at the clock. It was only 9 p.m. She flicked on the bedside lamp. Yellow light spilled into the room, and with it the last clutches of the dream – any resonance it might have had – vanished in an instant. Besides, what was there for it to tell her? Her husband and her child were dead, drowned. And there was no way anyone could feel anything beyond despair at the remembrance of that.

Freya closed her eyes and swallowed. Her throat was parched and she had a bitter taste of saltwater in her mouth. It was simply fallout from the dream, she knew – her doctor had told her enough times. It was her mind playing dirty tricks on her. She climbed unsteadily out of bed and made her way slowly across the creaking bedroom floor. The wood felt warm, reassuring against her feet, and yet she still felt cold to her core, had the sense of being disconnected from her own body. In the hallway she paused at the threshold of Sam's room, her hand resting lightly upon the doorknob. But still she could not open it. Ridiculous as it seemed, she placed her ear upon the door and listened. What was she trying to hear? she wondered. The sound of her son breathing? His voice calling out to her in the night? Or perhaps it was the absence of sound she needed to hear. For a moment she listened intently. All was quiet. The only noise was the faint sound of waves breaking on the shore. Freya's hand fell back down to her side. Perhaps tomorrow, she thought. Perhaps by then she would be able to do it. To look at everything that was still there, that was exactly as he had left it.

Turning away, she made her way down the hallway into the kitchen. Even in the dark, she could manoeuvre her way around it effortlessly – the long table against the north wall, the island in its centre, work surfaces along the eastern wall. She walked to the sink in front of the kitchen window, turned on the tap and stuck her head beneath it, greedily drinking the water down. She became conscious of the dull ache in her throat, as if all the breath had been squeezed out of it. But she blinked the thought away and continued to drink. It was always this way – after the dream. As Freya turned the tap off, the sound of running water was replaced instantly by silence. Outside, there was barely any cloud in the sky and moonlight shone down into the walled garden. It was unkempt, overrun, weeds strangling the pathway, the trees and bushes overgrown. But beyond it, she knew, beyond the whitewashed wall that ran around the lighthouse enclosure, was the sea. Freya opened the door.

It was still, the wind that had picked up earlier had dropped, and it was surprisingly warm given the lack of cloud. Barefoot, she made her way across the garden and then followed the path. When she reached the gate, she unlocked it and tiptoed down the slope to the beach, over the grassy knolls and the shingle. The sea was calm, flat, and when she reached its edge she dipped her toe in. It was cold. She took a step forward until her feet were submerged and a shiver ran down her spine. It was the temperature of the water, she told herself, watching her skin shimmer and distort below the surface. She fought the urge to take another step and then another and raised her head.

After a moment, a broad flash of light arced across her gaze, reaching – it seemed – almost to the horizon. Then there was only a dark ocean. Seven seconds later it came again. One, two, three, Freya counted in her head. It was magical, beautiful, this interchange of light and dark, making it possible for things to be saved from the clutches of the sea. After a time, Freya realised that she was looking for something to emerge. A boat, perhaps. She smiled and a tear slid silently down her cheek. Yes a boat, bearing her son and her husband back to her once more. She narrowed her eyes. Perhaps if she longed for it enough it might just be possible, if she simply wished for it enough. The lamp arced to the horizon, dissipated the darkness for three seconds, and then was gone.