Beachcombing

Beachcombing Part 3

By Ersatz

Thanksgiving came and went. No Phillip. I still think I did the right thing, letting him go without a fight. He needed some independence. I needed to know that it was me he loved, not just the first woman to drag him back from the edge. I wanted love, not gratitude.

What happened? I'm not completely sure, but here's what I imagined. You see, I'm such a nosy bitch that even when I can't snoop, I imagine snooping. Phillip returns to his university. Things change very slowly at universities, but they still change. Most of the faculty he knows is still there; a few have retired or taken other positions, and there are a couple of new faces, but for the most part it was the same. Quite a bit of the administrative staff has changed, but there are still many staff members who know Phillip. All of the graduate students are new.

I don't know her name, so I think of her as Vicky. Every Vicky I've ever known was a horrible, evil bitch. I imagined that she was younger and beautiful, but hid it behind glasses and frumpy clothes. She had advanced degrees in Library Science and Literature. She was passionate about the written word, in her own quiet way. Over the years the students and faculty marched through their lives while she watched from behind her library counter. Phillip was one of her favorites. When his wife died, she knew she had to make her move.

One day, Vicky would go to Phillip's office. "Dr. Siegel," she'd say breathlessly, "you've had the book Impossibly Difficult Physics Problems for the Unimaginably Brainy checked out for almost five years. People have been looking for it." She'd be wearing a push-up bra beneath a blouse with one too many buttons undone.

Phillip would apologize and start looking for the book amid the clutter of his office. While he was looking, a student would knock at his door and ask him for help with a homework problem. Looking up, he'd be surprised that Vicky was gone. He'd shrug, and then sit down at his desk to show the student how to solve the problem.

During his explanation, Phillip would be shocked to feel a hand undoing his zipper and pulling out his dick. Rather than leave, as he'd supposed, Vicky had hidden underneath Phillip's desk. He'd feel her mouth bobbing up and down on his cock as he choked out his physics explanation as quickly as he could. The student would ask a couple of questions to which Phillip would reply tersely. As soon as the student left the office, he'd explode into Vicky's slutty little mouth.

Then Vicky would stand up and say, "Never mind," as she wiped a drip of semen from the side of her mouth. "I'll be back for the book later." Then she'd slink away while Phillip just stood there gaping at her.

Every day after that, Vicky would go to Phillip's office right before lunch, lock the door behind her, push him into his chair and give him a blowjob. She'd leave without ever saying a word. She'd do that every day for a couple of weeks. Then one night, Phillip would hear his doorbell and be surprised to see Vicky standing there with an overnight bag.

Phillip is a caring, attentive lover, but it would be lost on Vicky. It wouldn't mean anything to her. She'd writhe underneath Phillip while she moaned things she'd read in bad romance novels. She'd fake one orgasm after another. Phillip, the stupid man, wouldn't stand a chance.

She's completely imaginary, but I hate her.

One dreary December day, I got a letter. I get lots of letters. I suppose they're mostly not letters, but bills, paperwork, and advertisements. Even in this Internet age, though, I do get regular old letters in my mail. People, associated with articles I've done; sometimes thanking me for telling their story, more often correcting little details that I'd gotten wrong, or just glossed over. Occasionally, I'd get a note explaining exactly how loathsome I was. Once, I'd even gotten a death threat. It didn't turn out to be anything serious at all. Even though it was scary and a bit freaky, I was a little proud of it. One of my favorite professors in college told us that you weren't a real journalist until you'd gotten a death threat. Well, I was a real journalist.

But this letter wasn't anything like any of those. For one thing, it was postmarked Bloomington, Indiana. Indiana University, where Phillip taught, is in Bloomington. God, I hate this, I thought. A Dear Gail Letter. That asshole doesn't even have the class to do this over the phone, let alone in person. I really knew Phillip wasn't an asshole, even if he'd written a letter that was going to hurt me. He didn't owe me anything, and after all, I knew that it was going to end like this from the very beginning. At least this would bring things to a conclusion.

I opened the envelope. It wasn't a Dear Gail Letter. It wasn't really a letter at all. The only thing inside the envelope was a photograph. It was a woman with brown hair, cut fairly short in a sort of bob. The camera caught her looking up from a book, surprised, but pleasantly surprised to see someone. Carol. It had to be Phillip's wife Carol. She had an infectious grin that showed that she knew not to take things too seriously. She was pretty, not breathtaking, but quite attractive. It looked like she was on the verge of saying something witty, but affectionate to the person taking the photograph, to Phillip. She looked like someone I could really like.

That evening and the days that followed, I kept returning to that photo. I wasn't really sure what it meant, why Phillip sent it, or how I felt about it.

The following week, I got another photograph of Carol in the mail. The week after, also. Every Tuesday, I'd get a new photograph from Bloomington.

Opening the Tuesday mail became a ritual. I'd separate the letter from the rest of the mail, light a candle, pour myself a glass of wine, and eat dinner with the letter lying next to my plate. I'd sip my wine and contemplate the envelope. When I was completely finished, I'd open the letter, gaze at the photograph. It felt like if I concentrated hard enough, I would start to see the scene just past the edges of the photograph. Then I'd turn the photograph over and imagine what I'd see from Carol's point of view.

I dreaded Tuesdays, but paradoxically Tuesday was also the highlight of my week. I'd wake the next morning completely emotionally drained.

In January, I had to travel for a few weeks. I made arrangements with my neighbor's teenage daughter to collect my mail and overnight Phillip's photo to my hotel so I didn't have to wait until I got back home.

My Tuesday photograph ritual became more and more elaborate. I'd try to get home early, which given my flexible schedule, was usually pretty easy to arrange. I'd go to the grocery, come home and make something that stretched my cooking abilities, always leaving plenty of leftovers for the next day or two. Opening the letter became the evening's entertainment. It was like a date: dinner and a play. The photograph would be the set for the theater of my imagination.

The first Tuesday in April, I took the last bite of my Chicken Paprikash, sipped some wine, and opened the envelope. I'd known this was coming, but that hadn't prepared me. The air rushed out of my lungs as I froze, staring at the photo. It was a photograph everyone has seen a million times: a little girl's birthday party. Sarah, Phillip's daughter, was wearing a cute patterned dress and a cone-shaped party-hat on her head. She was standing on a chair while blowing out the four candles on her birthday cake.

I spent the evening crying over the photo of the precious little girl who'd never grow up. I called in sick the next two days and spent all my time either imagining the birthday party or crying in bed.

Suzzy called me on the second day. "Why on earth don't you send those photos back?" she asked. "Or at least stop opening them?" I'd told her about my Tuesday evening ritual a few weeks earlier.

"I can't."

"For God's sake, why not?" Suzzy asked. "You haven't spoken a single word with that man since last summer. The bastard even stood you up! Now he's torturing you with pictures of dead people. Just throw away the letters without opening them."

"I can't." I repeated.

"Sure you can."

"No. First of all, I told him to show me his photos..."

"No you didn't," Suzzy interrupted. "You couldn't have had any idea he'd do this."

"Not exactly this," I said, "but I told him he'd never be able to move on with his life until he could show people pictures from his photo albums."

"So save them," she suggested, "and tell him to show you them in person."

"No," I said, "I can't wait to look at them. You see, they're these frozen moments of perfect happiness. Too much happiness to last, I suppose. I know that Phillip really loved Carol, and looking at the photos, I can see that Carol loved him, too. I understand why. Even when my marriage was at it's best, Bob and I never felt that way about each other. I have to look at them."

Suzzy ended the conversation by telling me what I already knew. She told me I was an idiot.

The week after that, I figured out what the photos meant. I called Suzzy right away.

"Suzzy," I said, "I really, really need to borrow your Nantucket cottage the last week of May. Please?"

Suzzy sighed. "Are you sure you know what you're doing, Gail?"

I thought a moment. "Yeah, You know, for once, I really think I do."

The night was quite a bit colder than the year before, but the sky was just as clear. As I walked down the beach, I felt anxious and apprehensive. I'd feel like such a fool if I'd misinterpreted what was going on. If I was wrong, the best I could hope for was a quiet, lonesome weekend on Nantucket. The worst would be the sort of complete and utter embarrassment that would haunt me for the rest of my life if Phillip wasn't alone.

I heard her bark and was almost bowled off my feet as Sylvie jumped up and placed her two wet front paws on the front of my sweatshirt. I leaned down to pet her and said, "Oh honey, I'm happy to see you too." She licked me and barked again. I reached into my pocket and gave her the pig's ear I stashed there. She took it, but continued to run little circles around me rather than sit and chew.

I walked a bit farther down the beach and saw him. He was sitting with his back to me on a blanket, watching the sky, right where he was last year, exactly the way it all started. The planet had spun back through its path, and everything was in the right place again. I had so many things I wanted to say, but I stopped and watched him for a while. It was so good to see him that I could have watched him for hours, but the carrying strap was starting to dig painfully into my shoulder. I walked over to him and put my big canvas bag down next to the blanket. It was a great relief to put it down. It was incredibly heavy.

Phillip jerked around at the thud my bag made. He jumped to his feet and rushed toward me, grabbing me in a tight hug that lifted me off the ground as he spun me around. "I missed you so much, Gail," he said. "I'm so glad to see you, I could burst."

Before I could reply, he kissed me. It felt like six months of missing him were packed into that kiss. It felt like all the things I've been worrying myself sick about were really only passing nuisances. He didn't smell like scotch this time, he just smelled like himself. I opened my eyes and looked up at him and smiled.

"I suppose that was a start," I said, "but you still owe me for six months of kisses."

"Well, four months, really," he said. "We weren't supposed to meet until November, so you can't count those months."

"I can't believe it!" I laughed. "You're actually negotiating about how much you're forced to kiss me! Besides, I think a fifty percent penalty for failure to provide services is only fair, don't you? You're back at six months owed, Buster."

Phillip smiled. "I owe you much more than that, Gail."

"You don't owe me..."

"Yeah, I do," Phillip cut in. "I don't mean in the sense that it's anything I can pay you back for, but really, you were what got me off my ass and interested in living again. Every day since you dropped me at the airport I must have wished that I could see you, or talk to you, or hold you at least a million times. But I promised that I wouldn't call you until I'd worked things through — and I have to say that you were right. The past six months were really tough for me. I'm sure I would have said something horrible and lost you.

"I hope you can accept my apology for not coming last Thanksgiving, but I just wasn't ready. You'd have had to tell me exactly what you told me at the end of the summer. The difference was that I was making progress. I don't suppose I'll ever really be over Sarah and Carol's death. Not completely. But I've been seeing a therapist — something I'd always thought was complete bullshit, by the way — and I think it's helped. That's why I was sending you the photos. I promised you I wouldn't call you, but I wanted you to know I was making progress. Maybe share it with you a little."

I held his hand, and we sat down. I wanted to get comfortable and let him continue. Phillip is a sweet and wonderful man, but it was exhausting when I had to figure out what he was feeling, so I was happy to let him continue.

"Phillip, I love you to death," I said, "but it won't work if your feelings are based upon gratitude."

"You were the reason for me to work things through," Phillip replied. "That's not gratitude, that's motivation. In fact, that's another thing I had to work my way through. If it weren't for the accident, I'd never have you in my life. I didn't know how to deal with that. I thought my life ended, too. So when I met you and started to live again, it felt like I was betraying their memory. I loved Carol so much, how could I love you that much, too? Gail, I..."

I'd heard enough. There wasn't any reason for me to make him apologize over and over. Being with him wasn't the only thing I'd missed. It had been six months since I'd had sex, and from the instant I saw him again I'd gotten so horny that I ached for him. I cut him off in mid-apology and pushed him onto his back and quickly yanked his shorts down. He moaned as I ran my tongue around his glans, and then slowly enveloped his dick. I bobbed up and down, running my tongue along the underside. Phillip gasped and began running his hands through my hair and lightly caressing my head. It wasn't long before he arched his back and gasped my name as he filled my mouth. I just loved the way he said my name during his climax.

"Wow!" Phillip said. "That was amazing."

"Yeah, well, it should show you that Vicky isn't the only one who can do that," I said smugly.

"Vicky? Vicky who?"

"Never mind. I missed you. You should be glad I didn't bite it off after you stood me up without even calling last Thanksgiving."

"Um, yeah, well, I wanted to tell you, but I promised I wouldn't call you until I was really ready..." he began, until I pushed him onto his back again and began kissing him. I could barely imagine how hard it had been for him, and I had a pretty good imagination. It felt so nice to hold him again.

Suddenly, I found myself crying. "What's the matter, Gail?" Phillip asked, very concerned.

"Phillip," I sobbed, "I just can't do it anymore, I want you to show me and tell me all about your life, but I just can't handle concentrating on one photo for a week, all by myself. It takes so much out of me." His arms came around me and held me tight. I can't remember what he whispered; it seemed to pass right through my mind to lodge somewhere deeper. Whatever he said, it worked. The hurt seemed to ebb away, leaving me feeling both comfortably warm and loved, and shivering as a cold breeze blew over me.

I reached over, unzipped my bag, and blew my nose on some tissues I'd stashed inside. When I packed the bag, I'd figured that if I saw him, at some point I'd probably need tissues. I just didn't know if they'd be happy tears or sad. Then I reached into the bag again and took out the blanket I brought to sit on. I pulled the blanket over us and put my head on Phillip's shoulder. We held each other and watched the stars and the waves.

Eventually, I sat up, unzipped the bag, and reached inside. "I brought some things," I explained, as I dug through my bag. "First, some decent glasses for that wonderful scotch." I handed him a glass and took one for myself. He reached over for his bottle of scotch. It was too dark to read the label, but it looked like the same bottle of Laphroaig.

"Did I tell you about this bottle?" Phillip asked.

"You told me that it's 40-year old Laphroaig. It's wonderful. Absolutely the best scotch I've ever tasted."

Phillip picked up the bottle and looked at it a moment. "Well, it was 40-year old Laphroaig when I bought it. I suppose it's really 50-year old now. I bought this bottle the day Sarah was born. I was going to save it and open it when she graduated college. We'd toast when she got married. And when she had her first child, I was going to give her the rest of the bottle."

I put my hand on his shoulder. "Oh, Phillip!"

It just tore my heart apart, so I was surprised at his wistful smile. "When she found out how much I spent on one single stupid bottle, Carol was furious. She said I should have bought a savings bond for her education." He took a sip. "Not an argument I wanted to win, at least not this way."

We drank in silence for a while before I asked, "What about the star?"

"It takes a little imagination because you can't see it unassisted, but..." He scooted over and put one arm around me and pointed up at the sky with the other arm, so I could use it as a guide. "Okay, a little above the horizon, to the south, you see that group of stars?" Looking down his arm, I could see a vague mush of stars. I nodded. "That's Sagittarius. That's supposed to look like an archer. Don't ask me why, just looks like a random clump of stars to me. Anyway, somewhere between those stars there is Ross 154." This year, I was reasonably certain which stars he was pointing at. "It's sending us light from about ten years ago. The light is there, but it's just a little too faint for us to see it."

"I brought something else," I said. "I've practiced, but it'll still take me a while to set it up." I fished in my bag for a moment. "Here, you hold the flashlight for me. This is going to take a few minutes." I handed him the flashlight and he trained it on the bag. I lifted it out, and fiddled with the legs for a while until I had the telescope assembled. I pressed the power button and some lights turned on. After a moment, its status light turned green, telling me it was okay. That was a relief, I'd worried that it might have bumped against something in my car on the drive up here. That stupid telescope was really expensive. This was easily the most expensive date I'd ever had. After adding all the electronics, it probably cost more than the engagement ring my ex-husband bought me.

"It's going to take a couple of minutes before we can use it," I said. "It's got a GPS thingie and it has to find the satellites first." After a little bit, the GPS indicator went on. "Okay, now I just have to point it at three guide stars." I found three nice bright stars (even though one turned out to be the planet Saturn again; you'd think I would have learned since last year), the telescope thought about it a bit, then gave me the message saying that it was ready. I pressed buttons to tell it to "recall location 1" and it moved into position to catch light from ten years ago. The LCD panel glowed "Ross 154."

Phillip turned to me, "I'm very impressed."

"I looked it up. Turns out there are only a dozen stars within 10 light years."

"Still, you figured out which star, realized we couldn't see it, so you bought a telescope. That was really very thoughtful. Thank you."

We took turns peering through the lens to look at the dim red star, that, and sipping the scotch, which I have to say was still quite wonderful. "Have I told you lately that you're absolutely amazing?" Phillip said, then leaned over and kissed me. I tasted the mellow scotch again on his tongue and on his breath.

"So, any other surprises?" Phillip asked.

"Just one," I replied. "I missed your birthday last month. I bought you a present."

"You didn't need to do that," he protested.

"Well, happy birthday," I said. "It's a telescope. Surprise."

Phillip chuckled. "Thank you. It's really a great telescope."

"Yeah? We'll see how much you like it after you carry it back. It weighs a ton."

"The telescope is great, but what's really wonderful is that you came tonight. I was hoping you'd come to be here with me. The things you brought, well, they're a really nice touch. But it means so much to me that you came to spend the anniversary with me."

"What would you have done if I didn't come tonight?"

"I'd have flown down to D.C. tomorrow," he said, "but that wasn't something I worried about. I knew you'd be here."

"You have an awful lot of faith in me."

"I do," he said. "But it wasn't chance: I knew you'd be here."

"How could you know I'd be here?" I was starting to feel like he took me for granted.

"I cheated," he said. "I called your friend Suzzy."

I laughed. "How'd you find her phone number?"

"I asked the woman who cleans her house. I told her that I found some earrings on the edge of her yard. You're a terrible influence, you know."

"So how'd you get Suzzy to tell you I'd be coming?"

"I just asked. I told her I'd be here and asked if she knew if you were coming, too."

"When?"

"Almost a month ago," Phillip said. "Why?"

"That little bitch!" I said. "I must have called her a dozen times and agonized over whether I should come here. Would you be here? Would you want me here if you were? She never gave me the slightest hint she knew the answers. Just let me stew."

"I'd imagine she loved every minute," Phillip said, laughing. "Suzzy told me that you always knew everything that was going on and she'd never been able to surprise you with anything. You always figured it out first. She was glad to help me. She just had one condition."

"What?"

"That we keep the dog off her furniture."

I had to laugh. That was Suzzy, all right. We lapsed into a comfortable silence. I leaned against him, and he put his arm around me. We sat like that, listening to the surf and watching the sky for a long time. I turned my head to look at Phillip for a while. He was sad, depressed, and a little drunk during last year's anniversary. This time, he looked relaxed and thoughtful. He noticed me watching him. He turned to me and kissed me.

I moaned as the kiss intensified and Phillip lowered me onto my back. This was exactly what I needed. I'd been by myself, worrying about him for so long, I just wanted him to take charge and make love to me. While we kissed, my hands roamed his back. It was reassuring to feel him pressing down onto me. I shivered when I felt his breath on my ear as he nibbled my earlobe and kissed my neck.

When Phillip's hands started fumbling with my sweatshirt, I reached down and pulled it off for him. Then I grabbed for his sweatshirt and the rest of our clothes followed. I found myself naked, completely turned on, and awfully cold. Phillip pulled the blanket around us and we huddled together.

Phillip kissed down my neck, over my collarbone, and down to my breasts. He nibbled and suckled while I held his head and tried to come up with the words to tell him how much I loved him and how much I'd missed him. He started to kiss lower, but I said "Please, Dear, just take me now. I can't wait any longer."

He slid into me and ground his pelvis against me. Then he started moving. I was so wound up, that a few moments of that was all it took. I looked up at his face, clutched his shoulders, and shook as I came, and came hard. Phillip looked down at me and smiled. When I came back to reality, he said, "I love you, Gail."

"I love you, too. I love you so much."

We kissed, while we continued to make love. I didn't want it to end, and when I felt Phillip pulsing inside me, I held him tight so we wouldn't be parted. While it was delicious to feel so close to him, eventually his weight began to be uncomfortable.

Phillip rolled over, wrapped me in his arms and I put my head on his chest. I don't know how long we lay there, lost in each other, watching the stars, and listening to the waves spend themselves on the beach. Then we started chatting again; about nothing important, upcoming deadlines, exam and grading schedules, research proposals, and vet appointments. Phillip held me, we talked, and the tide came in. Eventually, even with the blanket covering us, I grew too cold to lie there naked. We dressed, packed up, and started walking back to Phillip's cottage.

On the way back, I saw something glistening in the sand. I bent over to pick it up what turned out to be a piece of sea-glass. Ordinary tinted glass, probably from a broken soda bottle, it started out as a random broken shard of junk. Years of pummeling the hard, sharp edges by sand and waves softened had rounded it until it looked like a frosted, delicate jewel. I picked it up and put it in my pocket. When I stood up, Phillip took my hand and we walked back home together.

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