No Mountain Could Lead Me Home, No Old Dream Could Hold Me

I hit the water before I saw the reef. One second, I was bracing both hands against the skiff's rail, watching rain smear the coast into gray bands. The next, the hull slammed against something solid beneath us. My shoulder struck the rail. My fingers slipped. Cold water swallowed the sound of Miles shouting my name. I opened my mouth and got seawater. I couldn't swim. I had told him that on our first date, when he'd suggested a summer sailing trip. I had told him again when we bought the inn, and again when he persuaded me onto his boat that morning. He'd promised the ride across Bellwether Sound would take twenty minutes. My lungs tried to breathe before my head broke the surface. I coughed, swallowed more water, and clawed at the dark chop. The skiff had turned sideways. Its stern rose and fell in the swell, the motor coughing above me. Miles was still aboard, one hand wrapped around the console. "Lena!" I reached for the hull. It slid away. "Throw me a line!" I managed. Miles looked at the orange throw bag behind him. The waterproof case sat between his boots. Its contents were the transfer papers he had brought to the island, pages he wanted me to sign before we returned to our inn. He picked up the case. For half a second I thought he was moving it to reach the throw bag. Then the skiff lurched, and he caught the case against his chest. "Get the line!" I shouted. The water pulled me sideways. My coat ballooned around me, heavy and useless. I grabbed at the wake and got nothing. Miles turned the key. The motor sputtered. He looked down at me. His face was pale, his mouth open, but I couldn't hear what he said over the wind. The stern swung closer. I saw the throw bag still lying behind him. I saw the bright orange rope tucked neatly under its flap. I reached for the rail. My fingertips skimmed it. The skiff bucked away again. A wave slapped over my head. When I came up, Miles was no longer looking at me. He was staring toward the break in the reef, where the coast guard station's red beacon flashed through the rain. I couldn't keep my head above water. I knew that. I had known it all my life, in swimming pools and on quiet beaches, whenever my feet left the bottom. Panic had never made me stronger. It only made me waste air. So I stopped reaching for the boat. I rolled onto my back, trying to hold my mouth above the waves, and kicked at nothing. The cold stole my legs first. I turned toward a yellow mooring buoy bobbing thirty feet away. It looked impossible to reach. It was also the only thing in the water that wasn't moving away from me. I began to crawl through the waves. It wasn't swimming. I dragged myself forward with my arms and kicked badly, gasping whenever the water let me. Twice, I lost sight of the buoy. The third time I found it, I was close enough to slap the chain. I wrapped both arms around the buoy and held on. The metal was slick. The chain knocked against my wrist. I pulled my chest against the rounded top and tried to remember how to breathe. I thought of my mother teaching me to count the tide bells from the porch of the inn. One for the harbor entrance. Two for the outer channel. Three when the fog was thick enough to hide the shore. There was no bell now. Only rain and my own ragged coughing. A red light pulsed in the distance. I held on and counted the flashes. At some point, the skiff's engine faded. I told myself Miles had reached the channel and called for help. I told myself he had gone to get a rescue crew. I told myself the case had been too heavy to throw, or that he hadn't seen where I was, or that he would be back as soon as he could. I told myself all of it until a wave rolled over the buoy and dragged me under. Hands caught my coat. Someone shouted. I came up choking beneath the side of a small rescue boat, where a woman in a red waterproof jacket leaned over the rail. "Hold on to me," she said. "I've got you." I couldn't hold anything. My arms had stopped working. The rescue woman hooked a strap beneath my shoulders and hauled while another crew member grabbed my belt. They lifted me over the rail and lowered me onto the deck. I remember the deck shaking under my cheek. I remember a blanket pushed around my body. I remember trying to say Miles's name and coughing instead. Then the sky went dark. ***** I woke beneath bright lights with a plastic tube under my nose and a warm blanket tucked around my shoulders. A woman in scrubs stood beside the bed. "You're at Bellwether Regional. I'm Dr. Chen. You were hypothermic, but you're warming up. Do you know your name?" "Lena Hart." "Do you know what happened?" "Boat hit the reef." The doctor nodded and checked the monitor. "The rescue crew found you holding on to a buoy. You were lucky." I tried to sit up. My chest seized, and I coughed into a paper basin. Every breath hurt. "Where's Miles?" "I don't know," she said. "The coast guard has your husband's contact information. Let's take this slowly." I shut my eyes. My mind kept returning to the skiff: the orange bag, the papers, the way Miles's hands had closed around the case. The hospital door opened. A uniformed coast guard officer stepped inside, carrying a small notebook. "Mrs. Hart? I'm Officer Brooks. When you're ready, I need to ask you about the accident." "I can talk." "What do you remember?" I told him about the impact, the water, the buoy. I told him Miles had been aboard. When I described the throw bag, Officer Brooks paused. "Did your husband attempt to throw it to you?" "I didn't see him throw it." "Did he call for help?" "I couldn't hear him." The officer wrote something down. "We'll speak with him separately." "What did he say?" "I can't discuss his statement yet." The answer settled in my stomach like another mouthful of seawater. I asked for my phone. The nurse brought me a clear plastic bag containing what the rescue crew had recovered from my coat. My phone was dead, the screen cracked, but it was there. The waterproof pouch had held. I could feel the small rectangle of my mother's brass key in the pocket beside it. I closed my fingers around the key. Miles arrived an hour later. His hair was dry. His shirt was clean. He wore the gray sweater I'd seen him put on at the island's dock before we left. He came straight to my bedside and took my hand. His thumb passed over my knuckles, gentle and familiar. "I thought I'd lost you," he said. I looked at the dry cuffs of his sweater. "I was right there," I whispered. "I know. I tried to get back to you." He leaned down, resting his forehead against my hand. The performance was almost perfect. The trembling breath, the tight jaw, the wet shine in his eyes. Almost. "What happened to the papers?" I asked. Miles lifted his head. "What papers?" "The ones in the case." He released my hand. For a beat, neither of us moved. Then he gave me the same reassuring smile he'd used when he persuaded me onto the skiff. "Lena, you almost drowned. We can talk about paperwork later."