Chapter Text
A roll of thunder wakes Natalie from a good dream that fades before she opens her eyes. The room is quiet, the storm once again muted as if biding its time before another strike. She waits, body heavy with sleep as she tries to recall what she had been dreaming of. There was water, she knows, but that’s about as illuminating as an unlit candle. Even now, the ocean lies somewhere beyond the reach of her window. Its presence is like a bated breath, comforting and chilling in its constancy.
It must be late. It was only drizzling when she’d gone to bed, but now the rain is a percussive downpour that fills the air, nearly drowning out the sound of a fist pounding at her front door. Natalie glares at the ceiling, hoping that it might go away. Bang bang, bang-bang-bang, bang bang. It could be someone who’s been injured by the storm. Natalie’s not a doctor, but the closest thing to it. Or, she reluctantly considers, it could be Summer’s water finally breaking. Duty is not enough consolation to keep Natalie from resenting the chill in the air as she kicks the blankets aside and leaves the refuge of her bed. She grabs one of the sweaters strewn across her desk before walking downstairs.
The house is silent except for the storm. The wood creaks familiarly as she slips into the kitchen. The scent of corn and fish lingers around the stove; when lightning cracks, there’s enough light to remind her of the mess she’s left to clean in the morning. She reaches for the switch. Nothing happens.
She’d expected as much. Electricity is new and novel, and despite its usefulness, there’s a reason the bay has remained so staunchly attached to notions of the past. Innovation breeds best when people are willing to rear it to make room for it. Power’s been out since the first surge crashed into the cove shortly before the rain began. She reaches for an oil lamp and strikes a match. As she turns, lighting illuminates the silhouette of her visitor appears through the sheer curtained windows. The cap and the broad shoulders; the head tilted down, dark hair running like ink and fists by his side.
It’s Nathaniel. Of course, it’s him. Who else would it be, knocking on the door, a bottle of whiskey in one hand and a lumpy package in the other? Natalie isn’t entirely sure how he made it up the hill when he’s clearly dipped into the bottle. She sets the lamp on the kitchen table behind her and peers at him through the sheer curtain. His head’s tilted down to keep the water from running into his eyes, and he hardly seems to notice it moving.
It’s not as if he can’t let himself in. But she imagines he wants her to open the door because he’s home for the first time in a month. After all, that’s what a good wife does. It’s what she would be happy to do if the last time they had spoken hadn’t ended with an argument and slamming doors.
She watches him for a moment longer, clutching her sweater tighter around her as she presses her forehead against the curtain. The glass is chilled enough to sting through the sheer fabric. He really does look pitiful out there in the rain. With his head bowed and the water drenching him to the bone, he looks like a half-drowned kitten. Natalie sighs and unlatches the door.
They stand in a silent standoff as he holds out his bottle and the package.
“I brought you a present,” Nathaniel says. When it becomes evident that she won’t speak first, he adds, “It’s from one of the ports we visited.”
Natalie glances at the bottle and notes the label. The scotch is only half full. “You’ve drunk from it.”
“I thought we could have a nightcap,” Nathaniel runs his fingers through his hair sheepishly.
“And then I drank a little to warm me up.”
The wind howls, shifting the direction of the rain to puddle on her kitchen floor. Natalie’s sweater grows damp. “Well, come in, then. No point in standing in the rain.”
Nathaniel sways across the threshold, heading directly toward his chair. It creaks as he falls against it and deposits the package onto the table. The night is warm, even with the rain, and neither moves to take off their wet clothes. That might give the impression that either of them are comfortable. It might convince Nathaniel that she has forgotten their last conversation when she certainly has not. She gestures for the bottle he cradles in his other hand.
“You won’t like it much,” He says, shaking the bottle. “I thought you’d drink something from home. Mix it with something sweet.”
Natalie reaches for it despite his warning. He shrugs and lets her take it. The paper label peels under her grip as she pretends to read it. Like she cares what faraway place it hailed from or what flavors the dark liquor supposedly holds. It was never really a present for her anyway.
“I’m not in the mood for anything sweet.”
“What did we fight about, Nat? Do you even remember?”
Natalie ignores him, unscrews the cap, and takes a swig before the smell can hit her. She makes a face instinctively, and Nathaniel makes a face back as if to say, ‘I told you it was foul.’ The drink they usually share is home-brewed wine, sweet and cloying. Still, she’s too mad not to drink. She takes another smaller sip, which doesn’t burn as badly on the way down.
“Don’t you?” The bottle thumps as she sets it back on the table.
“Nat…” He says warningly.
“Keeper won’t stop coming over. I told you, and you left.”
Underneath his drunkenness and remorse, everything slots into place. He straightens up, elbows on the table, just like when he was a little boy begging for seconds at her mother’s dinner table.
“I have to go when the captain calls,” He reaches out, his hand resting a healthy distance away from her own, as if not to startle her. “You know that. It doesn’t mean-”
“It means that you didn’t stay.”
Nathaniel snaps. “It doesn’t mean I didn’t want to!”
This is where the argument got stuck last time. With Natalie growing increasingly annoyed as her rebuttals began to shift to outright begging, and Nathaniel, with his responses growing shorter and shorter as if brevity would serve as a greater defense against his broken promises.
He must remember the argument now. The memory sinks into Natalie’s shoulders, drawing them stiff and tense and curling her fingers in her lap.
Nathan sighs. His hair is getting too long, and it falls into his eyes when he places his head in his hands. He still looks pitiful, even as he sees her as the one who’s being unreasonable. Like this is all her fault for not remaining the same girl she was when they were kids, back when they got married, and he only spent a few months a year out at sea.
She hates that he blames her for the audacity of holding him to it when he promised her a happy life in exchange for her hand in marriage and all her dreams placed on a shelf.
Like a flame suddenly lit, she feels anger warm her where the liquor burns deep in her stomach. But she’s not allowed to feel that, is she? He’s home, and he won’t stay long. They can’t part like this again. She takes a deep breath, sighs, and pushes the damp cardigan off her shoulders. It falls to the tile floor like a corpse washed ashore. Natalie imagines the weight falling off like a drowning stone, the guilt and the anger settling by her feet like sediment.
“What’s in the package?” Natalie nods toward the limp thing in the center of the table. “You said you’d gotten me a gift.”
Nathaniel sits up, suddenly alert. “Yes, right. I won it, actually, from another crew. Playing one of those card games you hate.” He moves the package closer to her. It’s wrapped in plain brown paper and twine.
Natalie pulls the string and unwraps the damp paper.
It’s fur. At first, she thinks it’s a dead animal, but there’s no stench, either of rot or preservatives. Just the strong scent of salt. She pinches at it, holding it up until it forms a shape. It’s a pelt of some sort. Downy gray and spotted, like freckles running down the span of it. She thinks it might be a seal, though she’s never seen one this close.
Natalie has no actual use for it, but it would be worth something if sold inland, where it gets far colder in winter. It’s the thought that counts, or so they say. And she wants this fight to be over for a moment.
Natalie folds it over her arm. “Thank you, Nathan.”
The thin linen nightgown clings to her skin where the rain has dampened it. She can feel Nathaniel’s eyes on her, and this, at least, is familiar. He has always wanted her like this, and she is glad he still does.
“Let’s go to bed,” Natalie says, offering her hand. “We can talk more in the morning.”
And he takes her hand and follows her to their bed.