Page 85 of Stony Point Summer
“All right. Give us a couple of slices,” Shane tells her. “With whipped cream. Coffee, too.”
No sooner does she turn than Shane lays it on Neil. “No boat for you, Barlow. But—”
“But, what?”
“You can stay here in Maine a few days.”
“At your place?”
Shane nods. “I’m leaving at the crack of dawn. Shovin’ off the docks at 3 AM. You can crash here.”
“What the hell will I do?”
“Sit outside on my deck. Walk the docks.” Shane clasps his hands behind his neck and tips back in his seat. “Breathe that damn salt air that cures what ails you.And… you’re going to make a decision.”
“Decision?”
“Damn straight.” Righting his chair then, Shane tells his friend exactly how it’s going to be. As though Neil can’t think straight, see straight—hell, breathe straight. “Now listen up, and listen good. Here are your two choices. You’re going to either walk away … Let Lauren go and live your own life there at Stony Point. Work with Jason. Stay busy. Someone else will come along, man. Some broad who’ll be the one, all over again. You’re young, Neil.”
“Or?”
“Or?” Shane asks.
“What’s my other choice?”
Shane tosses up his hands. “Or you’re going to fight the fight of your life—against my brother.”
* * *
Days later, Shane disembarks a tired fishing vessel, waves off his crewmates and walks the harbor docks toward home. He looks beat, and has his duffel with him after lobstering far out in the Gulf of Maine. Before getting to his harborside home, though, he stops in at the Red Boat Tavern.
“The seas were calm; the skies, clear. It was a good trip,” he tells the bartender. Sitting on a stool, Shane tips up his newsboy cap and orders carryout: a triple-decker roast turkey sandwich with pickle spears and a side of chips. “Give me a ham-and-cheese, too,” he says then. “Might be a pal staying at my place for a while.”
“That right?” the bartender asks.
“Yeah. Having some problems with a dame.”
“Ayuh, story of every old salt.”
“Sure is, around these parts.”
“Hope it works out for your friend,” the bartender says minutes later, when the food’s all delivered to Shane in a bag, ready to go.
* * *
And go he does. Shane walks the few blocks to his silver-shingled house. You can see it in his stance, some relaxation that comes upon the sight of that little house with its flower boxes spilling with red geraniums. But as he nears, it’s apparent that the house is buttoned up tight. The door’s shut and locked. Mail’s in the mailbox. Windows are closed.
So Shane unlocks the front door, drops his duffel just inside, sets the mail on a table and walks through the living room. His boots are heavy on the wood floor.
“Neil?” he calls out, but there’s no answer.
Shane opens a few windows to let some fresh air into the stuffy house. Heading down the dim hallway, he scans the rooms there—a bedroom, the bathroom. He squints into the shadows as though looking for something. As though seeking some lingering evidence that Neil actually spent a day or two here.
Once in the kitchen, Shane sets the bag of dinner food on the counter, grabs a glass from the cabinet and puts it on the table. He also picks up a sheet of paper folded in half and leaning against the napkin holder there. In a slanted cursive, his name is written on the outside of the paper. Setting the note down, he takes off his loose denim shirt over a tee and hangs the shirt on the back of a chair. Tosses his cap aside, too. After that, he pulls out that chair and sits. And gives a long sigh as he leans back and taps that note on the tabletop.
Unfolding the paper then, Shane first looks toward the window and the distant harbor outside. Then he reads the note, whispering the words penned there:
I’m off to fight the fight, man. There’s no other way.
