Love and Other Words

As if Dad knew that I was delicate after the conversation about Christmas Sans Mom with Elliot, he was even quieter than usual at dinner Thursday night.

“Do you want to go to Goat Rock tomorrow?” he asked when he finished his chicken.

Goat Rock, the windy beach where the Russian River collides with the Pacific Ocean. It is notoriously cold, with a dangerous rip current rendering the beach unsafe for even wading into the water, and so much sand blustering in the air that it’s nearly impossible to grill hot dogs.

I loved it.

Sometimes, sea lions and elephant seals lazed at the mouth of the river. Dark, rich seaweed washed up on shore, heavy with salt and nearly unreal to me in its otherworldly, translucent oddness. Sand dunes dotted the shoreline, and in the center of the beach and out a narrow isthmus was the lonely giant rock jutting straight up more than a hundred feet as if it had been dropped there.

“You could invite Elliot, if you wanted,” he added.

I looked up at him and nodded.

The entire drive there, Elliot was fidgety. He shifted in his seat, tugged at his seat belt, ran his hand through his hair, futzed with his headgear. After about ten minutes, I gave up on trying to focus on my book.

“What’s with you?” I hissed across the back seat.

He glanced at Dad in the driver’s seat, and then back at me. “Nothing.”

I felt more than saw Dad looking in the rearview mirror at what was going on in the back seat.

I stared at Elliot’s hands, reaching now to toy with the strap of his backpack. They looked different. Bigger. He was still so skinny, but also so at home in his gawkiness that I didn’t notice it anymore unless I really looked.

Dad pulled into the parking lot and we stepped out, shocked at how the wind nearly knocked us over. We jerked our coats on, pulled our hats over our ears.

“No farther down the beach than the rock,” Dad said, pulling his own treat—a pack of Danish cigarettes—out of his pocket. He never smoked near me; he’d officially quit as soon as Mom found out she was pregnant. The wind pushed his fair hair across his face and he shook it away, squinting at me, saying without words, You okay with this?, and I nodded. He tucked a cigarette between his lips, adding, “And at least fifty feet back from the seals.”

Elliot and I trudged over a sand dune, standing at the top and staring out at the ocean. “Your dad intimidates the hell out of me.”

I laughed. “Because he’s tall?”

“Tall,” he agreed, “and quiet. He has the commanding-presence thing down.”

“He just says a lot more with his eyes than with his mouth.”

“Unfortunately for me, I don’t speak Danish Eyeball.”

I laughed again and looked at Elliot’s profile as he stared out at the crashing waves.

“I didn’t know he smoked,” he said.

“Only a couple times a year. It’s his private luxury, I guess.”

Elliot nodded, blurting, “Okay, look. I got you a Christmas present.”

I groaned.

“Ever-gracious Macy.” With a smile, he began walking back down the other side of the sand dune toward the beach, and only now did I notice a small wrapped package tucked beneath his arm. We navigated through thick sand, driftwood, and small hills of seaweed before reaching a tiny alcove, mostly guarded from the wind.

Sitting, he shifted the package into both hands, staring down at it. From the shape, I could tell it was a book. “I didn’t expect you to get me anything,” he said, nervously. “I’m always hanging out at your place on the weekends you’re here, so I feel like I owe you.”

“You don’t owe me anything.” I worked to tamp down the emotion I felt that he got me a book. Not just because it’s what we did together—read—but because of what I’d told him last night, about Mom, and gifts. “You know you can always come over. I don’t have siblings. It’s just me and Dad.”

“Well,” he said, handing me the package, “maybe that’s sort of why I got this.”

Curious, I tore open the paper and looked down. I nearly lost the wrapping paper to a brutal gust of wind.

Bridge to Terabithia.

“Have you read it?” Elliot asked.

I shook my head, pulling my windblown hair out of my face. “I’ve heard of it.” I saw him exhale quietly in relief. “I think.”

He nodded, and seeming to be more settled, bent to pick up a stone to throw into the surf.

“Thank you,” I told him, though I wasn’t sure he heard me over the roar of the ocean.

Elliot looked up and smiled at me. “I hope you like it as much as I did. I sort of feel like I could be your May Belle.”