Free Two If by Sea by Jacquelyn Mitchard

out and unwrapping them. “Here,” she said. “That was to be for you, in any case.” She gave Frank a waterproof pullover and a sweater, and a few pairs of jeans reinforced at the inner thigh, the kind riders wore, a heavy diving watch, an Omni, just the kind Frank had play-begged for from his doctor wife, and a barometer for the wall, because Frank, like all farm-raised people, was foolish about weather. An irony now. Tura kept going. Black corduroy slacks with a hem, a fine brown leather jacket, a linen shirt and vest. Frank understood that these last ones had been for Miles, and accepted them, kissing Tura on the cheek. He was broader across the chest than Miles, but about the same height. Natalie liked him to dress well and keep his hair cut shorter than he was used to. After leaving the force, he enjoyed letting his hair curl around his collar. She called him a hippie.
    Their son would have had dark hair.
    None of Natalie’s brothers was bald, and Frank’s hair was still a thick brown tightly curled pelt. Frank had suggested they call their son Donovan. Natalie said that was madness, but he caught her smiling.
    His wife and his son.
    â€œYou have nothing but what you’re standing up in,” Tura said. Frank had forgotten. It seemed that his memory would be like old Jack’s, a series of events closed off like the windows on an Advent calendar, each one a surprise to him when he glimpsed it again.
    They both turned as they heard Cedric making his way down the stairs. Existence narrowed to a commonplace. Cedric, despite his lame leg perhaps the fittest man Frank had ever known, had done just what it said in paperback novels, and aged twenty years in thirty minutes. The very flesh of his face was looser and a paunch had appeared, as well as an old man’s stoop. He crossed the room to the alcove where the boy lay flung out in sleep, and straightened his limbs and pulled the gaudy afghan up around the thin shoulders. It was impossible not to think of the motions of tucking this child in as meant for the younger Miles, for Miles’s long rest. As though he was alone in the room, Cedric brushed the little boy’s hair off his face with the tips of two fingers. Then he stood up and faced Frank.
    â€œI’ve been thinking while I did the stalls up. Now I’m sure. I’m done here. I take it you’ll want Glory, that savage bitch.”
    â€œI don’t know what will become of my life now, Cedric. She’s four. She can be a great mare. Maybe Grand Prix. With a few years of good work, maybe less, you could get plenty for her at auction, and if she settles down, and I think she will, she could be bred and her foals—”
    â€œI would like you to have her,” Cedric said, suddenly absorbed in a fly spot on the window across the room, which he quickly addressed with one of his massive handkerchiefs. “I didn’t ask you to give me money for her. I would like you to have her, as your own.”
    â€œWhat do you mean, Cedric?”
    â€œStart your life over a bit.”
    â€œIt’s too soon to think of that.”
    But Natalie had said as much. You’ll want to train your own horses . . .
    â€œTrain a jumper and a rider for what America has that passes for an equestrian world team. It can’t compensate. I’m not suggesting anything like that.”
    â€œFor Natalie?”
    â€œNo, rather I would like you to do it for Natalie, for Miles. For me.”
    â€œIt’s a wonderful thought, but that’s not how you are.”
    â€œHow am I now, Frank? Will you be the one to say that Natalie’s life was meaningless because a great bloody monstrous wave knocked her out of the world?”
    â€œOf course not. She is dead, and so is your Miles,” Frank said. He had not meant for it to be so harsh. But it was harsh. What kind of twaddle was this, about doing it for Natalie? “Nothing I do from now on has