Our Lady of the Harbour by Charles de Lint

Author:Charles de Lint
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9780920623800
Publisher: Triskell Press

* * *

I’m sorry, was the first thing she said to him, her hands moving quickly before he could speak.

He stood in the hallway leading into Lucia’s apartment, late on a Wednesday afternoon, not even sure what he was doing here. Apologizing. Explaining. Maybe just trying to understand.

“It wasn’t your fault,” he said. “It’s just…everything happened too fast.”

She nodded. Do you want to come in?

Matt regarded her. She was barefoot, framed by the doorway. The light behind her turned the flowered dress she was wearing into gossamer, highlighting the shape of her body under it. Her hair was the colour of soft gold. He remembered her lying on the bed, radiant in the afterglow of their lovemaking.

“Could we go out instead?” he said. “Just for a walk or something?”

Let me get my shoes.

He took her to the lakefront and they walked the length of the boardwalk and the Pier, and when the jostle of the crowds became too much, they made their way down to the sand and sat near the shoreline. For the most part, his voice, her hands, were still. When they did talk, it was to make up stories about the more colourful characters with whom they shared the beach, both using their hands to speak so that they wouldn’t be overheard, laughing as each tried to outdo the other with an outrageous background for one person or another.

Where did you learn sign language? she asked him at one point.

My cousin’s deaf, he replied, his hands growing more deft, remembering old patterns, the longer they spoke. Our parents were pretty close and we all saw a lot of each other, so everybody in the family learned.

They had dinner at Kathryn’s Café. Afterward, they went to the Owlnight, another of Newford’s folk clubs, but this one was on the Butler University campus itself, in the Student Center. Garve MacCauley was doing a solo act, just guitar and gravely voice, mostly his own material.

You’re much better, Katrina signed to Matt after the first few songs.

“Just different,” he said.

Katrina only smiled and shook her head.

After the last set, he took her back to Upper Foxville and left her at Lucia’s door with a chaste kiss.

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