Watching the Water by Donna Gentry Morton

Author:Donna Gentry Morton
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: BQB Publishing
Published: 2016-08-12T04:00:00+00:00

Jace and Julianna were walking back to the bungalow, the scorching noonday sun prickling their shoulders like hot needles.

“Did you ever think of turning in my father and his cronies?”

“Many times,” Jace told her. “But for what? Selling short, stock pools . . . it was the twenties and the market was unregulated. Everyone for themselves.”

They reached the house and went inside, escaping the sun and its blistering heat. She got a couple of Cokes out of the icebox and handed him one, which he finished in three swigs as he looked out the front window.

“So you got on a bus and left town,” she reiterated for him, taking a sip of her Coke. “What happened next?”

“I came back here,” he said, remembering that Ambrose Point had never looked so good—and never looked so bad.

The local bus terminal was small, not much more than a bench on Main Street. When Jace stepped off the bus, he saw that little about the town had changed. The same flag waved over the courthouse, the same old men sat sparring around the barbershop, and the same tarnished bell was hanging in the steeple of the First Baptist Church.

“The town had pretty much stood still in time,” he told Julianna, “but Granddad hadn’t. It was pretty clear his health was going and his days were short. The next few months were about taking care of him. He stayed inside most of it, but there were some days here and there when he felt like walking on the beach.” In his mind’s eye Jace could still see those days, slow and ambling, with Granddad once saying, “Don’t hate that I’m dying, Jace, ’cause I’m not. I’m just going to my real home.”

Jace had hated it, though, and answered by not answering. He had only looked at the ocean, her swells high and pewter. She could be the most beautiful creation in the world, or on days like that one, the saddest sight in all of nature.

“Granddad said that sometimes people can only get well by going to Heaven,” Jace recalled. “He told me to celebrate after he was gone, to do it by throwing his medicine bottles out to sea.”

“And I’ll bet you did exactly what he asked you to.”

Jace nodded. “It happened just before Easter, right inside this house. I stayed with him till the end.” He turned from the window. “Have you ever heard of people seeing angels right before they die?”

“I have, Jace. Cassie, knows a lot about the Bible and spiritual things. She’s mentioned that it’s been known to happen. Well, at least according to some people’s last words.”

“Yeah, Granddad pointed up and asked me if I could see him—the angel.” He laughed softly. “All I saw was the ceiling, but when I looked back at Granddad, he was gone and the ocean outside was calm.”

Julianna, who had been sitting on the sofa, now joined him at the window and wrapped her arms around his waist. “I can’t imagine how hard that must have been for you.

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