Page 28 of A Little Luck

I’m starting to laugh when a strange creaking sound from inside the house draws my attention. It’s a low groaning, almost like the noise of an old-timey pirate ship out on the ocean. I’m about to make a crack about Scottish pirates when it gets louder.

It’s followed by what sounds like a firehose going off in the house. Through the window, I see water spraying from the ceiling inside, and Ryan jumps to his feet, sending Fudge dashing off into the darkness.

“It’s raining in the house!” he yells.

My stomach drops, and I run for the door as my mom lets out a loud yell, “Oh! Oh, no!”

I crash through the door into the kitchen, diving under the sink where the main water line shut-off valve is located.

Everything seems to slip into slow motion as the upstairs toilet crashes through the ceiling of my living room and lands on the floor with water raining all around it.

CHAPTER6

ADAM

“Hard to believe you’re headed home already.” Max sits back in the low planter’s chair in the large backyard of Sheila’s small house. “The time has flown.”

“More likeIhave flown,” I joke, leaning against the thick palm tree and looking up at the grassy path leading to the cliffs overhead.

After showing me the island and learning I was “the pilot,” Sheila put me to work flying local residents pretty much everywhere they needed to go from the small airstrip. Some had medical reasons to get to the big island. Some had to take care of school or work issues.

Occasionally, I’d even taken the small passenger jet to San Francisco or Oakland for residents to visit family or see their grandchildren born or attend weddings.

The only charge was the cost of fuel, and if they couldn’t pay it, Sheila had “a fund.”

Never once did I regret it. To be honest, I really threw myself into the work. I used it to drown out the feelings of frustration and anger. I used it to give her space.

I kept in touch with Ryan and Owen and my brothers, and from what I can tell, not much has changed in Eureka. I don’t know what I’ll find when I get back home, but I’m doing my best to keep my emotions neutral.

It’s fucking bullshit, because I think about her all the time. I’ve started and deleted so many text messages, but I can’t send them.

I have to move on, and the only way that’s going to happen is by training myself not to need to hear her voice, or her thoughts, or her funny comments.

“What time are you leaving tomorrow?” Aunt Sheila walks out to the backyard, hardly using her cane to guide her steps.

“Before dawn. It’ll take me two days to get there, since I’m going back in time.”

“Your family will be glad to see you.” She sits at the table, removing the cork from the bottle of Oke. “Here’s to homecomings.”

Sitting across from her, I wait as she pours an inch of the clear liquor into two small glasses. We clink and shoot it, and I wince.

“It’s nothing like Stone Cold premium.”

The lines on her face lift with her smile. “Is that your brother’s bourbon?”

“Best in the world.”

“Let’s take a walk on your last night.” She rises slowly from her chair, and I reach out to hold her arm. “Max, you coming?”

“I’m good.” My friend has his phone out, and I’m pretty sure he’s keeping up with a pretty surfer he met last week.

I follow his aunt out the small gate and up the worn path to the top of the hill. As many times as we’ve walked up here over the past several weeks, it still takes my breath away.

“Have you always been blind?”

“I started losing my eyesight when I was eighteen.” Her expression sobers. “At first, I was terrified. Then I got angry. I wanted to lash out at everyone, God in particular. Then I fell into a black depression.”

“I think I can understand that.”

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