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He was tempted to yank it off, toss it aside. He was tired of his life and his mind being open to her when so much of hers was closed to him.
But as he started to remove the sweater, he thought he heard her voice, whispering.
A gift. Only a gift.
He lifted his head, looked into the mirror. His face was unshaven, his hair wild, his eyes reflecting the storm-cloud color of the sweater.
“The hell with it,” he muttered, and snatching up his camera and case, he left the house.
He wandered the hills for an hour, ran through roll after roll of film. Mockingbirds sang as he clambered over stone walls into fields where cows grazed on grass as green as emeralds. He saw farmers on tractors, tending their land under a cloud-thickened sky. Clothes flapping with whip snaps on the line, cats dozing in dooryards and sunbeams.
He wandered down a narrow dirt road where the hedgerows grew tall and thick. Through small breaks he spotted sumptuous gardens with flowers in rainbows of achingly beautiful colors. A woman with a straw hat over her red hair knelt by a flower bed, tugging up weeds and singing of a soldier gone to war. She smiled at him, lifted her hand in a wave as he passed by.
He wandered near a small wood, where leaves unfurled to welcome summer and a brook bubbled busily. The sun was straight up, the shadows short. Spending the morning in normal pursuits had settled his mood. He thought it was time to go back, see if Bryna had cooled down—perhaps try out the darkroom she had equipped.
A flash of white caught his eye, and he turned, then stared awestruck. A huge white stag stood at the edge of the leafy shadows, its blue eyes proud and wise.
Keeping his movements slow, controlled, Cal raised his camera, then swore lightly when the stag lifted his massive head, whirled with impossible speed and grace, and bounded into the trees.
“No, uh-uh, I’m not missing that.” With a quick glance at the ruins, which he had kept always just in sight, Cal dived into the woods.
He had hunted wildlife with his camera before, knew how to move quietly and swiftly. He followed the sounds of the stag crashing through brush. A bird darted by, a black bullet with a ringed neck, as Cal leaped over the narrow brook, skidded on the damp bank, and dug in for the chase.
Sun dappled through the leaves, dazzling his eyes, and sweat rolled down his back. Annoyed, he pushed the arms of the sweater up to his elbows and strained to listen.
Now there was silence, complete and absolute. No breeze stirred, no bird sang. Frustrated, he shoved the hair out of his eyes, his breath becoming labored in the sudden stifling heat. His throat was parchment-dry, and thinking of the cold, clear water of the brook, he backtracked.
The sun burned like a furnace through the sheltering leaves now. It surprised him that they didn’t singe and curl under the onslaught. Desperate for relief, he pulled off the sweater, laid it on the ground beside him as he knelt by the brook.
He reached down to cup water in his hand. And pulled back a cup of coffee.
“Do you good to get away for a few days, change of scene.”
“What?” He stared down at the mug in his hand, then looked up into his mother’s concerned face.
“Honey, are you all right? You’ve gone pale. Come sit down.”
“I…Mom?”
“Here, now, he needs some water, not caffeine.” Cal saw his father set down his fishing flies and rise quickly. Water ran out of the kitchen faucet into a glass. “Too much caffeine, if you ask me. Too many late nights in the darkroom. You’re wearing yourself out, Cal.”
He sipped water, tasted it. Shuddered. “I—I had a dream.”
“That’s all right.” Sylvia rubbed his shoulders. “Everybody has dreams. Don’t worry. Don’t think about them. We don’t want you to think about them.”
“No—I thought it was, it wasn’t…” Wasn’t like before? he thought. It was more than before. “I went to Ireland.” He took a deep breath, tried to clear his hazy brain. Desperately, he wanted to turn, rest his head against his mother’s breast like a child. “Did I go to Ireland?”
“You haven’t been out of New York in the last two months, slaving to get that exhibition ready.” His father’s brow creased. Cal saw the worry in his eyes, that old baffled look of concern. “You need a rest, boy.”
“I’m not going crazy.”
“Of course you’re not.” Sylvia murmured it, but Cal caught the faint uncertainty in her voice. “You’re just imagining things.”
“No, it’s too real.” He took his mother’s hand, gripped it hard. He needed her to believe him, to trust him. “There’s a woman. Bryna.”
“You’ve got a new girl and didn’t tell us.” Sylvia clucked her tongue. “That’s what this is about?”
Was that relief in her voice, Cal wondered, or doubt? “Bryna—that’s an odd name, isn’t it, John? Pretty, though, and old-fashioned.”