The Storm and the Darkness (3 page)

Walking up to the window, Ana counted ten people in front of her. She sighed.
Do I really have anything better to do?
She slid in line behind a tall, dark-haired gentleman.

He turned around and she recognized him immediately. It was Jonathan St. Andrews.
Doctor
St. Andrews, as the islanders called him, otherwise known as the town veterinarian, and the unpleasant neighbor she had been avoiding.

He looked at Ana, without any expression or indication of his thoughts, for what was an awkward ten seconds or so. He then turned back around without saying a word. She blinked and stared at his back, trying to process what had happened.

Ana’s instinct was to withdraw back into herself and go on as if nothing happened. She avoided conflict and awkwardness at all costs, and she didn’t want it here, in public, especially. But Ana was raised to be kind and hospitable, and the two weeks she had been on Summer Island had been anything
but
kind and hospitable. Jon’s childish behavior was at the pinnacle of this inexcusable lack of hospitality, and it could not be borne. Emboldened, she tapped him on the shoulder.

“Hi,” she said, her voice unsteady, “I believe we are neighbors.”

Giving a response that sounded more like a grunt than actual words, he continued to face forward.

The blood rushed to her face, and her toes curled up in silent anger. Not even in New Orleans had she met someone who was so openly rude without cause.
 

Ana took a deep breath and stepped in front of him. He couldn’t hide his shock at her boldness, but he quickly recovered himself, and tried to push past her again. “Ana Deschanel,” she said. She thrust her hand toward him, daring him to respond.

His eyes darted to the left and the right for a moment. Realizing there was no avoiding it, he reluctantly took her hand and mumbled, “Jon St. Andrews.” He dropped her hand like it carried the plague.

This was the first time Ana had seen his face in clear view, and she was surprised that he was not much older than she was. He didn’t look anything like his younger brother, or what she had seen of Finn from a distance. Finn was stockier of build with a raw, rugged earthy strength that went well with his strong features and ruddy blonde hair. In contrast, Jonathan was tall–much taller than she had realized before he turned to face her–with hair the color of midnight that looked soft and delicate to the touch. His face had the same softness, with only a few lines just around his mouth, reminding her of the wings of an eagle set to flight. He had the appearance of a man who has never seen hard days, but his eyes betrayed a much different truth. They were the color of emeralds, but had the depth of an entire forest. If not for the look of pure animosity on his face, she thought he would be handsome, in a dark sort of way.

Handsome, though, was the last description she had on her mind now that she was face to face with the reclusive island vet.

“So you’re a veterinarian?” Ana probed. She was enjoying his disquiet.
 

“Yes,” Jon said, shifting uncomfortably. He continued to look past her as if he was waiting for someone, but no one came. His face lit up with relief as the line moved forward.

“What do you do all day, sit in the back and play video games?”

“Excuse me?”

“I mean, I can’t imagine the veterinary business is exactly booming on an island of 200 people,” Ana clarified with a laugh.

Jon stared at her and blinked with a slow deliberateness, as if trying to decide if he should bother with a response. “It keeps me busy,” he finally replied.

“What, the video games or animal care?”

He lips formed a thin line and he gave a short sigh of disgust. He was once again looking past her, at the line, willing it to move faster. The conversation was obviously causing him great discomfort.

“Aye! Ana!” A voice called out behind her, and she turned to see Alex waving and heading toward her.

“I see you’ve met our beloved veterinarian,” Alex said enthusiastically as he joined them in the line, clapping Jonathan on the back. Jonathan flinched and grunted, but Alex didn’t seem to notice.

“Ya know, he is the first veterinarian this island has had in over 200 years?” She gave a polite acknowledgement and he added, “Aye, and his father was our only physician as’well. Family of medical geniuses, the St. Andrews men are!”

Jon’s lips twitched again at the mention of his father. “‘Course,” Alex continued, “E’ryone was hoping Jon would be a doctor as’well. Ya know, Andrew St. Andrews was the best doctor in the whole state of Maine, you best believe, and he did a lot o’things he weren’t supposed to, like surgeries and whatnot, and right out of his own house! He did it out of love, ya know, love for this island and the people, and oh, Jon, you were his assistant back in those days, ya?” The question seemed rhetorical as Alex continued to go on and on about Andrew St. Andrews and his wonderful, but unorthodox, medical practice.

Ana watched Jon as Alex talked. His eyes took on a darker gaze the more his father was mentioned. She still couldn’t read him, but could sense his unease. Ana found herself actually feeling sorry for this unpleasant man, as she watched his expression evolve from annoyance to pain.

“Alex, I’ve been meaning to ask you, should I be keeping the cupboard doors under the sink open at all times, or just at night?” She was bailing Jon out, even though he had given her no reason to. Jon’s lips twitched into what might have been a smile, and he turned back to face the line.

As it turned out, Alex was also dining alone, and offered to join her. She wasn’t opposed to some lighter company after that unpleasant interaction with her neighbor, so she accepted and they took the burgers back to her place.

She didn’t know if they were the best burgers in Maine or not, but they were better than anything she had eaten since she arrived.

After Alex left, Ana spent the afternoon returning emails from friends and family, including a handful from some of her students at the University. Seeing their names in her inbox caused a sharp pang of regret.

Her father had been holding out hope that she would join
Deschanel Media Group
, but she did not have the heart for business. She was sorry he hadn’t had sons, or even a more willing daughter. It was looking more and more like he was either going to need to groom one of the cousins to eventually take over, or go public and take a backseat, though Ana could not see her father taking a backseat to anyone.

When Professor Jones asked her to step in as a Professor of English, it was supposed to be temporary until he found someone else. Later, she would remember the glint in his eye when she accepted, and she wondered if he knew then how much she would love it.

She missed her students, her classes, and the feeling of belonging that only really came to her when she was standing in front of a class, speaking about those things she knew best. Ana related to people most easily when she was helping them, offering them a bit of herself.

Ana’s thoughts grew darker as her mind wandered back to all the nights in the Quarter. The routine was always the same: pick him out from a crowd (this was always easy; “he” was always the one scanning the crowd looking for the same thing she was), make eye contact, let him buy her some drinks, then back to his place. When she realized that this was not just an occasional thing anymore, she moved to bars in Treme, where she would be less noticed by anyone who knew her or her family. It was not the shame she might bring to her father than bothered her, it was the shame she felt in herself...for not being capable of connecting with another human being in any meaningful way; for letting herself seek it out in ways that were dangerous and completely unlike anything else she had ever done or wanted to do. She had been fortunate to never run into anyone that she knew, or anyone that might have recognized her. At least, she had been until that last night.

Was this what was meant by the Deschanel Curse? Many of the Deschanels believed that the family had a centuries-old curse brought upon them by a greedy ancestor who had sided with the wrong faction during the Civil War. Ana thought it was ridiculous, but sometimes, when she would wake up next to an unfamiliar face with an all-too-familiar headache, she wondered if there wasn’t some truth to it.

Then there was this ridiculous “gift” she had been granted, simply by being born a Deschanel.
Healers are rare
, her Aunt Colleen liked to tell her. Aunt Colleen was a healer too, but her ability actually worked. When Ana laid her hand on another person and imagined their wounds healing and their body mending, nothing at all would happen. It only worked on herself; she could only heal her own cuts and scrapes.
You’re not focusing enough
, Colleen would say. If Ana focused any harder, she thought her brain would explode.
 

If only it worked on my mind, and not just my body. What I wouldn’t give to fix
that.

Cocoa jumped into her lap and rubbed her face against Ana’s, creating a welcome distraction. Ana did not come here to dwell on what had happened. She came to distance herself from it, to figure out what was wrong with her and why she felt she could only connect to another human being through meaningless physical contact. To figure out why she had done what she did that last night in Treme, and if there was any way of correcting the damage done.

Later, when Finn offered her his daily wave and smile, she was reminded once again of the type of men she had taken to bed...the firemen, policemen, physical laborers...all strong, rugged, masculine...and she realized why she had not introduced herself to Finn St. Andrews. He reminded her of everything she had thought she needed back home, and everything knew she did not want for herself anymore.

The first storms were going to come early this year, although if asked to say exactly how he knew, Finn would not be able to rationally explain it. He had spent twenty-seven years on this small island, most of them watching the ocean, the winds, and the behaviors of the seasons. His mother taught him how to observe using more than just his eyes. Finn could smell, hear, and even feel the subtle changes when a storm was coming. He didn’t even check the Beaufort Scale anymore. He didn't listen to the weathermen. He only trusted his own senses.

He docked and dropped anchor, while Jeremiah tied down the ropes and finished settling them in.
Forbia
was the love of Finn’s life; an old, formidable, forty-foot fiberglass trawler built for the sturdiness of large hauls and not much else. She had helped him pull in lobster since he was a teenager, and he rarely lost a trap, even with his bold eight and nine trap trawls. Other fishermen always knew when it was Finn, for they would spot his buoys–the blended colors of the Irish and Scottish flags–and shake their head. None of them could understand how he lost so little equipment.
And I couldn’t explain it to you if I tried, just like I can’t explain how I know the weather.

Their catch had been average, but he had been hoping for more because he knew he might only have one or two weeks left before the snow started. Finn was one of the few fishermen still out on the sea this time of year, and most people thought him reckless. He would be less concerned if he had been able to stock the reserves better this season, but business was better this year than in the past, so more had gone to consumers and less to the household.

The St. Andrews boys inherited a nice sum of money when their father had died, but they left it untouched. Their father always taught them that reward comes with hard work, and they had never lived with excess. Finn could still hear the booming words of his father as if he were directly next to him, although he had been gone three years now.

Finn had learned more than just sensibility from his father. Andrew St. Andrews, to the casual eye, was an average, unremarkable man, but to the people of Summer Island he was a local legend. He brought his wife Claire to the island before their sons were born. They had few belongings, and paid for the old white and grey Colonial on the eastern shore with cash.  Nothing was known about the doctor and his wife except that he was Scottish, she Irish, and that they had come to open the island’s first medical practice.

The ferry service back then was not nearly what it was today, so having access to medical care seemed to drown out all the unanswered questions the islanders had about where the St. Andrews’ family had come from and why. Everyone soon learned that Dr. St. Andrews was no ordinary doctor. In fact, he was something of a rogue, practicing not just family care from his household, but also emergency procedures, often using very unorthodox methods. If he ran out of vital equipment before he could replace it, he would find and sanitize ordinary household goods as makeshift substitutes until a run to town could be made. Most of what Andrew St. Andrews did in his home office would have caused him to lose his medical license.

At first, the community did not know what to make of this, but when Dr. St. Andrews saved Mayor Cairne’s life performing an emergency appendectomy, the St. Andrews clan became honored members of the community overnight. The residents of Summer Island worked as a collective and the secret of the St. Andrews’ renegade medical practice would go with them to the grave.

It was Jonathan who took after their father, having inherited that same gift of healing hands and finesse under pressure. From the time Jon was seven or eight, he was assisting their father in the evenings, and as a teenager there were certain procedures he was allowed to do himself. Finn would watch as Andrew observed his son’s work with beaming pride, which always left Finn feeling a hollow emptiness. He did not begrudge his brother, as he loved Jon, and he had known even as a child that his older brother was...different. But there had been times that Finn wished he had inherited their father’s gift, too, so that he could share in those moments.

Then, Jon had thrown it all away. Two years of medical school wasted, when Jon shocked everyone and dropped out, enrolling instead in veterinary school. That had been the end of Jon’s sacred relationship with their father, who had never forgiven Jon. He could never understand or accept Jon’s choice, and he carried that disapproval to his death. It was a fractured relationship that Finn knew Jon regretted, deeply, even if he never said it. Finn had understood Jon’s reasons, but he was the only person who had ever understood Jon.