Legacy of the Dreams

Chapter 22 - A Walk on the Beach

Susan led the way from Portrero Road to the Pacific Coast Highway, with her brother's car right behind her. She turned off the highway a good ways north of Malibu, into the parking lot of a state beach. Despite the fact that it was a holiday, it wasn't particularly warm out, and so while the beach wasn't empty, there were very few people there. She pulled into a parking spot facing the water, offering up a little prayer for herself and her brother before they got out of their cars.

"Where are we going exactly?" Stephen asked as he zipped his jacket up.

"This way," Susan said.

Susan turned away from most of the people using the beach, walking in the direction of a large rock at the north end of the strip of sand. They walked in silence, side by side, until they grew close to its base. There she stopped. Susan turned towards the ocean, watching the endless waves that crashed on the shore, then beyond them to the horizon.

"I get it. The ocean represents eternity," Stephen commented as he watched her.

"To some people, it does," Susan told him. "To others, it's simply the reassuring rhythm of the waves that will never change, something reliable when it seems like everything has changed."

"And what do either of those things have to do with Mom's death?" Stephen asked. "Or Dad's either for that matter."

"It doesn't. It has nothing at all to do with either of those things," Susan told him calmly. "But being in places like this does help me cope."

Stephen frowned and emitted a sound from his throat that sounded something like a snarl.

"How can you simply accept this, Sue?" he demanded. "We've lost both our parents in the space of three months. And you act like you don't care."

"I care, Stephen. You know how close Mom and I were ... how much she and Dad both meant to me," Susan said.

"Then how can you be so calm about this?" Stephen asked; his voice brusque. "Is it because you've done without her before? While you were lost?"

"No," Susan said. "I missed Mom ... and Dad ... like you wouldn't believe while I was away. If anything, that only reminds me how much I will miss her now ... and for the rest of my life."

"Then why?" Stephen demanded.

"I can because I know it was the Lord who took her. If it wasn't Mom's time, she would still be here," Susan told him.

Stephen looked at her with a pained expression. "How can you say that, when you know how she died?"

"I think it was more horrible for us than it was for her," Susan said. "From what the medical examiner's office said, she probably died on impact. She probably didn't know about the fire."

"We don't know that for certain. They haven't said what her cause of death was, and the things they have told us are a guess. We won't have any definitive answers until they do the autopsy," Stephen reminded her.

"Yes, but we do know the end," Susan said. "I take comfort in knowing she's with the Lord now ... and with Dad."

"And you're sure of that?" Stephen asked. "You don't think she'll come back ... like in your movie?"

There was something odd in Stephen's expression as he asked the question, something hopeful and questioning. Something that let Susan know her brother hadn't truly contemplated what might happen after death until just recently.

"Why are you asking that, Stephen?" Susan wanted to know. "Are you hoping she will come back or something?"

"Or course! If I knew Mom would live again I'd feel so much better about this," Stephen said emphatically.