White Horses On The Bay

The Lone Ranger

"It's this one on the right. With the light on." Fisher pointed to his grandmother's home as Jenny pulled Gwen's car slowly into the driveway. Norma Sullivan's two-storey saltbox home with the white picket fence was bathed in a blue glow from the streetlight. It is the oldest house on the street. His grandfather finished building it just months before his ship went down off Burnt Island in 1918. The schooner went off course in a gale that night, ground into the rocks only a few miles out of the harbour and sank within minutes. Seven Twillingate wives became widows that night, including Norma Sullivan.

Four small windows on the second floor faced the harbour like two sets of eyes watching for the ships to come in. The front door, like most in the out port town, was missing a stoop, leaving a 4-foot drop to the ground below.

"That's kind of odd," Jenny said. "There is a porch light but no porch."

"Ah, yes, the mother-in-law door. I'll tell you about that as soon as I get out of these wet clothes." Fisher stepped out into the night air and held his arms across his chest as he led Jenny to the back door.

Fisher felt anxious bringing Jenny unexpectedly into his home. His heartbeat pounded inside his head as he held out his shaking hand and beckoned Jenny to go inside.

"Make yourself comfortable, my dear." Fisher squeezed by Jenny to reach the kitchen light trying not to touch her in his wet clothes, but his chest nudged hers as he passed. "Sorry, my love. It's a small room."

He hung his jacket on the peg by the door and took Jenny's coat and placed it on the back of a kitchen chair. It occurred to him that Jenny was the first girl he'd ever invited into his grandmother's house. The first guest of any kind in ages. He glanced around the room, fearing a mess. There were dishes in the sink and an empty milk jug on the counter. He tried to discreetly move a few things out of sight.

"Don't bother with that, Fisher. Go change."

"There's beer in the fridge if you'd like to open a couple. I'll get a fire going in the front room as soon as I get out of these clothes."

"Sure. Go on, now. I'll be just fine. I'll start a fire. I'm pretty good with a pack of matches and a little firewood. I spent a many a summer around the campfires at my grandparent's place in The Laurentians," Jenny said as she entered the front room and turned on a lamp. "Go, just trust me! I'll have this room toasty warm by the time you come back down."

At the bottom of the stairs, Fisher stood still and watched Jenny gather a few sticks of kindling and a bit of newspaper from a stand at the edge of the hearth. The lamplight cast a soft glow across the room and even though he was shaking from his cold adventure, a warm feeling came over him. As though smelling salts had suddenly been passed under his nose the stench of his wet clothes snapped him out of his daze and he bounded up the stairs to his room.

Dirty clothes on the floor, dirty magazines on the bed, but even worse, the room looked like it belonged to a six-year-old. Fisher quickly stuffed the clothes in his closet, smoothed the Lone Ranger bedspread and shoved the magazines under the bed. "Fuck. What am I thinking? As if I'm going to bring her up here at some point. You dumb ass. Get a grip!" Fisher mumbled to himself as he undid his jeans. They fell to the floor spraying sand across the rug. He tugged at the buttons of his shirt and managed to get enough undone to pull it off over this head. He pulled off his wet underwear and stood stark naked in the middle of his room. He looked at himself in the dresser mirror. "I'm a God-damn drowned rat."

He tried to rub the sea smell and remnant bits of sand off his skin with a towel he'd thrown over his desk chair that morning. Standing in his bedroom with Jenny just 20 feet away, he became aroused. "Shit!" He grabbed a dry pair of underwear and tugged them over his erection trying to push it down against his leg. He struggled to do up the zipper of his jeans as the smell of smoke drifted into his room.