He turned sharply, his posture suddenly guarded. She stepped down into the soft, dry sand cooled by the night air and approached him. “What are you doing?”
“Celebrating.” He lifted a bottle to his mouth and took a drink.
“More whiskey?”
“Rum.”
“Where did you get it?”
“Buried treasure.” He laughed and lifted the bottle to his mouth again. He took a huge swig, then wiped his mouth with the back of his hand. He held up the bottle. “Have a drink, sweetheart. You look like you could use it.”
She shook her head.
“No guts?”
“I don’t need liquor to color the world.”
“I do.”
“Perhaps you just think you do. It’s a crutch.”
He looked at her for a long and angry moment. “A crutch? Yeah, it is.” He drank some more.
“You don’t care?”
“Nope.”
“But it’s such a waste.”
“That all depends.”
“On what?”
“On whether you’re talking to me or you.” He laughed.
“You’re impossible.”
“Yeah, I know. But I’d bet if you drank some of this, you’d be possible.”
“What’s that supposed to mean?”
He didn’t say anything. It was times like this that his silences were worse than his words.
He stared at the bottle as if his mind were a million miles away. Then he laughed a self-deprecating laugh and shook his head before he took another drink. She stood a few feet away and watched him, wondering what kind of life would bring a man to this point.
There was a taint about Hank as if each of his years had slowly decayed him. No one could miss it. At times like this, he wore it like a hero wore his medals.
He was a rugged, cynical man with a distant isolation about him, a part of him that wasn’t open to the world. A part of him that said keep away. Hank Wyatt had all the scars and bruises of someone who had gone through hell at an early age and was still trying to get even.
“I’m sorry,” she said softly. And she was sorry not for how she felt, but sorry for him.
He looked up at her as if he just remembered she was there. He took another drink, then stared out at the sea. “Me, too, sweetheart. Real damn sorry.”
She shook her head, turned, and walked away.
* * *
Maybe it wasthe boozethat made Hank think. Maybe it was the trip inside that bottle and reminders of his past. But each night he had sat here on this small plot of beach. Alone. He’d recounted the years in his mind, drowning the memories with enough booze to make him forget who he was or who he could have been.
