Cindy Bradley Monterey Peninsula

So much promise. As I walk along the beach, gently kicking up the white sand with my browned feet, my eyes lingering on the blue-green water, I imagine the possibility of new life stirring within me. I’m an emotional whirlwind.

T he cypress trees dot the top of the hill above. Eucalyptus is all around, lending the salty air a honeyed tone. The lilting breeze caresses, cajoles. So why the sense of doom?

We’re here to celebrate the first year of our marriage. We’re here, in this house in Carmel, with my family, at the spot where the sand at the top of the hill at the bottom of Ocean Ave begins its decline to the shore.

A peninsula is a piece of land that extends out from a larger land mass and is surrounded by water on three sides. This encompassing water is commonly understood to belong to a single contiguous body of water, but is not always elucidated as such. The origin stems from 16th century Latin, paene “almost” and insula “island” almost, but not quite, an island. I walk along the peninsula’s edge, crushed lemon-scented cypress needles beneath my feet, and it’s the almost that reverberates in my mind.

We’re here to celebrate our anniversary, but there will be no celebration. We drive up and down the peninsula, listening to my favorite Benny Margolis’ “Into the Night” or his favorite Bob Seger’s “Against the Wind” on the radio. We drive and drive, looking for the perfect spot for dinner. I want something different, something cozy. He finds something wrong with the fish house and Italian restaurant I point out. Finally, hungry and tired, he pulls into the McDonalds drive thru and maybe it’s here that I first begin refusing to answer when he asks me what I want. 7

Begins its decline…why hadn’t I thought of this before?

6

L ately he’s taken to putting me down in order to build himself up. Nothing big, just a little bit, nothing I can’t laugh off. Although when he asks how can I be so stupid or insults the breakfast I prepare on my morning to cook the omelet was a little runny and fell apart in pieces my family isn’t laughing.

4

At times I feel so empty, a scooped-out, hollow version of myself. Like the seashells found at the edge of the shore, hold me close. Listen carefully if you want to hear me.

Pacific Grove, Mid Summer (1984)

9

Sitting on the deck with my four month old daughter snugly in my lap and a cup of sweetened coffee in my hand, I watch my three-year-old son separate the seashells he’s collected and imagine contentment, even if it’s only temporarily.

14

His love is frothy with jealousies, churning with an undertow of possessiveness. I feel as though I’m drowning.

12

Is it here the excuses began? To my family, to myself?

15

We walk along Fisherman’s Wharf, the sound of sea lions barking beckoning us to spot them. My husband lifts our son on top of his shoulders, and my son sits securely, peering over the weathered wooden rail, his hands resting in his father’s wavy blonde hair. Our son points to a brown shape in the slow churning water, “found one!” and I bend forward with the baby, holding her close, peeking into the depths below.

13

It’s the summer of Bruce Springsteen’s Born in the U.S.A., Prince’s Purple Rain, and Tina Turner’s Private Dancer and I’ve got “Dancing in the Dark,” “When Doves Cry” and “Better Be Good to Me” continually playing in my head.

T here’s a look in my mother’s eyes, a look that occurs split seconds before the questions roll out of her mouth. She wants to know why I allow him to talk to me this way, taunt me this way, treat me this way. I don’t have the answers.

17

T he tide is low and there’s a glistening stretch of wet sand where I place my daughter in her infant seat. I stand with my camera a few feet away, wanting to capture it all the sand, the baby, the water, the sky, the isolation and the promise. One day years later my son will look at the picture and an anxiety will grip him as he asks in a panicked eight-year-old voice, Why was she alone? Why was she left behind? Where was everyone at?

19

Maybe it’s me. Maybe I’m hard to satisfy; maybe I don’t know what I want. He tells me I’m not the same person he married, and maybe he’s right. I don’t really know who I am.

I wonder how the land feels, surrounded by all that water. The ocean is so capricious here, it’s easy to think of the three sides as separate, competing with one another, crashing wildly one minute, nuzzling softly the next, completely forgetting they derive from the same source.

16

My daughter convulses in belly laughs as she watches her brother frolic in the waves. Their father is in the water with him, and they take turns splashing cupped handfuls of the Pacific. I dip the baby’s toes into the cool water and her laughter makes me smile. Maybe this will work, this little family of ours. After all, it’s what we both say we want. Maybe this getaway will erase the feelings of dread. Maybe I just make too much of things. Haven’t I always been told I have an overactive imagination?

10

A seagull shrieks overhead and I’m startled, spilling my coffee while the baby cries.

A gap is a blank space, an interruption, a hollow, a lull, an interlude between what came before and what comes after. It is both what we don’t remember and what we cannot say.

20

We’re lying in bed, windows open, ocean breeze drifting through, the billowing curtain rises and falls. Listening to the rhythmic sound of the surf puts me in a trance I’m suspended in time and space, lost in a waking dream tethered invisibly to the watery swell. He gets up and closes the window hard, snapping it shut.

T he sand rises in uneven mounds beneath my towel. Def Leppard implores to “Pour Some Sugar on Me,” George Michael declares “I Want Your Sex” while Steve Winwood prefers his “Higher Love.” I’ve decided I won’t choose. I want it all. 21

Different house, different beach, different desire, different man I’m dreaming of.

I tell myself it could happen to anyone, this disintegration of a marriage. Under these circumstances, under these stars, under this fate. Four babies in five years, three make it, one doesn’t. One person needs more than the other could give. Who wouldn’t buckle, who wouldn’t brittle, who wouldn’t break? I wouldn’t. 22

T he warm sand. The warm towel. The sun prickly against my skin. The heat of it all. 24

My children playing in the water. The sound of their laughter echoed by the seagulls overhead. Their blonde hair lightened, their cheeks turned pink, their well-being intact. So I hope.

T he peninsula reminds me of threes: my three children, three sides to every story and a forbidden love triangle. 26

I walk along the beach. The waves roll one after the other, undulating swells in close succession. The slant of the afternoon sun is silver this time of day, fat stars sparkling on the water. I look past the families, past the beach, past the wharf in the distance and into the hills, where I imagine you to be. If not this day, not this weekend, not this month, a day, a weekend or a month soon. 25

A s I inhale the tangy air I’m not sure which stings more. The callousness of the one before he left or the wanting of the other I can’t have. Oh wait. I know.

I t hink about what beats in the hollows, what pulses in the omission. 29

T he sun is warm and the air is cool. The fog is breaking up, exposing the blue sky that lies behind. My marriage broke up, shattered beyond repair. My husband’s blue eyes turned to ice, exposing his hurt and how quickly he could turn. We were so young, so much ahead but still so much to learn. I tell myself I tried my best, all the while knowing he’d say that was a lie.

31

Inside the house I help my mother prepare dinner. She’s requested my pasta salad and I’ve obliged. The kitchen is sunny and warm, windows open. The ocean air mingles with the aroma of cooked pasta, Italian dressing and spices. It’s a rare night in, as we’ve always been a family seeking what’s outside.

Monterey, Early Spring (1989)

54

I climb into the car as the sun breaks through the early morning fog. It’s a stunning morning. The band Breathe comes on the radio and so do I, exhale and wonder what comes next.

32 You once told me if it’s going to happen it would have to happen away from home, we’d need distance from prying eyes and small town gossip. I remembered your words so here I am.

42

It’s hard not to have expectations when it’s something you’ve wanted so long and never really thought you’d ever have. It’s hard when the time you have isn’t nearly enough. It’s hard.

33

I’ve found a quaint little motel nestled in the cypress trees. I pull into the secluded parking lot as “Into the Night,” newly rereleased, plays on the radio. I see this as a sign. The lyrics, swollen with longing, create an incantation I can’t shake, as I slowly exit the car, book a room, and phone the number where I know you’ll be. I leave a message and wait.

34

Now I’ve got “I’m On Fire,” “Take Me with You” and “What’s Love Got to Do with It” running through my mind. It’s so funny how that happens, tastes change, cravings turn to something else, something different. Even if it’s just a song.

45

A hot hand slides underneath the small of my back. Fevered green eyes burn into mine. So much heat. A husky voice whispers in the dark. You’re here. Finally.

Will I pay for this, will I suffer? Will he? Will either one of us care?

49

One. Two. Three. Four. Five times.

41

You’re surprised. Didn’t think I’d really do it, didn’t think I’d come. Let me surprise you some more.

39

I don’t wish to know about your marriage. Not tonight. I know enough. She has her own distractions, her own indiscretions and has set you loose on certain conditions of which I’m not one. I wish so many things.

52

Even now, floating in the smoky penumbra, I find I have things I can’t tell you. Words become swallows in the hollow swells of gaps.

37

I’ve wanted this. I’ve been afraid to want this. I don’t want this to end. I’m afraid.

36

I think of my children but I try not to think of my mother. I’ve made plans to pick them up at her house on the way home. She thinks I’m somewhere else, and in a way she’s right. I don’t think of their father at all. Sometimes I don’t think of all the consequences.

47

I’ve brought food so we could stay in, accustomed as I am to keeping things hidden. He insists on taking me to one of his favorite restaurants, where we’ll order Italian. We venture outside and walk underneath a canopy of suddenly bashful trees. He reaches for my hand, pulls me close and we lean into the night.

Nicole Walker