She rocks, the antiquated chair creaking quietly against the worn wood of the porch. The sun blazes high overhead and she pauses; bends to steal a sip of lemonade, pink from the pitcher on the table beside her.
“So what do you think, Ma?” He nudges her back into consciousness, awareness of his presence.
She reflects, scrutinizing her son, seated still at her feet, nearly aged himself now: back bent, head bald, beard white. Just like his father, God rest his soul.
“I always wanted to live by the ocean,” she replies, turning away from him to face it again: the calm azure horizon, the warm gentle breakers foaming white off the shore.
“I know you did,” he says, turning, too. Seabirds scuttle back and forth across the muddy beach, forcing their beaks into the saturated earth when the waves retreat; retreating themselves when the wet wash returns.
She continues to rock, clasps her hands tight in her lap as she watches, thinking sadly of Herbert, the view they might have shared had he only lived longer.
“It’s lovely,” she admits at last. “But I don’t like having so many new people in town.”
Herbert Jr. leans back on his callused palms; extends his lanky legs down over the wide wooden steps, the familiar front stoop of his long-ago youth.
“They had to go somewhere,” he reminds her gently.
“I suppose,” she concedes. “But I do hope they’ll go home soon.”
He peers worriedly into the gray fog of his mother’s eyes. “They can’t go home, Ma. Remember I told you? Their houses are underwater now.”
“Still?” she inquires, astonished. “But it’s been so long.”
He swallows. “Don’t you remember, Ma? I told you what happened, with the sea level and all…”
“Laziness, pure laziness!” she sputters, an old fire rekindling itself in her cool clouded eyes. “In my day we knew how to work, how to rebuild after a catastrophe. Why, when your father came back from the war…”
He allows her to ramble while he again seeks the sea; descries the encampment at the foot of the dunes to the north, the shanty-town set upon the cliff to the south. For once he is grateful that her sight has grown dim.
“…There wasn’t a country in the world that could match us for productivity! We were proud to be Americans, proud to belong to these fifty states!”
“Forty-seven,” Herbert sighs without thinking.
She ceases rocking, cold choler in her countenance. “I’m not senile, Herbert. You think I don’t know how many states there are?’
“Sorry, Ma,” he answers contritely.
She sips her lemonade sourly. “You should be,” she agrees. “I suppose next you’ll be telling me it isn’t awfully warm for November?”
“No, Ma. You’re absolutely right; it is awfully warm for November.”
She resumes her rocking, a bit more fiercely; squints past her son at the calm azure coast, the light tranquil breakers, the warm gentle waves lapping ever nearer, ever closer to the old family home.
Lori Schafer’s flash fiction, short stories, and essays have appeared in numerous print and online publications, and she is currently at work on her third novel. Her memoir, On Hearing of My Mother’s Death Six Years After It Happened: A Daughter’s Memoir of Mental Illness is being released in October 2014. You can find out more about Lori and her forthcoming projects by visiting her website at http://lorilschafer.blogspot.com/.
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