“I understand. Then it’s all settled. When do you want to do it?”
“I’ll need at least a month to recuperate,” Joaquin said, a twinkle coming into his eyes. “With Maria’s help, of course.”
“Don’t be fresh or I’ll get a sixty-year-old nurse to take care of you,” Maria said and they all burst out laughing. “I’ll get with you, Pat, about timing.”
Six weeks later, there was a small group in attendance, including Steve’s sister-a pretty, pleasant woman in her mid-forties-when Jack and Pat, and then Joaquin and Maria, pledged their love to each other. Afterwards, they had a little reception at the house.
“I’m glad I rented this place to you,” Steve said to Jack, clinking his champagne glass. “I thought I’d have to eat it Now I’ve got a buyer and it still might stay in the family.” They both laughed. What a wonderful day, Jack thought. What wonderful people.
Six months after that wonderful day, Clay Evans stopped at his favorite coffee shop near his home in a rural section of Homestead, a suburb of Miami, to get a cup to go as he did every morning. As he exited the building, someone said they heard what sounded like a firecracker going off. It came from the woods across the road. Clay Evans was killed instandly by the bullet, which pierced his skull and shattered his brain. The bullet came from an unregistered rifle and the police had absolutely no clues as to the perpetrator, although some were sure the shot had to have been fired by a sniper.
The case was eventually put in a pile of unsolved murders. It was the same fate of the case of four murdered men found on a back road in Cobb County.
A few weeks after the trial was over, in the early morning before sunrise, Jack and Pat and Nancy’s father, Jim, went out on the river in Jack’s little outboard. They had two little urns containing the ashes of Nancy and Rudy. A few miles down the river, Jack made a right turn out of the busy traffic into a narrow canal bordered on both sides by thick mangroves and tall pines. He motored a ways down the canal and cut the motor. They sat in the dark for several minutes listening to the crickets drone and the frogs croak. As the sun started to rise, everything turned silent. Jack nodded to Jim and Pat, who placed the urns together, leaned them out over the water and slowly turned them so that the ashes intermingled as they fell. When they were finished, they all sat there silently, enjoying the tranquillity until the voices of the morning broke through. Birds appeared on shore and overhead, and Jack was about to start the outboard when something happened that none of them would ever forget. Two ospreys took off from atop the tall pines and circled the little canal twice, side by side. Then they hovered high above the little boat and flapped their wings before flying off.
After a few minutes, Jack started the boat and headed down the canal. Pat turned from the sights on the shoreline to look at him. He had a smile on his face and tears in his eyes, and he was mumbling something.
“What?” Pat asked gently.
Jack almost couldn’t get the words out.
“I’m sure now,” he told her.
“Sure about what?”
“That I can tell Mikey I’ll remember. I’ll always remember.”