Part Seven

At 5:15 a.m. the sky was apricot-colored in the east and blue directly overhead as Peggy walked up the ramp to the ferry. A single long cloud reflected the glow of the sun. The weather report had predicted highs in the 80s. Peggy could feel Summer coming on.

Raoul was not present as Peggy took her seat, and as the ferry pulled away it was obvious he wouldn't be riding today. No Raoul. She felt two sensations immediately: one was disappointment at his absence; the other was annoyance with herself for getting worked up over a man she hardly knew, a man she met on the ferry just a few weeks earlier.

Peggy's thoughts were interrupted by the view from her window as the boat motored out of Eagle Harbor and made the turn into Puget Sound. Directly across the water was Seattle, and behind it a backdrop that looked like an artist had sketched a long dark squiggly line on an orange and yellow canvas. It was the Cascade Range, etched beautifully against the morning sky. To her right was Mount Rainier, fully visible from base to summit, still covered with snow and ice, glowing orange and yellow. To her left was Mount Baker far in the distance. She wished Raoul was there to enjoy the view with her. As the ferry made another turn and headed directly across the Sound, Rainier slid from her view, just as the top edge of the sun made its appearance from behind the mountains. Several downtown skyscrapers began to twinkle as their upper windows caught the rays and bounced the light toward the Sound. Once the boat had turned, Peggy could look over her shoulder at Bainbridge Island, quickly receding, and beyond it the snow-covered peaks of the Olympic Range rose majestically into view.

Peggy remembered a hike she had taken with her late husband, Taylor. It was less than two years before his death; he was still healthy and active even then. They had driven to Hurricane Ridge, on the Olympic Peninsula, on a very clear December day. It was cloudy at the low elevations, around the port town of Sequim, but as they drove up to the ridge in their car they broke through the clouds and came out on a vista with a fifty- mile view and the bluest sky Peggy had ever seen.

They walked along a snow-covered road that had been packed down by many hikers and cross-country skiers before them. Taylor, wrapped in his parka and sunglasses, took pictures of everything in sight. He was always in awe of his surroundings, always amazed at the marvels of Nature, even after seeing them over and over again. Peggy had found those pictures while unpacking after her move to Bainbridge Island and it made her terribly homesick for her former life with Taylor, living in Ballard, raising their son and daughter. She had not heard from her children in a couple of weeks; they both lived across the country: the daughter in Arlington, Virginia, and the son in Brooklyn, New York. It made her terribly sad to have lost that life. She lived, she thought, a form of death, a state of not living at all, of going through the motions of existence, doing things in a mechanical way, out of habit rather than any real desire to do them. It was a special form of death that comes after a loved one has passed on, after a life has ended and a survivor is faced with surviving.

"Peggy?" A man's voice, but not Taylor's.

She was startled out of her reflection. It was Raoul, without his usual motorcycle leathers and helmet. Instead it was just the dark suit and tie that he normally wore underneath his riding outfit. His gray beard was neatly trimmed. He was handsome.

"I had to drive the car today," he said, sliding onto the bench next to her. "So I thought I would come up to see if you were here. And to see if maybe you wanted to meet for lunch."

Peggy felt a wave of relief wash over her like the swells of water rising and falling against the sides of the ferry. "Yes. I would love to," she said.