Salvage by Stephen Maher Page B

stood there on the dock, listening, and I could hear the two of them grunting and moaning.”
    He laughed and looked out the window. “The hatch was open, so I jumped through it and landed right in the salon, right where he was banging her. Fucking shock of their lives. Still had his cock in her.”
    â€œSo, what’d you do?” said Angela.
    â€œNothing,” he said. “Waved my arms. Shouted. Called her a whore. Told her to get her shit off my boat. Told Bobby to get his boat off Charlie’s dock and stay the fuck away from me or I’d cut him open like a flounder. Then I stomped out of there. Last time I talked to either one of them.”
    â€œJesus,” she said. “I suppose you went on a tear, did you?”
    â€œI had a few drinks, yeah,” he said.
    â€œHow long’d it last?” she said.
    He helped himself to another one of her cigarettes. “Well, I don’t know. I think about seven years, so far.”
    They laughed together then and Angela lit their cigarettes. “I have to stop smoking until I have the baby,” she said.
    â€œYou’ll feel better about yourself if you do,” said Scarnum, and he put his hand on her flat tummy, where he thought the baby must be.
    â€œI don’t know,” she said. “I guess so. I couldn’t feel much worse. I can’t believe I got coked up the night I found out about Jimmy.”
    She started to tear up. “Oh my God,” she said. “I just keep thinking about the baby, whether it will be like one of those crack babies.”
    Scarnum tried to take her into his arms, but she pushed him away, and suddenly the tears were gone.
    â€œDo you think I’m a bad person?” she said and she studied his face as he answered.
    â€œNo,” he said. “I think you were under a terrible strain and you broke down. I think it was wrong, but I can’t blame you, and I’m no doctor, but I’m pretty sure that one binge like that won’t fuck up your baby.”
    â€œJesus,” she said. “When I was dancing in Montreal, I did some wild shit, things I never told nobody about, things that would curl your hair, but I never did anything as bad as I did that night. What kind of a mother am I going to be?”
    Scarnum pulled her into his arms, and she let him hold her this time. She cried softly, snuffling in his ear.
    â€œYou’re going to be a grand mother, Angela,” he said, and he kissed her behind her ear and stroked her hair. “I know you’ve got a good heart. You’re going to love that kid, and that’s the most important thing. I’m not worried about what kind of a mother you’ll be. Jesus. I seen you with your sister’s kids, those little brats. I woulda wrung that young fellow’s neck, the way he was carrying on, but you were patient and sweet. You’re gonna be fine. It’s not gonna be easy. I don’t think it’s the easiest thing, raising a kid with no daddy, but I know you can do it, ’cause you have to, and you’re gonna wanna do it because you’ll never love anybody as much as you love the kid you’re carrying around inside you right now.”
    He pushed her away and held her at arm’s length and looked her in the eyes, serious. She blinked at him and rubbed her tears away with the heel of her hand.
    â€œAnd it’ll be years before he knows that his mother used to be a coke whore.”
    She laughed and slapped him, and they wrestled in the back seat until Scarnum was hard again, and they made love again, much more slowly.

    S carnum got Angela to drop him off on the side of Highway 3 behind the Back Harbour, where a shallow, rocky brook runs under the road.
    He walked down to the woods and crept along the edge of the brook, following it to the ocean in the dusk. He slipped a few times on the wet rocks and got his feet wet.
    Eventually, he came to the stone bridge at the head of the