Sea Beggar

Sea Beggar, By Tracy Rud

Islamorada, Florida
August, 2007

“What in the hell was I thinking?” Macy said to no one in particular, holding the lock to the gate that enclosed the property.

Her parents bought the land when she was nine—three acres at the end of a small peninsula on the bay side of Long Key. The peninsula faced a small group of islands, the Isles of Sumter, which lay to the northeast about half a mile away. The peninsula completed the west side of a horseshoe that partially enclosed an old quarry. Macy called it “the lagoon,” and remembered many a day jumping off the rope swing into the deep azure blue water. Vacationers used to park on the side of the road to take a dip, fish, or just leisurely enjoy the picturesque view. If they were lucky, they might spy a dolphin or two swimming in the bay just on the edge of the lagoon.

There was a lot of discussion around what to name the estate. Macy remembered the last conversation well.

“How did you come up with Pirate’s Cove?” Juliette asked Robert.

“Well, it reminds me of a similar jetty in Rye, New Hampshire. Just around the corner was a restaurant called Pirate’s Cove. Great baked scallop pie. Plus, you’ve heard the locals say there’s treasure buried somewhere around the peninsula.” Robert winked at her.

Juliette smirked and rolled her eyes. She knew he had more than a just a passive interest in the pirate stories that his family told again and again.

“I must admit though, I will miss our camping days,” she said.

Macy would miss those days, too. Sleeping 20 feet from the water, listening to the ebb and flow of the little waves licking the shoreline and the water birds announcing their catch in the night shallows.

With the insurance money and the remainder of her parents’ assets she no longer needed to work. But she felt useless and idle with too much time on her hands. Now, the house was nothing more than a skeleton of rebar and concrete that stood on the peninsula like a sentry, waiting for the return of the wayfarers that would never make it home. Macy decided to take a year off and resume construction on it. Somehow, she would make Pirate’s Cove her home.

She roamed the around the lonely structure, hearing voices and whispers at every turn. She watched the sunset from the second floor of the skeleton house. The September sun dipped below the lowest cloud and painted a burnished orange arc just above the horizon. It reminded her of a child taking a swipe across a page using a fistful of orange and red crayons. The sun settled into its cozy night-nest and Macy turned to her own bed—an air mattress and sleeping bag on the floor. The roof was in place on the house but the vast open spaces allowed the breeze to dance around the rooms before exiting to the ocean side. She wept a little thinking of her parents, but being in the open air near the water made her feel closer to them.

Macy settled into her sleeping bag and grabbed a bottled water from her cooler. The only other items in the second floor bedroom were a telescope she had brought from her apartment in New York, some clothing, a battery-operated lantern, and a book about the stars. She didn’t even bring anything to protect herself from unsavory characters. Sure, the Keys were full of unsavory characters, but dangerous ones were few and far between. Plus, she’d lived in New York City for the last dozen years, and Macy thought that about said it all.

Watching the stars had been her passion since she was in junior high. She thought about studying astronomy at NYU but opted for something that might afford her a better living—Finance. After a 10-year stint on Wall Street as a stockbroker, Macy was now hundreds of miles, and what felt like hundreds of years away from that life. She didn’t miss it at all.

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