"Maybe it'll turn out all right yet," he said, trying for reassurance.
"Maybe," she said, a dull hopelessness in her voice.
Then they ran out of language and they turned and watched the surf run away with their childhood.
Laddie sat at the helm of his small sailboat and watched his mother in the bow. He felt a gust of wind take the sail and automatically he compensated for the drift while scanning the sky.
There were squall clouds coming up ahead.
Time to head for the dock.
Slowly he began to come about.
"Turning back?" he heard his mother call.
"Yes, Mother," he replied.
It seemed strange to have her aboard. But she had wanted to come. It was almost as if she had sensed there was something troubling him.
"You've been pretty quiet this morning," she said.
He didn't meet her gaze. "I have to concentrate on the boat, Mother."
"I don't know what's the matter with you children," she said.
"You're both so moody lately."
He didn't answer. He kept his eyes on the squall clouds up ahead.
He thought about Rina. Then himself. Then his parents.
A sorrow began to well up inside him. He felt his eyes begin to burn and smart.
His mother's voice was shocked. "Why, Laddie, you're crying!" Then the dam broke and the sobs racked his chest. He felt his mother's hand draw his head down to her breast as she had done so often when he was a baby. "What's the matter, Laddie? What's wrong?" she asked softly.
"Nothing," he gasped, trying to choke back the tears. "Nothing."
She stroked his head gently.
"Something is wrong," she said softly. "I know there is.
You can tell me, Laddie.
Whatever it is, you can tell me.
I’ll understand and try to help."
"There's nothing you can do," he cried.
"Nothing anybody can do now!" "Try me and see." He didn't speak, his eyes searching her face for something, she didn't know what.
A curious dread came into her.
"Has it- is it something to do with Rina?"
It was as if the muscles that held his face together all dissolved at once. "Yes, yes!" he cried. "She's going to have a baby! My baby, Mother," he added through tight lips.
"I raped her, she's going to have my baby!"
"Oh, no!"
"Yes, Mother," he said, his face suddenly stony.
The tears sprang to her eyes and she covered her face with her hands.
This couldn't happen to her children. Not her children.
She had wanted everything for them, given them everything.
After a moment, she regained control of herself.
"I think we'd better turn back," she managed to say quietly.
"We are, Mother," he said. He looked down at his hands on the tiller.
The words slipped from him now. "I don't know what got into me, Mother." He stared at her with agonized eyes, his voice strained and tense. "But growing up isn't what it's cracked up to be, it's not what it says in books. Growing up's such a crock of shit!" He stopped in shock at his own language. "I'm sorry, Mother."
"It's all right, son."
They were silent for a moment and the waves slapped wildly against the hull of the boat.
"You mustn't blame Rina, Mother," he said, raising his voice. "She's only a kid. Whatever happened was my fault."
She looked up at her son. A glimmer of intuition pierced the gray veil that seemed to have fallen in front of her eyes.
"Rina's a very beautiful girl, Laddie," she said. "I think anyone would find it difficult not to love your sister."
Laddie met his mother's eyes. "I love her, Mother," he said quietly. "And she really isn't my sister."
Geraldine didn't speak.
"Is it terribly wrong to say that, Mother?" he asked.
"I don't love her like a sister. I love her" – he searched for a word – "different." Different, Geraldine thought. It was as good a word as any.
"Is it terribly wrong, Mother?" Laddie asked again.
She looked at her son, feeling a sorrow for him that she could not explain.