Tsunami Blue by Gayle Ann Williams Page B

me in next to him.
    “She’s okay, boys,” he said before I could find my voice. “Bacon just caught her off guard.”
    I nodded, still not trusting my voice. I looked at Bacon, held back in Nick’s arms. This dog was certainly not Max. Could never be Max.
    “She’s beautiful, boys,” I said at last, hoping my voice didn’t sound as shaky as I felt.
    “Did you have a dog like her, Bambi?” Nick asked as he let Bacon go and she trotted over to my side. “’Cause you called her Max. Just Gabe had one too. Bacon’s brother.”
    I knelt and held the dog’s massive head in my arms. “Once,” was all I could get out.
    “Hey, Just Gabe,” Alec said. “Maybe Bambi’s dog was related to Bacon and Beans.”
    “Beans?” I looked up at Gabriel. “Please don’t tell me you named your dog Beans.” I had a hard time keeping the ice out of my voice. Max was magnificent, not a joke. Not deserving of a name like Beans.
    “It wasn’t Just Gabe,” said Nick. “The breeder named them.”
    “The breeder?”
    “Yeah. They were the second litter, the B litter. Bacon and Beans. Just Gabe took Beans and gave us Bacon.”
    “Yeah,” said Alec. “Right after our parents died. Bacon’s been our family ever since.”
    “Bacon and Just Gabe,” Nick said, shrugging. “When he’s around.”
    “I’m around, boys,” Gabriel said, “even when you don’t realize it.”
    I stopped petting Bacon and looked at Gabriel, surprised at the raw honesty in his voice and the intensity of his words. Sadness creased the corners of his eyes and I realized the investment he had in these boys. He loved them. Pure and simple. It was evident in his voice. In the way he looked at them with pride, the way he patted their shoulders, the way he tossed their shaggy hair.
    What was it like to be loved like that? My family, now a faint memory, had loved me like that. Hadn’t they? Loneliness and pain filled my heart, and as I gazed upon the boys an awkward silence filled the air around us. A sorry little band of misfits, that was us: a rogue Runner, a freakish captive, orphaned twins, and one huge dog. Sounded like characters in a classic work of fiction. If only we could all have a happy ending. But with a monster wave coming, I knew it wasn’t possible.
    I stood and walked to the bow, inching out on the narrow wooden sprit. The tide was closing in and the pools were melting into one another, releasing the jellies to travel on the current, final destination unknown. The air smelled of sulfur and salt, and the winter sun felt warming yet waning, as the sky filled with clouds promising another overcast day.
    One of the boys padded up behind me and I turned and looked into the hazel eyes of Nick. I thought of him and his brother, alone after their parents’ deaths, and I couldn’t help myself. I had to ask.
    “How did they die, your parents?”
    “Wave.”
    “Oh,” I said, my voice a whisper. Didn’t I just know how that felt. I turned and faced the boy, so close to being a man, and yet closer still to a child. My heart hurt for them both.
    “Tsunami Blue saved us, though.”
    Shocked into silence, I didn’t know what to say.
    “We heard the warning on the radio. Alec and me, we got to higher ground and got ourselves up a tree. That’s where Just Gabe found us. He’s been looking after us ever since.”
    Nick settled on the deck and crossed his legs. “Have you ever heard her, Bambi? Tsunami Blue?”
    They can’t know who you are. They can’t know. Gabriel’s message played in my head. “Can’t say that I have,” I replied, hating the lie and hating Gabriel for making me tell it.
    “She saved us. Wish we could meet her someday. That’s what Alec and I want more than anything.”
    Anything? “How come?” I found myself asking.
    “’Cause when we hear her voice she makes us feel safe. Kinda like Just Gabe does. We don’t think she’s a witch or anything.”
    Well, that was a relief. “You don’t?”
    “Naw. She’s