Chapter 21 #2
Another farewell, she thought, and found to her surprise that she was not as sad as she expected to be, although she was still anxious about what lay ahead.
She knew she would miss her work at the hospital, although she was hopeful she might find some kind of nursing position in Alaska.
As for the people she was leaving behind…
most of them had already gone. Philip and Adelaide, Wilhemina, even Jenny…
they’d all slipped out of her life, or were about to, before she’d boarded this ship.
Maybe, Maggie reflected, she’d chosen to come to Alaska not just because she wanted to be with her family, but because she wanted something more for herself.
It was a better thought than that she’d simply run away out of fear or made a mistake.
Maybe she wasn’t as different from her da as she’d always thought, and just like him, some part of her hankered after the wide blue skies of adventure.
Maggie’s hands tightened on the railing as she lifted her chin to let the sea breeze cool her heated cheeks.
“There you are,” Brendan said as he came to stand beside her on the crowded deck, his hands resting on the railing as they both looked out at the harbor. “It’s a madhouse down there. I was worried I wouldn’t get a bunk.”
“It seems a lot of people want to go to Alaska,” Maggie agreed. She slid him a sideways glance, trying to gauge his mood. He’d seemed so surprised and maybe even displeased before, when he’d realized she was coming with them to Alaska. Was he finally starting to accept her presence?
“Or at least Washington,” Brendan replied. “We’ll need to take another steamer to get all the way to Alaska, from Port Townsend.”
“I don’t even know the route,” Maggie admitted.
She barely knew anything about the journey or even the destination besides what little Brendan had already told her.
Again, she was struck by the recklessness of her own actions, and yet despite the anxiety swirling in her stomach, she couldn’t regret her decision.
Not yet, anyway. Perhaps in time she would.
“From Port Townsend to Victoria and then Fort Wrangell, and finally Juneau.”
“Juneau…” The name was familiar, but still felt foreign. “That’s where we’re going?”
Brendan nodded. “For now, anyway. I don’t know what kind of place it is—there’s a big hard rock gold mine there, and I’ve heard the weather is more temperate than it is in other places in Alaska, but as for how rough it is, the kind of people…
” He shook his head, smiling faintly. “I think it will be quite different than any of the other places we’ve been.
It might take some getting used to, you know? ”
“I’m sure,” Maggie murmured, although, in truth, she couldn’t imagine it at all. All she knew about Alaska was that it was wild and vast… and cold. Although, according to Brendan, maybe not in Juneau. “And what are you hoping to do there?” she asked. “You said there were business opportunities?”
“I don’t know,” Brendan admitted. He braced his forearms on the railing as he stared out at the waterfront, his gaze narrowed against the glare of the morning sun, the wind ruffling his hair. “Truth be told, I came as much to get away as to go to. I just… I needed to escape from it all.”
He pressed his lips together, his eyes narrowing further, so Maggie could see the crow’s feet fanning them in a way that was not unattractive.
He was thirty now, and the roundness of his face had hardened into a lean cheek and chiseled jaw.
There was a toughness to him that hadn’t been there before, perhaps from his years escorting unruly guests from Miss Jessie’s. It suited him, she thought.
“Do you mean the parlor house?” Maggie asked hesitantly. “You wanted to leave it behind?” She braced herself, afraid of what else he might say.
Brendan kept his gaze on the waterfront.
“That, I suppose, but…” He blew out a long, low breath.
“Ever since we left New York, I’ve been drifting in one way or another.
I haven’t settled to anything, I haven’t found a way forward…
” He raised one hand to knuckle his forehead.
“And I thought maybe in Alaska… it could be different. I could be different.”
Maggie regarded him uncertainly; he sounded so resigned, as if he had decided he couldn’t be different even before they’d gotten there, when they hadn’t even left the harbor.
“You can be different, Brendan,” she told him. “We all can.”
At least she hoped so. Wasn’t that why they were traveling on yet again?
That, and because they were once more running away from trouble.
Well, Danny and her da were. Maybe she was running, too, in her way, not from trouble, but from loneliness.
From feeling like, even now, there had to be more to this life.
“No, I can’t be different, Maggie!” The words burst out of Brendan, shocking her so she took a stumbling step back. He turned to face her, his cheeks flushed with what she feared was anger. “I can’t,” he continued, his voice rising, “because you decided to come with us!”
Her mouth dropped open as she stared at him in shock. His face was still flushed, his eyes sparking, but she realized he didn’t sound angry. He sounded hopeless.
“Brendan—”
“Do you know how long I’ve tried to escape you?
” he asked her in a low, agonized voice.
“How long I’ve tried to be what you want?
Because you’ve said that you weren’t what I wanted, Maggie, but I’ve come to realize that was just an excuse, and the truth is, I’m not what you want.
It’s never been about me trapping you into marriage, motherhood, all that.
It’s that I’m not the person you want to be trapped with. ”
Maggie stared at him in deep dismay, her stomach hollowing out, her head feeling light and faint. “Brendan…” She had no idea what to say to him.
“God knows I’ve tried,” he continued. “I’ve tried to be your would-be lover and husband, and then your friend and then even just your acquaintance.
I’ve tried to keep my distance, and I’ve tried to show you how much I care.
None of it works.” He let out a sad huff of laughter.
“Even this last year, seeing you only every few months, and then with Jessamine…” He shook his head.
“Nothing works, Maggie, nothing. But I thought maybe if I went to Alaska, if I traveled to a place where you’d never go, then maybe, just maybe, I could finally be free of you.
Of wanting you and never having you. Loving you and having you never love me back.
Because I don’t want to love you anymore, Maggie. I don’t want to. I can’t.”
Maggie pressed her hand to her hot cheek, her stomach swirling.
“You don’t want me here,” she whispered.
His surprising lack of welcome on the deck made so much more sense, and yet to have it stated as plainly as that…
She felt sick with the knowledge she saw written plainly on his face.
“You left because of me.” And she was following him all the way to Alaska, much to his obvious regret—and now her own horror.
“Not just because of you,” Brendan replied heavily. “But… yes. I wanted to get away. From you.” He stared at her levelly, his eyes seeming empty.
Maggie stared back, horrified. Why had she come?
“I… I don’t…” she began, not even sure what she was trying to say. That she wouldn’t seek him out in Alaska? That they could go their separate ways? That she was sorry that he’d been so tormented by her for the last four years?
Was that her fault, or his?
Before either of them could say anything more, the ship horn sounded, low and mournful, and City of Pueblo began to move away from the shore.