Siren's Cove
by Cassie Sandwich
Balance Sheet
~ 2018 ~
Me and my brother walk the long path up towards the cliffs of the island, off the side of the beach. If the air felt humid and cool down on the beach, up here it was salty and acrid; a true seafront’s air. It was the perfect vantage point to look out onto the open sea, to feel the cool ocean air, to watch the waves splash onto the rocky shoal below. It wasn’t a difficult climb or anything. It was like the island itself carved the path up here, like it was begging its visitors to come here. Still, I’ve never seen anyone but myself or my brother make the hike. Blue light started filtering in from the sky, and what had once been inky blackness had given way to a soft, dreamlike haze.
“So.” Edgar leans back against one of the jagged, craggy rock outcroppings we used to play on as kids.
“So,” I repeat back to him. My nerves start to eat at me a little. I can feel my guts start to summersault.
“What exactly did you mean? That you don’t care?”
I look down, almost in shame. I know he must be judging me, turning my back on the family like this, on our legacy. “I’m sorry. I’m not cut out for this. This was never my world. I was always supposed to be the soft, quiet, also ran of the family. Easily ignored on the side, allowed to just do my own thing. Where my actual passions lie.”
He crosses his arms, scowling at me. “You’re going to be a terrible leader with that attitude, Morty.”
I blanch, I feel like I’m going to empty what little bile and acid I have in my stomach right now. Instead, I vomit out what I’ve been holding back for a while. “I’m not going to be the leader. Edgar, do you not understand what I’m trying to say? I’m not taking the position.”
At that, his entire body language changes. His mouth falls open, his arms slack down to his sides. I’ve actually managed to shock him. After a minute, he seems to come back to his senses. He’s still totally slack jawed, but he manages to speak. “What? No, you have to take it. No one else can.”
I walk up to him, leaning against the outcropping myself now across my shoulder. “You can, Edgar. You care, you know what you’re doing. You would be an amazing leader. You could take this company into the stars if you wanted to. I’d run it into the ground.”
“You don’t know what you’re talking about.” He sighs, pressing his head up against the crag. “I’m removed from the family trust, from the family registry. Dad burned me out. He took it from me. No one is going to let me waltz back in and take over the place. You can’t shrug this one off, bro.”
I frown, rubbing under my eyes. “If he took it, then I can give it back. I can make them take you back. We can reinstate you, get it done together. We hold all the power in this now. This is a family squabble, and the only family left is you and me.”
He laughs to himself, shaking his head. “To do that, you’d have to take the position. It’d be so long, so difficult, that eventually they’d decide they already have their man. It’s not going to happen.”
I don’t say anything to that. I sigh, slump down onto my ass, head against the outcrag. He follows suit, leaning against me softly. “Do you remember…” he starts, “When we were kids? How we used to play here? On the cliff?”
I laugh slightly, disheartenedly, turning away. “Yeah, man. Taking turns pretending to be the witch? Make a wish, and then scamper away while the other tries to get them.” I pick up a pebble, and throw it over towards the cliffside.
“I don’t think I heard you ever laugh as hard as when you got to play the witch, and actually caught me.” His smile faltered a little, head shaking. “I never did get you to actually make a wish, though. Little chickenshit.” He reaches over and musses with my hair.
“Hey!” I push him away, laughing. “You can’t blame a little kid for being actually scared of the ghost stories you would keep telling. I actually thought I would die up here if I did that.”
“I don’t think,” he says, “even if the magic was real. That anything a little kid could ask for would be that dangerous.”
I reach up for my pendant, grab it between my fingers, twist it back and forth in front of me. “You know what? What I would ask of the island? What I actually desire?” The knots are back. I really can’t believe I’m going to tell him. The shameful thought I’ve had in the back of my mind. But the thought won’t leave my head now that I’ve started. I know he, of all people, would understand.
He scowls, folds his arms over his chest. “Mort, I swear to christ, if you say that you’d put me in the lead chair one more time I’ll–”
“What I want,”I interrupt him, before stopping. Breathing in, holding. Calming myself. Now or never. “What I want, more than anything, is to not be a Penrose.”
Once again, he stares at me blankly. “Not be… what?”
I grip the pendant tightly. “I mean it! I don’t… I don’t want any of this! The position, the fame, the power, the money! I don’t want the connections or the influence or the responsibilities or the way that people look at you…”
He stands up, dumbfounded. “You don’t know what you’re saying.”
“I know exactly what I’m goddamned saying!” I bolt upwards, face to face with him. I thrust my hand into his face, pointing, chain dangling down from my fist. “You might be too scared to say what you want, that you want everything I have, but I’m not!”
He stares at my hand, eyes moving back and forth. “I don’t… I…”
I watch the delicate chain wave in the breeze, before pulling it back to my face, opening my palm. In my haste to stand up, I accidentally ripped the necklace off my body. I stare at it, the massive thing disguised as a dainty pendant. “I know I’m being greedy. That I have everything I could ever want, and I would reject it. I thought about trying to eat my cake and have it too. Stay but have you take the work. I could pump so much money into my charity…” I stop, and laugh. “I keep saying ‘my charity’, but all I do is pump money into someone else’s work. What have I actually done to help anyone? Ever in my life?”
He goes to open his mouth, but before he can I thrust my hand out to him, palm open. He looks at it and looks at me. “What are you doing?”
“Take it.” I thrust my hand out towards him again, and hold it there. “I want to be a new, better person. Someone who could actually help people who need it. I want to be as far away from this miserable legacy as possible. And I’ll give anything for it. My name, my money, my position. I’d start over with nothing. Anything to be rid of it.”
He just stares at my hand, before slowly reaching for the pendant, picking it up. Looking at it in his own hand. I walk away, looking out over the sea. The sun’s just starting to break over the horizon. The sky is a brilliant, hazy blue, with a deep gold ridge.
My brother calls from behind me. “What’s your wife going to think?”
I laugh, still watching the sun rise. “Of course I’ve discussed this with her already. Maybe not phrased as extremely, or so finally a position, but she knows. That I don’t plan on taking it. She told me to reconsider, to think about it. And now I have. I’ll never put her in a place where she’s going to be uncomfortable, I know the woman I married. But I know we can make it through this together. And, you too!” I turn to face him, eyes shut, smile wide. “You’re going to make out so well on this, Edgar. I think everyone’s going to make out just fi–”
A rush of wind, an earth shattering pounding noise, a violent explosion of pain. I open my eyes as I topple to the floor, vision blurring over, watching as my brother stands over me.
