Geography
Whoosh-hush, whoosh-hush, waves breaking on a shore. Seaside air is a balm, the very breath of life on Earth. Filtered through cedars and infused with ocean, each inhalation healed my sore body, but chilly white mist enveloped the trees, seeped inside my skin and drifted through me like despair.
Once upon a time I had ten fingers, a home and a family. That was before the Juan de Fuca tectonic plate sprang free of its sticking place, releasing centuries of stored kilojoules, and an earthquake measuring 9.3 on the Richter scale shook the west coast of North America like a colicky infant in the hands of a raging parent. Fissures swallowed neighbourhoods. Bridges collapsed and tossed cars into chasms. Glass and steel filled the streets. Nuclear waste tainted water supplies. Dams fractured, releasing floods, and landslides buried roads. Tsunamis battered harbours and toppled buildings.
The earthquake brought death and destruction. I should have been safe.
Once upon a time I lived on a farm in the Okanagan Valley with my husband, Prax, and three half-grown children. When the earthquake struck Amelia had been a feisty and rebellious teenager, Thane a sullen adolescent and Cleo a quirky twelve-year-old. Manx, our golden retriever, had also lived on the farm, and two horses, Math and Duchess, and a dozen sheep, more or less, depending on cougar attacks and the toughness of the lambing season. Our life had been enviable, marbled with imperfections but overwhelmingly rich and good. We’d been living far from the epicentre yet I had lost everyone and everything.
How was it possible?
Not lost, as in dead. Lost, as in lost track of.
After the earthquake, animals spoke. I heard them in my head and answered them out loud. Animals are better listeners than talkers and their expectations are refreshingly low. A bull snake once listened to me for hours, yellow-black eyes unblinking.Yesss, the snake had said, then slithered into the sunset and never returned. Sea lions weren’t like snakes; Tish and Tosh wanted to hear why I was alone on the coast, preparing to die. The truth would feel good, like a deathbed confession. But where should I begin? Could I relate events coherently, without mistakes and omissions? My story was blurry because when the earthquake struck I had been stoned.
The drugs were because of a fall from a horse. The horse was because of Henry.
…
My parents, Gus and Helen Campion, made a fortune as oil exploration consultants in Alberta. In their late thirties they semi-retired to Vancouver Island, close to beaches, hikes, bike trails and kayaking routes. Tall, tan and brashly confident, Gus managed investments from our spacious home in Sooke, cocktail in hand, cursing when tech markets took a nosedive. Helen left business behind in Alberta and in a
