Fire in the Stars Read online

  In memory of my father, Cecil Currie

  Contents

  Dedication

  One

  Two

  Three

  Four

  Five

  Six

  Seven

  Eight

  Nine

  Ten

  Eleven

  Twelve

  Thirteen

  Fourteen

  Fifteen

  Sixteen

  Seventeen

  Eighteen

  Nineteen

  Twenty

  Twenty-One

  Twenty-Two

  Twenty-Three

  Twenty-Four

  Twenty-Five

  Twenty-Six

  Twenty-Seven

  Twenty-Eight

  Twenty-Nine

  Acknowledgements

  By the Same Author

  Chapter One

  Amanda didn’t begin to worry in earnest until a hint of land shimmered through the early morning fog. Slowly, Newfoundland emerged in a ragged silhouette of rock and the blurred white spire of a lighthouse. The MV Highlanders had ten decks and she was on the top, her favourite place. The powerful engine of the ferry throbbed beneath her and the cold ocean foamed below. She leaned on the railing and sheltered her cellphone from the mist. It had finally registered a signal from the town of Port aux Basques.

  No messages. Not one word from Phil. Normally this would be a minor frustration. Black holes could swallow him up for days on end, but he’d spring out of them ebullient and cleansed as if they had never happened. Even my wife calls me Mr. Unreliable, he’d once said with a twinkle in his eye.

  But this time was different. For one thing, this camping trip had been his idea, and Amanda had sensed a manic edge to his excitement when he’d begged her to come. You need this, he’d said. We need it. There’s nothing like the wilds of nature to heal a broken soul. She wasn’t so sure, but it was the closest he’d come to admitting to a problem.

  For another, he’d promised to do all the planning. Newfoundland was his adopted home now, and he wanted to show off its charms. All Amanda had to do was get herself, her motorcycle, and a sleeping bag over to the Rock and he’d find them the perfect getaway. Imagine miles of rugged coast, tangy surf, the wind in her face, and the call of ocean birds. After her long, bleak year spent clawing back from the terror of Africa, it had sounded like paradise.

  The problem was, he’d never told her where this paradise was. Now that she was about to disembark on the southern tip of the island, she had no idea where to meet him. Newfoundland’s coastline was ten thousand kilometres of switchback coves and ragged headlands, most of it wild. There were island bird sanctuaries and dark, unexplored inland forests. Its oceans teemed with whales, dolphins, seals, and polar bears, its forests with moose and bears. The perfect getaway was everywhere.

  Amanda had always loved nature. As a child trapped in the tidy residential crescents of suburban Ottawa, she had escaped whenever possible to the lakes and forests of the surrounding countryside, much to the bemusement of her parents, who considered a wine tour of Tuscany to be the ideal holiday. During her postings in the hot, arid climates of developing countries, it had been the wilderness that she had missed most about her homeland. The lush green of the forest floor, the delicate birdsong, and the chatter of brooks tumbling over rocks.

  The solitude.

  There are not many people in Newfoundland in September, Phil had promised her. No machetes, masked marauders, or homemade bombs. Not even many tourists left. We’ll have the campgrounds and coves to ourselves.

  The ferry was churning through the narrow channel toward the dock, past the breakwaters and pastel cottages scattered along the barren shore. Passengers had begun to head toward the stairs leading to the car decks, clutching their pillows and bedrolls blearily. Where are you? she texted one last time before slipping her phone back into her jacket and heading to the pet kennels. The sound of barking was deafening as the dogs woke to the sight of their masters. For a moment, when she couldn’t hear Kaylee’s bark above the din, she felt a familiar surge of anxiety. My dog’s safe, she assured herself. You know she’s safe. It’s only a seven-hour crossing, and she’s had plenty of water.

  Nonetheless, Amanda was surprised by the rush of relief that coursed through her when Kaylee’s high-pitched scream joined the fray. She spotted the frenzy of red fur as she drew closer. Kaylee hurled herself against the door of the kennel, every inch of her wagging. Amanda opened the door and knelt down to press her face into the dog’s long, silky fur.

  “Sorry, pumpkin,” she whispered. “No more, I promise.”

  Kaylee tugged at the end of her leash as they made their way down to Amanda’s other prized possession, her brand-new motorcycle. Having spent almost all her adult life in the developing world, she was much more at ease on two wheels than on four. She loved the lightness, agility, and thrilling speed of motorcycles. In anticipation of this trip, she had traded her smaller bike and splurged on this latest-model Kawasaki, which could handle a trailer, but she had not yet found the perfect name for it. For now, she called it Shadow, which had an intimate, evocative ring. Not only did it have its own shadow of sorts — the small, custom-built trailer for Kaylee — but it felt like an extension of her soul. It gave her the freedom to roam the wide-open spaces, to race the wind, to follow any whim that beckoned her.

  Kaylee leaped eagerly into her spot in the trailer, her tongue lolling and her eyes dancing in anticipation. As Amanda fastened the dog’s seatbelt and undid the straps and cables that secured the bike, she smiled in response to the stares from the neighbouring cars. She suspected the red dog and the lime-green motorcycle made quite a spectacle.

  She was almost thirty-five, but, dwarfed in her sheepskin jacket, leather boots, and red helmet, she looked barely fifteen. Hardship had aged her on the inside, but her fine freckles and long chestnut hair belied the decades. Noticing the little boy in the minivan beside her eying Kaylee solemnly, Amanda winked at him.

  “She’s looking forward to Newfoundland. Are you?”

  He nodded. “What kind of dog is that?”

  “She’s a Nova Scotia Duck Tolling Retriever. Forty pounds of pure energy. Do you have a dog?”

  He shot a quick glance at his father before shaking his head. “What’s her name?”

  “Kaylee. Since she’s a Nova Scotia breed, I figured she deserved a good Gaelic name. Do you know what a ceilidh is?”

  He shook his head again.

  “It’s a party. The lively, dancing-singing-making-music kind. And that’s what she is, a party.” Amanda leaned over to ruffle the dog’s ears. “Do you want to pat her?”

  The boy glanced at his father again. The two of them were alone in the minivan, father and son on a holiday. The man looked as if he hadn’t slept or shaved in days, but he managed a bleary smile. But just as the boy was opening his door, car engines rumbled to life around them and the vehicles prepared to inch forward. The boy tugged his door shut and gave Kaylee a shy wave.

  The long trail of vehicles wound through the ferry dock and out onto the open road, where the fog still hung thick. Amanda could see nothing but a blurry stream of red lights heading north along the only highway toward the interior of the island. Signs and landmarks leaped out of the fog too late to decipher. She longed to lean into the wind and open up the throttle, but d
ecided it was safer just to follow the tail lights directly in front of her.

  She needed a decent breakfast and, more importantly, coffee, and just as she was beginning to despair of finding either, the lights of an Irving gas bar and diner caught her eye. She pulled in, fed Kaylee, and took her for a short stroll to a handy patch of grass before tying up the dog and heading inside the diner. The place was bright and bustling as if half the ferry passengers were inside, but Amanda found a small table by the window where she could keep an eye on Kaylee. The waitress was at her side instantly to fill her coffee cup. A woman of experience, Amanda thought with a smile of thanks. Once she’d taken her first sip, she pulled out her cellphone. No response to her text. Mr. Unreliable indeed.

  While she looked up his home number in Grand Falls, she braced herself. Phil had confessed that things were rocky between himself and his wife, and Amanda wasn’t sure how Sheri felt about this trip, nor about her. Phil had assured her that Sheri supported it, that in fact the trip had been her idea. Anything to get me out of her hair, he’d joked. She can’t come because she’s teaching, but she knows how much I need

  this escape.

  Amanda hoped that was true. Despite their different temperaments, the two women had once been friends, but that was before Africa, and Amanda knew Sheri could be unforgiving. Did she still blame Amanda for Phil’s decision to go?

  It had been nearly two years since Amanda had last spoken to her, but time slipped away the moment the woman answered the phone. The same brisk, no-nonsense voice, with just a hint of Newfoundland.

  “Hi, Sheri, it’s Amanda Doucette. How are you?”

  A pause, a drop in tone. As if the air had gone out of the room. “Amanda. It’s been a long time. You’re back in Canada for good now, I hear.”

  “I am. I just arrived in Port aux Basques.” She paused, listening to the silence. Feeling the chill through the airwaves. Not forgiven, then. “Is Phil there?”

  “How could he be? He’s with you.”

  “No. I’m supposed to meet him, but I don’t know where.”

  “Well, he’s already gone. I imagine he’ll call you, in his own sweet time.”

  Bewildered, Amanda plowed ahead. “When did he leave?”

  “Two days ago. I’m surprised you haven’t heard from him yet. Well, not exactly surprised, but …”

  “Did he say where he was going?”

  There was another long silence. Sheri’s voice lost its chill, became uncertain. “He … we … I was out when they left. He didn’t actually say goodbye.”

  “They? Who’s with him?”

  “Well, Tyler. Our son. He’s going with you.” She paused again. Amanda heard a small intake of breath. “Isn’t he?”

  Amanda felt her own small quiver of alarm. First, Phil’s manic excitement about the trip, followed by the days of silence. What was he up to? “I’m sure it’s just a misunderstanding,” she forced herself to say. “You know Phil.”

  “Indeed I do.”

  Amanda rushed on. “He’ll probably be in touch any minute. Meanwhile I’ll head up toward your place.”

  “Why?”

  Amanda floundered in the heavy silence. “In case he comes back. Or we can at least figure out where Mr. Unreliable has disappeared to.” She hung up before Sheri could object and glanced outside to reassure herself that Kaylee was still there. The early morning fog was lifting, curling off the scoured coastal rock in pale, wraithlike swaths. At this rate, she could reach Grand Falls by afternoon. To what purpose or reception, she wasn’t sure.

  Her attempt at levity on the phone was fooling no one, least of all Sheri, who must know how close to the edge Phil could stumble. Indeed, she’d been the one to drag him back more than once over their twelve years together.

  Amanda had heard it in her voice at the end. Sheri was angry and fed up, but she was also afraid.

  Chapter Two

  As the bleak tundra of the southern tip gave way to the canyons of the Humber River valley, Amanda felt the tug of this extreme, unforgiving land. Over the centuries, countless explorers had been lured to the soaring cliffs and dark, secretive forests, but its storms were too fierce and its terrain too barren for all but the most intrepid to settle. The first nor’easter to come through blew most of them off the island, leaving only a few stubborn and contrary fishermen clinging to its sheltered coves.

  But it was this primal challenge of nature that excited her. She was in search of a toehold in something pure and timeless, beyond the struggles and cruelties of man — a sense of awe and inspiration that would lift her above the quagmire of her life and help her see further down the road.

  Because she knew she could not go back to Africa.

  She leaned into the wind and felt the engine throb as she accelerated down the empty road. The bike chewed up the kilometres effortlessly, leaving her thoughts free to return to Phil. She hadn’t seen him in nearly a year since they had both managed to reach the capital of Nigeria. Like her, he’d been a feral shadow of himself, scrawny with hunger and fear, his blue eyes hollow above his matted, black beard. It had taken her three hours in the hotel bath to soak the pain and filth from her body, but Phil had barely tried. He’d just wanted to go home.

  Home at the moment was Grand Falls, Newfoundland, where Sheri had lived until her university years and where she and their son were waiting for him. Tyler had been born in happier times when they were all working together for Save the Children in Cambodia, but Sheri had wisely refused to bring him to unstable West Africa and had moved back home instead to live with her parents until Phil’s return.

  Nigeria was supposed to be a quick stint, four months at most to help the northern villages cope with the influx of refugees fleeing Boko Haram, but when the violence intensified and their replacements did not arrive, the posting had stretched to nine. Despite repeated entreaties from Sheri to come home, Phil had stayed on with Amanda. The makeshift refugee village in northern Nigeria had seemed so much more real and needy than the cozy Canadian town he barely knew.

  Since their return to Canada, his emails to Amanda had been sporadic — crisp two- or three-liners about his latest joe job or his repair work on the little house they had bought on Sheri’s teacher’s salary. His determinedly upbeat emails skimmed the surface of his days, bouncing gaily over the pain of lost jobs, the empty hours, and the lingering wounds of Africa.

  Just what was his state of mind? Amanda wondered now, as the afternoon shadows lengthened and the desolate expanse of black spruce continued to unfurl. Phil had never been a talker, unless it was to share a joke or a tall tale. Even now, he had couched this trip as a great adventure, not as the pilgrimage toward healing that she knew it to be. Not just for her, but for him. I can deal, he’d always say. Canadians have no right to complain. Unlike those we help, we have a warm, safe country to go home to.

  But warmth and safety, she knew, was not a place. It was a state of mind.

  The city of Grand Falls came up unexpectedly out of the rolling emptiness of interior Newfoundland. Unlike most of the rough-and-tumble fishing villages that had cropped up like barnacles along the rocky ocean coves, Grand Falls had been built as a pulp-and-paper company town, prosperous and orderly. But according to Phil, the closing of the mill after a hundred years had left it bruised and struggling for a new source of purpose and jobs. He’d been lucky to land seasonal work during the Christmas holidays and the mid-winter festival.

  Amanda knew it wasn’t about the money, for both of them had received modest compensation for their ordeal through the NGO’s medical plan. It was about having a reason to get out of bed and a goal to aim for, preferably mindless and light. Amanda had spent her year focusing on her mind and body— yoga, meditation, and a rigorous fitness regime, all designed to make her feel in control again. Sometimes it even worked.

  Phil and Sheri’s house was a small bungalow in the older section of to
wn down near the Exploits River. The clapboard siding was painted a vibrant yellow, and purple asters and miniature white roses spilled onto the slate path leading to the covered porch, complementing the large, hand-painted welcome sign on the door. The place had an optimism that belied the worn treads on the steps and the peeling paint on the siding. Like Phil, it was making the best of lean times.

  She rumbled gratefully into the gravel lane that ran up beside the house. There was a white Cavalier parked against the house, and the door flew open just as she was easing her stiff body off the bike. Sheri appeared in the doorway, her lips a tight slash of red.

  “Any word?” she asked before Amanda could even say hello, sending her hopes crashing. She studied Sheri cautiously. Neither woman had ever been a fashion plate; in the places they’d worked, comfort and availability in clothing trumped any thought of style. But the woman had obviously done herself over. She’d lost the residual mommy fat and clothed her now curvaceous body in skinny jeans and long red sweater. She had cut her long brown hair to a fashionable shoulder length and added auburn streaks. Oversized gold hoop earrings danced in the sunlight.

  Amanda tugged off her helmet and ran a futile hand through the dusty tangle of her hair, feeling every inch of the long, sweaty, gas-fumed drive she had endured. She shook her head.

  “Fucking Phil!” Sheri said. “What the hell is he up to?”

  “Maybe it’s just a mix-up. Cellphone reception over here seems to be pretty spotty.”

  Sheri seemed about to retort, but stopped herself. She shielded her eyes and squinted against the sun. Her restless gaze flitted the length of the street before it lit upon Amanda’s motorcycle, where Kaylee was poking her nose eagerly through her mesh door. For the first time a smile broke Sheri’s tense features.

  “What in the name of God is that?”

  “My dog.”

  “Oh, for the love of —” Sheri hopped off the porch, lithe as a cat, and strode over to release her. “Look at you!”