The Cliff House Curse

As the arc of her fall continues, I'm reminded of her work on the parallel bars. She could literally fly. She took second place in high school, looking so proud standing up there on the podium. This is the Caroline I'm trying to rescue, not the one that was ready to cut my dick off a few seconds ago. My fingers graze her ankle, but I can't get a grip.

"NOOO!" she screeches as she sails head over heels towards the rocks below. I watch, stunned, as she manages to right herself in midair. It's as if she's trying to do a clean dismount from the parallel bars.

"Caroline!" I scream, but it's too late. There will be no perfect landing. Not this time. I close my eyes and wait for the thud. Surprisingly, it's a small sound, almost indistinguishable from the crashing of the waves on the rocks below. I wait a minute before I open my eyes again, hoping it was all a dream, but it wasn't.

I sit there for a moment, shivering, trying to catch my breath. I feel like retching, but I can't. All I can do is look down at Caroline's mangled frame at the base of the cliff, a red trail of blood dripping from her smashed skull and mixing with the white surf. I breath slowly, steadily, feeling the tears slithering down my cheeks, but I can't cry. Not yet. I have to get my shit together. Figure out what comes next, other than handcuffs.

Ten minutes later, I'm on the phone with Redcloud. They change their plans. Instead of dinner in Carmel, it'll be a weekend in San Francisco. He tells me to clean up the blood with bleach, throw away the sheets, and check under my sister's fingernails for evidence of our struggle. I explain to Redcloud that her body is already half submerged in the surf, so if there is any evidence, it'll be washed away.

Redcloud says they'll be back on Monday, when they'll call the sheriff and explain how Caroline was supposed to be house sitting, and how she was acting very despondent lately, and how devastated they are that they couldn't prevent her suicide.

I'm in a daze, thinking maybe it's all just a pot-induced hallucination. But the gash on my wrist isn't a hallucination, it's the real thing. Slowly, methodically, I go through the motions: The sheets get wadded up into a plastic garbage bag. The bleach is under the counter just like Redcloud said it would be. The blood on the floor comes right up, the blood on the deck takes a little more work. Finally, when I'm finished, I take a shower in Zephyr's greenhouse/bathroom, where my tears swirl down the drain, accompanied by the pounding of the surf below.

******

By Wednesday it was in all the papers. It even made the national news:

'THE CLIFF HOUSE CURSE STRIKES AGAIN'

Oh, there was talk of pressing charges for contributing to the delinquency of a minor, but Redcloud dug up a signed model release form stating Caroline's age as twenty-one, so they beat that rap. But having one of his models commit suicide off his porch kind of ruined his reputation, and his business dropped off considerably.

Then 9/11 hit, and the market for original artwork tanked. After a couple of months, Zephyr had to start waiting tables at Nepenthe's to make ends meet, but it wasn't enough. When they got behind on the mortgage, and the bank foreclosed on the Cliff House, Zephyr and Redcloud did what everyone else did when they passed through that particular Big Sur landmark: They hired really expensive divorce lawyers and vacated the premises.

When I didn't go back to college in the fall, my folks decided that, because I was so devastated about my sweet sister's death, the only Christian thing to do was to transfer her estate to me, since it was her fault that my life had been ruined. I tried to turn down the two million, but they insisted, so on my twenty-first birthday, I became a rich slacker.

Being a rich slacker was hard at first. Can you imagine being put on permanent summer vacation? With pay? I dabbled in this and that, but my sister's memory kept haunting me. Finally, it hit me. What better way to make things right than to get Mr. Fletcher - Caroline's alleged rapist from high school - out of jail?

With a little help from a retired accountant, I started a construction company, and made sure there was a position open for a man with Mr. Fletcher's skills. (He taught physics and wood shop before he got busted.) It was kind of a hassle, having to fill out all that paperwork and drive up to Vacaville for his parole board hearing, but I felt like it was the least I could do.

Mr. Fletcher was a little skittish at first, avoiding underage hippie chicks like the plague, but now he's doing great. He even grew himself one of those stupid looking goatees, and he's gotten rid of his plastic pen holder. I suppose I pay him way more than he's worth, but it helps to keep the guilt at bay. In fact, he's coming down next week to start a major remodeling project for me. There's a certain third floor deck that's coming down. It's just too freakin' dangerous.

Yeah, I bought the Cliff House for a song. Nobody wanted it. The Cliff House Curse scared them all off. The curse doesn't bother me that much. Once I get all new furnishings in here, and figure out which girlfriend I want to have move in with me, I'll be fine. Monique's been coming around quite a bit, but, fool that I am, I don't want to commit until I hear from Zephyr. Surely she'll find out that I own this place now. She left Big Sur before I got the two million, so she had no idea how things were going to turn out.

I do miss my sister, but I've still got those polaroids Zephyr took, and every now and then I take them out and spread them around on the bed, reminiscing about our precious last few hours together. I have to believe that she's in a better place now, a place where she won't be tormented by big titted cheerleaders, or slutty ex-Penthouse Pets, or older brothers with erections.

In my perpetual state of summer vacation, I've had a lot of time to think, and I've discovered that the truth lies in the moment, not in the long term plans we make. Sis and I having forbidden sex, Zephyr "borrowing" love from me in the hot tub, Redcloud provoking me to violence in defense of a woman, these are all life lessons I will cherish forever. It took these events to show me that obeying the conventions of societal norms doesn't matter. What matters is the act of surrendering to our true nature. I believe this is God's plan, and I have those precious three days in Big Sur to thank for showing it to me.

Have a great summer, everyone.