COB
By
R. L. Keller
Chip sat
in his office at NIMR staring at, but not really seeing, his computer
screen. He had no idea how long he’d
been sitting there, and in all honesty didn’t particularly care. But movement at his open office door caught
his attention and he discovered Lee standing there. Chip recognized the expression on his
friend’s face – one of total disbelief.
It had been on most of NIMR’s employee’s faces for the last week. “I know,” he said softly. Lee left the doorway and collapsed into one
of the chairs across the desk from the blond.
“I can’t
believe it,” came out of the brunet’s mouth in a tone Chip so rarely heard from
his friend – one filled with desolation and angst.
“Join the
club,” Chip commiserated.
“I should
have been…”
Chip cut
him off. “There’s nothing you could have
done.” Lee was always jumping in, taking
the blame for everything that went wrong, whether or not he had anything to do
with the problem. It was just the way
Lee was. “It happened so fast, Jamie
said he could have been standing right next to him and he wouldn’t have been
able to change the outcome. Your being
gone was just a coincidence.”
“Jamie’s
sure?” came out a bit plaintively.
Chip rose,
walked over to the coffee pot on a side counter, and poured out two large
mugfuls. Not for the first time did he
wish that he had something stronger. He
handed Lee one of the mugs and settled into the other chair next to Lee with a
heavy sigh. “He’s sure,” he said
firmly. He took a long drag of the
powerful brew and was grateful when Lee also managed a swallow.
“I got
just the bare facts from Charley at the gate,” Lee finally continued, “and only
that because of the expression on his face.”
Chip nodded. “I came straight
here. I didn’t see the Admiral’s car in
the lot, and Angie wasn’t at her desk.”
“Not sure
where Angie is,” Chip told him. “Not
far, I’m sure.” Both men managed a small
grin; Admiral Nelson’s PA took her duties very seriously. “The Admiral had a meting first thing this
morning at the University. He’ll be here
by 1000 hours.” Lee’s turn to nod. “The Chief and I supervised several drills in
the morning and there wasn’t a clue. We
both came up to eat lunch in the cafeteria.”
Lee let a quick grin show, and Chip matched it. If there was one person at NIMR who could
match Chip in the ‘bottomless pit’ category of eating, it was Seaview’s COB,
Chief Curley Jones. “I had a meeting
with the Admiral so left while Curley was polishing off the last of his coffee. I’d barely made it to my office, to grab my
notes for the meeting, when the emergency claxon went off. One of the cafeteria staff saw the Chief
start to get up, hesitate just a bit, then fall to the floor. She sounded the alarm.” He stopped to take a deep breath. “Jamie said, once he’d seen the autopsy
results, that Curley was most likely dead by the time he hit the floor, it was
that fast.” A soft stream of expletives
slipped out of Lee’s mouth. “Yeah,” Chip
agreed.
“The
funeral?” Lee asked
“Here in
Santa Barbara. Curley’s sister and brother-in-law
flew in. They said that Curley loved the
area here so much, they didn’t want to take him away from it. I think the only people from NIMR who weren’t
there were the guards who had the duty, and they weren’t overly happy; drew
straws to see who had to work.”
“And me,”
came out low and hard. Chip reached out
a foot and tapped one of Lee’s. “I
know,” Lee told his friend. “But I still
feel bad.”
“Understood,”
Chip commiserated. He polished off his
coffee. “Come on. I’ll drive you over to the cemetery and we’ll
have our own quiet moment.”
“Should
probably get to my desk,” Lee told him.
“Whatever’s
there will wait another hour,” Chip told him firmly.
Lee
hesitated, but finally nodded.
“Thanks.” The pair left a quick
message on Angie’s phone – she apparently was still away from her desk – and
headed out.
It didn’t
take them long to reach the entrance to the cemetery, and Chip drove slowly
through and around the area closest to the ocean. There was no ocean view from the cemetery,
but Lee nodded as Chip told him this was the closest plot Curley’s sister could
arrange. They parked nearby and walked
over to the newly disturbed grass, leaving their covers in Chip’s SUV. Too soon for a permanent marker, the grave
was marked by a small metal frame around a covered middle that held a paper
with Curley’s name and birth and death dates.
Attached to the plate someone had added another paper, covered so
moisture wouldn’t ruin it. The two men
looked at each other, Chip shrugged, and together they read what had been left
at the grave.
I
want to age like sea glass. Smoothed by
tides, but not broken. I want my hard
edges to soften. I want to ride
the waves and go with the flow. I want
to catch a wave and let it carry me to where I belong. I want to be picked up and held gently by
those who delight in my well-earned patina and appreciate the changes I went
through to achieve that beauty. I want
to enjoy the journey and always remember that if you give the ocean something
breakable it will turn it into something beautiful. I want to age like sea glass.
~
Bernadette Noll ~
“Whoever
left that, they couldn’t have said it better,” Lee said, and Chip agreed. “His sister, perhaps?” Lee added.
“No
idea. But it’s perfect.” They stood side by side a few more minutes,
each in their own thoughts.
Finally
Lee sighed, and Chip sent him a look.
Without a word they headed back to the SUV.
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In Memory of Henry Kulky. Aug. 11, 1911 – Feb. 12, 1965
Gone way too soon.