Too Cold For Snow

and enveloping epiphany and the two human beings in their frail kayak were spellbound by the sound.  
    And then, just as suddenly as it had appeared, the whale lifted its tail and dived down. Jerry Lee sat stock still and the sound of his excited breathing melded with Bee’s breaths, audible even within the soughing of the wind.  
    They might have stayed there a century or just five minutes, but the magic was slowly dissipating. This majestic, enormous beast, this nature, this thing of ineffable mystery diminished to tadpole size and swam away into memory.  
    A whale and its calf, unexpected in Carmarthen Bay, under an arc-lamp moon. And then, above, two shooting stars raced in tandem across the void and Jerry wondered if they’d been sent by his father, flashing messages from the King of Fireworks who had passed away exactly a year ago. It wouldn’t surprise him. He had a flair for timing his pyrotechnics just right. He imagined his old man lighting the touch paper just before his eyes closed in on themselves, like ferns curling away from summer.  
    They had to negotiate choppy water on their return. The little craft lurched from side to side now, and soon Bee was being heavingly sick and Jerry was finding the rowing hard work as he strained his sinews to beat a path back to land. It started raining, too, and there was the occasional hailstone. His eyes were stinging even as he oared on, the work heavy now, pausing only to bark out reassurances to Bee who was having the worst time of her life. Hard on the heels of the best time in her life. She was scared now, scared and cold and very aware of the fact that she only had a yellow badge for swimming the width of the municipal swimming pool when she was still in school.  
    ‘How far are we?’ she asked, trying to contain her voice down which was tempted to shriek.  
    ‘We’ll be there in no time,’ said Jerry, his lungs working like bellows now, the strain catching up with him. He couldn’t see anything at all, but trusted his instinct which had been unfailing in the past.  
    They made landfall an hour later and by then Bee was past fear and Jerry’s muscles were close to spasm. He had barely enough energy to help Bee out of the kayak and haul the slim craft up the beach, aware that the tide was now on the turn, and, ironically, the weather was just beginning to improve.  
    As she began to find her legs on land, Bella turned to Jerry Lee and confided in him that she could not swim. He took her in his arms and pulled her in tight towards his torso.  
    ‘I am a woman transformed,’ she said, as she settled within his embrace.
    In the dunes a light flickered from a bonfire and Jerry imagined a circle of people, burning a Steinway that had been carried in by the tide, the ivories crackling in the heat, the strings zinging as they burst.  
    He pulled Bee closer to him, trying to get rid of the sound of the lacquered wood splintering. In her eyes he could see tiny orange flecks, reflecting the flames in the dunes. But there were also fathomless depths, ones to explore for ever.  
    Another piano string burst, louder than the others, sufficient to startle the crows in their roost in the conifers behind the beach. From far out at sea came the plangent sound of whale call. Jerry gave in to what was happening to him, as she kissed him, her hair black foam in the moonlight, her beautiful eyes marooned beyond all description. He gave in because she was the one, and her lips seared his, hot and wonderful, slick with brine.

 
     
    www.parthianbooks.com

About the Author
     
     
    Jon Gower is a writer, performer and broadcaster whose work includes award-winning documentaries for radio, television and the internet. He has written fifteen books on subjects as diverse as a disappearing island in Chesapeake Bay – An Island Called Smith – which won the John Morgan award, Real Llanelli – a west Wales tour in psycho-geography – and the fiction of Dala’r Llanw, Uncharted and Big Fish. His most recent work of non-fiction is The Story of Wales , which accompanies a landmark TV series.
    He writes in both Welsh and English, is a Creative Wales Award winner and is currently a Hay Festival International Fellow.
    Jon lives in Cardiff, Wales with his wife Sarah and two daughters, Elena and Onwy.

Copyright
     
     
    First published in 2012
by Parthian
The Old Surgery
Napier Street
Cardigan
SA43 1ED
www.parthianbooks.com     
     
    This ebook edition first published