Specter~Chapter 1
"I'm going, Lucinda, and nothin' you say can stop me!" Sam said to the pouting blonde girl standing in front of him.
The day was a glorious Maine fall day in 1852 and 17-year-old Samuel Evans just found out that he could join the crew on the new Battenfield Company schooner, the Lizzy Dean, named for the captain's daughter. This was his opportunity, to show his worth on the vessel and earn a living wage to support himself and, his plan was, Lucinda in the future.
However, Lucinda Fabbrae, with all her 16 years of wisdom from living in Battenfield, Maine, on the coast of the mighty ocean, knew what happened to men on the schooners in foul weather, fog, or if the captain of the ship was in his cups. Her grandfather had perished at sea when she was 9 years old; she knew what could happen. Sam knew the dangers, too, having grown up alongside Lucinda in Battenfield, his father, uncles, and cousins all having earned a living on the sea. They all lived to tell their stories of storms and running aground and fighting off pirates; Sam yearned to live that life.
"There's work to be done here, Sam Evans! You could-you could-build the ships! Many men do that proudly!" she retorted, stomping her tiny foot. She would have crossed her arms in defiance, but she held a basket of eggs in front of her. Sam had caught up with her as she made her way to town to sell the eggs. He just had to share his good news with her.
Of course he knew he could learn the ship building trade; however, that was left for the men not brave enough to dare the seas. He had heard the crewmen laugh about the "land-lovers," and there was no way he was going to stay on shore while the others experienced high seas adventure.
"The Lizzy Dean is a very sturdy vessel," he said, hoping to convince her. "Artie Abrams helped build it!"
She rolled her eyes. "That's a silly name for a boat!" She knew Elizabeth Dean and the girl was as scatterbrained as a chicken. She also knew Artie Abrams, and he was a natural genius at ship building.
"I won't be goin' alone, Lucindy...Finn Hudson has signed on too," Sam told her, still trying to sway her. Finn was the beau of her acquaintance, Rachel Berry, and Sam called her Lucindy, a special name only he called her.
She began walking again, her nose pointed toward the sky. Over her shoulder, she said, "I thought you were fond of me, Samuel Evans!"
He stood there, his feet not moving. Oh, he was fond of Lucinda Fabbrae alright, very fond of her. He thought she knew that since they had basically spent all of their free time together the preceding summer, when he would hold her hand and steal kisses from her in the moonlight, not to mention the time after a church picnic in the meadow when things almost went too far. He watched her petite figure walk away briskly, her navy blue dress whipping around her feet, strands of blonde hair escaping her white bonnet. He suddenly ran after her.
He grabbed her shoulder and turned her to face him. "I am fond of you, Lucinda Fabbrae! I'm doing this for us."
She gazed into his blue-green eyes, a blue the color of the sea sometimes. "It sounds as though you're rightly doing it for yourself," she sniffed.
She turned to walk away again but again he stopped her.
"No...for us...I want to be your husband and I need to do this job to convince your pa to let me marry you," he said finally. He watched her chew on her bottom lip. "I promise you I'll be back, Lucinda."
Her eyes shone brightly in the sunlight, her pupils almost gone, making the strange defect in her right iris even more noticeable to him.
She studied his face. His words were spoken in earnest. She knew how he felt about her; he had expressed it several times during the summer months when he would shyly touch his lips to her when walking her home and the time in the meadow, when his breathing had been heavy and she had said they needed to be married before anything else happened though she longed to be with him in every sense of the word. She should've known he'd choose to work on a boat. She knew, as well as he did, that that was where the best money was to be had, given the level of danger associated with the nature of the work. She thought of her father and uncles and cousins and how they all were crewmen or captains. They had all survived the treacherous ocean and returned to tell about it. She also knew how worried her mother would be while they were all out to sea, the creases in her forehead always present, her eyes always tired. Lucinda also knew that her family did not want for anything; her father provided very well for them. She sighed and kicked her toe in the dirt.
"When do you set sail?" she finally asked him quietly.
He broke out in a big smile. He had her approval, and, with a few dollars in his pocket soon, he'd be able to ask her father for her hand.
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Two weeks later, she stood on the Battenfield pier in the sun and watched the Lizzy Dean set sail on her excursion southward to Portland. On the way to Portland, they would be lobster fishing; in Portland, they would sell the lobster and pick up supplies for the townfolk, then return. All in all, depending on weather conditions, they'd be gone about a month.
Families of the crew had gathered on the pier to see them off.
Sam stood in front of Lucinda, wary of her father nearby. He would be on the ship, also, as it turned out. All she had heard from Sam the past two weeks was how exciting this would be, the adventure was calling his name...she pretended she didn't care when, in fact, she did.
Now, standing with her on the pier, the brand-new schooner moored not ten feet away, it all became very real to Sam. He kissed her lightly on the cheek.
"You have my promise, Lucindy...I'll be back for you," he told her again.
She nodded and smiled, holding back tears. "I'll be waiting for you."
He pressed something cold into her palm, embraced her quickly, and ran off to the schooner to take his place.
She watched as the ship was cut loose and bobbed and floated on the choppy water until the wind picked up her sails and took her out to sea. She waved at Sam and her father and the others and returned home with the ones left on the pier.
In her hand, she found an irregular piece of silver, twisted into a ring. She smiled and slipped it on her small finger; it fit perfectly. She had no doubt that he'd be back for her.
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Word around Battenfield was the Lizzy Dean made it to Portland in good time due to good weather. Captain Dean sent word to the townfolk to inform them they were on their return trip back home. Lucinda received the news when she walked to town to sell the eggs at the general store. She listened with interest, twisting the silver ring on her finger the entire time. She knew how persistent Sam was and how he had probably been pestering her father the entire trip.
The weather stayed nice for the next few days, then a cold rain moved in. Lucinda didn't think the rain would ever stop. Every day, she'd wander out to the pier and watch the choppy waters, looking for any sign of the schooner, knowing it was still too soon for them to return.
She woke up one day to dense fog and knew that that was not a good sign. She could barely see to collect the eggs in the chicken coop. The walk to town was quiet and lonely. How nice it would be to have Sam appear out of the fog and walk along with her? She missed him so, more than she had expected.
The fog would not dissipate. If anything, it worsened. But, they were used to that in Battenfield. She overhead the older fellows talking about Captain Dean's prowess as a man of the sea, his many years of experience on the high seas, and they had no doubt in his abilities so neither would she.
Until the sound of a ringing bell woke her from slumber in the middle of the night. The bell was a warning, calling out all men and able boys to meet in town. Something was terribly wrong; the bell was only sounded for a tragedy, such as a fire, war, a shipwreck. She pulled herself from her bed, along with her sisters and mother, dressed in a hurry. Lucinda helped her mother hitch the horses to the wagon, they loaded up and went to town. A ship had wrecked into an outcropping of rocks near Battenfield; word was it was the Lizzy Dean.
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The Lizzy Dean was shredded by the rocks. There were no survivors. The men of Battenfield had the gruesome task of retrieving bodies as they washed up on shore, then burying them. Lucinda waited every day for Sam to be found. Her father's body had washed up the night of the shipwreck and had since been buried. Sam's friend Finn had been found and buried. On the day they decided to stop waiting for anymore bodies of the crew, Samuel Franklin Evans was found.
Lucinda attended the burial at the only cemetery in Battenfield; Sam's grave marked with a simple cross, his initials and the year carved in it. After the grave had been filled with dirt and the men left, she knelt at the graveside, placing some wildflowers at the cross. She wiped away a few tears; she knew there was no sense in crying; it wouldn't make him live again.
"You kept your promise, Samuel Evans...you came back to me," she whispered in the quietness. "And I'll always be waiting for you." She thought of the tender kisses they had shared many times. She thought of how happy he was when he first approached her with his idea of sailing, the adventure, the money he'd make, how he'd come back and ask for her hand in marriage. She decided then and there that that was how she'd always remember him.
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The Battenfield Times-Tribune
September 1, 1916 – Ms. Lucinda Q. Fabbrae, 80, Battenfield resident her entire life, passed peacefully in her sleep at the Arthur Abrams estate. She had resided there the last 50 years. A daughter of Russell and Judithe Fabbrae, both of Battenfield, Ms. Fabbrae lived her life as a saintly patron of God, childless. Her father was a victim of the 1852 Lizzy Dean shipwreck. She then assisted in the care of her mother until her mother's death in 1866. Two sisters deceased. Ms. Fabbrae was interred at the olde pioneer cemetery of Battenfield at her request in a private ceremony.
A/N: I hope you like the beginning. I've been working on this story for some time now so please read and review and I'll upload the next chapter soon. :) Thanks, as always!