Chapter 3 – The Memory

June 1975

Steve sat on the beach looking out over the ocean. He may have been looking, but the tears in his eyes prevented from seeing very much at all. He shivered a little in the evening air, the sun was going down and a chill had begun to descend on the beach. He wiped the back of one hand over his eyes spreading the tears in a long, dirty streak in its wake. His mind was numb with shock. Although he had known how ill his mom was Steve hadn't, deep down, really expected her to die. A sob escaped him as the words formed in his mind. Somehow the whole day seemed like a sick nightmare and he kept expecting to hear his mom's voice calling from the deck, telling him to put a jumper on. The tears again overflowed and ran, like two silent waterfalls, down his cheeks. He would never hear his mom's voice again and, for a second, that realisation threatened to overwhelm him and his chest felt so tight with anguish that he had to fight for every breath.

A hand coming to rest on his shoulder made him jump. He looked up and through his tears saw the hazy outline of someone standing next to him.

"Steve?" the figure spoke and he realised that it was Amy, his girlfriend for the last six months.

"She's dead, Amy," he managed to say, "Mom is dead."

Swiftly sitting down beside him and enfolding him in her arms Amy replied, "I know, Honey, I just heard. I am so sorry."

The tenuous hold which Steve had kept on his emotions since he had left the hospital, finally gave way and he collapsed against Amy sobbing as though his heart was broken, which indeed it was.

Unable to think of anything to say Amy simply continued to hold Steve in her arms, occasionally dropping soft kisses on the disordered locks nestled against her bosom and making soft, indistinct soothing noises which only she and Steve could hear. Slowly Steve managed to regain control of himself and the sobs which had wracked his body gave way to an occasional sniff punctuated by deep, heavy breaths. He sat up and, for the first time since Amy had arrived, looked at her with clear, although still glistening, eyes.

"I'm sorry, Amy," he said.

"For what?" she demanded knowing full well that big, macho Steve Sloan was about to re-assert himself, "For loving your mom, for being sad that she's gone, for being man enough to cry? Which?"

A ghost of a smile flickered on Steve's face for he knew that Amy hated his macho image as it wasn't in any way like the real Steve and that she never failed to take an opportunity to prick the bubble.

"Thank you," he said.

"For what?"

"For being here when I needed you," Steve cupped Amy's face with both hands, "I love you."

"I love you too," she replied, pulling Steve towards her for a kiss.

It started off very gently, as their kisses often did, but Amy sensed there was a different quality to this one, a sort of desperation. Gradually, imperceptibly, the kiss deepened as Steve's mouth began to move against Amy's persuading her lips to open allowing the tip of his tongue to dart in and out between them to tantalise hers with the briefest of contact before retreating.

"Amy?" Steve's voice was a question.

Opening her eyes that she hadn't been aware of closing Amy looked at him.

"Please?" he asked, his eyes echoing the plea in his voice.

Amy stared at him for a long silent while at the young man in front of her. She knew what he was asking and she had to make a decision. They had been dating for six months and their relationship had grown ever more physical, but always stopping short of full consummation. Many nights Amy had laid awake after a date with Steve, her nerve endings tingling from their naïve, inexpert fumbling in the back of Steve's old station wagon, wondering what it would be like to 'go all the way', as her parents delicately called it. Steve had never pushed her to do anything she was uncomfortable with, indeed it was often he who called a halt to things when it seemed like they could be getting out of hand.

Amy came to a decision. She reached up and removed Steve's hands from her face and carefully re-positioned them, one on each breast. Then before Steve could respond she reached down and placed her hand against the zipper of his jeans, gently applying pressure to the bulge which quickly appeared. Her eyes softening Amy laid back onto the sand, pulling Steve with her.

Afterwards as Amy lay on the sand she felt Steve sit up and she opened her eyes to realise that he was, once again, crying. Swiftly sitting up, pulling her blouse around her, she wound her arms around Steve's torso.

"What's the matter?" she asked.

"We shouldn't have done that. I shouldn't have made you," he cried.

"You didn't, Steve." Amy asserted, "You didn't take anything from me that I didn't want to give."

"But I shouldn't have asked."

"I'm glad you did. Your mom has just died and you needed to know that life will carry on. So did I, I think, and what could be more life affirming than making love?" Amy kissed Steve's neck before continuing, "I will never regret what happened between us tonight and I'll always cherish the memory."

Present day

Steve's eyes glistened with tears as he finished speaking.

"Amy was right, Dad," he said, "I did want to prove that life, my life, would keep going. I just didn't realise that we weren't just affirming life but creating it as well."

For a few seconds he was silent and then, in a voice filled with emotion, he said, "What am I going to do?"

"We are going to find your son," Mark responded firmly.