Chapter 24: Farewell Party
The morning came grey and still, the wind having died overnight to a hush that felt almost unnatural after weeks of howling. Javier woke in his bunk with the light slanting through the small porthole, pale and patient, and for a moment he simply lay there, feeling the quiet thrum of the base around him. His thigh ached, but it was a dull, manageable ache now. The stitches pulled when he moved, but they no longer burned.
He dressed slowly, testing the leg with each step. The crutches stood by the door, but he did not take them. He walked down the narrow corridor to the mess hall, his hand brushing the wall, and found Anke already there, a mug of tea cradled in her hands.
"You're walking," she said.
"I'm walking."
She nodded, her eyes bright, and did not say anything else. That was the way of the crew now. They looked at him differently, all of them, as if he carried something they could not name and did not need to. Hugh had clapped him on the shoulder the previous night and said nothing at all. Margaret had simply fixed him with her sharp grey gaze and nodded once, a soldier's acknowledgment.
The day passed in a blur of small tasks. The crew packed the samples that had been collected over the months, cataloguing and sealing each container with meticulous care. The base had to be left in good order, Greta reminded them, for the winter crew who would take over. Javier worked at the computers, entering data, his leg stretched out beneath the desk, and Greta came by twice to check on him, her hand brushing his shoulder each time.
"You should rest," she said the second time.
"I'll rest on the ship."
"The ship is two days of rolling grey water and nothing to do."
"Perfect. I'll rest then."
She made a sound, half laughter, half exasperation, and moved on. But she smiled as she went, that rare, private smile she kept for him alone.
The farewell party began that evening, after the last crate was sealed and the last checklist completed. They gathered in the mess hall, which had been cleared of tables and pushed against the walls. Someone had strung a string of fairy lights along the ceiling, a pale yellow glow that softened the stark fluorescent wash, and a speaker had been set up in the corner, playing music that was mostly old rock and some Irish traditional tracks that Piotr had found somewhere.
Javier sat on a bench with a glass of red wine in his hand, watching the crew transform. Hugh had put on a clean shirt and had combed his beard. Margaret had pulled on a dark green dress that made her look strangely elegant, though she still wore her heavy work boots. Martin and Shona danced slowly, their arms around each other, their heads bent together.
And then Greta came in.
She had changed. She wore a black dress, a silky thing that fell to her knees and hugged her generous curves in a way that made Javier's breath catch. There were high heels on her feet, black straps that made her ankle look delicate, and her hair was loose, falling in waves around her leathery round face. She had put on earrings, small gold ones, and she moved through the room with a kind of quiet authority that was entirely her own.
"Jesus, Mary and Joseph," Margaret said, low, and raised her glass. "The boss scrubs up."
Greta ignored her. She walked across the room to where Javier sat and stopped in front of him, looking down at him with a lift of her eyebrow.
"Well?" she said. "Don't just stare at the floor."
"You look beautiful," Javier said, and he meant it. The word was too small, too ordinary, but it was the only one he had.
Greta's mouth twitched. "I'm fifty-five years old and I look like a boiled ham. But I'll take it."
"You don't look like a boiled ham."
"Anke." Greta raised her voice. "He's flattering me. Make him stop."
Anke appeared at Javier's side, holding a glass of something clear and fizzy, and she looked at Greta with open, delighted eyes. "You look incredible, Greta. The dress is gorgeous."
"It's from a catalogue," Greta said. "I've been saving it for a special occasion. This seemed like one."
The music shifted, something slow and warm, and Greta held out her hand to Javier. "Come on. You owe me a dance. For all the trouble you've caused."
"I caused trouble?"
"You nearly died in my base and you want to call that not trouble?"
Javier laughed and took her hand. He stood carefully, testing the leg, and Greta's arm came around him, steady and strong, guiding him to the open space in the middle of the mess hall. The crew watched, some smiling, some raising their glasses. Hugh whistled, and Margaret shushed him.
They danced. It was not a skilled dance, not a trained one. They swayed together, Greta's hand resting on his shoulder, his on her waist, her body warm and solid against him. She smelled of something floral, something she must have been saving, and the scent was soft and intimate.
"You're going to marry Roisin," Greta said, low, so only he could hear.
"Yes."
"I'm glad. You deserve someone who'll wait for you. Someone who'll keep knitting you scarves."
Javier's chest tightened. "You knew about the scarf?"
"I called her. After the accident." Greta's eyes were fixed on his collar bone, not meeting his gaze. "She told me she was knitting. She told me it was a surprise for you. She told me I was not allowed to tell you, because she wanted to give it to you herself when you came home."
"And you kept the secret."
"Of course I did. I keep your secrets too."
The words hung between them, weighted with something that was not said. Javier's hand tightened on her waist, and Greta looked up at him then, her grey eyes holding his.
"That night," she said, so quietly he almost missed it. "The storm. Do you regret it?"
This was a question she had never asked. She had said it would not happen again, and they had both pretended it hadn't happened at all. But now, with the music playing and the wine warm in her veins and this man in her arms who had nearly died, she needed to know.
"No," Javier said. "I don't regret it."
"Good." She let out a breath, something released. "Because I don't regret it either. It was not love. I know that. You know that. But it was something. It was what I needed, in that moment. And I will carry it with me." She paused, her fingers tracing the rim of her wineglass, the cool glass a contrast to the heat still lingering between them. "I've never been fucked like that in my life. You're half my age and you're the best lover I've ever had." Her voice dropped to a whisper, just for him. "I just thought you should know." The words hung between them, thick and unspoken, yet undeniable, as the music swelled around them, wrapping their confession in a cocoon of sound and intimacy that felt both dangerous and perfect.
Javier's face flushed. "Greta..."
"Don't blush. I'm an old woman. I'm allowed to be honest at a party." She smiled, a real smile, warm and unguarded, and she reached up and touched his cheek. "I will never forget you, Javier. My adopted son. Do you know that? You're the son I never had."
"You have Simon," he said.
"Simon is my partner. It's different." She pressed her palm flat against his chest, over his heart. "You're the part I didn't know I was missing. And now you're going home, and I'm going back to Australia, and we'll see each other at your wedding, if you'll have me."
"Of course I'll have you. You have to be there. I won't do it without you."
Greta's eyes went bright, and she blinked hard, and then she laughed, a loud, full sound that turned heads. "Look at me, getting sentimental at my age. Come. We need more wine. And I need to tell Anke about the wedding invitation."
The party continued. The wine flowed, and the dancing grew livelier. Hugh and Margaret attempted a jig and collapsed into laughter. Martin and Shona kept dancing, slow and close, their own private world. Anke came and took Javier's arm, pulling him into a dance that was mostly her leading and him limping, and she laughed, open and free.
"I've never seen you laugh like that," Javier said.
"I've never had a reason to." Anke squeezed his hand. "You saved my life. You showed me that I can be more than a machine that follows orders. I will never be able to repay that."
"You don't need to repay it."
"I know. But I want to come to your wedding. You said we'd be welcome. Me and Heidi."
"Of course you're welcome. Both of you. I don't know when it will be. I need to get back first, and ask Roisin properly, and plan it all. But you and Heidi will be there. I promise."
Anke's face lit up, and she hugged him, fierce and quick, and then she pulled away, dashing at her eyes with the back of her hand. "God, this party is making me maudlin. Come. We need more food."
The night wore on. The wine bottles emptied, and the music grew softer, and the crew drifted to corners, talking and laughing in low voices. Javier found himself on the bench again, his leg stretched out, a glass in his hand, watching the room with a warmth that had nothing to do with the wine.
Greta came and sat beside him, her high heels kicked off, her feet bare on the floor. She was tipsy, a little, her cheeks flushed, her hair escaping its careful arrangement.
"Seven days ago," she said, "I held your hand while Whitfield shocked your heart back into beating. I thought I was going to lose you. And here you are. Drinking wine. Dancing with Anke. Making promises about weddings."
"Here I am," Javier said.
"I want you to know something." Greta turned to face him, serious now. "I know you'll keep diving. I know you're going to keep taking the risks, because it's in your blood. And I know I can't stop you. But I want you to know that you will always be welcome back under my command. Always. Every expedition, every survey, every ship I'm on. There's always a berth for you."
"Even after everything?"
"Especially after everything. You're the best diver I've ever worked with. And I'm not just saying that because I love you." She said it simply, without embarrassment, and then she smiled. "But also because I love you. Maternally. Obviously."
"Obviously."
"Don't joke. I mean it, you little shit. You're my son now. I've decided. You don't get a vote."
Javier laughed, and Greta laughed, and then she leaned over and kissed his cheek, soft and warm, and left it at that.
The morning came too soon, grey and cold, with the ship's horn sounding far away across the water. The crew worked quickly, carrying the last of their personal effects to the waiting vessel, a sturdy ice-strengthened ship that had come to take them north.
Javier stood on the jetty, looking back at the base. It was a strange feeling, leaving it. The faded orange buildings had become a kind of home, a place of fear and terror and wonder, and he had almost died here, and he had come back to life here, and he was leaving it behind.
Anke came to stand beside him, her duffel slung over her shoulder. "Ready?"
"I think so."
"You don't sound sure."
"I'm always sure." Javier looked at her. "I just want to make sure I remember it. All of it. The ice, the light, the orcas. You. Greta."
"You'll remember," Anke said. "You'll remember it every time you close your eyes for the rest of your life. I can promise you that."
They boarded the ship together. The crossing took two days, as Greta had predicted, through grey waters and changing skies, and Javier spent much of it resting, letting the stitches heal, letting the bruising fade. He read, he wrote letters, he watched the seabirds appear as they drew closer to land.
Greta was quiet on the ship. She kept her distance, but she was always near, always watching. She brought him cups of tea when he sat on deck, wrapped in a heavy coat, staring at the water.
"You're thinking about her," she said once.
"I'm always thinking about her."
"Good. That's good. She's the reason you're going home."
"Yes," Javier said. "She is."
They reached Chile on a bright, cold morning. The port was a jumble of containers and cranes, and the crew disembarked with their bags, their breath pluming in the air. There was a hotel for the night, a meal together, a final gathering that was gentle and a little sad.
And then the airport.
It was an ordinary place, all glass and fluorescent light, but it felt charged. Margaret hugged him hard and told him to take care of himself. Hugh shook his hand and said he had a good man in Ireland. Piotr embraced him and said something in Polish that made Anke laugh and refuse to translate. Martin and Shona kissed his cheeks and told him to invite them to the wedding. Whitfield gave him a small leather notebook, a farewell gift, and told him to write down his adventures.
And then Greta.
She stood apart, waiting, and Javier walked to her, leaving Anke behind at the boarding gate.
"You don't have to make a scene," Greta said, her voice rough. "I'll be fine. I'm going to see Simon. It'll be lovely."
"I'm not going to make a scene. I'm going to say goodbye."
"Well then say it quickly, before I lose my nerve."
Javier looked at her. She had been his captain, his commander, his mentor. She had yelled at him, protected him, trusted him. She had held his hand while he died and called his woman to tell her he was alive. She had danced with him and told him, in her blunt, unadorned way, that he was the best lover she had ever had.
"Come to my wedding," he said.
"I'll be there."
"I mean it. You have to be there. I won't do it without you."
Greta's eyes went bright, and she blinked, and then she reached out and pulled him into a deep embrace, her arms around him, her face pressing against his chest. She held him for a long moment, and he could feel her heart beating, could feel her trembling.
"You take care of yourself, you hear me?" she said into his shirt. "You stay out of the deep water. You keep yourself safe for her."
"I will."
"And if you ever want to dive again. Ever. You know where to find me. Next year I'll be back on a ship in the Great Barrier Reef. There's always a place for you."
"I know."
"I mean it, Barreiro. Don't make me come find you."
Javier laughed, a little choked, and held her tighter. "I wouldn't dream of it."
She pulled away, finally, her eyes wet but her smile steady. She looked at him for a long moment, this man half her age, this adopted son, this best lover she would never have again.
"Go," she said. "Go home. Marry your woman. Live your life. That's what your grandfather told you to do."
Javier nodded, and he picked up his bag, and he walked away. At the gate, he turned back, and Greta was still standing there, watching, her hand raised in a final wave.
He waved back, and then he was gone.
The flight to Madrid was long and quiet. Anke sat beside him, her head resting against the window, and they did not talk much. There was nothing left to say. They had shared something that few people ever shared, a brush with death, a rescue, a friendship forged in the deep.
At Madrid, they parted ways. Anke's flight to Frankfurt was boarding; Javier's to Dublin followed an hour later.
"I'll see you at the wedding," Anke said, embracing him at the gate.
"You will."
"With Heidi. She's looking forward to it. She's never been to Ireland."
"I'll show her around."
"Don't be a stranger, Javier. Write to me. Call me. Tell me about your life."
"I will."
She hugged him hard, and then she was gone, disappearing into the crowd.
He watched her go until the crowd swallowed her, and then he stood alone in the terminal, his bag at his feet, the weight of everything settling into his bones. Four months of ice and darkness and near death, and now the fluorescent lights of Madrid, the smell of coffee and diesel and duty-free perfume, the ordinary hum of a world that had kept turning while he was under.
His flight was called. He boarded. The plane lifted into a grey Spanish sky and climbed north, and he slept, truly slept, for the first time in weeks, his head against the window, his body finally letting go of the tension it had carried through the storm and the accident and the slow, careful recovery.
He woke as the plane began its descent. Below him, Ireland spread out, green and soft and impossibly bright, the fields a patchwork of emerald and gold, the clouds breaking to let the afternoon sun spill through. His heart hammered in his chest. He pressed his hand to his sternum, feeling it beat, feeling the solid, undeniable fact of being alive.
The plane touched down. The wheels bumped and screeched, and the cabin filled with the rustle of passengers gathering their things, and Javier sat still, his hands on his knees, breathing.
He was home.
He walked through the jet bridge, through the long glass corridors, past the duty-free shops and the crowded arrivals boards, and then he saw her.
Roisin stood at the barrier, her blonde hair soft around her face, her blue eyes fixed on the door, her hands clasped in front of her like a prayer. She wore a cream coat, a scarf in soft gold, and she was trembling, he could see it from across the room, the way her whole body vibrated with the effort of holding still.
Their eyes met.
She broke. She came apart the way a wave breaks on the shore, her composure collapsing into movement, and she ran, pushing through the crowd, her coat flying behind her, and Javier dropped his bag and went to her, and they collided in the middle of the terminal, her arms around his neck, his around her waist, her face buried in his shoulder.
She was crying. He could feel it, the hot wet soak of it through his shirt, the shaking of her shoulders, the muffled sound she made, half sob, half laugh, against his skin.
"Javier," she said, his name a broken thing, over and over. "Javier, Javier, Javier."
"I'm here," he said. "I'm here. I came back. I told you I would."
"I know. I know you did. I just... I didn't..." She pulled back, her hands on his face, her thumbs tracing his cheekbones, his brow, the line of his jaw, as if she needed to feel every inch of him to believe he was real. "You're thin. You're so thin. And there's a scar. On your forehead. What happened to your forehead?"
"A scrape," he said. "I bumped it. It's nothing."
"Nothing. You call that nothing." But she was smiling through her tears, and her hands were still on his face, and she was looking at him like he was the sun coming up after a long, dark winter.
"I'll tell you everything," he said. "Everything. But not here. Take me home."
She nodded, and she took his hand, and she led him out of the terminal, through the cool grey light of the Dublin afternoon, to the car park, where her car waited. She drove with one hand on the wheel and the other holding his, her fingers woven through his, squeezing every few seconds, as if to remind herself he was still there.
The house was the same. The house was different. It was theirs now, the place they had chosen together, the rooms they had painted, the bed they had slept in before he left. It smelled of her, of lavender and warm wood and the faint sweetness of her perfume, and it smelled of home.
She made tea. They sat in the living room, on the sofa, their knees touching, and she looked at him, her cup cradled in her hands, her eyes soft and waiting.
"Tell me," she said. "Tell me everything."
And so he did.
He told her about the base, about the ice and the light and the strange, beautiful desolation of that place at the bottom of the world. He told her about Anke, about their partnership in the deep, about the trust they had built. He told her about Greta, about her gruff kindness, about the way she had called him her son. He told her about the storm, about the wind that had howled for days, about the way the base had held firm against the fury of the Antarctic night.
And then he told her about the orca.
He told her about the dive, the clear day, the pod of four. He told her about the young whale, its curiosity turned to something else, its charge toward Anke, the way he had moved without thinking. He told her about the impact, the rock, the dark.
He told her about dying.
Her face went white. Her cup clattered into its saucer, and she gripped his arm, her fingers digging in, and she did not interrupt, did not breathe, just listened as he told her about the light, the ceiling, the view of the base from above. He told her about Whitfield's defibrillator, the serial number. He told her about Anke's red notebook. He told her about Greta's call to Dublin, the exact words she had said.
He told her about the scarf.
Roisin made a sound, small and broken, and her hand flew to her mouth. "I was knitting it," she whispered. "That night. I couldn't sleep, and I knew something was wrong, I could feel it, and I sat on the sofa and I knitted, and I cried, and I prayed, and I didn't know, I didn't know what was happening, I just..." She shook her head, tears streaming down her face. "You saw me. You saw me from where you were."
"I saw you," he said. "You were in the front room. The lamp was on. You were wearing your blue cardigan. Your hair was loose. You were crying, and you were knitting, and I thought, that's her, that's my girl, she's still there, she's still waiting for me."
"I was so scared," Roisin said. "I didn't even know why. I didn't know what had happened. But I was so scared, and I couldn't stop shaking, and all I could do was knit that stupid scarf."
"It's not stupid," Javier said. "It's the most beautiful scarf in the world. Because you made it. While you were terrified, you made something with your hands. You held on."
Roisin wept then, openly, unashamedly, and she crawled into his lap, her face against his chest, her arms around him, and he held her, one hand in her hair, the other on her back, and he told her about his grandfather.
"He was there," Javier said. "He put his hand on my shoulder. He told me my time had not arrived yet. He told me I had to go back and live my life. He told me to live."
"And you came back," Roisin whispered. "You came back to me."
"I came back to you. I could have stayed. The light was so warm, and I was so tired, and I didn't want to hurt anymore. But I thought of you. I thought of this. Of the future we promised each other. And I came back."
Roisin held him tighter, and she did not let go for a long time.
That night, they made love.
It was not gentle. It was not slow. It was fierce and hungry and desperate, the way two people make love when they have been apart for four months, when one of them has died and come back, when the world has tried and failed to keep them apart. She pulled his clothes off, and he pulled hers, and they tumbled onto the bed, her body soft and warm beneath him, his hands everywhere, her mouth on his, their bodies moving together like they were trying to fuse into one thing.
Afterward, they lay tangled in the sheets, her head on his chest, his arm around her, both of them breathing hard, slick with sweat.
"I want you to promise me something," Roisin said, her voice muffled against his skin.
"Anything."
"Don't dive again. Don't go back under the water. I can't... I can't do it. I can't lose you. I've already loved you for over two years, and I've spent every one of those years wondering if you were going to come home. I can't live like that. I need you here. I need you safe."
Javier was silent for a long moment. He stared at the ceiling, at the soft play of shadows, and he thought about the deep, the cold, the silence that was like nothing else on earth. He thought about the coral, the light, the creatures that moved through that other world, a world he had spent his life studying, a world he loved.
He thought about the orca. The impact. The dark.
"I can't promise that," he said.
Roisin went still. "Javier—"
"Listen to me." He rolled over to face her, his hand on her cheek. "Diving is not just something I do. It's who I am. It's the thing I was born to do. I've been in the North Sea. I've been in the Caribbean. I've been under the ice in Antarctica. And I've almost died twice. Once in the North Sea, once down there. And you know what? I'm still here. I'm still here because I was trained, and I was careful, and I was lucky. And I want to keep doing it. I want to study the deep. I want to understand it. I want to protect it."
"At the cost of your life?"
"At the risk of my life. That's different." He stroked her hair. "Roisin, if you asked me to stop breathing, I couldn't do it. That's what the water is to me. It's air. It's home. I can't give it up. Not even for you."
She was silent, her eyes bright with unshed tears.
"But I can promise you this," he said. "I will be careful. I will follow the safety protocols. I will never dive alone. I will check my gear twice, three times. I will listen to my body, and I will come up when it tells me to. And I will always, always come home to you."
"You can't promise that," she said quietly. "You can't promise you'll always come home."
"No," he admitted. "I can't. But I can promise I'll always try. And I can promise that every time I go down, I'll be thinking of you. I'll be thinking of this house, and this bed, and the life we're going to build together. I'll be thinking of the scarf, and the way you held on while I was gone. And I will come up. I will fight my way back up, every time, because I know what's waiting for me."
Roisin looked at him for a long moment. Then she let out a breath, something released, and she pressed her forehead to his.
"Fine," she said. "Fine. But you're going to have to make it up to me. Every time you go down, you're going to come back and make love to me like you mean it."
"That I can do," Javier said. "That I can definitely do."
She laughed, a wet, broken sound, and she kissed him, and the argument was settled, not because either of them had won, but because they had found a way to hold each other through it.
The days passed in a gentle blur. Javier recovered fully, the stitches coming out, the bruising fading, the strength returning to his leg. He walked along the canal in the mornings, running a little, testing the limits of his body. He visited Killian's Boxing Club and got back in the ring, slowly at first, then with more confidence, the old rhythm returning.
He thought about what came next. His master's was done, first class honours, a bright future ahead of him. There were offers, always offers, from universities and research institutes who had heard of the young Spanish diver who had made a name for himself in the deep. But he was not ready to decide yet. He wanted to be here, in Dublin, with Roisin, in the life they were building.
They talked about marriage. They had talked about it before he left, in the soft hours of the night, her head on his chest, his hand in her hair. But it had always been a future thing, a someday thing, a promise they made to each other in the dark. Now they talked about it differently. Now it was a plan. Now it was a date on the calendar, a colour scheme, a list of names.
Roisin wanted a summer wedding. She wanted the garden of their new house, the roses she had planted in the spring, the afternoon light slanting through the trees. She wanted her friends, his friends, all of them together in one place. She wanted Greta there, and Anke, and Heidi, the woman who had saved her love and the woman her love had saved.
Javier wanted all of that too. He wanted to look at her across a table covered in food and flowers and see her eyes, the way she looked at him when she thought he wasn't watching, the way she always looked at him, like he was the whole world.
One night, they went out with a group of friends. Molly was there with her boyfriend and Fergal, from the two-year master's and a couple of Roisin's old-time friends, loud and laughing in a corner table of a restaurant on the quays. There was wine, and there was beer, and there was the easy rhythm of old friends catching up, telling stories, teasing each other about the years they had spent together.
Javier sat next to Roisin, his hand on her knee under the table, watching her laugh at something Fergal said. She was beautiful. She was twenty-four years older than him in the calendar, fifty-one years of beautiful history, but she was the most beautiful woman in the room, and he knew it, and everyone who saw them together knew it.
The meal wound down. The plates were cleared. The coffee came, and the dessert menus, and the conversation drifted to other things, and Javier felt the moment arrive.
It was not planned. He had not rehearsed it. He had thought about it, of course, imagined it a hundred different ways, but in the end, it was simple. He pushed back his chair, and he knelt on the floor of the restaurant, and Roisin's eyes went wide, and the table went quiet.
"Roisin," he said, and his voice was steady, which surprised him, because his heart was pounding so hard he could barely hear himself think.
"Javier, what are you—get up, everyone's looking—"
"They are," he agreed. "That's the point."
He reached into his pocket and pulled out a small velvet box. He had bought it the week before, had carried it with him every day since, waiting for the right moment. He had not known that the right moment would be here, in this crowded restaurant, surrounded by their friends, but it was. It was the right moment, because she was here, and he was here, and they were alive, and that was the only thing that mattered.
"I died," he said. "Down in Antarctica, I died. For a few minutes, they brought me back. And while I was gone, I saw my grandfather. He told me to go back. He told me to live my life. And I knew, in that moment, that the only life I wanted to live was a life with you."
Roisin's hand flew to her mouth. Her eyes were filling, the blue turning bright and liquid.
"I know we've talked about this. I know we've planned it. But I wanted to ask you, properly, in the way you deserve. I wanted to say it out loud, in front of everyone who loves us, so that there could be no doubt."
He opened the box. The ring was a sapphire, deep and blue, set in a band of white gold, and it caught the light of the restaurant and held it.
"Roisin O'Sullivan," he said. "Will you marry me?"
She was crying. She was laughing. She was shaking her head, and nodding, and her voice came out in a rush of tears. "Yes. Yes, you stupid, wonderful man, yes."
She pulled him to his feet, and she kissed him, and the table erupted, everyone cheering, clapping, wine glasses raised. Fergal banged his fist on the table. Molly was crying. Saoirse was on her feet, phone raised, capturing the moment.
Javier kissed her, and he felt the ring slide onto her finger, and he held her face in his hands, and he looked into her eyes.
"You're mine," he said. "You're going to be my wife."
"I'm going to be your wife," she said, and she laughed, the sound bright and free and full of joy. "I'm going to marry a man who died and came back for me. I'm going to marry a man who swam with whales and lifted me out of the ordinary and showed me what love could be."
"I'm going to marry the most beautiful woman in Ireland," he said. "And I'm going to spend the rest of my life making sure she knows it."
They were still kissing when the dessert arrived, and they did not notice. They did not notice anything but each other, the ring on her finger, the promise in his eyes.
Outside, the Dublin night was soft and cool, and the Liffey glittered in the dark, and Javier walked home with his arm around Roisin, her head against his shoulder, the future ahead of them like a road that finally, gratefully, led somewhere they both wanted to go.
He felt the phone buzz in his pocket as they walked along the canal, the soft vibration pressed against his thigh, the first time he had felt it all night. He ignored it, his arm around Roisin, her head still against his shoulder, the two of them moving through the cool Dublin air with the easy rhythm of two people who had nowhere to be but together.
It buzzed again, more insistent, and Roisin felt it through his coat. She lifted her head, looking up at him with a curious tilt of her brow.
"You're popular tonight," she said.
"No one's supposed to be calling this late." He shifted, fishing the phone from his pocket, already dismissing whoever it was. The screen glowed in the dark. An unknown number, a foreign prefix he did not recognise. Some telemarketer, probably, or a wrong number from somewhere across the world.
It buzzed a third time while he was looking at it.
"Answer it," Roisin said. "It might be important."
He pressed the green button and lifted it to his ear. "Hello?"
There was a pause, a crackle of static, the faint hiss of a long-distance connection. And then a voice, female, young, with a lilt that was not quite Irish, not quite anything he could place.
"Is this Javier? Javier Barreiro?"
"It is. Who's this?"
"My name is Heidi." The voice was nervous, quick, as if she had rehearsed the words and was trying to get them out before she lost her nerve. "Heidi Vogel. Anke's daughter. She gave me your number. She said I should call you."
Javier stopped walking. Roisin stopped with him, her hand finding his arm, her eyes questioning. He held up a finger, and she waited, patient, watching his face.
"Heidi," he said, the name settling into him. "Is everything alright? Is Anke okay?"
"She's fine. She's fine." A breath, quick and shaky. "I'm sorry to call so late. It's... it's late there, isn't it? I didn't think about the time difference. I'm in Bremen. It's not that late here. I'm sorry."
"It's alright." Javier walked to a bench by the canal and sat, Roisin settling beside him, her hand still on his arm. "Take your time. What's the matter?"
There was a long pause. He could hear her breathing, the soft static of a call that had travelled across half the world. And then, in a voice that cracked slightly on the last word, she said, "I want to ask you something. And I don't know how to ask it. So I'm just going to say it."
"Go ahead."
"I want to come to Ireland." Another pause, another shaky breath. "I want to come to your wedding. I know you invited me. Mum told me. She said you invited both of us. And I want to come. I really want to come. But I don't want to come as someone's daughter. I want to come as myself. I want to meet you first. I want to talk to you. Because I have questions, and I think you're the only person who can answer them."
Javier's heart had begun to beat faster, a steady, deliberate drum. He could feel Roisin's hand tighten on his arm, and he knew she was listening, could hear the edge in the girl's voice, the weight of something that had been carried for a long time.
"What questions?" he asked, keeping his voice gentle. "What do you want to know?"
"My mother almost died," Heidi said. "In Australia, on that reef. She was trapped, and she was drowning, and she thought she was going to die. And then a man came down and rescued her. A Spanish man who had no reason to risk his life for a stranger. He cut her free, he brought her up, he saved her. And she always told me about you. She always said you were the bravest person she'd ever met. But she never told me the whole story. Not until she came back from Antarctica."
Javier closed his eyes. The night air was cool against his skin, the canal dark and still, the city humming softly in the distance. He could feel the weight of the call on his chest, the weight of everything he had done and almost not done in that other place, so far from here.
"She told me about the orca," Heidi said. "She told me how you pushed her out of the way. How you took the blow that would have killed her. How you died. She told me you died, and they brought you back, and you came back, and the first thing you did was talk about her notebook. The red notebook. The one she writes in when she can't sleep."
"I remember the notebook," Javier said.
"She showed it to me. She let me read what she wrote that night, the night she thought she was going to lose you. She wrote that you saved her twice. Once in Australia, once in Antarctica. And she wrote that she would never be able to repay you. She wrote that she would spend the rest of her life trying."
Javier swallowed. He could feel Roisin's eyes on him, warm and steady, and he reached out without looking and took her hand, holding it tight.
"She doesn't owe me anything," he said. "I did what anyone would do."
"No, you didn't." Heidi's voice was fierce now, a flash of her mother's steel. "Anyone would not have done what you did. Most people would have frozen. Most people would have thought about themselves. You went down into the water with a whale and you took a hit that should have killed you, and you did it to save my mother. I need you to know that. I need you to know what you did for our family."
The word hit him somewhere soft. Family. He thought of Anke, solid and quiet, the way she had sat beside him in the medical bay, the way she had told him about Heidi, about the letters they exchanged. He thought of the way she had looked at him at the airport, her eyes bright, saying she would see him at the wedding.
"I'm glad I did it," he said. "I'm glad I was there. I'm glad she's alive."
"That's why I want to meet you," Heidi said. "I want to look at you and thank you. Properly. I want to ask you about that day. I want to ask you what it felt like to go under that water for a woman you barely knew. I want to ask you... I don't know. I want to ask you everything."
Javier looked at Roisin. Her face was soft in the lamplight, her eyes asking a question, and he nodded, a small, private signal.
"When do you want to come?" he said.
"I can come next week. I have leave from university. I can fly to Dublin. I can stay for a few days. Mum said I should ask you first. She said you'd understand."
"I do understand." Javier squeezed Roisin's hand, and she smiled, a small warm curve, and he felt something settle in his chest. "Come. We'll meet you at the airport. We'll show you around. I'll tell you everything you want to know."
There was a long silence on the other end of the line. And then Heidi let out a breath, a sound that was half sob, half laugh, the release of something she had been holding for a long time.
"Thank you," she said. "Thank you so much. I'll text you the details. I'll... I'll see you soon."
"I'll be waiting," Javier said.
The line went dead. He lowered the phone and sat there for a moment, the canal dark before him, the weight of the call settling into him like a stone dropped into still water.
"She's coming," Roisin said softly. It was not a question.
"She's coming."
"To thank you. For saving her mother."
Javier nodded. He turned to look at her, at the woman he was going to marry, her hand small and warm in his, her face full of a soft and knowing light.
"I didn't think about it," he said. "When I pushed Anke out of the way. I didn't think about consequences, or risk, or what I had waiting for me back home. I just saw her in danger, and I moved. That's all it was. Just moving."
"That's what makes it extraordinary," Roisin said. "You didn't think. You just did. You acted on instinct, and your instinct was to save someone else's life. That's who you are, Javier. That's the man I'm going to marry."
He looked at her, and he felt a rush of something too large for words, a gratitude so vast it seemed to fill the canal and the city and the whole dark sky above them.
"I love you," he said.
"I love you too." She stood, still holding his hand, and pulled him gently to his feet. "Now come on. You've had a long night. A proposal, a celebration, and a phone call from across the world. Let's go home."
They walked the rest of the way in silence, their hands linked, the night cool around them. The phone stayed quiet in his pocket, and the ring on Roisin's finger caught the streetlight as they passed, glinting like a promise kept.
Heidi arrived on a Thursday, a bright morning with a crisp wind off the sea, and Javier drove to the airport alone. Roisin had offered to come, had wanted to be there, but he had shaken his head. This was something he needed to do himself, a conversation that needed to begin in a particular way, with a particular pair of eyes meeting his across a crowded arrivals hall.
She found him at the barrier. She was tall, big and strong, like her mother, with the same broad shoulders and short-cropped blonde hair, but her face was softer, younger, her eyes a lighter shade of blue. She carried a small rucksack and walked with a nervous, deliberate stride, stopping a few feet away and looking at him.
"You're him," she said. "You're the man from the water."
"I'm Javier," he said. "It's good to meet you, Heidi."
She did not move for a moment. And then she stepped forward and hugged him, a quick, fierce embrace, her face pressed against his shoulder, and he felt her shake.
"Thank you," she said, her voice muffled. "Thank you for bringing her back."
He held her, steady as the earth, and let her say it.
They drove back to the house in a comfortable silence. She looked out the window at the green fields, the stone walls, the low grey sky, and Javier let her take it in. When they arrived, Roisin was waiting at the door, her smile warm, a pot of tea already steeping on the table.
Heidi stayed for three days. They walked along the canal, and they drove to the coast, and they sat in the kitchen of the house Javier and Roisin shared, talking for hours. She told him about her studies, her plans to become a graphic designer, the letters she exchanged with her mother, the fear she had carried since the accident in Australia, the fear she had carried since the accident in Antarctica.
Javier told her about her mother. He told her about the way Anke worked, methodical and steady, never wasting a movement. He told her about the partnership they had built in the deep, the trust that had grown between them, the wordless understanding they had developed in the cold, quiet water. He told her about the way Anke sat with him when he was healing, the way she read him stories from her notebook, the way she told him about the daughter she was going to see in Bremen.
That made Heidi cry. She cried quietly, without hiding it, and Roisin brought her a box of tissues and sat with her, holding her hand.
"She never told me," Heidi said. "She never told me how scared she was. She always made it sound like it was nothing, like the accidents were small, like she was never really in danger. And then she came home from Antarctica and she couldn't stop talking about what happened. She couldn't stop talking about you."
"She's a brave woman," Javier said. "Braver than she knows."
"She thinks you're the brave one."
"She's wrong." Javier smiled. "We were both just doing what we do. She was doing her job, and I was doing mine. We looked out for each other. That's all it was."
It was not all it was, and they both knew it. But the words served their purpose. They built a bridge across the table, and in the evening light of the kitchen, with Roisin's hand in his and Heidi's eyes full of a gratitude he could not quite hold, Javier felt something that felt a lot like a small, quiet piece of the future falling into place.
The day she left, she hugged him at the airport the same way she had hugged him three days before, fierce and quick, her face pressed against his shoulder.
"I'll see you at the wedding," she said.
"You will."
"I'm going to bring Mum. She's going to cry the whole time."
"She never cries," Javier said.
"You haven't seen her with wine." Heidi laughed, a bright, open sound. "She'll cry. I promise you. She'll cry, and she'll hug you, and she'll tell you she loves you, and she'll mean it. Just like I mean it now."
She pulled back, her eyes bright, and she looked at him one last time.
"Thank you, Javier. For everything."
She was gone, swallowed by the security gates, and Javier stood alone for a moment, the air of the terminal moving around him, and he thought about all the things he had been given in this strange, improbable life. A woman who loved him enough to find him across an ocean. A crew that trusted him with their lives. A girl he had never met who had flown from Germany just to thank him.
He took out his phone and dialled Roisin's number.
"She's gone," he said. "She's on her way home. She's going to be fine."
"I know," Roisin said, her voice soft and warm through the speaker. "And so are you, my love. So are you."
The following morning, Roisin was already dressed when Javier woke, sitting on the edge of the bed in a soft grey blouse and dark trousers, her hands folded in her lap. She was watching him with an expression he had learned to read over the months they had been together, a mixture of tenderness and determination that meant she had something on her mind.
"You're up early," he said, his voice thick with sleep.
"I've made an appointment," she said. "For you. At the Mater Private. A cardiologist. Full workup. Everything."
He sat up slowly, letting the words settle. "Roisin."
"I know what you're going to say." She reached out and took his hand, her fingers cool against his. "You feel fine. You're young. You're super fit. You've been cleared by Whitfield at that base. I know all of that. But I need this, Javier. I need to hear it from someone here, in Dublin, in a proper hospital, that your heart is okay. That it's strong. That it didn't... that what happened down there didn't leave something behind."
He looked at her, at the lines of worry around her eyes, at the way she was holding herself so carefully, and he understood. She had spent months carrying the fear. She had knitted a scarf in the dark because she could not sit still. She had been told by Greta that he was alive, but she had never heard the full story until he had told her himself, and the telling had opened a door she could not close.
"Alright," he said. "I'll go."
Her face relaxed, a small release of tension he had not realised she was holding. "Thank you."
"But you're coming with me."
"Of course I'm coming with you. I made the appointment."
The clinic was modern and quiet, all pale wood and soft lighting and the faint hum of machinery behind closed doors. A receptionist with a kind smile took his details and handed him a clipboard of forms, and he sat in the waiting room with Roisin beside him, her hand on his knee, her thumb tracing small circles through the fabric of his trousers.
"Do you want coffee?" she asked.
"I'm fine."
"You should have eaten more at breakfast."
"I ate plenty."
"You had one slice of toast."
"That's plenty."
She made a small sound, half amused, half exasperated, and he took her hand and brought it to his lips, kissing her knuckles. "I'm going to be fine. You'll see. They're going to tell you I have the heart of a twenty-year-old."
"You already have the body of a twenty-year-old," she said. "It's your heart I'm worried about."
A nurse called his name. He stood, and Roisin stood with him, and they walked together down a corridor lined with closed doors, past a room where someone was being asked to breathe deeply into a tube, past a chart on the wall showing the anatomy of the heart in muted colours.
The cardiologist was a woman in her late fifties, grey-streaked hair pulled back in a neat bun, round glasses perched on her nose. She introduced herself as Dr. O'Connor and shook both their hands with a firm, warm grip.
"So," she said, settling behind her desk, "I understand you had a cardiac arrest. One month ago, in Antarctica. You were revived with a defibrillator on the scene, then spent time in the medical bay at the base. Is that right?"
"Yes," Javier said.
"And you've had no symptoms since? No chest pain, no breathlessness, no palpitations?"
"Nothing. I trained lightly while I was recovering, and I've been back at the gym since I got home. Boxing. Running. No problems."
Dr. O'Connor nodded, making a note on her tablet. "Good. That's a good sign. But let's not rely on signs. We'll do the full workup and see what your heart actually looks like."
The tests were thorough and unhurried. An electrocardiogram, the cold gel on his chest, the small adhesive pads pressing against his skin while the machine traced the rhythm of his heart. An echocardiogram, the transducer gliding over his ribs, the image of his heart flickering on the screen, a dark chamber pulsing in silent, steady rhythm. Blood tests. A stress test on a treadmill, the speed increasing, the incline rising, Javier pushing himself until his breath came in sharp bursts and his legs burned.
Through all of it, Roisin was there. She sat in the corner of each room, her hands clasped in her lap, her eyes fixed on him, on the screens, on the faces of the technicians and the doctor. She did not speak. She did not need to. He could feel her presence like a physical weight, steady and warm.
The final test was a cardiac MRI, and he lay in the narrow tube, the machine thrumming around him, a voice in his ear telling him to hold his breath, release, hold again. He closed his eyes and thought of the water, of the deep, of the cold silence that had almost taken him. He thought of the light, of his grandfather's hand on his shoulder, of the voice telling him to go back. He thought of Roisin, sitting outside, waiting, holding her fear in her hands like something fragile.
When it was done, they were led back to Dr. O'Connor's office. The results were already on her screen, a cascade of numbers and images he could not fully parse but could feel the weight of. She studied them in silence for a long moment, and then she turned to face them.
"Good news," she said. "Excellent news, really."
Roisin let out a breath, a long, slow release that seemed to carry the tension of months with it. Her hand found Javier's, gripping hard.
"Your heart is structurally normal," Dr. O'Connor said. "The chambers are the right size, the valves are functioning properly, the walls are thick and healthy. Your ejection fraction is excellent. There's no sign of damage, no scarring, no inflammation, nothing that would suggest you had a cardiac event of any kind. Your rhythm is normal, your blood pressure is excellent, your cholesterol is a dream. Honestly, Mr. Barreiro, if I didn't have the records from Antarctica, I would say you had never had anything close to a cardiac arrest."
Javier felt a smile spread across his face. "I told you."
"Shush," Roisin said, but she was smiling too, her eyes bright.
"The fact that you were revived so quickly and completely," Dr. O'Connor continued, "combined with your age and your fitness level, means your heart has essentially recovered as if nothing happened. There's some evidence, in cases like yours, that a healthy young heart can bounce back remarkably well, particularly if the arrest was caused by trauma rather than underlying cardiac disease. That appears to be what happened here. Your heart stopped because of the impact, not because there was anything wrong with it."
"So he's fine," Roisin said. "He's really fine."
"He's really fine," Dr. O'Connor confirmed. "I would go so far as to say he has the cardiovascular system of an elite athlete. Whatever you've been doing, Mr. Barreiro, keep doing it."
They left the clinic hand in hand, the afternoon light soft and golden over the city. Roisin did not speak for a while, and he let her have the silence, watching the streets pass by through the window of her car, the familiar landmarks of Dublin sliding past.
When they reached the house, she pulled into the driveway and killed the engine, and she sat there for a moment, her hands still on the wheel.
"Javier," she said.
"Yes?"
"I'm going to cry now."
"Okay."
Chapter excerpt truncated at the edge.