Matecumbe by James A. Michener

nurse, and really dedicated to her patients at Children’s Hospital in Philadelphia. She just didn’t want to leave the area. So we put off the wedding until we could find housing together somewhere near her job.
    “Then Hurricane Agnes came. It wasn’t that horrible a storm as hurricanes go, especially in the Northeast. But Becky was traveling to work during the worst part of the storm. The roads were pretty washed out from all the rain and visibility was pretty poor. She was only two miles from the bridge to Philadelphia when a tractor-trailer skidded and lost control, plowing right into her. The police said she never knew what hit her. She died instantly.
    “I’ve never really felt the same for anyone since.”
    Joe finally turned to look at Melissa, and she saw his eyes filled with tears. She squeezed his hand, and rested her head on his shoulder unable to say anything that seemed appropriate after such a tale.
    They sat for a few more moments, and then Joe stood up, pulled Melissa to her feet, and said, “Let’s move on, shall we?” Melissa smiled in relief that the sparkle was back in Joe’s eyes again.
    Thus, with worries over hurricane sanity finally put to bed, the next stop on the duo’s itinerary was the beach at nearby Caloosa Cove.
    At the far southwestern point of Islamorada, just before the bridge that marked the end of Joe’s official police jurisdiction, was a secluded beach hidden off the ocean side of the highway. To get to it, Joe drove his car down a slight, unpaved incline and over some very bumpy terrain.
    “It looks like sand we’re riding on,” Melissa offered, as she bounced slightly on her seat and literally had to hold onto her sunhat with one hand, “but it’s not very soft.”
    “Just a few more yards,” Joe laughed. “This is a far cry from the beaches in New Jersey. The islands in South Florida were formed from hard coral. There’s no soft sand.”
    When Joe stopped the car, close to the water’s edge, Melissa was captivated immediately by the picturesque view. Spread out before them was a dictionary definition of the word “magnificent.” A wide expanse of pure white beach was accented by calm, minute ripples of seawater that sparkled before them, from right to left as far as the eye could see and straight out to the cloudless horizon.
    The beach was deserted except for the tiny, sandpiper-like birds who didn’t fly much but who hustled along on feet moving so fast that only a blur was visible. There were hundreds of these birds, and they seemed to change directions in groups, as if they were miniature soldiers practicing their marches on a military parade ground.
    Huge palm trees provided occasional shade from the eighty-five degree sunshine. The trees, most of which bore clusters of greenish coconuts poised far above ground level, no doubt began their lives by bursting through the shallow dirt before snaking skyward like so many crooked secondary roadways.
    Sprinkled haphazardly throughout the beach were wild, purplishhued hibiscus bushes that helped paint a truly tropical scene.
    Surprisingly, there were no waves at all breaking in the surf.
    “The approaching swells slice through the coral reef long before reaching the shoreline,” Joe noted. “The offshore water is always calm here, as if it were one big, gigantic swimming pool.”
    Melissa was the first one to leave the car. As part of a magnetic reaction to the closeness of the sea, she slipped out of her tee shirt and slacks, revealing a red-and-blue, flowered bikini that was a shade more conservative than racy.
    “Let’s try the water,” she beamed, holding her hands to her hips and waiting as Joe started a mild struggle to kick off his trousers.
    From the way Joe kept shifting his gaze from Melissa to his clothes and back again, she was sure that her suddenly undraped, thin, shapely figure was definitely to his liking.
    Joe’s strong, athletic build was also a turn-on. Melissa liked his rippling,