What Happened to Lani Garver

by Carol Plum-Ucci

  I realized I was in as much trouble as Lani.

  29

  Vince and Phil managed to stuff me in the net before I came out of shock freeze, but they didn't just plunge us under. They twirled and twisted that net like they had for Phil the other night. The only thought I could grab on to was an instinctive one—to curl up tight into a little ball like Lani was, to keep from getting too tangled in the net. But hair, fingers, sneaker tips, any little thing seemed to snag and wrap it tighter around me.

  We were two balls hurling through space, smashed up against each other so that I could feel his hypothermia shaking us around like a convulsion. When I finally opened my eyes, I was a little ball looking down. Immediately below me were Lani's wide eyes. Far below was the water. They left us dangling over the water while the four of them argued below.

  Tony kept screeching. "She cut off my hand ... She cut off my hand..."

  "She did not, and if you don't quit that baby fuckin' crying, I'm gonna cut off your head!" Vince's voice ... Scott and Phil groaning in disgust ... Vince's voice again. "You need a bunch of stitches, that's all. Bunch of stitches. Claire, you nutcase! You hurt my brother. Now we're gonna drown you—"

  "You got blood all over my dad's boat!" Scott made frenzied stomping. "We are in deep shit! Get off, Tony! Go to the truck! This ends now! Get those morons out of my dad's net."

  Tony backed up toward the dock and flopped one leg over the rail, trying to wrap his hand in his brother's T-shirt while holding it over the water. Vince stood with his bare back to us, too busy arguing with Phil and Scott to realize it was cold out here.

  "I'll clean up the blood! I'm gonna drown that crazed bitch first—"

  "Nobody's drowning!" Phil grabbed for the crank. "We got to clean up this mess, or they can prove something to the cops."

  "There ain't gonna be any cops, because I'm gonna drown them!" Vince yelled.

  "Nobody's dying off this boat!" Scott had a mop in his hand. He jabbed it down into the water off the side closest to us and ran it frantically across the deck. "We aren't some fucked-up Wyoming cowboys. And we aren't killing no girl."

  And Vince was all "Your girlfriend fell in love with a queen!"

  Scott moved right up to him, shoved the mop at his chest, and said under his breath, "Your brother is ... a queen."

  Despite where I was, I felt a smile forming. I suddenly didn't think we were in danger of drowning. They would pull us back in. It was fun to watch Vince break that mop in half over his knee and send the top part whizzing past Tony's whimpering head. I could feel Lani trembling ferociously and hoped he was together enough to have heard.

  "They believe us ... They believe us! You said they never would. They're just a bunch of overgrown brats," I tried explaining.

  I figured he might disagree, being that he was busy slowly freezing to death while the brats finished arguing. His voice trembled so badly it sounded like a song with too much vibrato. "Never thought ... they're totally ... bad. Bad ... would have ... done a group hysteria thing ... don't really want to kill us..."

  I pulled my head back as far as I could, which was only about six inches from his face. Because I'd curled up in a ball, it was not hard to wiggle my fingers out of my cheerleading jacket, pull my arms in tighter and manage, in little jerks, to get the jacket over my head and shove it between us. It didn't seem to warm him much, though I wanted it to. I felt strange toward him, stunned by his charitable comment, and yet pissed at those parts of him I didn't know well at all, obviously.

  "What the hell went wrong with you tonight? Acting like that in front of Tony? Why did you tell me you could always think on your feet? You're here, you know, because you might as well have begged him to drown you. Could you have lied and said you were a great swimmer?"

  "No. You're ... in this net ... because you couldn't ... find ... middle ground—"

  "Don't talk to me about what I did." I seethed through my teeth. "You wimped out ... We looked like fools, you first, and then me. Don't lecture me! What the hell is wrong with you tonight?" I grumbled again.

  He blinked at me, trembling so bad even his eyelashes shook. I thought he must be losing it, floating in and out of sanity ... talking normally one minute, crazed philosophy the next. Middle ground. This was not the time. But it made me stare. Actually, it was too perfect a time ... a perfect truth that I knew deep inside. It just shouldn't have been coming from a person in the throes of hypothermia who needed to answer the question: What the hell is wrong with you?

  He forced himself to quit shaking for a moment when he answered. "Nothing."

  Nothing was wrong with him.... Crazy people always think they're sane. Speaking of crazies, I turned my eyes to the boat because Vince, Phil, and Scott had gotten enough of their act together to face us and deliver a speech. Tony was still whimpering off the port side.

  "Do you know how ridiculous you two look?" Scott shouted. "Coupla goose eggs half upside-down. Listen up, assholes. I'm not putting no girl down under. Phil, neither. And Vince, neither. We're gonna let you go, under one condition. Nobody talks. Nobody finds out about what happened tonight. You talk, we come find you. And next time you won't be so lucky. You with me, Garver?"

  "You, too, McKenzie. I'm gonna be watching you when you sleep!" Vince almost screeched. "You even think the wrong thing, I'm gonna drown your ass!"

  I wanted to say so badly, "Oh! Drown me like your drunk-ass father drowned!" But my hatchet moment was still ripe.... Middle ground.

  "Hurry up," I told them in an even voice, "before somebody dies of pneumonia."

  Scott had a net pole, and he tried to drive it into the net and bring us back. His reach was short, and it slapped the water.

  "Claire ... are you a good swimmer?"

  I glanced down at Lani, ignoring his question, all thinking, Please, don't get morbid when we're so close to out of here. He was looking sideways, at the deck. I followed his eyes. Tony had hauled himself onto the stern again and reached for the hatchet. He gripped it in his good hand and, with an insane screech, lay a swing into the rope that hooks the chain to the crank.

  I half screamed and started answering Lani, though there was not enough time. "I've had lifesaving, but go limp, don't grab my neck!"

  That's all I could share before the sea sprang up to meet us. A thousand icy teeth laid into me as the cold water swallowed us. Hitting the water made the net bounce into a little slack. Lani wrapped himself so tightly around me, I could not move my arms, could not move at all.

  30

  Lani became a hundred-pound snake squeezing the life out of me in the icy blackness. The net started to unwind, loosening us, but he would not ease up. I pushed off with my arms, but he was like a rubber band. The surface light felt upside-down as the net unraveled, then sideways, then right side up. I kicked my legs to get away, but Lani's grip was superhuman. He's killing us both ... can't save myself, let alone him...

  I also had to fight the urge to gasp or scream, the water was so shocking. His legs were wrapped around, so I could only kick one leg free. Will never kick us both to the surface... I braced myself for blacking out. My body relaxed somewhat. Surprisingly, Lani seemed to be doing the same thing. Without waiting to believe it, I slithered out of his loosening grip and kicked. Lani's face swayed close to me one last time. Through the murky black sea, the whites of his eyes widened. Terrified. Don't leave me ... Don't leave me... My bursting lungs drove me straight up with hard kicks.

  The net had become completely untangled and floated loose. Its outline glowed in the surface spotlight, a thousand fingers ready to choke me. I broke the surface, gulping in air as the spotlight blinded me. The whites of his eyes still flashed in my brain. Terror ... betrayal...

  Scott and Phil were screaming to me, but I dived under again, eyeing what I could see of the net. The icy pins had stopped biting near the surface. I headed down for the trace of white, flailing in the lower shadows of darkness. Every instinct was telling me to get higher, away from the increas
ing cold, but I kicked until a flailing arm hit me in the face. I felt netting between us. Tangled on the inside? Or had he managed to follow me up, then sink to the outside? I charged back for the surface, for another breath.

  I heaved cold air into my lungs, my eyes bulging. This time Phil's voice rang out. "Claire! We can't reel it in!"

  "I'm trying to fix it!" Scott screamed.

  Vince and Tony were having a loud argument that I paid no attention to. I dived again, searching through the black for the glow of white. This time it was still. A floating ghost. I kicked toward it as the instinct to break for the surface screamed. My fingers brushed the fabric, and I grabbed it and pulled.... Still tangled. I pulled harder, trying to stay clear of his limbs, just in case he might grab me again, but my lungs were bursting. I lurched for the surface, eyes shut tight, tears of defeat making my eyelids burst.

  The icy air poured into my lungs. But a splash beside me threw me closer to the boat, and I realized one of the guys had gone down for him. Arms pulled me out of the water and into the night air. The arms gripped like giant snakes, and I screamed, coming into that wind. I squirmed in agony, but Scott was squeezing me in half. I saw a door and a huge boot kicking it in.

  Scott's voice screamed louder than my own as the door gave way, banging open. "Gimme your clothes!"

  "Stay away from me!"

  "Do it! Phil went after him!"

  In the distance I heard a truck engine starting. Scott started hurling dry clothes over my head and yelling, "Ahhhhhh!" just to keep from crying. Somehow I was in sweatpants and a sweatshirt. We stumbled out onto the deck, and Phil's screaming drew us quickly to the side. That desire to scream was overwhelming, yet I instinctively knew that something beyond the pain of the cold was making him scream.

  He sputtered, "Thought I had him free, but it was only Claire's jacket! I seen him—He's outside the net! But he's all tangled! I seen that white thing, all tangled!"

  Scott heaved the crank around a giant makeshift knot they must have completed too late. They would have been afraid to crank the net up once I'd said Lani might have been tangled outside. If they'd heaved it up, they might have dropped him, lost him in the strong current. At this point, they had no choice. Phil scrambled out of the way. The V-chain broke the surface, then the net. The eerie sight brought a scream out of my throat. A white nightgown hopelessly tangled in the netting, torn and inside out, hung by its lonesome...

  31

  I buried my face in my hands. "But ... I can't swim!" ... whites of his eyes ... terror gaze ... don't leave me down here, Claire...

  Scott backed into me, and I ran screaming for the boat's searchlight, moving it back and forth across the surface, pleading with them to stop fighting and help me hunt.

  But the Sophomore Show continued to wail around me. Phil shouted up at Scott, accusing him of probably sending the body to the bottom when he pulled up the net. Scott accused Phil of not being able to dive as deep as I had. Vince and Tony were nowhere. As Phil dived again, Scott lost it totally. "Oh my god ... Tony fuckin' killed somebody..."

  I watched the surface of the water—front, back, and sideways—watching and praying. The wide terror in Lani's eyes wouldn't stop replaying. I should have been able to pull harder, think faster ... but he'd been so hopelessly tangled...

  Fishermen play chicken with each other, risk each other's lives, but then risk their own lives to save a person they just threw in. Strange breed. Phil Krilley dived six more times after Scott hauled the net in, while I searched with the spotlight. Once Phil stayed under so long, I thought he wasn't coming up. Each time, I prayed he'd come up with an unconscious body. After the sixth time, he said, "I can't no more."

  Scott threw dry clothes on Phil as quickly as he had on me, and I stumbled behind them as they ran for the truck. I thought we were running for Tony's car phone. The truck was gone. Vince stood staring at the entrance gates, pacing in zombielike circles, smoking a cigarette.

  "Went to get himself fixed up," Vince said. His hands trembled almost uncontrollably. "He had to leave us. Had to. Or he would have bled to death."

  Phil put a hand on his shoulder and shook him—not too hard—I couldn't tell whether it was affectionate or angry. "Vince, somebody just died. Do you understand that? Do you get what's going on here?"

  "I don't understand nothing. I don't want to understand nothing. I just want ... I think ... I'm goin' home." He started to walk off toward the gates.

  I let out some disgusted yelp, and what followed really drives home my meaning when I say fishermen are a strange breed. I got three steps into a run toward another boat when Scott grabbed my arm and slung me backward.

  "Where are you going?"

  "To call for help!"

  "There is no help, Claire! Don't make this any worse than it is!"

  I froze, stunned.

  "He never broke the surface! Krilley dove for fifteen minutes! People drown in four, Claire! There is no help! Do you get that?" He shook me.

  I hadn't had a chance to let any concepts sink in—alive, dead. I just knew when someone doesn't surface in the water, you call the coast guard.

  "You can't just leave him." I tried to scream at him, but my words got drowned in some gluey stuff in my throat and my ears.

  "He's done, Claire! It was an accident!" He shook me again. "You and Phil ... you almost just lost your lives, diving for some goddamn flake in a nightgown! That's what he was, Claire! A whining, whimp-o, fucking weirdo. And nobody is going to jail over him!"

  "His body is going to wash up." Phil was close to crying again.

  I had turned to stone, which is the only reason I couldn't be ripped in half while trying to remember the definitions of right and wrong. If I had seen Lani do anything to try to save himself, I might not have been mad at him, too. I let go of so much to stand by him. In the end he shocked me—and only me. No one was surprised—except me. I had given up everything, and for what?

  I felt betrayed. I felt terrible I couldn't save him. But I felt betrayed. I didn't want to think about living without him. But I felt betrayed.

  Maybe Phil and Scott hadn't completely fallen for a grouphysteria murder. Yet they'd only come to their senses after it was too late. I felt betrayed by them, too—by everyone.

  Stony, I caught bits and pieces of their argument, not quite believing what I was hearing.... Something about the mysterious tides off Hackett ... Phil blathered how two fishermen fell off the dock during a hurricane, and they never washed up. Yet a guy whose boat sunk a mile off the coast did wash up.

  Scott said, "It's low tide. If he's gonna wash up, it'll be tonight. If not, then he ain't washing up. I'll come back at first light. I'll clean up the deck, fix the net right..."

  I watched him in stunned awe. His thinking always runs to covering up. Even now. Push it as far as you can, then cover up what goes wrong.

  I croaked out what I hoped would make them feel their guilt the most. "Do you realize ... he was leaving tonight?" I thought of the two backpacks Lani had kicked into the closet, trying to hold on to his few possessions. Like he would actually need them, now. "How does that make you feel? If you'd just given him fifteen more minutes he would be gone. Never to bother you again—"

  "He was leaving?" Phil grabbed me by the arm and jerked me up to him.

  "He was running away!"

  "Then, that's it. That's our story." He looked over the top of my head at something far off. "We'll say we heard he was planning to run away. Nobody would come down on us for keeping that one to ourselves. We don't say nothing beyond that. Even if he washes up ... he ran away as far as we know ... Where's that thing he was wearing?"

  "Hurled it over the side," Scott muttered. "We didn't beat him ... he wasn't bleeding. He was wearing jeans, right? Could look like a suicide—"

  I screamed, "What the hell kind of perverts are you?"

  Phil jerked me up to him hard. He clamped my arm in a death grip. "You are so lucky to be alive. Do you realize how lucky you are? D
o you?"

  He shook me and shook me. I finally caught his meaning, though his shakes and sputters sounded childish, and he was still crying. I didn't think he would be able to come through on some scheme to drown me next. But he wasn't Tony.

  The walk home was something I can never quite remember, yet never quite forget. At one point I realized that just my head and feet were cold. I had only wool socks on my feet. Scott must have given me his football jacket, because I was wearing it. My wet clothes and Phil's wet clothes were stuffed inside a plastic garbage bag Scott was carrying. Unbelievable.

  I also could not believe I was actually walking with them. I stayed focused on how weird that felt, because it was better than thinking of anything else—especially how they kept lecturing me and each other. According to Scott we would keep our mouths shut. Scott would stay up all night, make Vince drive him back at sunrise to see what had washed up, if anything. He would mop up the rest of Tony's blood, fix the rope where Tony had sliced through it, and no one would ever know. According to Phil I ought to feel damn lucky they didn't drown me along with Lani, just to keep me quiet.

  They decided they would not turn on Vince Clementi's brother. They would handle him themselves, but no one would go to the cops. They figured they personally hadn't done anything so wrong, but Tony could go to jail over this—manslaughter, even attempted murder. He was already on probation for a drug bust.

  Somewhere in my stunned brain I found a bit of accuracy they were missing. They could all go to jail if people were pissed enough. They deserved it. There was kidnapping and assault and harassment and a hate crime. I tried to think of snaking them out to the cops. But it was hard to think too deeply when I had their big shoulders and determined attitudes right in my face ... when our cops had known their parents since forever, and Lani was a kid who "dressed up in nightgowns," and wouldn't Macy be happy to say so?