The One I'm With

by Jamie Bennett

  ∞

  When my phone rang early on anti-Valentine’s Saturday morning and I saw who was calling, I thought there had to be an emergency. Ava was much too controlled to call me by mistake with a purse or butt dial.

  “Ava? What’s wrong? What happened to my mom?”

  “Lanie, my Lord. You’re a little jumpy this morning,” Ava answered coolly. “Nothing is wrong with your mother.”

  “Oh.” I stopped for a second. “Did you want something?”

  She also paused, long enough that I said hello again.

  “Yes, hello,” she snapped, and I heard the anger in her voice. “Your mother told me…she requested that I shop for a gift for Kristian for Valentine’s Day. She requested it this morning. Of course, I have other plans, and I won’t be able to do that for her.”

  “Where do I come in on this?”

  “I assumed that you wouldn’t have anything to do today…”

  “You were going to punt this off on me? You thought that I would go out and buy my mom’s gift for Kristian?” It was so absurd, I started to laugh.

  “I thought that you would want to help your mother.”

  “Actually, I do have plans for the day,” I was saying, just as Brooks put his head in through my bedroom door.

  “Ready, Lanie? I don’t know how much longer the sun is going to last.”

  “I have to go, Ava,” I said. “You should just tell my mom that you don’t have time or something.” Despite myself, I felt a little sorry for her. It sucked to be someone’s Valentine’s lackey.

  “Thank you for your sage advice,” Ava bit back, and she hung up before I could say anything more.

  “Let’s go, Peanut. Do you have Maisie’s floatie?”

  Just in case she ran into the waves, she had a little life preserver. I didn’t anticipate it, though, because she got angry about wet sand on her paws so she never went that close to the water. “Yep, and I have her bowl, and her stuffed carrot for comfort for the ride. I still think this is a bad idea. You know how she gets in the car and the road over to Limantour Beach is really twisty.”

  “I’ll let her sit on my lap,” he said confidently. “She’ll be fine.”

  About an hour later, we were hosing dog puke off his pants at the trailhead that led to the beach and Maisie was lying on her side, panting and kind of groaning, like we had killed her.

  “Never again,” Brooks said. “Never, never again.”

  “Well, you wanted the anti-holiday,” I reminded him. “You really can’t get farther away from a romantic Valentine’s than dog vomit.” I studied him as he frowned. “Maybe it’s just too soon for this to be funny.”

  He hosed for a while longer then gave up. “This isn’t working. I’m going to change,” he told me, and disappeared into the disgusting public bathrooms. He came out about a second later wearing his bathing suit, which was pretty far from weather appropriate on this frigid, 60-degree day.

  “I’m sorry about Maisie,” I offered. I was cuddling her now, and after some water and one of her treats, she had perked back up.

  “I was the one who wanted to bring her. You did warn me.” He took the dog from me. “Feeling better?” he asked her. “Is there anything left in you to throw up or is did it all end up on me?” She tried to lick him and he pulled his face away quickly. “No, it’s definitely too soon for that,” he told her, and put her under his arm. “I’ll carry her so she doesn’t have trouble in the sand.” He carried most of our gear, too, the bag and the chairs, and I picked up the towels and wetsuits. Brooks had urged me to bring mine, just in case I was feeling brave enough to go in the ocean. The answer to that was already no.

  He carted our load of stuff and dog down the path. “I haven’t been here in a long, long time,” he mentioned. “Senior year everyone was coming out for a huge bonfire but I had…man, I don’t remember, but I couldn’t go. I was so pissed off.”

  “You had a water polo tournament in Irvine,” I said. “That was why you missed it.”

  “Really?” He looked over at me. “How do you remember that?”

  I stared out over the horizon, beyond the wide, sandy beach and across the dark blue water. Because I had made it my business to learn everything about him. “I don’t know. I remember weird details.”

  He put down the chairs and spread out a towel for Maisie. She huffed and plopped down, looking suspiciously at the sand.

  “I was so unhappy,” Brooks continued. “That whole year, it felt like everything was spiraling out of my control. I wanted to get in my car and leave, just drive away. Or drive off a bridge or something.”

  “Brooks, my God.” I put my hand on his arm. I hadn’t known that. “Brooks.”

  He looked at the ocean. “I was struggling but I didn’t know how to say it. I was drinking too much, driving too fast, taking every risk I could. Tempting fate. It could have ended very differently.” He glanced over at me. “No, no, don’t cry. Lanie, don’t cry!”

  I did try to stop. “I don’t want you to be unhappy,” I choked out.

  “I’m not. Not anymore.” He shook his head. “Lanie, it was a long time ago.”

  “I always thought you had it all together. I just feel terrible that no one helped you. That I didn’t help you when you needed someone.”

  He put his arms around me. “Peanut, don’t cry. It was too much pressure, I see that now. I was trying to ace everything in my life, from grades to friends, polo, the whole thing had to be perfect. I felt like I was responsible for my mom and my sisters. I felt like I had to live up to some ideal of my dad.” He rested his cheek on my head and I held on to him. “Things got a lot better when I went to college and got away from everything here. I got to reinvent myself, in a way. No one had any expectations and I felt…free. It’s good to get away.”

  I was still holding on to him as tightly as I could. “I’m so sorry, though,” I said. His shirt was getting wet, because I couldn’t seem to stop crying.

  “I remember you crying when we found a dead bird, once. You cried like your heart was going to break. I had to pretend to take it to the bird hospital to make it better.”

  “You did that for me?” I hiccupped.

  “I don’t like it when you cry,” he said. I felt his breath on the top of my head, and then his lips, and I froze. He was holding me in his arms and I was so close to him, with just a little fabric between us. Suddenly my body lit up and instead of a sob, a sigh left my mouth.

  “Ok, good.” Brooks stepped back and smiled at me. “No more crying over things from ten years ago.” He looked at our bag. “Did we bring anything to eat?”

  I wiped my jacket sleeve under my eyes, glad for my mom’s “Carmel-by-the-Sea Breezes” collection waterproof mascara. “You’re always hungry at the beach. Of course I brought a lot of food.”

  We sat as he scarfed down what I’d packed and I did my part, too. Even Maisie relented and ate a bite of my lunch. Brooks watched her and sighed. “I get the feeling that I’m going to be seeing that sandwich again,” he noted as she swallowed.

  “Sorry. But I tried…”

  “I know. You tried to tell me. She seems to be enjoying herself now,” he noted, as she tried to catch a fly out of the air, and barked at a seagull.

  “Are you enjoying yourself? I mean, are you really happier now?” I asked, and felt tears well up again.

  He leaned forward and gently wiped his thumbs under my eyes. “Yes. And I wouldn’t have told you that if I had known it was going to make you so upset.” He looked at me for a moment, then said, “I was thinking about you, Lanie.”

  “What?”

  “I was thinking about you and how you never got away. You were so unhappy, but you stayed in Marin for college and lived at home, and then you went back to Starhurst to work there. Didn’t you ever want to go?”

  I shrugged and looked out at the ocean. “I thought about it. It just…I guess it was easier not to. I was kind of, um, scared. Better the devil you know than the devil you
don’t. Uncharted waters. Unknown quantities…” I trailed off. “I never got the courage.”

  “I think you have more than you know,” he said. “I think it’s inertia. And also,” he said, and stopped.

  “What?” I asked him curiously.

  “I don’t think your mother does you any favors,” he said, and I laughed.

  “You should ask her about the favors she’s done for me. She’ll explain all about the education she paid for, private school and private college, for me to get a job playing with glue sticks and singing songs.” He didn’t crack a smile. “I am making big steps,” I told him. “I moved out.” Because my mom had forced me to, but I left that unspoken.

  Brooks nodded a little. “That’s true.” Then he pointed. “She’s after your chips.”

  He didn’t mean my mother. I interrupted Maisie’s almost successful heist of the rest of my lunch.

  We read and relaxed for a while, but Brooks could never sit for too long. “Let’s swim,” he said, sitting up and gently slapping my thigh.

  “The water has ice chunks in it.”

  “I see where Maisie gets it,” he said, and stood. He reached and took my hands and pulled me to my feet as well. “Show her how tough you are and lead by example. With your wetsuit on, this will be like bathwater.”

  “That’s a lie. Do you see how there’s no one swimming? It’s too cold to go in.” I tried to tug my hands back a little, but I liked holding on to him, even if it meant my death in the frigid Pacific.

  “It just means that no one else is as brave as we are,” he said. “You’re brave, Lanie. I know it.” He let go of me and pulled off his jacket, then his shirt. Oh, God. My mouth watered. “Am I going to have to yank your wetsuit on you like I used to?” He sat on the sand and pulled his on.

  I had vivid memories of Brooks and my dad holding me off the ground, shaking me down into the suit and then later, playing tug-of-war with me and the wet neoprene to get it off. “No, I can handle it myself.” I waited, but he didn’t leave after he pulled up the zipper on the back of his suit. “I’ll meet you in the water.”

  “I don’t trust you. I’ll stake out Maisie while you get ready.” As if that lazy mutt was going to go somewhere. He attached a leash to her collar and tied the other end to his shoe. “That should hold her.” He waited, watching me.

  I hadn’t moved. “Turn around.”

  “What?”

  I motioned in a circle with my finger. “Turn around. I don’t want you to watch me change.”

  His eyes widened. “I’ve seen you naked.”

  “When I was five! Turn around or I’m not coming.” Not that the wetsuit left much to the imagination, but it was something. I fought it on over my bathing suit as quickly as I could and Brooks held out his hand to me when I said I was ready.

  “Let’s go. If I’m holding on to you, you can’t make a run for it.” He gripped my fingers. “Got you.”

  That was fine with me until I felt the icy, wet sand under my feet. “Holy shit!” I yelped, as the water lapped my ankles. “At what temperature does salt water freeze?”

  Brooks continued to pull me deeper. “You’ll get warm once you start swimming.”

  My teeth started to chatter. “This would be too cold for polar bears. Penguins. It physically hurts.”

  “It’s great,” he corrected. When I was up to my waist, he let go of my hand, the only part of me that was in any way warm due to his body heat, and dove in. “Come on, Peanut,” he called, surfacing a few yards away. “You can do it.”

  I ducked under and it was so damn cold I thought I was going to start losing extremities shortly. I kicked back and forth parallel to the beach, flailing my arms some, to show that I was game, but then that was enough. I struggled back onto the shore and up the beach to Maisie, where I wrapped myself in towel and put my hands under the dog to try to warm them. I was so cold that my ears were aching inside and my jaw hurt from clenching my teeth.

  “See? Wasn’t that refreshing?” Brooks dropped down next to me on the blanket. “We should come out here all the time. Every weekend.”

  “Mmhmm.”

  “Shit, your lips are blue. Let’s get the wetsuits off.” He stripped his down to his waist but I was still fumbling with the zipper of mine. “Here, Peanut. I’ll do it.” Just like when we were kids, he peeled me out of the wet, clinging rubber. I put the towel around myself and held it over my ears. Brooks sat behind me and pulled me into his body. He held my head to his chest, his big hand over mine to cover my other ear. He draped his towel over me too and snuggled me against him. I moved away my hand so that my cheek was pressed against his bare chest. I could smell the ocean and the salt water on his skin, but mostly my senses were just engulfed by Brooks, his warmth and his strength wrapped around me. I made myself breathe carefully, in and out, so that I wouldn’t start panting. I forgot about being cold.

  He moved his hand off my ear. “Better? Are you warmer now?”

  I nodded but didn’t move, and he tucked the towels more snuggly around me.

  “Maybe we’ll come back in July on a sunny day and try it again,” he said. I listened to his voice echo in his chest and shook my head, no, so that then I heard his laughter. “Well, this is nice, too,” he commented, and his arms held me tighter.

  That funny feeling was spreading through my body again. Kind of a tingling, making me feel like I was hot, despite the subzero water. And then I started to kind of throb. I was pulsing, way down low. Brooks’ hands rubbed my back, stroked across my hair. I felt his chest moving up and down and I moved my cheek against his skin, nuzzling. His chest moved faster. I tilted my head and looked up, and our glances met.

  “Your eyes remind me of deep water,” he said quietly. “There’s so much hidden there, going on underneath the surface.” His lips brushed my forehead and then he looked at me again, his blue eyes burning into mine.

  Oh, my God. He was going to kiss me. Brooks bent his head and I heard him breathe in quickly.

  His lips met my forehead instead. “You’re such a funny Peanut,” he murmured, then he pressed my head back to his chest. “I’m glad I got to not-celebrate this holiday with you.”

  We sat that way, as I made my breathing calm, until a sea gull landed too close and Maisie ran away in fright, dragging the shoe she was anchored to behind her. Whatever had been about to happen, maybe, possibly, wasn’t going to happen anymore. But I appreciated every single moment, even the vomit on the ride home, about our Valentine’s Day together.

  Chapter 10

  Shit! I couldn’t hit pause on the day to call my mom in the middle of class, even though I was pretty desperate to stop everything to hear her news. What I did hear instead was Mrs. Rosse’s sniff from across the room, so I stuffed my phone back into my pocket, with texts from my mother piling up one after the other. My phone had been rattling with so many notifications that I’d picked it up off my desk and glanced down to see what was happening. I’d seen only the first one: “Scarlett broke mats!”

  I wanted to know more with every fiber of my being, but instead I walked around the classroom, admiring the booklets about “My Favorites” that the kindergarteners were all supposed to be engaged in writing. “My favorite holiday is St. Patrick’s Day,” Bashir told me, looking up from a green scribble that could have been, maybe, a leprechaun. Or a four-leaf clover.

  I stopped, woken up out of my wondering daze about Scarlett to focus on his page. “That’s really your favorite?” I asked doubtfully. “Why?”

  “Because it’s about a real person. Patricks. And I love to catch those green guys.”

  A minor skirmish broke out at the table group over whether or not Bashir had ever really caught a leprechaun. Jonah was firmly on his side. “I mean, if I can catch all the lizards that I do, then I bet that you can catch a leprechaun,” he backed up his friend. I reminded myself to check Jonah’s pockets after recess. Evie had sent me a picture of a detailed drawing of the school playground that she had found
in his backpack, with various spots labeled “lizrd trap.” At first, I was impressed by his drawing skills and also how well he had sounded out the words, but then I read her message. He just loves lizards so much, Evie had written, so watch out. Something will make its way into your classroom. My phone vibrated in my pocket again but I ignored it and redirected everyone away from the leprechaun discussion and back to their writing.

  Finally, lunch rolled around and I was able to call my mom rather than reading through her misspelled play-by-play of the events one line at a time. But Ava answered her phone, and I really, really hated when she did that. “Hello, Lanie. Your mother isn’t able to speak to you right now because she has a job. May I help you with something?” She sighed. Because you always need help, she left unsaid. Basket case alert.

  “No, thanks.” I hung up fast and spent my short break at the teachers’ lunch table with Jolie, trying to interpret my mom’s messages.

  After the “Scarlett broke mats!” text, next she had written “if said so!”

  “I think she means that she said it was going to happen. That’s not true, but she always likes to claim that she saw things coming,” I noted.

  “What’s next?” Jolie scrolled down. She didn’t know either Scarlett or Mats but a busted engagement was always interesting to everyone. “Scads dont love mat nd pursy pursy!” she read.

  “Scarlett doesn’t love Mats, and vice versa,” I translated. I was sorry to read (kind of read) that Scarlett had been right about what she had said to me about her feelings for Mats, and pursy pursy. We continued to look at what Pamela Wolfe thought, what Zara said, how Mats had broken it to his mom, who was, apparently, “side sell!”

  “His mother is beside herself,” I told Jolie. “I wonder what Brooks thinks about all this.” I quickly texted him and he sent back a question mark. Out of everyone, I thought he had actually spotted this coming, unlike my mom, who (despite what she wrote about foreseeing the break-up) had already gotten Scarlett a wedding gift because she liked to clean out the registry early. I looked up from my phone at Jolie’s raised eyebrows.