Surfacing

by Nora Raleigh Baskin

  “I got overwhelmed by practice and my parents fighting all the time,” she offered. All true.

  “I didn’t know,” Nathan said.

  “And the coach has a lot of expectations. A lot of them on me.” Maggie tried kissing him, or she thought about kissing him, hoping she looked kissable and he would respond.

  “So what’s the other saying?” she asked him.

  “What other saying?”

  “The other saying your dad told you.”

  “Oh.” Nathan pulled her tightly toward him. He returned her almost kiss, his lips cold from the air and warm, both, and they started walking again. Side by side, bumping hips, brushing arms. “He says, ‘Never sell a good thing twice.’ ”

  A television advertisement for some automobile or new food processor came to mind, with confetti and balloons, and then, finally, she got it: Never sell a good thing twice.

  “Oh, you mean, you. Don’t sell yourself. Twice,” Maggie said. “Don’t sell yourself more than once, because once should be enough? Because you’re worth it, right?”

  “Right. And this is twice already. I can’t go for three.”

  Maggie told him, “You won’t have to.”

  Nathan let his hand drift back and reach for hers. He held it out and waited. It was the quietest, kindest invitation.

  “It must be nice to know you’re worth it,” she said.

  “Huh?”

  “Nothing.” Maggie took his hand, wrapping her fingers between his, and held it tight.

  Lucid dreaming had become easier. By the time she came home from practice, ate dinner, and stayed up doing homework — well past the hour her body wanted to sleep and dreaming was within reaching distance — Maggie would lay her head down and had to spend most of her concentration trying not to fall asleep, not yet.

  Not so fast, she willed her mind.

  But now, instead of creating scenarios that she wished would come true, she dreamed of moments she had spent with Nathan, moments that had already come true. She relived them, retold them, until she could feel them again. The one or two she liked best, she kept repeating, like a favorite book on the nightstand.

  Behind her eyes, the images were not made of light waves or words, not sound the way sound travels through the air in waves, but something beyond language and beyond sight. Pure feeling. Maggie moved her hand to her belly and felt her own skin, soft and, between her legs, warm. The story began as memory. Nathan walked up behind her, turned her around, and placed his hands on the sides of her face, his fingers touching her neck, pulling her toward him. When she felt his lips on her forehead, then the bridge of her nose so that now she could smell him, the cotton of his clothing and the scent of his breath, a sensation drove through her body, all beginning and ending between her thighs. Nathan moved beside her, keeping one hand on her face and putting the other on the small of her back, so she felt trapped and supported. She felt both possessed and more powerful than she had ever felt before. He came to lie beside her, face-to-face.

  When he pulled her to him, Maggie could feel the heat of his mouth on hers. She could feel the pressure of her own hand and hear her shallow breathing quicken.

  In those words beyond language, Nathan told Maggie he loved her, and she felt it wholly as it flooded her entire body.

  “You’re not eating,” Mr. Paris commented. Maggie’s dinner plate looked untouched.

  “I’m waiting for Mom to come in.”

  Mrs. Paris still had not sat down. They could hear her scraping plates, moving dishes around.

  “Mom, come and sit down,” Maggie called into the kitchen.

  “Be in in a minute. Just want to get these pots soaking. You know how brown sugar sticks. It’s something about the sugar caramelizing in the high heat. If I don’t get it soaking, it will never come clean.”

  So her parents were fighting again.

  Her mother’s voice arched in that false, high-pitched, overly explanatory way. Her father wouldn’t make eye contact when he talked, but he spoke as if nothing were wrong. Maggie wondered if they really thought they were fooling anyone. Or just themselves.

  “Maggie, just eat. You know how your mother is,” Mr. Paris said.

  A pot banged in the sink.

  The boys had already finished, or hardly eaten, and darted from the table, diving onto the couch that acted as a separation to the living room. They were allowed to turn on the TV but had to keep the volume down. Lucas popped his head up with Dylan right beside him.

  “Love Maggie is in,” he said.

  Dylan finished: “Why that is she won’t eat.”

  Mr. Paris raised his eyebrows, first at the boys, then at Maggie. But he seemed happy to have something to redirect the tension away from him.

  “You have a boyfriend, Maggie?” Mr. Paris asked.

  “No, Dad. I don’t have boyfriend. It’s just a boy I know.”

  Mr. Paris smiled. “You kids. I don’t know what’s changed. When did it become uncool to be dating?”

  “Nobody dates, Dad.”

  “I believe you. I just think it’s sad, that’s all. Love is a beautiful thing.”

  Maggie thought her mother might have clanked another plate into the dishwasher with a bit of extra aggression, but she couldn’t be sure.

  Mrs. Paris appeared in the doorway between the kitchen and the dining room. She had a wet dish towel flung over her shoulder, just in case anyone should doubt the work she had been doing. She put her hand on her hip.

  Mrs. Paris looked at her husband, then at the heads of her two twin boys peering over the couch, and then at her remaining daughter. “Well, Maggie, invite him over for dinner sometime. Even if he’s not your boyfriend, he must have to eat,” Mrs. Paris said.

  The girls’ swim team was granted permission to miss the second half of last period in order to get on the bus and make the two-hour drive to the Wilton YMCA. Large meets were, at least, less boring. There was more going on. Usually a sports store set up shop in a corner, selling bathing suits, caps, and goggles. Music might be pumped in. Hot dogs cooked. Cookies sold. There were swimmers in all stages of chlorine saturation and in various colorful outfits. A lot of the girls were decorating their pool shoes with plastic fruit or toy animals, which flopped around with every step.

  Maggie walked around between races, imagining how she would report it back to Nathan, which things he would find funny or interesting. She had located the most remote toilet right away, a single handicapped bathroom on the opposite end of the building, which, thankfully, someone forgot to lock.

  “I’m sorry I can’t be there,” Nathan had told her. He skipped last period to walk her to the bus. “But, here, take this.”

  Maggie held out her hand. “What is it?”

  “It’s something of me, so I can be there with you when you win. Don’t open it until you win.”

  “And what if I don’t?” A bunch of faces were already looking out the windows of the bus. “What if I don’t win?”

  “You will. Then you’ll open it.”

  Her first event was the 800 free. She took second, a good seventeen points for the team. A win, certainly. Maggie dried off her hands and reached into her swim bag for the brown-paper package Nathan had given her. Underneath the first wrapper was a rectangle of aluminum foil, and inside that, covered in cellophane, was a perfectly shaped, perfectly baked loaf of oatmeal chocolate-chip banana bread. A small yellow Post-it note was pressed on top, with A piece of me for you written in boy scrawl. And just as she thought of needing one, Maggie noticed a white plastic knife wedged on the side, which brought an enormous smile to her face.

  “It’s looking good.” Julie bounced over to where Maggie was sitting cross-legged on the floor in the Y lobby. “Ooh, what’s that?”

  “It’s banana bread.”

  “Yum, it’s all good. And hey, with your win, we only have to place in the four-by-one-hundred medley relay and we go to the state semifinals, and if we win those, we go to the state finals, and then to
Nationals — and that’s in Florida. Cecily is already talking about getting us a side trip to Disney.”

  “That’s cool. Wanna slice?”

  “Of course,” Julie said. She picked up the Post-it. “Nathan? My God, he bakes, too?”

  “Apparently so.” Maggie thought about a little boy burning himself at the stove who now makes banana bread, and she smiled.

  “Oh, my God. With chocolate chips.”

  “Umm, I know.”

  “You deserve this, Maggie.” Julie licked the crumbs from her fingers. “OK, maybe you don’t — but I do.”

  “I know.”

  Since the backstroke begins in the water, it is always the first leg of the relay, to avoid a second swimmer landing on anyone’s head. After that, the relay is arranged by speed: breast, fly, free. Maggie had the last leg, the fastest time and stroke: front crawl.

  She watched Natasha Beard coming in a few lengths behind the lead swimmer. Natasha had a powerful kick. It propelled her out of the water, her arms arching, her mouth wide open to suck in that beautiful air, but there would be seconds to catch up, fractions of a second to pass. The sounds across the water were deafening: people were not only cheering but screaming. One team would advance; one would see the end of their swim season.

  The key was to launch yourself off the starting blocks at the exact perfect moment that your teammate touched the automatic touch pad. A second too early and you risk disqualification; a second late could cost the race.

  The splashing became louder, each water molecule spinning, shaken from its principle and sent off into space, longing to return to become one again. It was as if Maggie could hear each one calling to her, pleading with her, telling her when to dive, propelling her through the water.

  The ride home was quiet. Coach Mac asked everyone to save their celebrations and focus on what they needed to do to win the state semifinals. Most of the girls were exhausted at this point, leaning their heads against the window or one another. It was nearly ten p.m. Some of the team had been allowed, with prior written permission, to go home with their parents, but most of the girls rode the bus. The next meet, which would leave only six teams competing in the finals, was less than a week away.

  Maggie had told her dad he could drive straight home. She told him she had a ride. She knew Nathan would be waiting for her in the high-school parking lot, and he was.

  The darkness of late fall pressed against the car windows, but inside, it felt cozy, the engine vibrating steadily, the blowers warming the air. Nathan kept his eyes on the road, but he reached over, feeling for Maggie’s hand. When he found it, he gave it a squeeze and held on.

  Maggie told him, “The bread was delicious.”

  “I knew you’d win.”

  “How do you know? How do you know I didn’t just lose and eat it anyway?”

  “Oh, everyone heard already. Tweets and texts, you know. But thanks. I’m glad you liked the banana bread.”

  “With chocolate chips.”

  “Why not?” Nathan smiled.

  They turned onto Maggie’s block and Nathan swung the car into the driveway. Maggie watched. He took a moment, then shifted into park; another second and he cut the engine. When he turned to kiss her, Maggie was already there. She let her face, her lips, her body, melt into his. It was part fatigue, part excitement, but another part life — living, being alive, being connected — and she wanted more. She wanted it more deeply. She wanted it to last, to obliterate everything that came before and maybe after.

  Maggie groped Nathan’s body, keeping her eyes shut as if blind and only seeing for the first time. She reached inside his shirt and drew a map. She let her fingers slide across his chest, his shoulders, the dip of his belly, the shadow of parts hidden below, touching every surface, absorbing him, trying to attach her skin to his, trying to heal his wound with hers. Nathan groaned softly and did not protest. Instead, he responded in kind, and with urgency and gentleness, and that night, Maggie found it all easily beautiful, and she understood immediately why this had not worked before.

  Maggie watched the world change around her, simply because she had been changed, and it made her happy. It was as if the edges had softened, the hardness of the Formica desks, the harshness of the fluorescent lights in the ceiling, the sharp voice of her history teacher.

  Maggie sat, content in a way she had never felt before. She had separated herself, truly marked a break from her parents, from all those in charge. She had joined the ranks — not of the adults, per se, but of those just a bit older than her. The secret they had once kept was now hers, too. The images in movies, in love songs, those hidden messages and innuendos, they spoke for Maggie. They sang for her now, too. Even if no one else sitting in history class knew it, which, of course, they didn’t, Maggie had waged a private revolution and won.

  “As soon as you have finished, you can give me your paper and you are free to go,” Mr. Green, the history teacher, announced. Several kids stood up right away and filed toward the front of the room.

  The girls’ swim team was not boys’ basketball or football or even lacrosse, so news of the impending championship was not spreading across the school like wildfire, nor was it on the tip of anyone’s tongue, other than those of the girls themselves. But it had been announced over the loudspeaker in the morning, and some of the teachers followed girls’ sports.

  “Good work yesterday,” Mr. Green said when Maggie dropped her paper on his desk. “You’re going to the state semifinals, right?”

  Maggie nodded.

  “Well, you worked hard. You deserve this.”

  Maggie blushed, her cheeks warmed. “Thanks, Mr. Green.”

  Whatever Meghan Liggett had been so closely inspecting in the grass in front of her condo no longer seemed to hold her interest. When Leah dove into the pool, Meghan looked up.

  “I think I am going to go down the slide now,” Leah called out to Maggie. Loudly — she said it too loudly, and Maggie knew exactly what her sister was doing.

  She wasn’t sure which was making her more angry, her sister’s naughty behavior — after Leah had just reprimanded Maggie and told her to sit on the stairs — or her apparent infatuation with the snobby neighbor girl.

  Loudly, Maggie responded, “No, you’re not, because Mommy won’t let you.”

  Leah’s head abruptly turned toward the lawns of the pool-facing condos. At exactly that moment, Meghan stood up and pretended to notice, for the first time, who had suddenly dived into the pool on this hot Saturday morning. Meghan’s mouth formed a tiny O shape, and then, just as quickly, she appeared as indifferent as she could manage.

  “Well, Mommy’s not here. Is she?” Leah answered, nearly shouting at this point.

  Maggie will remember the sun, which had been beating down on the identical red condo roofs, reflecting off the surface of the clean, aqua-blue pool water all morning, suddenly tuck itself behind a large cloud and stay there for what seemed like forever.

  Five kids — two older brothers and two younger sisters, with Nathan smack in the middle — and for the most part, they all had similar personalities. Even with eight people at the table, it was quiet. No one seemed to feel they needed to be the center of attention. The older boys, Jeffrey (the one with the darker hair) and Thomas (the one with the tattoo on his wrist) — or maybe was it Jeffrey with the tattoo and Thomas with dark hair, as Maggie was having a hard time remembering which was which — hadn’t said a word since they sat at the table.

  “So, Maggie, you’re on the swim team?” Nathan’s mother asked.

  “Yeah. We actually made it to the semifinals this year. They’re in a couple of days.”

  “That’s nice.”

  There was always something uncomfortable about eating at someone else’s house. The food was a little unfamiliar and the way they set the table. Like how Julie’s mother put out a wooden basket that held all the silverware and everyone reached over and grabbed what they needed. At her own house, her mother put out a folded paper
napkin — always in a triangle — and nothing but a fork. If the meal required anything else, she would have to jump up and get one for everyone. Here, Nathan’s mother used cloth napkins and every place had a fork, knife, and spoon, though Maggie couldn’t figure out what she might need the spoon for. His mother had made baked ham, a string-bean casserole topped with dried onions, salad, and Pillsbury Crescent Rolls. And maybe there was going to be a dessert.

  Maggie’s family never served dessert. That was more of a fend-for-yourself, in-front-of-the-TV kind of thing: Oreos or Fig Newtons, if you could find them in the pantry.

  But, despite what was different, it felt right sitting at this table. There was not only a sameness in disposition — gentle, if Maggie had to put a word to it — but in appearance. There was no denying that this was a family. The two younger sisters, Emily and Anne, were only eleven months apart. “Irish twins,” Nathan’s mother said when she introduced them, “but we’re not Irish. It’s just a saying.

  “But I hear you have real twins in your family,” she said to Maggie.

  “Yeah, I have twin brothers. They’re six.”

  Maggie tried to notice Nathan’s face — he was sitting next to her — without being too obvious. She knew Nathan wouldn’t like his mother cross-examining her, but she wondered if he had told her anything about Leah. Of course, what could he have said? Only what Maggie had told him.

  “Do you have any sisters?” Anne (or possibly Emily) asked.

  She was used to that question. If she answered, “I used to,” it sounded provocative, like an invitation to more questions, or even glib, like a joke. The other person would be forced to ask what happened, as if maybe there were another explanation for “once” having a sister.

  If she said, “I did, but my sister died,” it was usually a big downer, as if she were trying to gain sympathy or, worse, garner unearned attention. But, somehow, to deny Leah’s existence altogether felt wrong.

  “Not anyone as annoying as you two,” Nathan answered. His tone was out of character enough to redirect Emily (or Anne) completely. For the next five minutes, Anne (or Emily), and then both of them, tried to convince Nathan that they were not annoying and never had been.