by Jen Malone
I force my eyes away from the beach, which is growing more distant by the second, and turn my head to his.
“You spent your Saturday nights on campus at the quiet room in the library?” I ask, disbelief in my voice.
“Ri-ight. It’s Saturday—I’m losing track of days out here. Well, no, in that case I’d probably be bombed and passed out in my dorm.”
“Impressively mature,” I say cheerfully as Drew laughs.
Jonah replies, “Yeah, yeah. Just wait until it’s your turn. I’ll be waiting by the phone when you call to beg forgiveness for your snide remarks. Unless you’d prefer to radio instead.”
“Depends. Will your tropical beach hut in Mexico have a landline?”
Below us, the people strolling the beach are the size of minifigs, and the wooden structure groans underneath our car. Jonah ignores my dig and says, “C’mon, this is a pretty amazing way to spend your night, no? Admit you’re having fun. Right, Drew?”
Drew gives a thumbs-up, and Jonah leans back as we finally reach the top. We crest the hill and stop, poised, for only a breath. I screw my eyes shut and lift my arms into the sky just as my butt rises off the seat.
I let go.
We rocket toward the bottom, and tears, caused by the rush of wind, leak from the corners of my eyes.
“Okaaaaaaay, thissssssss issssss funnnnnnnn!” I scream, grabbing on to my brother and laughing the whole way into the next curve.
23
Three nights later, I wake up to voices in the cabin and immediately reach for my phone to check the time: 4:33 a.m.
What the—
Oh.
It’s 4:33 a.m. on Drew’s birthday.
I know just what the voices are.
Ever since I can remember, Mom and Dad would tell each of us the story of our birth at exactly the moment it happened however many years before that. Luckily for me, I was born at 8:52 p.m. Drew was not as blessed in the time department.
Despite the insanely early hour, they would always wake me up too, and I’d crawl under the covers with Drew and half listen, half doze while my parents sat on the edge of his bed and took turns. Just like with my version, they each had their assigned portions, and there have been enough years by now for them to fine-tune their lines; it’s a well-oiled accounting. It’s also completely cheesy, really, but it’s tradition, and I’m positive Drew is as sentimental about it as I am.
I do quick calculations. It’s 7:33 p.m. in Hong Kong and it’s a Tuesday, which means Dad is teaching his night course. He hates teaching at night (Dad is a total morning person and by dinnertime he’s got one eye closed), and I’m certain he’s especially pissed about tonight’s class, since it means he can’t even Skype in for Drew. I have no idea if he’d suck it up and tell the birth story with Mom for Drew’s benefit, but I guess it’s a moot point.
It’s all on her now.
I creep to the door and press my ear against it. Usually it’s impossible not to hear every little sound in the cabin, but at first all I can make out are murmurings. I slow my breathing and strain my ears.
“. . . trying to come up with a list of everything I ate that day, to tell the anesthesiologist,” Mom’s saying. “And I hear the nurse on the phone with the doctor at home. She’s asking how long it’s been since my water broke and how far apart my contractions are. . . .” Mom pauses, and I whisper Dad’s interrupting line under my breath: “Okay, so get this now!”
Mom rushes over it. “. . . Because the doctor’s in the middle of showing her family all the pictures she took on the trip to Egypt she’d just gotten back from, and she doesn’t want to abandon that until she absolutely has to.”
My eyes begin to well. Here’s where Dad always takes over and says, “Do you know how torturous it is to look at someone else’s vacation pictures? For weeks after that I would walk to the mailbox expecting to find a thank-you card from that doctor’s kids for saving them that night.”
Mom recounts Dad’s lines nearly verbatim, and I swallow over the lump in my throat. I wish I could hear Drew, but he’s silent as she continues.
Mom reaches the ending. “Then, right as the surgeon lifted you from my belly, you peed all over her. We knew right then and there that you, my son, were a true pisser!”
She gets Dad’s line just right again, and now I’m actively crying. Drew murmurs something that’s impossible to make out because his newly deep voice is so low, and then it’s quiet again.
I turn back to my bed but, of course, a floorboard creaks as I do.
“Cass?” my mom calls softly.
I ignore it and ease under the covers. Tears are still streaming down my cheeks. I can’t even imagine how I’m going to hold it together on my birthday next month. It’s shocking how I can be feeling slightly better about things with Mom and then something like this comes along and—whammo! Back to square one.
There’s no chance I’m falling asleep after that.
I’m claustrophobic. I can’t breathe. I need to run and scream and be alone and I can’t do any of those things on this stupid boat. Although maybe I can make a small jailbreak, just for a little while.
I wait at least a half hour in the quiet, until I’m sure both Mom and Drew have gone back to sleep, and then I slip into my bathing suit and creep up the steps. At the top, I have to unlock the doors that barricade us in at night and keep us safe from anyone who might try to board while we sleep at anchor. I do it as silently as possible, then slide them back into place behind me after I slip outside. With them closed, Mom shouldn’t have any reason to suspect I’m not sound asleep in my berth.
The coast of Capitola is off the port side. Despite the fact that we’re steadily working our way toward warm Southern California, we are most decidedly not there yet. Meaning: it’s chilly this morning, and it’s definitely going to be even colder in the water.
But I don’t care one bit. My frustration is charging me to the point where I doubt I’ll even feel the temperature.
My plan is to swim the few hundred yards to the farthest boat in the harbor and back, as many times as I need to. I’ll have to weave among the dozens of boats moored here in the harbor, but they’ll also provide safety if I get tired or start to cramp or anything.
I dangle from the platform, then ease myself into the water, and HOLY HELL, is it freezing! There’s a reason surfers wear wetsuits in these parts. I force myself to duck all the way under before I lose my nerve. When I surface, I lick salty water from my lips and pedal my legs to try to keep them from turning into blocks of ice. So much for anger-fueled oblivion.
Hoping “inhospitable” will turn into “invigorating” once I get going, I do my best swimmer’s crawl toward an anchored catamaran bobbing nearby and then cut around its side. Despite the freezing water, it feels good to slice through the glassy surface, leaving ripples in my wake. I try not to get creeped out thinking about the abundance of sea life just beneath me.
Before long I’ve passed by ten or so boats, keeping the lights of the pier in sight when I lift my head. Circulation comes back to my toes and fingers as I pick up speed. This is good. I don’t even think; I just move. Exactly what I need right now.
I reach the outer anchorage, circle around a motorboat, and tread water until I’m convinced I’ve distinguished the mast light of Sunny-Side Up from all the others surrounding it. I aim and resume my strokes.
And then it hits. Out of nowhere.
The way my night went from peaceful to heart wrenching in an instant is just one further reminder—no matter how much I allow myself to relax and let down my guard, there’s always the potential, in the space of a single breath, for everything to go black. And I’m not just talking about my parents’ divorce, which I’m not naive enough to think won’t get easier to deal with as time goes on. I’m talking about all of life. In every moment of light, darkness is always lurking in the shadows, just waiting to pull the rug out from under you and steal your innocent happy away. At any second. It happened before, and
it’s only a matter of time until it happens again.
All the emotions I held inside when Mom was telling Drew his birth story press down on my chest. All the tears I wouldn’t let myself cry, for fear they’d hear me, flood my throat. I have to do a backstroke because I can’t breathe through them with my face in the water.
I’m losing it. I reach a sailboat and grab on to its platform with one hand. The occupants are probably sleeping, and even if they were moving about, I’d be hard to spot unless they leaned over the stern to peer below, but I still struggle to contain my crying so I won’t give them reason to investigate.
When I compose myself enough, I slip off and aim for the next mooring, then the next, sobbing in the open water and choking on tears while I rest at each boat. This is not what I had in mind for my swim.
Then again, I guess a complete breakdown is long overdue.
I have my head in the water, aimed at a motorboat, when something brushes against my leg. Eeek! I pull my knees in and dart my head around. Please don’t be a shark, please don’t be a shark, please don’t—
It’s Beatriz.
Her usually fluffy fur is plastered against her as she paddles closer to plant a slobbery kiss on my face.
“Hey, mutt! You scared the hell out of me! What are you doing out here in the dark, girl?”
She swims off, turning her head to make sure I’m following. I take a few deep breaths to calm myself and give chase. When I round the front of the motorboat, I spot her again, now holding a tennis ball between her teeth and bobbing her way over to a yacht. Christian’s yacht.
Where Jonah stands bundled on the platform, urging her on.
Crap.
He hasn’t noticed me yet, but when he does . . . Well, he wanted opened-up Cassie. He’s about to get her in a big way, splayed and gutted.
Beatriz reaches him and scrambles aboard, dropping the ball at his feet and shaking off her fur. Jonah jumps out of the way just in time to avoid getting showered, and despite my mental breakdown, I almost manage a smile as I execute a sidestroke in their direction. The distraction has forced me far enough out of my own head to allow me to regain some control, thank god.
Before Jonah can throw the ball again, Beatriz splashes back in and heads right to me. Jonah puts a hand over his eyes to shield them from the anchor light and tracks our movements until we’re close enough for him to make out who I am.
He drops his arm and rushes to the ladder, where he stands on the top step.
“Sprite, what are you—are you crazy? The sun’s not even up yet! And you must be an icicle!”
He helps me out and waits for Beatriz to follow. This time we both get covered in dog spray when she shakes. He jumps into the cockpit and tosses down a towel.
“Wrap up and follow me.”
I trail slowly behind him. “Where’s Christian?” I whisper, suspecting the answer.
“Sleeping, you nut. You do know what time it is, right?”
“I know. What are you doing awake?”
He glances at me over his shoulder as he pauses in front of a door. Despite having spent a lot of time aboard Reality Bytes, I’ve never been in this part of the yacht. “I told you, I’m always up crazy early. It’s both a blessing and a curse.”
He pushes the door open and stands aside for me to enter. I swallow when I realize it’s his room. I look around to distract myself from the awkwardness of being alone with him in here.
His berth is at least twice the size of mine, though it’s hard to tell exactly, because every inch of it is a mess. He’s clearly made himself at home. Laundry piles fill every corner and the bed is a jumble of blankets. The metal-framed backpack he was wearing when we met in the woods leans against a wall, and books are propped open on every surface. It looks like he’s reading at least five at once.
“Sorry,” he says, his arm sweeping over the area. “I, uh—wasn’t expecting company.”
“S’okay,” I mumble, suddenly overly conscious of the fact that I’m only wearing a bathing suit and a thin towel.
“Okay, let’s find you something dry to put on, stat.” He pulls open a drawer and rifles through it, handing me a sweatshirt and flannel pajama pants, alongside a pair of folded striped boxer shorts. Oh god, am I supposed to wear his underwear? But if I don’t, then I’m going commando in his pants and . . . this is the very definition of dilemma. Seriously, if you were to look it up, there’d be a picture of this moment.
“I—” My skin is already crime-scene red from being in frigid water, but now it splotches even more.
Luckily Jonah already has one hand on the door. “I’m gonna get Beatriz some fresh water and give you privacy to change. I’ll be back with coffee, okay?”
I murmur a thanks and wait for his footsteps to fade before quickly shucking my damp suit, wrapping it in the towel, and putting on his clothes. They smell like Jonah—fresh air and sunshine and fabric softener. It’s light-years away from grizzly bear, dead or otherwise.
I stand stiffly in his room because it feels too intimate to sit on his unmade bed, but inside I’m a mess of activity. The unexpectedness of happening upon Beatriz and him shocked me sober, but now, in the quiet, the emotions start to creep back. It’s not the deep, gulping, suffocating feeling from before, but there is evidently still a slew of residual tears that need an outlet. They slide down my face and I turn to the wall and dab at them with a corner of the bundled towel.
When Jonah taps lightly on the door a few minutes later, I’m no closer to getting them under control. Damn it!
“Come in,” I call, still facing the wall and sucking in breaths to calm myself.
“I have coffee—wow, you’re shaking, Sprite.” I hear him set the mugs down. He grabs a blanket from his bed and settles it gently on my shoulders, wrapping the edges around my front. My heart seizes briefly at the sweetness of his gesture.
Three, two, one . . . I count to myself in a last-ditch effort at composure, then force a smile before turning around.
“Thanks.” I think I manage an easy tone, but he takes a step back and cocks his head.
“Not shaking,” he says, studying me closely. “Crying. Why are you crying, Cassie?”
The fact that he sounds so concerned and that he uses my name instead of teasing me with Sprite unleashes a steady stream of fresh tears down my cheeks, making a response pointless.
I half expect him to bolt for the door. He’s a twenty-year-old guy and some girl he barely knows is having a meltdown in his bedroom. But he doesn’t. He walks forward and tugs the edges of the blanket tighter, bundling me like a sad little burrito. Then he takes another step in and wraps his arms tightly around me.
“Hey. Whatever it is, it’s gonna be okay. Hear me?” he whispers near my ear.
I nod, because that’s all I can manage with the size of the lump in my throat. Although I’m suddenly having a hard time deciphering if the lump is being caused by my tears or by the new feelings that rushed in when his arms came around me. Those particular ones are burrowing deeper at his responses and his sympathy and the way he’s holding me so sweetly and—
How it is possible to have insane romantic thoughts about a guy in the same instant that my head is so completely messed up over everything else? Why are emotions just the absolute worst?
He continues to hold me, rubbing his hand up and down my arms gently, while I fight to get myself under control. Eventually, I’m able to wind down to just some lingering sniffles and he pulls his head back to ask, “Do you want to sit?”
I nod again and he shuffles us to his bed before settling me on its edge, still wrapped in his blanket. He joins me, scooting back and leaning his torso against the headboard, maintaining a perfectly respectable distance.
I’m way too embarrassed to look at him, but he doesn’t push the issue. Instead he asks, “So that swim; was that actually your attempt at a swift getaway? Because I gotta warn you, without a mermaid tail you’re not getting too far in these parts. And you know what happened
to the last guy who tried to escape our caravan.”
Now I do turn to stare at him with wide eyes. “They found Tommy?”
He makes a face. “Well, no, actually. But in my fantasies, he’s turning on a spit over hot flames for stealing from Uncle Chris.”
I try to laugh over a sniffle and end up hiccuping instead, which makes him laugh.
“Yes, I was attempting a prison break,” I answer.
“From . . . a bad dream? I’m trying to picture what else could have been going on over there at four in the morning.”
I give him an abbreviated version of the birthday ritual and his forehead wrinkles. “I’m sorry, I don’t—are you upset because you were missing your dad during it?”
I nod, then shake my head. “Yes. No. It’s my mom. I just couldn’t take it . . . her . . . anymore. She acts so matter-of-fact that life without my dad is our new normal now and I had to . . . had to—”
I can’t help it—I start to cry again. “Sorry,” I manage.
Jonah moves closer and puts his hand on my knee. “No. Hey.” I take a shuddering breath and turn my face toward his. His eyes are soft and concerned. “It kind of—it kind of seems like you’re keeping a lot in. Maybe letting go like this is a good thing.”
He speaks the words gently, but they have the opposite effect. They slap me back to reality, to where I can see how I’m acting. This is not cool. This is not how I cope. I might sulk or get annoyed or act passive aggressively, but I don’t fall apart. I stiffen my shoulders. Screw this sadness. What I need is to get angry. What I need is to remember all the reasons to be angry.
“I hate her,” I spit, and Jonah’s eyes widen. My tears evaporate, and I embrace the surge of this new emotion gratefully. Anger I can handle. It’s not confusing at all, unlike my feelings about my mother or for the boy sitting next to me right now. Anger and I have only been intimately acquainted for about six or seven months now, but we’re already old friends.
“Okay,” Jonah says. His simple acceptance is too easy. It’s sweet that he’s in my camp with so little persuasion, but I need him to understand why I’m angry. Why I hate her.