Learning Not to Drown

by Anna Shinoda

  The sun peers out from behind a cloud, warming my skin. It’s probably no more than sixty-five degrees out here, but it feels hot since we’ve come from the land of ice and snow.

  “Think it’s warm enough that I can swim in the ocean?”

  “Maybe.” Drea throws her bag over her shoulder. “Let’s get to the beach while it’s still light.”

  Bags drop in the entry. There are hugs and welcomes. Drea’s aunt locks arms with Ms. P, angles her toward the patio for some coffee and catching up. We’re invited to join but opt to change into our bikinis and take the steps down the cliff to the ocean.

  We put our toes into the water first.

  “No fucking way.” Drea pulls her foot out, backs to the dry sand, where she sits with her towel wrapped around her. “I bet the Jacuzzi is nice and warm.”

  “I’m going for it,” I say, plunging in—knee deep, waist deep, then finally diving under waves.

  “It’s not so bad. Once you get used to it. The lake is hot in comparison!” I yell to Drea even though my teeth chatter. It is freezing.

  “Whatever, crazy. You have all the fun.” She opens the rag mag that she grabbed from her aunt’s counter.

  The best way to warm up is to swim. Long strokes out, out to the open ocean. Stop and look back at Drea, becoming ant-size on the beach.

  There are so many things I could think of, but all that comes to mind is Luke. The words “sex offender” and “criminal” are strong in my mind, but so are the images of him teaching me to float, his hand supporting my back, keeping me safe. Keeping me from drowning. I dive under a wave, as deep as the salt water allows. How long can I stay down here? Under the surface, out of the breeze, in a place that tricks me into thinking I am warmer the longer I stay. No wonder people want to believe mermaids exist. Nothing would make me happier than one grabbing my ankle and pulling me deep down until I turn into a mermaid with silky blue locks and a shiny tail. In peace. I’d live in peace.

  A bubble of air releases now. Again. I open my eyes and watch the bubbles float to the surface, imagining they each represent a good memory of Luke that I have to let go. Maybe I will let all the air run out, and sink to the bottom, mermaid or not.

  It’s not a bad idea. I’d be done. No longer having to think, think, think all the time, swinging from anger to fear to depression. It might just be a good idea. I let another bubble escape.

  Then I picture Drea. Waiting on the shore. I picture Drea, dark skin deepening as the sun dips into the ocean. I picture her realizing that her best friend isn’t coming to the surface.

  I push the water to the side, break into the air.

  “What the hell are you doing?” Drea yells, already chest deep by the time I surface.

  “Sorry. You know how I get, with swimming. I was just enjoying the ocean,” I lie.

  Drea swims with strong stokes toward me, saying, “That better be all it was.”

  Hot, hot, hot water. Neck deep. My body is tingling, tiny little pinpricks on the skin, shocking my body back up to 98.6 degrees.

  “Are you relaxing?” Drea says, one eye open, watching me, the other closed, her head resting on the cement rim of the Jacuzzi.

  “Yep.” The sun has almost completely set.

  “Really? Good, because this trip is all about you relaxing.”

  “Great,” I say.

  “You know, Clare”—Drea rolls her head to the side, looking directly at me—“lately you have gotten quite a knack for just using one word around me.”

  “Sorry,” I say. Crap. She’s right. When did this oneword thing start?

  “Listen. I know what Luke is accused of doing. Talk to me. I won’t judge. I just want you to be okay,” she says.

  When Luke was just a thief, or at least when I thought he was just a thief, it didn’t seem so bad. But she won’t be able to understand this. She wouldn’t be able not to judge. How could she? How can anyone else understand, if I can’t put it together in my own head?

  “Thanks, but I’d rather not talk about it. I’m so tired of even thinking about it. I’ll be okay.”

  She looks at me with You’ve got to be kidding me eyes. “I can’t fucking believe this,” she says, her voice filled with anger and getting louder. “You don’t want to talk to me. Fine. But figure out a way to pull yourself out of this shit. Because I can’t keep hanging around you if you don’t. It’s fucking exhausting being your friend right now.”

  Her words hit me hard. Like she has any type of problem that even comes close to what I’ve been living through. It would be so easy being Drea. Everyone likes her. She doesn’t have any skeletons clanking around her. And I would do anything to trade my mom for her mom. It’s fucking exhausting being my friend? It’s really fucking exhausting being me.

  She waits for a response. When I don’t give one, she shakes her head and turns away.

  The jets pound me in my back and shoulders, their loud groan drowning out my thoughts. A few minutes later Drea looks back at me.

  She’s my best friend. She won’t judge. She just wants me to be okay. And no, this can’t be easy on her, either. It doesn’t matter what anyone has said. She has believed me even with the tiny bit of information I’ve given her. She knows me enough to still be my friend. My best friend. I have to trust her.

  “Fine. I’m not okay. At all.” I let my eyes pool. “I can’t figure anything out. How can Luke be one person? I think he’s guilty, Drea. I think he really hurt that girl. And I’m scared he’s done it before but this is the first time he got caught. So why does part of me still love him and hope he’s innocent?”

  Drea’s eyes close; painted fingernails tap at her chin. She nods.

  “He’s always been kind to you, and you’ve seen the caring side. Of course you have compassion for him,” Drea says. “But he’s done violent shit. And you have to consider that.”

  “I think about that all the time. Am I an idiot because some of me loves him and I hope he’ll turn around someday?”

  “No. Love is a fucked-up emotion. Sometimes I think of good things about my dad and a little of me still loves him. But I don’t forget he left and has never had any interest in us since. As far as Luke turning around— no offense, just my opinion—I would have given up on him a long time ago. You’ve given him so many chances. Maybe he’s just this way, and there is nothing you can do about it. You can’t control him. You can’t change him.” Drea pauses. “As much as I couldn’t control or change my dad, you know?”

  A breeze rustles the palm tree next to us, making a soft shushing sound. Maybe Drea is right.

  “It’s not just Luke. It’s my parents. Why do they love him more? Why do they put so much energy into him? Why him and not me?” Saltwater tears drip off my face, joining the chlorinated water. Crap. I sound like a fiveyear-old.

  “Are you shitting me?” Drea’s eyes are on mine, refusing to let go of contact. “Why him and not you? You are beautiful. You’ve got great friends; none of them are criminals. Your grades are so high that colleges are begging you to choose them. You’ve worked hard to save money, and even harder to get scholarships. Not to mention, you are a fantastic lifeguard. Clare, you have so much going for you. You don’t need them. Luke does.”

  It sounds so simple. Maybe it’s true.

  I suddenly have a flashback of Mom the day we left Tennessee. Her tiny hands wrapped around mine. Her line of questioning. Did I do anything illegal? Anything at all that she needed to know . . . before we left Tennessee. Was she trying to protect me then? Figure out a way that I could run so I wouldn’t go to jail? It’s a strange thought—comforting and disturbing all at the same time. I push it away, instead focusing on Drea’s words—I have so much going for me.

  “Thanks,” I whisper, feeling a little better now.

  “Anytime you need me,” Drea says, taking a deep breath in and submerging herself completely. She pops back out just as a cold breeze blows.

  “Mom and Aunt T have a feast planned for tonight. We should
go in.”

  Wrapped in damp towels, we run up the stairs, run from the chill, the creeping darkness, and the increasing wind. We fly through the back door, and the wind slams it shut behind us.

  Safe and warm, amazed by how much protection a pane of glass can provide, I look, down to the shore, across a field of grasses forced to the ground with each gust. They bounce back, only to be flattened again a second later. Bent branches of palm trees fling back and forward. The palms rest between gusts, drooped and panting. Even the ocean’s waves appear to be pushed back, pushed away from the beach.

  The next morning the wind has stopped completely, leaving the grasses standing, the palm branches with their regal arcs, but a couple of juniper trees along the edge of the grass are still bent to the side, their branches reaching toward the ocean, looking old and tired, reshaped their entire lives because of the wind. Bent to the side, permanently.

  If Luke and his actions are the wind, what am I? The proud grasses, the regal palms? Or the permanently bent tree?

  “Mom, I hope I get into Pepperdine. I really want to live at the beach,” Drea says, looking out the back window of the car as if to catch the last glimpse of the ocean before our weekend is over. I look back too, but in the darkness I can see only a black pit.

  “Don’t I know it,” Drea’s mom agrees. The cloudy sky starts to sprinkle.

  My smile is leaving. Over the weekend we swam and played board games, and watched girl movies where everything was so funny or so dramatic, it made me forget all about my own problems. I slept completely through the night. Not one bad dream. I even fell asleep lying on my stomach. I forgot about home. Forgot about Luke. And Peter. And my parents.

  The radio reports snowfall in the mountains. “Only in California,” Drea’s mom says as she raises her eyebrows and looks at the clock. We have already driven more than an hour; we are going forward.

  As we drive up the mountain, the falling rain turns to snow.

  Plows have been up and down the highways, making dirty drifts that grow as we rise in altitude. Even with the four-wheel drive engaged, we inch up the road, the snow now falling rapidly. The plow has carved its way down my street, making banks on either side at least three feet tall. Drea’s mom cautiously drives down the one-lane ice cave. We stop in front of my house. “Wow. Looks like nobody has shoveled your walk today, Clare,” Ms. P says. “Do you need help getting in? Do you want to come to our house instead?”

  Yes. I want to go to your house forever.

  “I’ll figure it out.” I jump from the car.

  “Do you have your key?”

  “Yep,” I say, double-checking. Then I grab my bag, put each strap over a shoulder like a backpack. Leap into the snow, sink to my knees. This is going to be more difficult than I figured.

  Looking ahead, I feel awful for having to push through the fresh snow. It’s so beautiful. Untouched, smooth, perfect.

  “Clare? Is that you?” Mom opens the door. “What are you doing just standing there? You’ll freeze. Come inside.”

  I push through the snow toward my mother, ruining the perfection.

  Mom’s raging fire has the room perfectly warm. The chair to the side shows a dip of where her body just was, hot coffee and a newspaper sitting to the side. The scene is cozy, warm. It actually makes me want to grab a book and read with her right next to me, in some sort of comfortable silence.

  Peter joins us in the living room, flipping on a Lakers-Suns game. Mom pulls out her polishing rags and lines them up on her desk. She goes into the kitchen and brings a small bowl of sudsy water back into the living room, places it next to the polishing rags. The room fills with the smell of white vinegar as she splashes some into the mix. Her hands cautiously remove the crystal snowflake from the holder. After dipping it into her cleaning mix, she uses a brush to get the dust out of each crevice. I lean back on the couch next to Peter, trying to ignore Mom.

  Dad shuffles in from outside, covered in snow. “I’m lucky I got home tonight. There’s no way,” he says to Mom, “no way the roads will be clear by tomorrow. I’m sorry.” He gives her a little hug, then adds, “I don’t think we’ll be able to go to the trial.”

  I had completely forgotten. Completely and totally. In my vacation haze with Drea and Mrs. P, my mind had floated away from my reality. Including Luke’s trial.

  Mom gives a sad little moan. She looks like she might cry. But instead she pulls the crystal snowflake from the water, gently places it on a polishing cloth, and says in a somewhat upbeat voice, “This storm can’t last all week. I’m positive we’ll be able to make it at least for the verdict.” She hangs the snowflake back up, leaving the rest of the ornaments unpolished. She’s saving them, just in case.

  But the storm does last. Piling snow higher and higher, until we look out the windows and see only a sheet of white. School is canceled day after day.

  On Tuesday our Internet, cable, cell phone, and phone service—all of it goes out. Skeleton points to the dead phones and the computer, reminding us that our connection with Luke and his lawyers is completely gone now. I pull out every scrap of leftover yarn I have, knit squares of bright colors until my fingers burn.

  On Wednesday the electricity goes out. I watch the temperature in my fish tank drop degree by degree. Making it my new mission to keep my fish alive, I wrap blankets around the glass and add to the tank a Ziploc baggie of hot water I warmed by the fire, and replace it every few hours. It gives me something to do, something to think about other than Luke’s trial.

  While I’m concentrating on keeping my fish warm, Mom and Dad pack snow in the refrigerator and freezer to keep our food cold. Then they bring out every board game we have, insisting it’ll be fun. There is no way we can get any information on Luke’s trial; the phones don’t come back on despite Mom’s obsessively lifting the receiver every fifteen minutes. We don’t even know if, one hour away and fifteen degrees warmer, this storm would be bad enough to postpone the trial. Nobody says a word about it, but Mom polishes the silver star by candlelight as I stitch my squares together, slowly forming another blanket. That night we all pull our blankets and pillows into the living room. It’s more comfortable to sleep in front of the fire.

  On Thursday the water pipes freeze. Mom melts water in a pot on the fire. We eat hot dogs and marshmallows for dinner for the second night in a row. Skeleton pings Mom’s bell ornament with his finger, making the silver clapper and mallet hit the fragile crystal again and again. Its high-pitched ding drives me out of the warm living room into my chilled bedroom. By flashlight I can see that the fish are lethargic but still alive.

  On Friday morning Peter and I can’t stand to be inside for another second, so we go out to attempt to shovel the front walkway together. We give up within fifteen minutes and sit with our backs against the house, somewhat protected by the eaves above us, watching the snow fall.

  “This seriously sucks,” Peter says. “If I have to play one more game of Chinese Checkers or Monopoly or Life or watch Mom polish another ornament, I’m going to go crazy.”

  “It’d be really endearing if our family weren’t so messed up,” I say flatly. “Kind of like camping.”

  Cold is already creeping under my parka, snow pants, and gloves. But I can’t go inside and watch Mom desperately rubbing the glass ball for the second time today.

  “I’ve got to move out this spring,” Peter says. “I’m going to go insane if I live with Mom and Dad for another year. I don’t care if I blow all the money I’ve saved for school renting an apartment. Owing student loans can’t be that bad. I should have moved out two years ago.”

  Just as he’s talking, the snow actually stops falling. We sit for five minutes, watching the sun slowly melt away the cloud, then pick up our shovels and start making a thin path to the road. The top of the bank comes up to my eyes. I can’t help but wonder what Luke is doing right now. What a trial is actually like. What the witnesses said he did. What they look like. What they talk like. Did they tell the tr
uth? Did he have anyone on his side, other than the lawyer? He’ll be found guilty, at least of the receipt scandal, so that’ll be a sentence. But the sexual assault. If he’s innocent and the lawyer can prove that . . .

  Peter breaks my thoughts. “My hands are starting to blister. You want to finish this tomorrow? The plows haven’t gotten to the road yet, so we are kind of digging a path to nowhere anyway.”

  I nod, and we head back inside.

  Sometime in the middle of the night, the electricity flickers to life, throwing on lights, the heater, and our TV, without signal. Mom runs to check the phone. Dead. She fumbles to plug in her cell phone as the rest of us gather our blankets and head to our own rooms. As the fish tank slowly warms up, my angels start to swim around again. I give them some flakes and add some stuff to the tank that’s supposed to help keep them healthy when they’re under stress.

  The next morning Mom wakes to find no cell service but a dial tone on our landline, and immediately calls Luke’s lawyer. When she’s done, she turns to face us, her lips thin. Skeleton standing tall behind her.

  “Luke has been sentenced. A total—” Her voice breaks. She takes a breath and continues. “A total of twenty-seven years, twenty-four years good behavior, in a maximum security prison. He was found guilty of everything.”

  Twenty-seven years? Twenty-seven years? I won’t see him for twenty-seven years. Not unless I go to visit him in prison. Twenty-seven years. That’s almost as long as he’s been alive. He’ll be so old when he gets out. Fifty-six years old.

  I have to admit that despite everything I knew about Luke, I still had a little quiet whispering type of hope that wanted the jury to find that he’s not guilty. For the evidence to prove he’s not guilty. A hope that his assault on Heather was a onetime occurrence, a horrible mistake he’d never repeat, a mistake that I could maybe, someday, possibly forgive him for. That the thing with the fork was just because he was on something, and he could go to rehab and get better and never let that happen again. It was such a tiny little quiet hope, but Skeleton and I watch it snuff completely out.