Mina smiles sadly. “I think it’s a projection.” She brings a hand up in front of her face and then waves it across the horizon surrounding us like a snow globe. “Alternate worlds, Sam, like you said. Alternate possibilities. I created this one. From memory.” She fingers the frayed edge of my sundress, an old favorite stitched up in three places. “Including us. Apparently, I can’t imagine a world where we don’t breathe.”
So of course I have to try to stop breathing. But there’s no way to stop without holding your breath, making me hyper-aware of my lungs, the air pushing against them, and the fact that I’m about to pass out.
Mina snorts in laughter. “Nice try, Einstein.”
I deflate noisily, but I don’t feel like laughing anymore. “You’ve been here the whole time. Locked up here by yourself.” My head is a bag of Jiffy Pop, kernels of questions about to explode like a machine gun.
“Not exactly.”
I look around at the eerily tranquil summer day, my skin prickling like I’m being watched. “I don’t get it. An alternate world? You just—poof—landed on a dock?”
Mina frowns. “Well, that’s the thing. When I went, I heard a different voice—my mother’s, I think. She was guiding me, helping me to create a space where I could join her. Same as how I got you here. But I kept thinking about you, about our plans, our research. And the light scared me, so I conjured a favorite memory—this place. Then I ended up here all alone.”
I study Mina’s face, sadness draped over it like a funeral veil. And, I realize now, she’s trying not to show me she’s afraid. Her mother’s voice, she said she heard, like all those stories of near-death experiences. My next words I whisper. “But why do you think it’s an alternate world, Em? And not just—” I shiver in the sun “—death?”
“Well—” Mina’s face turns purposefully mischievous, a twinkling in her black eyes I know all too well “—I’ll show you.” She takes my hand, pressing my fingers together hard. Her eyes catch mine and hold, like now I’m the soap bubble hovering on a breeze. “I have no idea if you’re ready.” She scoots forward on the dock, pulling me along. “We’ll find out.”
I resist her tugging. The last thing I want to do is go for a dip. “What do you want me to do?”
“Jump.”
Mina yanks me into the water and everything goes black. I scream like a fish hooked through the eyeball must scream inside its head.
CHAPTER
36
“SAMANTHA, STOP SCREAMING.”
A house. The beach house. I’m on the beach, and there’s the gate splayed open to the rustling palm grove and the empty patio beyond.
“Are you here?”
I ignore the disembodied voice. I’m back! I’m alive! The dock was a dream. Isabel must be waiting for me in the house. We’ll swap horror stories about the near drowning. Jesse will laugh and Lynette and Cornell will hug me tight. I look down at my feet, ready to take off running.
No! Dammit. No feet. No legs. No hands. I freeze my racing thoughts and wait, trying not to panic.
No heartbeat. No breathing. Terror without a body is difficult to describe. As is despair. I have nothing. I feel nothing, like trying to caress a hologram.
Unable to make sense of things, I focus my attention back on the house. This time as I try to make out the outlines of the hammock in the palm grove—Whoa! I’m at the hammock. Wherever I look, my vantage point moves, my mind positioning itself at will. I look down.
Isabel. Oh my God.
She’s lying oddly still with her eyes open. Her body is sunk into the hammock at an unnatural angle, her arm hanging listlessly over the side. Isabel’s eyes are so red and swollen I can’t see the whites. But somehow that makes their blue more piercing than ever. Oh, Belly. A whimper emits ever so softly from Isabel’s lips, but no words that I can understand.
“Samantha, please. Are you here?”
Isabel. Why can’t she see me? I want her to.
“Samantha, answer me.”
“Well, then what do you mean, am I here? I’m not here. I died, Mina.” The truth stings. The truth is a homicidal jellyfish.
“I know.” Mina’s voice is the saddest thing I’ve ever heard. It ripples the air around me, a kaleidoscope of colors. “So you see her, right?”
I look down at the hammock. Isabel is crying. She doesn’t move to wipe the tears, they simply run their course down into her nose and over her lips. Her hair is matted and stuck to her forehead. She begins to move her head right and left, making the hammock cut into her skin.
“Come on, Sam. Come with me inside.”
I turn in the direction of the invisible voice and in an instant I’m at the kitchen table inside the house.
Arshan and Cornell are playing cards in slow motion without speaking. They’re not making eye contact either. They look old, like gloomy daguerreotypes of defeated generals. Between them is a bottle of rum. Cornell picks it up and splashes sloppy helpings into each of their glasses. Big glasses considering the clock says 11:00 a.m.
“Jesse and Lynette must be in the back.”
Even before Mina’s voice fades, I’m inside Jesse’s bedroom.
Lynette sits on the bed, while Jesse paces the room—scraping her sandals angrily across the weathered boards. They’re not speaking either. Jesse keeps licking her lips and bringing her fingers to the side of her mouth like she’s about to speak, but then stops. Lynette watches her, with a look that is both concerned and chary. Jesse stops in her tracks, picks up a coffee cup from the nightstand and chucks it at the wall. As the cup becomes jagged pieces oozing murky coffee over the plaster, she snarls like a cornered Rottweiler. “Goddammit, Lynette. Goddammit all to hell!”
“Mina, I want to go back to the dock.”
“Okay. But I have to do something first. Go back to Isabel.”
I’m at the hammock. Isabel’s in the same painful position, but now there is a tomato-red scratch on her cheek from slicing it against the coarse netting. I see a shimmer on the wooden boards beneath the hammock—a shiny American penny. A penny for your precious thoughts, Mina always said to Isabel and all of her big save-the-world ideas. Isabel blinks.
“How did you do that?”
“I’m not sure, really.”
“So, you’ve been doing it to Isabel, too.”
“Of course. And Kendra. Didn’t they tell you?”
CHAPTER
37
WE’RE BACK ON THE DOCK. I DROP MY HEAD into Mina’s lap and sobs pour from my mouth like lava. Everything everywhere hurts. We’ve seesawed back to this strange world where I can feel my body, but now the downpour of sensation only makes me nauseous and raw. Crying here hurts worse than anything when I was alive. It hurts worse than dying. I think it will never stop. I think it will never stop hurting.
“No, it won’t, Sammy. Not as far as I can tell, anyway.”
The cries turn to whimpers in my throat. As Mina strokes my hair, the heaving feeling slowly passes. When I sit up, I curl my knees to my chest to anchor myself somehow. I force myself to feel the warmth of the sun, to be still like the glassy water. “So you go anytime you want?”
The look in Mina’s eyes is as old as time. “What do you think I’ve been doing?”
“It’s torture. Why do it to yourself?”
Mina looks wounded. “It’s the only way to be with them.”
Her response trips me into a dirty puddle, muddling my thoughts. But I don’t want to visit. I don’t want to watch. I want…
“What, Sam? What do you want?”
“I want to go back.”
“Let’s go. This is the most time I’ve spent here yet! I’m worried about Isabel—”
“That’s not what I meant. I mean I want to go back to before.”
“You mean you wish you hadn’t died.” Mina tries her best to look comforting. But she frowns. “You wish you never ended up here, with me.”
The look on my best friend’s face is a poisoned arrow, infecting me with shame
. If I hadn’t died, wouldn’t Mina have been forced to watch us for eternity, a fish in an invisible fishbowl? “Of course I’m glad to be with you.” I poke her shoulder. Then her leg. I poke her repeatedly until she smiles. A thought strikes me finally. “Does Kendra know about me? Does Remy?”
“Kendra, yes. Isabel emailed Remy and left a voicemail. He hasn’t responded.”
“Why not? What is he doing?”
Mina looks away. “I don’t know. I visited you two when you were alive and with him. But I can’t go now.”
“Why not?”
“I don’t know, Sam.”
“Can I go?”
“I would think so. Do you want to try?”
I look out across the green water. “Let’s go see Kendra first.”
“Where are we?” Blue. Blue everywhere. And the smell of chlorine.
“Kendra’s swimming.”
There she is. Third lane from the right. Swimming hard, like the devil’s chasing her.
“Yeah, she’s upset. But, Sam, there’s something else… something you don’t know.”
Kendra finishes her lap. She yanks herself out of the pool, and stomps a path toward the changing room. She checks the clock.
I’m in the changing room when she comes in the door. She sits down on a bench, unlocks her locker and takes out a towel. Still dripping wet, she covers her face with the terry cloth. Then she leans forward and bangs her head on the locker five times. When she stops, she tips her head back, eyes wide-open. It startles me. I can count on one hand the number of times I’ve seen Kendra Jones cry. She stops as soon as she starts. She wipes her nose and sniffs hard. Tough girl Kendra. Never a big fan of naked emotion. She opens the locker again. She slips quickly out of her swimsuit and into a dress, conspicuously averting her eyes from her body. She dumps everything in her bag and leans hard against the locker. Her face is all angles and shadows. Then it starts to shimmer. Everywhere.
“Mina?”
“We have to go, Sam.”
I can barely make out Kendra heading for the exit. But then she turns sharply and looks back. I can see her clearly now and I follow her gaze. On the floor is a single green clover leaf.
CHAPTER
38
“YOU DID THAT. HOW?”
“I don’t know.”
The dock is just as before—the sun shining, the clouds still unmoving but perfect. It’s like a scrapbook picture of my childhood. Mina’s as still as the clouds, as if she’s part of the photograph, too. I touch her shoulder.
“Why did we have to leave?”
“We can only go when they’re thinking about us.”
“Mina, how many times have you seen Kendra cry? Of course she was thinking about us.”
Mina kicks her feet in the water, rippling the photograph. “She was at first. But then she was thinking about something else.” Mina hugs herself like she’s cold. “Tomorrow is her appointment.”
“For what?”
Mina looks up and frowns. “Kendra’s going to have an abortion.”
I think of Kendra’s voice in our last phone call. “Why didn’t she tell me?”
“I think she’s ashamed.”
“Of getting pregnant?”
“Of being more concerned about ruining her perfect life than creating a new one.”
“Michael doesn’t know?” How could Kendra not tell him? And not tell us? She must have been going crazy.
Mina looks at the water. “It’s what he wants.”
The water suddenly appears to boil around her feet. Mina yanks her feet out of the water and looks at me curiously.
“How can she be with such an asshole?”
Mina laughs uneasily. “Ye who live in glass houses—”
I cock my head. “Remy? You don’t like him?”
Mina’s answer is surprisingly soft. “Did you?”
I want to shoot her an angry look but it fizzles. The news about Kendra is overwhelming, but now Remy moves through my mind in countless flittering memories. “Should I go see him? Do you have to go with me?”
Mina pats my hand. “I’ll wait here. Just think about him as hard as you can. You can do it.”
Remy. Remy. Remy getting out the shower, singing a silly French song with my name in it. Remy in bed, snoring like a bear. Remy’s smile with his gleaming teeth. Remy’s hand on my waist, possessive but so reassuringly confident.
Wow, he looks great.
Remy is in front of a fancy crowd, making a toast. He is obviously drunk, but carrying it well, dressed impeccably in a tux.
Not exactly what I expected. He’s at a party? But if I’m here, he must be thinking about me—
“Merci! Merci beaucoup. Ce prix me signifie le monde.”
People applaud as Remy clutches an award in his hands and thanks them profusely. The ballroom is filled with tables covered in white linen tablecloths and towering flower arrangements. Photographers wind amongst the guests, setting off firefly blasts of light. Camera crews zoom in on Remy walking down from the stage, a trophy in hand. Beautiful women in ball gowns stand clapping and wiping fake tears, beside their cheering, handsome dates.
A busty blonde in a slinky black cocktail dress breaks off from the crowd and makes her way towards Remy, shifting her hips as she glides through the adoring spectators.
“Tu le mérites,” she croons into his ear with a disgusting familiarity. She lingers a second longer to exhale onto his neck.
Remy closes his eyes and does not respond to her passionate praise. When he opens them, he looks ill. “Excusez-moi,” he mumbles, and claws his way through the smiling people.
When he gets to the bathroom, a distinguished gentleman is just about to step inside. He stops when he catches sight of Remy and smiles. “Ah, Monsieur Badeau—”
Remy puts his hand on the doorknob and averts his eyes. “Pardonez-moi,” he says as he slips past the startled congratulator.
Inside, Remy barely makes it to the toilet in time to vomit. His face is splotchy and dripping sweat. He flushes the toilet and wipes the seat with a wad of seat covers. He clenches a fist and punches the metal wall. He smoothes back his hair as if trying to calm himself down, but then he kicks a gilded trashcan and it careens to the floor clattering like armor. The kick sends Remy staggering until he slumps down on the toilet seat in his tux. With the growl of a grizzly, he drops his head into his hands and sobs.
It’s heartrending to see. I long to touch him, comfort him. And I need to be held, feel his strong arms wrap around me and confirm my existence. But there is no me here. Here I am, a freshly completed last chapter. And a source of pain.
Helplessly watching Remy cry is the ultimate confirmation of my death. There is nothing to separate us, none of the usual barriers between lovers. No skin, no eyes staring into another’s, no discordant heartbeats to denote the boundary between us. I am not him, I am not here. I am an observer of a world where I no longer swim. I’m a visitor to the aquarium.
CHAPTER
39
“HE’S NOT AN ASSHOLE.” THE SOLIDITY OF THE wood dock soothes me, moors me to a world where at least I feel alive.
Mina’s floating on her back in the lake. She looks over, surprised, but then her face sinks into dullness, her eyes gun-metal gray.
“Well, I suppose it doesn’t matter anymore, does it, Sammy?”
It’s like she punched me in the stomach. But she’s right. “Will this go on forever?”
Mina sighs and looks up at the sky. “I don’t know.”
“Will it stop when they stop thinking about us?” The tranquility of our snow globe is beginning to irritate me.
“I don’t know.”
The smooth water reminds me of the swimming pool. “Is Kendra going to go through with it?”
“I don’t know, Sammy.”
Anger hisses up from my stomach like vapors from a tomb. “Why don’t you know?”
Mina looks me flat in the eye. “I. Don’t. Know.”
I want to slap he
r. The clarity of that thought scares me. She challenges me with her obsidian eyes. You can hear what I’m thinking. She nods her head. We stare each other down like rival tigers. The water is so still it makes Mina look like a bust on a mirrored platter. “Does it ever rain, Mina? Does it change? A dock. A lake.”
Curiously, the lake begins to tremble. Mina notices when waves start to lap at her chest. But I can’t slow down. My anger is a hurricane barreling through my ribs. “Billions of people arguing about God, and this is it? An unfinished memory. A sliver of puberty. This is what we get? Why did you stick me here?”
“Samantha, stop.”
It’s too late to stop. “What if you’d listened to your mother? Maybe you broke the rules and now we’re cut off from whatever was supposed to happen! What if now I’m stuck here for eternity? While everyone in the world slowly forgets I ever existed—”
My blood runs cold at the thought of such a fate. In tandem, my skin chills, like that instant when the sun dips behind the clouds. I cover my face with my hands and drop to my knees with a thud. It’s impossible to make out Mina’s reply over the sound of my tears and the rushing sound of rain.
Rain? My eyes spring open as the first drops hit my shoulders. The rain begins to hammer, much like the tempo of my heart, striking my cold skin the temperature of warm tears. Black clouds swarm in the sky, churning like the outrage in my belly. In the distance, lightning crackles in fury.
“Stop!” Mina’s trying to ride a lake turned into a dark roiling ocean.
The water is rising. I jump to my feet but it rises to my waist and then to my chin and I have to tread water. We’re swimming in a hurricane from hell—no dock, no land, no grass. Just an infinity of storm.
A swell rises behind Mina, like the tidal wave from my nightmare. She’s screaming something at me, but I can barely understand over the roar of thunder and water. She points at me, then at the sky. “You. You’re—” Her words are swallowed again by the wind. The glinting wave curls above me and I raise my arms to shield myself. Mina puts out her arms. “Your emotions! Sam—”
The Summer We Came to Life Page 17