The Deepest Blue

by Kim Williams Justesen

  “There you go. Try to sit up a little more.”

  Maggie’s voice is patient. She sounds like the time she took care of me when I got chicken pox, telling me not to scratch and feeding me bologna sandwiches on Wonder Bread with mustard and fresh lettuce from her garden. I use my right arm to scoot back against the wall at the head of my bed, then I blink my eyes hard and make them open half way.

  “I thought I’d let you sleep a little while, but it’s getting late, and we need to head to the house to get ready for tomorrow morning.” She brushes a piece of hair from my forehead. “You were dead to the world. I almost started to worry.”

  I shake my left arm to get the blood flowing. “I didn’t mean to fall asleep. I just laid down for a minute.” I yawn and stretch my arms in front of me. “What time is it?”

  “Seven thirty. I thought you might be getting hungry, so I came to get you.”

  “How’d you know I was here?”

  “Jayden telephoned. He said he dropped you off here and that you were okay.”

  I swing my feet to the edge of the bed, careful not to knock Maggie to the floor. “I’m sorry. I meant to call, but I guess I just passed out.”

  Maggie smiles at me. “We’re all a bit out of sorts. I’m sure that nap did you a lot of good. I may take one myself after dinner.”

  “Why not just go to bed?”

  “I might at that,” she says. “You may need to pack a few things. I don’t know what’s going to happen tomorrow or the next day, so we’d better be ready.” She lets out a quiet sigh.

  “I need to switch laundry loads,” I say. “I left a load in the other day.” I stumble from my room to the laundry closet, take the load from the washer, put it in the dryer, and head back to my room. I grab a few pairs of shorts and some T-shirts, boxers, and my gym shoes. I find an empty duffel bag and shove everything in. “What about tomorrow?” I ask. “What do I wear for that?”

  “I’ll press your shirt and slacks. The jacket looks like it’s still okay.” She picks up the jacket and tie from the end of the bed where I put them.

  I follow Maggie out the front, making sure to lock the door. The sun is still high in the western sky.

  The Subaru glides along the roads leading to Maggie’s. We pass the arcade and the strand of trees I ran through during the storm. Everything is so familiar and yet so foreign. We pull into the driveway and head into the house. Rocket barks and begs for attention.

  “Hush, dog,” Maggie says, but there is little behind her words to convince the dog to settle. He licks my hands and barks again. I let him out in the yard and wait by the door for him to take care of business. As he trots back into the house, he stops to nudge my hand with his nose, as if he’s trying to let me know that nothing has changed for us.

  I head to my room and change into a pair of shorts and a tank top, or a “muscle shirt” as my dad used to say. He’d usually follow that by commenting about my lack of said muscles. Then he and I would flex our biceps, pestering Maggie to declare one of us the winner of the Best Muscles contest. I smile at the memory even though it’s wrapped in sadness.

  “Hand those to me,” Maggie says, pointing to the pants and shirt I’ve just shed. I give them to her. She has changed into a long T-shirt that nearly reaches her knees, and I realize it’s one that belonged to my dad.

  “What time do we need to leave in the morning?” I ask.

  Maggie heads to the small laundry room at the back of her little house, and I follow. She plugs in an iron as she drapes the pants across an ironing board she has set up. “We have to be at the court in Jacksonville by ten, so I guess we’ll leave by eight forty-five, maybe eight thirty if Chuck feels we need to be there early.” She quickly presses each pant leg, flipping the fabric and snapping it into shape.

  I can smell the warm, humid scent of freshly pressed cotton. It calms me for some odd reason, like a reminder that Maggie is here for me. Then the familiar knot returns to my gut. “Julia will be there, won’t she?”

  “I assume so,” Maggie says. “I’d guess she has to be.” She slides the pants onto a hanger and sets them aside. She maneuvers the shirt onto the board and begins pressing it. “I’m sorry that happened today,” she says, never raising her eyes from the task in front of her. “That was a shock to all of us to have her show up unannounced like that.”

  “Not to me,” I say.

  Maggie looks at me with an odd expression, one eyebrow arched high, the other tucked low over the socket.

  “Nothing Julia says or does could surprise me. She’s crazy.”

  “She’s certainly got issues.”

  “I mean, I think she’s really crazy. Like mental issues kind of crazy,” I say. Suddenly I am flooded with memories. Julia held a bottle of something in her hand, a small brown bottle. I knew it was medicine, but I was only about four, and I didn’t know what kind of medicine it was. She dumped the little pills down the drain in the kitchen, and I could hear the plink and rattle as they fell. Water ran in the sink. She pressed a finger to her lips as she looked at me. “Shh,” she said, “don’t tell Daddy.”

  Tell him what? I remember Dad coming home later, finding the empty bottle. Julia told him something about the doctor trusting her to know what’s best for her. Dad was mad. He tried to call the doctor, but Julia grabbed the phone from his hands and hurled it across the room.

  “What is it, Mike?” Maggie says as she slides the shirt onto another hanger.

  “I swear I remember Julia having to be on some kind of medication, but she didn’t like it so she told my dad she didn’t have to take it anymore.”

  Maggie looks at me, processing the information. “What was it?”

  “I don’t remember, but I remember her pouring the pills down the sink and then making me promise not to tell.”

  “Hmm. You need to tell Ms. Young about that.” She takes the clothes on the hangers and puts them in my closet.

  I follow her from room to room, and we end up in the kitchen.

  “Are you hungry?” Maggie asks.

  I notice that the counter is full of plates and pans covered with plastic wrap or foil. Maggie opens the fridge. It is jammed with pies, and hams, and other mysterious foods covered in shiny foil.

  “We’ve got enough to feed everyone in the next three counties,” she says.

  For the first time today I feel hungry. We fix plates of chicken and potato salad with homemade rolls and coleslaw. We each take a slice of banana cream pie, then sit at the table. I take a few bites and realize I’m starving. I shovel food into my mouth, one bite after another in rapid succession.

  “There’s plenty more,” Maggie says.

  I force myself to slow down. Maggie has barely taken a bite of anything. “Not hungry?”

  “I ate a bit at the church,” she says, but I know she’s not being completely honest. “And I think the sight of so much food actually makes me lose my appetite.”

  “I think it helped me find mine.” I bite a hunk of chicken from a leg bone and swallow, pausing to take a drink of water. “Where did it all come from?”

  “Ladies from around town, people I work with, folks who knew your dad.” She pulls apart a roll and takes a bite of the bottom half, chews slowly, and swallows hard as if the food is resisting her—or she’s resisting it.

  “You’ll be there tomorrow the whole time, right?” I ask.

  Maggie nods. “The whole time.”

  “What about Chuck?”

  “I think he’ll be there, but it’s really up to Ms. Young. Chuck is just there for moral support.”

  “You think I should tell Ms. Young about the medicine thing?” I take another bite of chicken.

  Maggie shrugs. “It’s up to you, but it might be important.”

  We finish eating in silence, then clean up the dishes and put everything away. We sit in front of the television for a while, but neither one of us seems all that interested in what’s on. Around ten o’clock, I take Rocket outside.

 
; Crickets are chirping, and I can hear a big toad bellowing off in the distance. Rocket trots around the yard, poking his nose under vegetable leaves, pawing at a frog that leaps and startles him. I wonder if it’s fair to Rocket to make him move. There’s no grass at our house, no garden, no yard. It’s mostly sand and shells, a few splotches of grass, with a couple of squatty oak trees to give shade. Behind that is a private street with another row of houses facing the beach; expensive places owned by people from New York or Illinois or other places I’ve never been. They try to push the locals farther up the island, but Dad and I have never budged. It’s close enough to the beach that you can listen to the surf break against the shore at night. Then again, it’s not close to the creek like Maggie’s.

  Rocket gallops toward me, his nose covered with a smudge of mud. “Goofy dog.” We go back into the house. The air is chilly inside, and my arms prickle with goosebumps as I shut the door.

  “I think I’m turning in,” Maggie says. She wipes the mud from Rocket’s nose with her hand and then goes to the sink to wash it off. She heads toward her bedroom but stops at the hallway and looks at me. “It’s all going to be okay,” Maggie says.

  “I know,” I say, but there is a familiar tightness in my stomach and chest because I don’t really believe anything will ever be okay again.

  chapter 18

  The boat rocks from side to side and whitecaps crest each passing wave. Gulls hover overhead or land in the water and float through the frothy peaks. The water is dark, and I can’t see anything beneath the surface as I lean over the portside edge. I can’t find what I’m looking for no matter how hard I try to see.

  Rain begins falling in heavy drops that splash as they break the surface of the ocean. I keep staring into the water, looking for it, but it isn’t there. The rain gets harder and comes down in pellets that sting as they strike my arms. But I keep looking into the water—I’m certain it’s in the water.

  The boat rocks harder now, bouncing and twisting in the swells. Beneath the dark waves I can just make out a shape, rising to the surface so slowly that it almost seems as if it isn’t moving. The wind whispers around me, pushing and pulling to get my attention, but I am only focused on the shape. I think it’s what I’m looking for, but I can’t be sure until it gets closer. The boat slides and dips through the churning water. I move around the railing, keeping my eyes glued to the shape that’s rising.

  I can almost make it out now. It’s familiar but not recognizable—not just yet. It’s a pearl color, long and thin, with dark hair that shifts and sways with the current of the water.

  “Dad,” I say, calling out to it. “Dad.” I reach my hand out to help him, to pull him from the water. My heart is beating hard because I may be too late, but I know I have to try. “Dad!” He floats faceup in the blue-black water. The boat dips and I reach out to grab him, but I only graze his arm with my fingers. His body spins in the water, and he looks up from beneath the churning surface, his face white and carved by the giant scar that slices from the bridge of his nose to the back of his head.

  “No,” I say, desperation and anger bubbling to the surface. Tears splash like rain in the water as I strain to reach him and pull him to me.

  “Ten years too long,” says a voice behind me. I spin and see Julia in a Donald Duck T-shirt. She grabs for my arm, but I turn back to the water.

  “Dad,” I call again, but already he is slipping beneath the waves. His pale face disappears as the water grows darker and darker around him.

  I sit upright in bed, panting and sweating. I look around my room, my eyes adjusting quickly to the absence of light. Through the window I can see the speckle of stars above the pines, but the sky is still black.

  I check the clock; its glowing green numbers read 2:35 A.M. Rocket lies across my feet, snoring like a diesel engine. His paws twitch and paddle as he chases something in his sleep. I rub my hand across his side, and his tail wags instinctively.

  Worry floods my mind. What if the judge sends me to live with Julia? What if I have to leave Maggie, my friends, Rocket? What will I do with the boat? My head aches with confusion.

  I want to lie down and be sucked back into the darkness of sleep, but I am so afraid of my dreams that I resist closing my eyes. I move off the bed and make my way to the kitchen. The refrigerator hums softly as I tug the handle and open the door. The small light is almost blinding. Cool air spills out to the floor and snakes around my feet. I’m not really hungry, but I don’t want to fall asleep again. I slip a chicken leg out from under a piece of tinfoil, then grab a bottle of soda that’s been shoved to the back.

  I hold the chicken leg in my mouth as I set the soda on the counter and open the cupboard to get a glass. Quietly, I twist the cap off the two-liter bottle. The hiss of carbonated pressure sounds as loud as a steam engine in the dark air. Rocket has followed me out of the bedroom in the hope I might let him share in whatever I’ve pulled out to snack on. He sits by the fridge, his tail sweeping back and forth on the linoleum, looking up at me with longing eyes.

  I tug the door open again, and Rocket inches back so as not to get his nose bumped. A flood of smells mingles together: potato salad, ham, chicken, banana cream pie, baked beans. It’s almost overwhelming, though from the looks of it, it’s a blissful torture for Rocket. I find another chicken leg, grab a paper napkin, then set both of the chicken pieces on the counter and finish pouring my drink.

  Rocket licks his chops as I tear small pieces of meat from the bone for him. He follows me to his bowl as I drop the chunks for him to eat. I grab my snack and sit at the table, nibbling small bites from the chicken and chasing them down with soda.

  “Can’t sleep?” Maggie says behind me.

  I jump, startled at the break in the quiet. I turn to see her leaning against the hallway entrance, a shadow in a white T-shirt, arms folded across her stomach.

  “I didn’t mean to wake you,” I say.

  “You were making a lot of noise a little while ago. Is everything okay?”

  I yawn and stretch my arms above my head. “Weird dreams. Just stressed, I guess.”

  “I’m not sleeping so well myself,” Maggie says. She opens the fridge and lifts the foil from another dish. “How’s the chicken?”

  I swallow another bite. “It’s okay. A little salty, but Rocket liked his piece.”

  “Don’t give him stuff like that. You’ll turn him into a beggar.” Her voice isn’t serious, and I’ve seen Maggie feed Rocket leftovers at least a thousand times before.

  “If you need something to help you sleep,” she says, taking a plate from the sink, “I’ve got something that would be safe for you to use. It’s all natural.”

  “Will it keep me from having weird dreams?”

  “I don’t know.” She sits in the chair next to mine and pulls a hunk of chicken from the bone. “You’re right,” she says, licking her fingers, “it’s a little salty.”

  I bite the last sliver of meat off the thick bone, toss it with the napkin in the trash, and sit next to Maggie again. “I can’t go with Julia,” I say. “I won’t leave with her. I’d rather live by myself or be in foster care if I have to.”

  Maggie looks at me, her face shadowed in the darkness. “She’s still your mom, Mike.”

  “She was never my mom. Not really.” The smell of cold chicken begins to turn my stomach a little. “She didn’t even want me around. She said that. So why would I want to be with her? I won’t do it. I will take the boat and head for somewhere else, disappear if I have to, but I won’t go with her—even if the judge says I have to.”

  Maggie has her elbows propped on the edge of the table. She pulls apart the chicken breast like she pulls apart her pizza: slow and methodical. “Don’t worry yourself sick over things you don’t have any control over.”

  “But why don’t I have control?” It sounds like a stupid question when I say it, but it is a genuine concern. “It’s my life. If I don’t have control over it, then who does?”

 
; Rocket moves to my side and sits again, resting his chin on my thigh. He looks up at Maggie hopefully, but Maggie isn’t paying any attention to him. She looks thoughtful as she pulls another strip of meat from the bone and chews it slowly. “All we have,” she says, then swallows, “is the illusion of control. We make plans, we make choices, we make decisions, but then something comes along and knocks us over and proves that all this planning and choosing and deciding is just for show.” She reaches over and takes my glass, gulping the last of my soda. “What you want doesn’t always matter,” she says, and I can hear the sadness in her voice. “Life gives you what it gives you, and your job is to do the best you can with that. But really, there’s just no such thing as having control over it.”

  Anger boils in my chest, matched by confusion. “Then what’s the point?”

  “The point is,” she says, moving to the sink to throw away the bones and rinse her plate, “the point is that sometimes, just for a little while, you get the smooth, calm waters that let you see twenty feet down. You get the peaceful day, the cloudless sky, the moments that let you breathe so deeply it feels like your lungs might burst.”

  I’m not sure I’m really understanding any of what Maggie is saying, but for the first time in days, she smiles at something. “These are the things that keep you going, because just one day like that can erase months of all the other garbage.” She heads down the hall toward her room, but turns back to me. “You can’t control it, and that’s what keeps you going. That’s the point. You keep going because you don’t know when you’re going to get one of those amazing days again, but you know you will.”

  She shuts her door, and I move to the edge of my bed. I want to believe what Maggie says—that there will be other days that feel “amazing,” but right now, I feel like I’m being sucked under the waves in the deepest, darkest part of the water—and Julia is waiting for me at the bottom.