“You know, I loved a girl once. I mean, other than you. I lost my virginity to her, back up in Virginia. It’s not like I’ve never loved a woman before now. I’m hardly some kid, baby. I’m way older than you, don’t forget.”
“You’re thirty-nine.” The right side of her mouth turns up at the corner with tender amusement. “You’re only six years older than me.”
“Hey now, I’m old enough.” I smile back at her. “Enough that I know exactly what I’m doing here.”
“I guess it’s just weird to me, thinking of you with a guy. I mean, we’ve made love now, and then I think about your past.” She looks away from me with a slight shiver, and somehow rather than feeling judged or exposed, I understand. She loves me. I know it, even if she hasn’t said as much. It’s not an easy place for either of us to be, standing squarely between this moment and my sexual history.
It’s interesting to me that this conversation is only coming up now—after she’s made herself so vulnerable to me, physically and emotionally.
I trace my finger across the long scar on her breastbone, thoughtful. “I think what you’re trying to get at,” I answer quietly, “is whether or not I’m capable of staying straight.”
“Yes, exactly.” I see relief in her eyes.
“But, see, it doesn’t work like that for me,” I explain, bending low to kiss the jagged arrow-shaped scar across her chest. “I’m just me. I’m me, and I’m in love with you, Rebecca. That isn’t gonna go away.”
“Then why am I so scared?” She searches my face; I draw her closer.
“Because you’re in love,” I explain. “And that’s always a scary place to be.”
She pulls back, staring up at me intently. “I do love you, Michael. I hope you know that.”
“I’m beginning to get that idea,” I tease, all my anger dissolving with one look into those liquid-green eyes. I notice that she’s shaking a little, naked there beside me, so I pull the sheet up over her shoulder.
“I love you very much, Michael,” she whispers, closing her eyes. “I don’t want to do anything to hurt you. But loving you like this, it’s terrifying, you’re right.” Her eyes flutter open again, filled with tears. They’re not tears of pain or heartache—just tears of deep emotion.
Those tears remind me of my sheer panic when Alex and I first got together—and then I realize that for some blessed reason, I’m not frightened with her. That nothing about Rebecca O’Neill ever makes me want to hide or run the other way at all.
Pressing my lips softly against hers, I repeat powerful words from a rainy night long ago. The words that changed my life and my heart.
“Baby,” I whisper, “instead of fighting everything so much, you could just open up your heart and see where it leads you.”
And I swear somewhere in the mystic universe, I hear Alex cheering me on.
Chapter Twenty-Three: Rebecca
“Rebecca, wake up.”
“Hmm?” I blink back sleep to find Andrea staring into my eyes, her auburn hair a disheveled morning mess. Beyond the bedroom windows July Fourth has broken bright and sunny over the Pacific, all the overcast clouds burned off from yesterday.
Andie nudges me in the ribs again. “Rebecca, let’s go surfing.” Her clear eyes have a conspiratorial twinkle.
I smile. “I thought late day was best.”
“Oh, but early morning’s great too—lots of colors.” Beyond her, the orange-red of daybreak refracts off the waves.
“Okay,” I say. “But you’re sure about this?” I’m thinking of how hesitant she’s been until now.
Sitting up in bed, she stares out at the glittering morning light, her expression growing somber. “Yeah, I want to do it,” she says, scrunching up her nose. “Is that okay?”
“That’s great,” I enthuse. “Let’s go tell your dad.” I flinch at my wording choice, but she doesn’t seem to mind for once.
“It would be fun if you got into surfing,” she tells me. “If it were something you liked to do too.”
Reaching to the bedside for my hairbrush, I gesture her closer. “I love the beach, sweetie,” I warn with a laugh, “but I may not be very good at surfing.” Michael’s litany of scary surfing tips from yesterday nearly chased me away from the sport for good.
She scoots near, turning her back toward me, and I begin brushing her shiny hair.
“Silly,” Andrea laughs, glancing over her shoulder at me, “who cares about that? Just surf ’cause it’s fun, okay?”
I think of that little girl who sat beside me on the edge of Mona’s pool only a month or so ago. Who talked about a hidden scar, one that kept her from wearing a bathing suit—a scar that evoked powerful and ambivalent feelings, even toward the sport she clearly loved. She seemed an ancient woman in a child’s body at Mona’s that day.
But today, with all her quivery excitement about going out into the ocean, she finally seems eight years old to me.
When I finish with her hair, I hand her the brush. She hops from the bed, then with a quick glance my way, slips out of her nightgown and Barbie panties, her small little-girl body naked before me. Reaching into her suitcase, she retrieves her bathing suit, wiggling into it. She stands in front of the large windows, staring out at the ocean like she’s gathering her nerve.
Then pivoting slowly toward me, she announces in a hushed voice, “This is it.” She takes her index finger and points to a longish silver line on her upper thigh, tapping it significantly. “This is my scar.”
Mentally, I scroll through my options. I could tell her that it’s nothing, hardly noticeable at all—which would be the truth. Or I could say that I’m sorry; after all, she’s haunted by the same demons that are so familiar to me. But staring into her trusting blue eyes, neither choice seems right.
“Come closer,” I encourage her. “So I can see.”
Beside the bed, she stands so that I’m nearly eye-level with it. Her scar’s different from mine, pale against her freckled skin. Like someone zigzagged along her leg with a silver-tipped felt marker.
Scowling, she touches it with her small finger. “They couldn’t get me out of the car,” she explains in a solemn voice. “That’s how I got it.”
“I’m sure that was very painful.”
She shrugs but remains silent, eyes downcast.
An inspiration comes to me, one that I’m uncertain about. “Andrea, sweetheart,” I begin tentatively, touching her on the arm, “I have a thought.” She glances up, meeting my gaze. “You want me to tell you what it is?”
“Sure.” Her eyebrows furrow with sharp concentration.
“I know your scar makes you sad. That it makes you think of unhappy things, like your accident,” I say. “And your daddy’s death.”
She nods her silent agreement, still listening. Once I’m sure I haven’t pushed her away, I continue. “Well, what if we had a plan? What if we decided your scar would remind you of his life?”
Her expression becomes troubled. “But I got it in the accident.”
“I know, but it could remind you of the good stuff,” I say. “You could touch it, and think of your daddy, even though he’s far away.”
She runs her thumb over the scar, tracing the length of it. “It used to hurt. But then that stopped,” she tells me. “I didn’t want it to stop. I liked to feel it.” I recall her words that day at Mona’s: Mine feels like nothing. My own scars are always itching and aching, causing terrible complications, yet I have an idea of what she’s trying to say.
“When it hurt, it felt real.”
She nods. “Daddy still felt real.”
“That’s why maybe using your scar to remember him is a good thing,” I reply, lifting my fingers to her cheek. She lets me stroke her face, closing her eyes. “Better than feeling the pain. He’s always with you this way.”
A slow smile spreads across her face, until her dimples appear and her eyes open again. “Oh, he’s always with me,” she answers with a determined nod. “I know that. He told
me so in a dream. But don’t tell Michael,” she rushes to add, leaning closer. “It upsets him when I dream about Daddy.”
I drop my hand away, curious. “Why would it upset him?”
“’Cause I think Michael wishes he’d get a dream too,” she explains, biting her lower lip. “I heard him say something to Aunt Marti about it once.”
Do you still dream? That very first question we posed to one another. He turned from me then, troubled. At the time I thought it was just his happily-ever-after that was no longer intact. Now I’m thinking it might have been the literal dreams, too.
“Dreams are important,” I half-whisper. Andie looks up at me.
“You dream,” she observes. “You dream a lot, don’t you, Rebecca?”
I give an intentionally opaque answer. “Sometimes.” All of the nightmares, the ones that won’t entirely go away, they’ve abated these past two months since Michael and Andrea came into my life. But she doesn’t need to know all that.
“I dreamed about Daddy last night,” she continues in a quiet voice. “That he was talking to me. He does that sometimes, tells me stuff I should know and all.” She grows serious, focused. “That’s how come I want to go surfing now. ’Cause he told me I should.”
“He did?”
She settles on the bed, staring into my eyes. “He told me to surf again—” she pauses, getting a mischievous smile, “—because of you, Rebecca.”
“Me?” My eyes widen in disbelief.
“Daddy told me it wasn’t just for Michael,” she explains. “He said you need surfing too.”
***
I’ve been riding my surfboard on my stomach for what seems hours, to the point that I feel worn out. Not Michael, though. He grins from ear to ear, riding sluggish little waves and showing off like a teenager performing for the Y-camp girls on the other side of the lake. He showboats, walking out the length of his board—something they explained is part of longboarding style. Casey floats on his own board beside me, coaching me.
“Rebecca, you can get a wave and ride on your knees,” he tells me. “That’s your next step.”
Sitting back on my board, I observe the scene around me. “I’m not sure.” I watch Michael paddling back toward me with Andrea. They caught the last wave together, having fun and giggling as they rode it to shore side by side on their boards.
“Rebecca.” Casey splashes me with water, demanding my serious attention. “You should try.”
My heart pounds within my chest, fear and adrenalin blending together. Trailing my fingers through the water, I say softly, “Casey, I don’t want to die.”
He laughs, edging closer in the water. “You’re not going to die, you freak.”
I look around us at the breaking waves and the teeming pack of surfers in the lineup. “But all that stuff Michael said yesterday—”
“—He said because he loves you.” He gives me a meaningful look. “All right? And the last person he loved did die. Think about that for a while.”
I stare down at my board, my mouth tugging into an awkward smile. “Well, when you put it that way…”
“Surfing saved my life, Rebecca,” he continues, gesturing around us. “There’s no greater peace than being out here in the water, riding the waves. I want to give that to you.”
“Why?” I ask, surprised by his seriousness.
“Because of what you’ve done for Mike.” He nods toward Andrea, paddling in our direction on her small board. “And her.”
I shrug off his compliment, not sure what to say. “Casey, that really wasn’t my doing.” I don’t feel responsible for these positive changes in Michael and Andrea’s lives; I hardly feel right taking credit for them.
“No?” he asks, staring into my eyes meaningfully. “Were you around this time last year? Mike was barely hanging on. He stayed depressed and drunk a whole lot of the time. It wasn’t pretty.”
My throat tightens. “I hate thinking of him in that much pain.”
“He tried to pull it together…” He shakes his head. “He kept trying, but I don’t think he got better—not truly better—until you came along. Everything seemed to change then.”
I smile. “You didn’t like me at first.”
“Screw that.” He rolls his eyes in mock irritation. “I liked you enough.”
“You liar.” I splash him, giggling. “You thought he belonged with a guy.”
He gives a grudging laugh, and I know that I’ve hit the truth. “But I changed my mind, O’Neill,” he says. “You did notice that, right?”
“When exactly?” I tease, tossing my wet hair back over my shoulder. “Last week or yesterday?”
“Shut up. You’re good for them—both of them. Course I can see that,” he admits. “Sure, I thought Warner should’ve stuck with the boys, but…” He shrugs, squinting at the shore thoughtfully. “But you brought them back to life, and I can’t argue with that.”
“They were ready to find healing, that’s all.”
“They needed you, O’Neill.”
“I needed them too,” I admit quietly, but he doesn’t hear me. His focus is trained behind us, at a mounting wave.
“Okay, look, that one’s got your name on it.” I follow his gaze as the wave burgeons upward. It will break somewhere in my proximity. “Go for it, Rebecca!” he shouts, glancing back hurriedly at me. “It’s yours! Paddle, Rebecca, go! Paddle! Paddle!”
He makes motions with his hands, demonstrating, and, lacking a better plan, I begin paddling like crazy. Feeling the wave burst forth under me, I rise upward in answering instinct onto my knees, clutching hard to the board as it takes off toward shore.
Charging forward, the wave vibrating and thundering beneath me, I begin to laugh—a cleansing, liberating, wild laugh of freedom that won’t stop.
Off to my side, I’m aware of passing Michael and Andrea heading out on their boards, conscious that they’re cheering me on. Michael whoops with pride. Behind me I hear Casey shouting me onward too.
I can do this, I think, grinning like a little girl, like I did the first time my dad helped me canter on my horse. I can do this: I can be free again.
***
Sitting on the beach, swaddled in a towel beside Michael and Andrea, the day is ending the way it began, down by the ocean, and it’s as if all the hard years have washed out to deepest sea. Like the undertow reached up from that one wave I rode and snatched all the black things away, dragging them out to the distant horizon. To a place you only imagine as a child, the edge of nothing.
“I’m so proud of you,” Michael whispers in my ear, kissing me there. The three of us are sitting together, watching the waves and laughing. A full day behind us, our bodies tired and saturated with sun.
Kissing his jaw, I long for more of him—for as much as he gave me last night. “Proud of what?”
He grins. “’Cause you’re my surfer girl.” He draws me close, against his side. “I’m proud of you for going out there. That’s a big freaking deal.”
Beside him, Andrea bobs her head in agreement. “You’re gonna be on your feet soon, I bet,” she says.
Up the shore, I hear the staccato sound of firecrackers popping. In a little while, the sun will sink below the horizon and the sky will begin to light up. It seems a celebration choreographed just for me. I’ve lived with fear for so long, it’s become like breathing—not always easy, but impossible to shake.
But today—if only for today—I know that it’s gone because I can breathe. Easy, effortless, exactly like it should be.
Hours later, and everyone’s gone to their respective rooms, collapsing in bed after a full day in the sun. Beside me Andrea’s nestled close, her body warm in contrast to the chilly air conditioning in Casey’s house. But unlike Andie, I can’t sleep despite my exhaustion; I keep replaying the events of the past twenty-four hours in my mind.
A muffled sound from the living room startles me: the television set. Glancing at the clock, I see that it’s after midnight; seems someone el
se is battling insomnia tonight. Crawling out of bed, careful not to wake Andrea, I decide to investigate. Maybe I’ll get a glass of water while I’m up.
Stepping into the hallway, there’s the sound of laughter and familiar voices, all coming from the TV. I stop and listen. I hear Michael and Casey and someone else’s—a man’s voice that I don’t immediately recognize. Then Marti’s laughter. Moving stealthily, I peer around the corner, and see them all on the television screen: it’s a home video playing. Michael sits on the floor in front of the TV, remote in hand, rapt. He reminds me of Andrea watching cartoons or Disney, he’s that absorbed.
I discovered a mound of these home videos earlier today while trying to locate The Princess Diaries for Andrea. They were stacked beside the VCR, with labels like Huntington and July Fourth and various dates from the past few years. At the time, I burned with curiosity, knowing Alex must be on several of the tapes.
Although he has plenty of videos at home, ones populated with Alex and their shared memories, I think I understand what propelled him to watch these particular videos right now, in secret while the rest of us are asleep. Because he betrayed Alex last night. By making love to me, he betrayed his real partner.
In the video, Alex stands on the beach, laughing with Marti. It’s unsettling to see him “live”. I’m accustomed to his pictures, to his arresting blue eyes, but seeing him on screen, watching his movements and facial expressions, my mental portrait of him becomes more complex. I get a better fix on his lanky size—that he’s even taller than Michael, and simply towers over small Marti.
He would have towered over me too. It’s an unsettling thought, imagining him alive and beside me. Steadying myself against the wall, I begin to shake: if Alex had lived, there’d be no right now. I wouldn’t be here at all because he and Michael would be together.
They stand on the beach, blabbering about something indistinct, something I can’t hear. Watching the way the group circles together I understand another thing I could never have fathomed from a simple photograph. Alex drew attention and energy from everyone near him. Like their sun, the others orbited around him. But what he took, he obviously gave back unselfishly; there’s an electricity in their group interactions that I haven’t noticed in his absence. A fire.
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