Breathing Water (22 page)

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Authors: T. Greenwood

Tags: #General Fiction

BOOK: Breathing Water
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The cracked window of the studio let in the sun, and I shielded my eyes.
He pulled something else from the box. “Fool's gold,” he said, gently touching the surface of the rock.
I touched the rock and squinted. “The sun is out. Let's go outside.” I opened up the door and stepped onto the wet grass. The garden was shimmering in the new light. Every leaf was sparkling, speckled with pure shimmering light.
Devin pointed to a metal bucket accidentally left at the edge of the garden. “I was going to start picking the beans before it started raining. I hate picking beans. My mama used to send me and my brothers out to the garden when all we wanted to do was play baseball.”
“It's full of rain,” I said.“Guess you'll have to wait 'til it dries up.”
“Guess so,” he said.
Suddenly the sky rumbled and the clouds closed around the sun like a fist.
“Fool's gold,” I said, motioning to the disappearing sun.
“Let's get inside,” he said. “I have an idea.” He grabbed the bucket of rain and carried it to the door of the cabin. It sloshed and spilled.
“What are you doing?” I asked.
“You'll see.”
Inside, I sat on the couch, curling my knees under me while Devin disappeared into the garage. He came back with an armload of firewood.
“Oh, let me help,” I said. “I can make a great fire.”
“Go for it,” he said and dropped the wood on the floor.
I went through the motions, my grandfather's hands helping me build the pyramid of twisted newspaper and kindling inside the woodstove, igniting the careful construction. And then the fire was roaring inside, and the room smelled of wood and flames.
Devin lifted the bucket of rain up and set it on top of the woodstove. Soon the water was hissing and steaming. “Don't want it too hot,” he said, checking the water with a careful finger. “Just warm.”
I watched him watching the rain, listened to the rain tapping secrets on his roof.
“I have a present for you,” he said when the water was warm.
“Again?” I asked.
“I'll be right back,” he said and disappeared into the closet. He came out with a thick white towel. “Here.”
I took the towel from him and looked for an explanation.
“Come with me,” he said and led me toward the door. “You have to do this outside,” he said apologetically.
I stepped out into the misty morning air and shivered.
“Now sit down on the bottom step here,” he said. He went back into the house and came out with the bucket.
“Ready?” he asked.
I nodded.
He sat on the step behind me, circling my body with his legs. And then his fingers were prying loose the silver barrette. He set it down on the step next to him and said, “Okay, now I need you to bend over at your waist.” He stood up and I put my head between my knees.
The water was warm as he poured it slowly onto my hair. I could feel it seeping into the tangles, warm on my neck and scalp. When my hair was completely wet, I could see his dark hands disappear into the ends of my hair. His fingers were tentative, cautiously working the lemon-smelling soap into the ends. Slowly, his hands moved toward my head, making quiet circles. When his fingers touched my scalp, I shivered. My eyes grew heavy, and I concentrated on the calluses of his fingers and the soapy circles they made in my hair. I could have stayed like this forever.
“Okay, this may be a little colder than before,” he said, and I felt the warm rain coming again. I opened my eyes and watched the soap swirl onto the grass beneath my feet. And his hands were working so slowly, so gently, coaxing the soap from my hair. His hands were making prisms of light, glass bubbles from my hair. Finally, when the water ran clear, turned from glass into rain again, he twisted my hair, wringing out the rain. And then the towel was enclosing me, soft and warm on my head. He wrapped the towel like a turban; when I sat up my head was heavy.
His hands were wet. He reached to adjust the towel that was leaning with the weight of my hair. He left his hands on the sides of my head and crouched down, facing me, and peered into my face. Curious.
I caught my breath.
His hands moved slowly down from the sides of the towel, pressing against my temples, my ears. The sound of rain and birds and the lake were muffled by the darkness and thickness and warmth of his hands pressed against my ears. I closed my eyes.
And his hands found the sharp bones of my face. Lingered at the bones beneath my eyes, grazed the straight short plane of my nose, the sharp corners of my jaw.
I could smell the incense sweetness of him, the breath of him not so familiar this close, new and stronger. Less subtle than before. And then I could taste the sweet incense of him. The thick, dark, sweet incense of him. And soon I was not sure if it was his lips or the kiss of rain saved and warmed by fire. Or just his hands, dark birds, that were redefining my lips, softening the angles, the sharp edges of me.
Late Summer, 1991
S
he was always there.
My head is pounding, my heart is pounding, my feet are pounding against the sharp ground as I run to the night water. She knows that I am coming. She expects me now. When I reach the edge of the water, I will see her floating under the moon or moonless sky. When I walk down the red dock, away from land and solid ground, she will feel me, feel the way the water yields and responds to my weight. Then she will paddle slowly toward me, motioning with her small hand for me to join her. Then I will lower myself into the water, roll onto my back, let the water hold me. And knowing that she is there will be enough to make me feel not so alone.
Max doesn't hear me anymore. I could sing or cry as I rise from the bed where he lies like a dead man. He doesn't stir when I escape.
He might not know that I am gone. He might not notice.
It is warm tonight. After rain. The air is electric and humming. My legs are humming, new bruises like bee stings. I run to the edge of the water. But she is not here tonight. I look to the Foresters' house, frantic, buzzing. The house is dark and still as water. I stop walking, and my legs become dead currents.
I opened the door tonight. I opened the door and looked at the car sitting in the driveway. I even peered into the window and stared at the torn vinyl upholstery, at the crushed shoebox on the floor, the Coke can and the ashtray filled with gum wrappers and coins. I imagined my hands on the wheel, the way my fingers might feel curving around the wheel, on the cold key. His breath did not change when I moved away from his body. The uninterrupted rhythm of his almost-death.
He might not know that I am gone. He might not notice. I am transparent. I do not need the car to carry me. I can throw myself into the wind and be lifted by the breezes. I can lay myself in the water, be carried by the current to somewhere safe.
She and I don't speak in the water. What would there be to say? Instead, we lie on our backs in the water's hands and stare at the sky. I note the differing shades of summer, the patchwork of blue and yellow and green of my body is really no different from the changing sky. When I am cold and tired, I swim back to the dock. She returns to land too. And I help her out of the water. Then I pull my grandfather's coat around me and she grabs a threadbare towel from the clothesline and pulls it over her shoulders like a cape. When she walks back to her window, cracked open ever so slightly to the night, she turns sometimes to see if I have left. She doesn't wave. She only watches to make sure I am safe.
But tonight the lake is empty, the surface unbroken by a child's arms or legs or breath. I take off the coat and laid it on the edge of the dock. I pull my T-shirt over my head and cringe at the tender blue bruises that once were breasts. I pull my hair over my shoulders to hide the colors of my skin. But no matter how hard I try to hide the shades his hands have made of me, I always find another blossom. I tug at my curls, pulling the long dark strands, making a futile costume of hair. I am anxious without her. I am terrified of the water.
But I lower myself to my knees, allow the pain of bone against wood. And then I lower myself into the lake, the water dark enough to hide even the most purple of my ribs and vertebrae.
When I lean back my hair becomes heavy with water. It falls under me, reaching for the bottom of the lake. Water fills my ears until all I hear is the sound of Gormlaith. The strange watery, thick sound of bagpipes. The sound of a thousand nights like these. The sound of drowning. My hair reaches like wet fingers to the bottom of the lake, finds the weeds that sometimes wind themselves around my legs. My hair grows as it reaches, tangles with the beckoning weeds. Conspires and intertwines. Soon there is no difference between my hair and the dank weeds. And I am being pulled under.
The sound comes from somewhere older than this lake. Deeper than this water. I open my mouth to let it out, a bird trapped in a concrete room. Its wings beat and smash against the walls. It is the sound of bagpipes. Strange siren. It moves the water. It shifts the earth beneath the lake. It loosens the weeds and roots,
my hair, my hair, my hair.
 
In Gussy's kitchen I pull the drawers open frantically. I can no longer remember where to find things. The drawers slam and creak. Nothing wakes him. Finally I find what I am looking for. I take the scissors and close the bathroom door loudly. I am suddenly capable of making terrible sounds.
Nothing wakes him.
The blades are dull. The roots are thick. But soon the first one falls to the floor and curls around the pedestal of the sink. Each one is reluctant. Strong and unwilling. I make a forest of the bathroom floor. I cut until there is nothing to hold on to. I cut until I am standing in a lake of my hair. Until I am lighter than air. Until I am nothing but a canvas covered with the colors of his hands.
My shoulders are cold, bare. The sink is laced with dark strands. I blow the small hairs from my arms and chest and legs. In the mirror, I see the reflection of something blue. Transparent.
Like this, exposed, I walk through the brightly lit kitchen. There is a long-legged mosquito on the wall. A box of cereal on the counter, an empty carton of milk. I walk naked across the cold wood floors of the living room, up the twisting staircase to the loft where he is sleeping. And at the foot of the bed I stand and look at him.
He doesn't move.
I turn on the small lamp on the nightstand, filling the dark room with artificial warmth and light. I pull the covers off his body. Motionless, his pale soft skin doesn't seem to rise or fall. He could be dead tonight. I could have dream-wished him dead this time. I open up the window, old paint chipping from the sill like dead skin. The window is heavy, tired, but finally I am able to get it open and use his shoe to keep it propped it open. The late summer cold wind battles against the curtains. I am freezing. Nothing. I stare at him in the bed and hate him. I look at my hands and wonder what sort of damage they could do. I wonder what they are capable of. If they could save me after all.
For a long time (
minutes, hours, years?
) I stand waiting for him. My back aches. My hands wish. But it is not until nearly dawn that he stirs. Liquor like quicksilver when the sun breaks. His eyes flutter open and he rolls over, confused by the light, by my absence. Then he is awake, awake and aware.
“What the fuck?” he says. His voice sounds like a crumpled paper bag. “Jesus. Are you insane? What are you doing?”
The curtains blow into the room, wrap my legs in their lacy arms. I do not say a word. I am learning silence. His eyes grow wide with something that looks like fear.
“What's wrong with you? What did you do to your hair?”
And I don't speak. I don't answer. I don't cry. I only stand there, looking at his confusion.
When his hands come, when they grab my shoulders, and his fingers fall into the holes they have made over time, I am silent. When his voice crawls into my ear,
no, no, no,
I am leaving this place. And when his mouth tries to breathe me back, tries to fill me with breath instead of water, I am already gone.
 
There
was
a child in that swing. In the red swing. And it was her.
I find her when I am looking for something else. For the woods, I think. For the safety of trees. At first, I think she is the dream child, the one whose mother was dead. The one who imagined for Max. But she is real. I can see the swing moving, her legs pushing it higher and higher. When I get closer, I can see that her knees are bloody. Her knuckles are skinned, her hands wrapped tightly around the rope on either side of her. Her hair is a mess of dark curls, wild and sure. I stop at the edge of the lawn in front of the Hansel and Gretel house and watch her. She doesn't see me; I am invisible without my hair. She is looking at the lake behind me, through me. But it must just be the sun in her eyes, because when she descends from the tree line she looks startled.
“Hey!” she says. “Whatcha doin'?”
I look for a way to escape, but the woods are not welcoming me today.
She keeps swinging and I stare at my feet.
“You wanna swing?” she asks. Her voice is raspy, as if she were fighting off a cold.
I shake my head.
“Sure?” She rises again then, and leans back, opening her mouth to the sky.
I nod.
She slows the swing down. The dirt under her feet makes small brown clouds. When she jumps out of the swing, she could be walking on air.
“You cut your hair off,” she says. “Why'd you cut your hair off? It was pretty.”
I shrug my shoulders and motion to the new cuts on her knees.
“Some kids in town,” she explains, kicking at a stone in the driveway.
My voice comes from somewhere outside of me, as if I caught the words in a gust of wind. “What happened?” I ask.
“Swimming lessons,” she says, reaching to touch the open wound. “None of them kids like me.”
“That can't be true,” I say, my words coming back to me. I can feel them in my throat.
“No, I mean none of them
like
me. They all
different.”
“Oh,” I say.
“It's okay, I don't need none of them. I'm going back home in a week. I got plenty of friends back home. I got you too, right?” she asks me then, taking my hand. Holding my hand like it's something fragile and real.
We start walking together back toward the camp. Her hand is small inside mine. I can feel the bones of her fingers, the bones of a small dark bird. In front of the camp we stop. A motorboat hums across the lake.
“You goin' swimmin' tonight?” she asks.
I nod my head, as I see Max behind the porch window.
“Promise?” she asks, raising her eyebrow.
“I promise,” I say. Max moves from the porch into the living room. I can see his silhouette moving through the camp like a ghost.
 
I recollect this day, all of the small details of this day. I remember stubbing my toe on the threshold as I went back inside to him. I remember the thick waffle batter in a glass bowl, teetering on the counter. Eggs running yellow across the griddle. The earthy smell of potatoes and onions. The sweetness of peppers. I remember walking past him in the kitchen, through the stench of the air that circled him in a liquor cloud. I remember the mug he used for coffee, the chipped handle, the ring of orange flowers around the rim. Memory serves this day like a fancy cocktail, the clarity of water and ice. But drunken somehow, slow-moving-hazy.
As Keisha returns to the Foresters, I walk past Max pouring coffee into the chipped mug with orange flowers. Through the vodka cloud, the scotch haze of his breath.
“What'd she want?” he asks, sitting down at the table with a plate covered with leaden waffles and runny eggs.
“Who?” I ask, touching the bristles of hair at the base of my neck.
“That kid, the Fresh Air kid I saw you talking to outside,” he says, and cuts into the waffle flesh with his knife.
“Oh,” I say. “Nothing. Wanted to know if I'd seen her baseball.”
I imagine the ball lost in a game of catch or throw, rolling down the dirt road, across lawns, through the woods. I imagine the pursuit.
“Did you?” he asks.
“What?”
“Find the ball,” he says annoyed.
“Yes,” I say. “I found it.”
I bend over in the tall grass and hold the baseball in the palm of my hand. I hand it to her and a smile spreads across her face.
“I hope you're planning to go to a hairdresser and fix that mess you've made,” he says.
I touch the sharp points of hair that frame my face like black razors.
“If you were trying to shock me, it worked,” he says. There is a bit of yellow egg stuck in the corner of his mouth.
Instead of staying, instead of defending the sharp edges of my hair, of my bones, instead of searching for the words that will soften him, I stand up and move away. He moves toward me and I turn away. He reaches for me and I recoil. He asks me questions and I pretend that his words are only air. All day, I practice. He doesn't know what I am planning. That each successful parry brings me one step closer. I move from room to room, each doorway one doorway closer to the last door. I am so close now. Close.

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