Girl Underwater (7 page)

W
hen Colin finally emerges from the trees, the boys forget their hunger for a minute. Spellbound by his long, lanky strides, they watch him cross the shore. When Colin sits down, Aayu holds out a hand covered in shards of candy cane.

“For you,” he says.

“Thank you, Aayu,” Colin says. “But that's for you. And so's this.” He places a Hershey's Kiss in Aayu's hand. The kid's eyes go wide. Colin distributes two more to the other boys, their excitement palpable. I know we should probably talk about what happened, but I can't bring myself to ruin the moment.

“And one for you,” he says. He places a silver Kiss in my palm. “I had them in my pocket. Forgot all about them.”

“You walk around with Kisses in your pocket?”

The joke seems to startle him a bit. “Not sure I'm ready to answer that,” he says, and smiles.

Liam makes the bold move of climbing into Colin's lap. Aayu's lower lip trembles, so Colin pulls him up there, too. Meanwhile, Tim presents the transceiver in all its hopeless glory.

“I cleaned out all the sludge to make room for new batteries,” he says.

“Looks brand-new.” Colin gives it a full inspection. “Better than new, probably.” He searches my face for a moment. “What is it?”

Tim's grin is triumphant. “A radio!”

“Hmm.” Colin is still looking at me. “What kind of radio?”

“Very short range,” I say. “For, uh, snow emergencies. For skiers.”

“Ah,” he says, grasping the unsayable word.
Avalanche.
He turns the transceiver over in his palm, his gaze hinging on the empty battery compartment. Yet another setback, although I try not to think about it this way.

“It's a great find.” Colin hands it back to Tim, who glows with pride.

“I want to be an engineer someday.”
Someday
sounds like
thumb-day
. He puts his tongue behind his front teeth and tries again.

“You can do anything, Tim,” Colin says. “And you will.”

•

The afternoon brings fatigue and fierce appetites. The boys doze on a patch of pine needles, while Colin fortifies the lean-to for the tenth time. The fire burns in fits and snaps, the smoke curling skyward. Still no wind.

“The weather's good,” I say.

He peers up at the sky. “Pretty good.”

“You don't sound convinced.”

“Well, weather has a way of changing.”

I keep my voice down just in case the boys are listening. “What are you saying?”

He steps back from the lean-to and sits beside me in front of the fire. As he talks, he focuses on the pair of bungee cords in his hands. “I checked the weather report before we left.”

“For Boston?”

“For everywhere.” Then, like he's embarrassed to admit this: “It's one of my hobbies.”

“Well, that's . . . nice.” It's the most personal thing he's shared since we crashed. Which is ironic, in a way, because weather is the talk of strangers.

“It's a little nerdy.”

“I mean, sure. A little.”

His smile loosens the tangle of nerves in my stomach. “Anyway, I'm guessing we're somewhere between Denver and Salt Lake City. The flight path is always more or less the same from San Fran to Boston.”

“So . . . near Vail, maybe?”

“Maybe,” he says.

“What did the report say?”

He looks up at the sky. “Snow later today.”

“Snow?” The word creeps past my lips.

“A foot in Salt Lake.” He pauses. “Probably more up here.”

I crane my neck and search the skies for what feels like the thousandth time. The occasional plane cruising some twenty thousand feet above us doesn't reassure me at all; it just makes me feel smaller, like a tiny speck on a woodsy-green canvas. Even with the NTSB's technology and black boxes and GPS, searching the Rockies for survivors before a big storm hits puts other people at risk—especially if the powers that be assume no one made it out alive.

Colin abandons the cords and kneels in front of me. “They'll find us, Avery.”

His eyes tell such grievous truths, which weigh on me more than anything—more than the altitude, or the weather, or the fact that three boys are depending on us. Because once someone decides we're dead, it's all for nothing. We won't make it out of here.

Liam wakes up and rubs his eyes. Dazed, he looks around and bursts into tears. Aayu quickly follows. So much for a peaceful nap time. Soon they'll be asking me for food, which I don't have. Or their mothers, who are dead. Or a warm bed, which they may never know again.

“Avery,” Colin pleads.

I get up before he can say something that will make me feel worse. Because that's my problem with him—his lies are obviously lies, and his false reassurances make me feel childlike and fragile. His truths, on the other hand, are too raw for me to handle. The compromise leaves us in a silent stalemate, a comfort zone with a population of one.

The boys receive Colin with hugs, but they look to me for food. All I have to offer is salty peanuts and some waterlogged cookies. Liam wolfs them down, but Aayu takes his time inspecting every morsel he puts in his mouth. Tim eats with the cautious satisfaction of a picky eater. I can picture him at his kitchen table at home, eating Kraft mac 'n' cheese while his well-to-do parents dine on asparagus and lamb. But he doesn't complain. When I hand him a tiny packet of nuts, he thanks me politely.

Colin selects a bag of chips, then proceeds to offer all of its contents to the boys. I snatch it away from him. “Colin, you need to eat.”

“I will when you do.”

Tim has deposited two cookies on each of my knees. Both vanilla Oreos, which to me is an insult to standard Oreos everywhere, but they're still making my mouth water. Even so, it doesn't seem right. I can go a week without food if I have to. The boys can't.

“I'm not hungry.”

Colin lifts an eyebrow.

“I had a huge dinner last night.”

“In the airport?”

“Yeah.”

“
While
you were sprinting to the gate, or before?”

The flush in my face settles somewhere along the span of my collarbone. “I can wait a while longer,” I say. “Really.”

“Eat those cookies, at least.”

Liam's been ogling them with hungry eyes, but even he backs off at the sound of Colin's stern tone.

“Only if you have a chip.”

“Deal.”

I start with the cookie on my left knee. It's dry and crisp and delicious. Maybe I'm coming around on the vanilla Oreo thing.

Colin eats a soggy chip. The bag must have punctured in the water, and the contents look more like chip soup than a tasty snack.

He pops another one into his mouth. “Mmm. Delicious.”

Aayu laughs. Liam holds out his hand. “Can I have one?”

Before long, Colin has given away the rest of his chip soup. He spins a fantasy for the boys—of feasts and cozy kitchens and McDonald's. Once he starts talking about Happy Meals, it's all over. The boys can't get enough. I don't know how he does this—how he gives these children hope without making empty promises. When he glances my way, I can't bring myself to participate. McDonald's seems impossible. A suburban dream.

I peek into the plastic bag. There are nine more snack packs, which should get us through dinner. Beyond that, I don't have a plan—because we weren't supposed to be here beyond that. I refuse to think about what nightfall will bring.

“Do you know any stories?” Tim asks. Colin shrugs, but something tells me he's full of stories. His eyes are shining as he flicks his gaze over to me.

“I bet Avery has a whole stockpile of stories,” he says.

“I don't really—”

“Tell us!” Liam exclaims. Tim watches me with wide summer-green eyes, flush with expectation. Well, he's about to be disappointed. I don't exactly come from a creative line.

“Maybe Colin knows a few . . .”

But they're all tugging on my shirt. Aayu looks at me with such intensity it seems as though he might cry if I don't come up with something soon.

“Um, okay,” I stammer. Colin folds his hands and leans forward, like a kid at story hour. Liam and Aayu snuggle up next to him. Tim sits Indian style, as he probably does in his kindergarten classroom when his teacher gathers everyone up for nap time. Or maybe that's preschool. “Well, there was once a mermaid . . .”

“A mermaid?” Tim looks skeptical.

“Yes.” I clear my throat. “A mermaid, and her name was Ariel.”

Tim frowns. “I've heard this one before.”

“Scratch that. Her name was Ophelia.”

“Okay . . .” Still skeptical.

The story begins with Ophelia, the tentative mer-girl from Mermaidia who becomes a famous mermaid. I'm not sure where it all comes from, or how her simple tale morphs into something magical. Maybe it isn't magical at all. Maybe it's silly. But seeing the captive faces of Aayu and Liam and Tim is enough to justify all the nonsensical twists and gaping plot holes. They don't care. They don't even notice.

Of course, Ophelia isn't entirely fiction. She's largely autobiographical—a shy girl (mermaid) born to a big family and high-stress, demanding parents. The youngest of four siblings, all boys except her. Two went on to professional baseball careers (Aqua-Ball, in this story); another works in Hollywood (Holly-Sea). But Ophelia was different. Ophelia lived in their shadows and tried to make their dreams her own, but it didn't work. She liked to swim and read books. She cowered on the edge of the sofa at parties. She didn't drink till college.

Colin doesn't know the real Ophelia—the Ophelia who moved to California (the Pacific Ocean) to escape the mountain of expectations back home (the Atlantic). But once she got there, she became someone else, someone she didn't recognize. Someone her brothers (except Edward, the youngest) would have liked and probably hit on if they weren't related. Someone her dad would have bragged about to his golfing buddies (golf is the same in Mermaidia). She wasn't sure how this transformation took place—just that it had. And now, removed from all those old expectations and faced with a set of entirely new ones, she realized that she kind of missed the older, less popular version of herself.

“So how does the story end?” Tim asks.

“I don't know.” I look up to find Colin studying me with dark, discerning eyes. “To be continued.”

His silence heightens the tension in a moment that lingers longer than it should. The boys don't notice, of course, but
I
do.

“Well,” I say, slapping my knees to signal the end of story time. Liam jumps. Aayu is already dozing. Colin scoops him up and tucks him into a nest of blankets and coats. It's only midafternoon, but the poor kid looks like he could sleep for days. He's not the only one.

Liam settles in next to him, and soon he's asleep, too. With the younger boys sleeping, Colin and I are granted a rare moment of peace.

“I liked your story,” he says. “I always had a thing for mermaids.”

He acknowledges the joke with a smile, but I know what he really means. He hands me a waterlogged notebook, its pages dried to a near crisp.

“What's this?”

“For the sequel.”

I flip through the first few pages. Blank, inviting. Tragic, too, when I think about whose thoughts and dreams were intended for it.

“Here.” He places a pen in my palm—the tip chewed off, the ink green.

“I'm not a writer,” I say.

“The boys won't care.”

“What do you mean?”

“This is for them,” he says, and I wonder what he means. Ophelia's story? Or the story I told to forty new faces on the first day of swim practice? I always believed people injected slight variations into their own biographies—until I met Colin. His has been constant.

“Someday, they'll want to know what happened out here,” he says. “We need to give them that.”

“I'm not sure I can do this.”
The crash, those screams, that woman and her baby . . .

“You can,” he says. “I'll help you.”

And so, with Colin's gentle encouragement, I start where our lives intersected on Flight 149. Rows 12, 13, 14, and 15. It aches to remember, but I can do it because Colin remembers, too. The fear. The skittering of pine and stars and nothingness. The horror of leaving so many behind. This isn't my story. It's his, too.
Ours.

I write until the fire burns out, whipped into submission by a howling wind.

Clouds are moving in.

S
ometime later, I finally make it back to the house. Uncle Ted and a few other relatives have set up camp in the den. My parents corner me in the laundry room.

“What the hell happened?” Dad asks, adopting the same no-nonsense tone of voice he uses with his patients. “Your mother and I are concerned.”

Concerned.
I hate the ambiguity of that word, the way it echoes back to moody teachers and slave-driving swim coaches.
I'm concerned about Avery's ability to balance swimming and schoolwork. I'm concerned about Avery's adjustment to high school. I'm concerned about Avery's low self-esteem . . .

“I don't have PTSD.”

He swallows hard, momentarily thrown by this response. “No one said you did.”

“You think that's what it is, though. I can tell.”

He searches my face again. No one in this household tosses that word around lightly; my grandfather had what came to be known as PTSD, a product of his time spent in Vietnam. He put a bullet in his brain when my dad was five. “Avery,” he finally says, “we'd like you to see someone. That's all.”

“Who?”

He glances at my mom, who nods to confirm her approval. I wonder how many times they've rehearsed this conversation.

“We were thinking about Rachel Shriver.”

“Who's that?”

“One of my colleagues at Mass General. She specializes in . . .” He takes a breath, skipping over that Unspeakable Word. “Issues like yours.”

“What kind of issues?”

For the first time ever, he struggles to produce a response.

Mom rubs my arm. “Don't be defensive. We're just trying to do what's best for you.”

“Rachel knows how to handle this,” Dad adds.

“This
what
?
You're not even telling me what you think is wrong.” I pull my hood off, even though that makes the circles under my eyes more obvious.

“I made an appointment for you on Friday.” His initial hesitation evaporates in the setting of renewed paternalistic conviction. “You will be there, whether you want to go or not.”

“Dad—”

“This conversation is over.”

“Lee's coming in on Friday! What am I supposed to do, make him sit in the waiting room with a bunch of schizophrenics?”

“Do not make light of this, Avery. I've seen what can happen to people like you.”

“I'm not gonna shoot myself.”

I've gone too far. His nostrils flare, but he doesn't say anything. The silence is even worse than the sting of an unwinnable argument. The silence tells me I've upset him, disrespected him, and, worst of all, disappointed him.

I brush by them and run upstairs. My muscles feel fluid again, my toes and fingers working in finely tuned coordination. That leaves the damage that no one can see, the demons that no one can tame with operations or physical therapy. And I know, deep down, that Rachel Shriver can't quiet them, either.

In the end, I decide not to face any of it. I stay in my room for the whole night, while our curious relatives mill about the house and my parents make excuses for my absence. Only Edward, the youngest of my older brothers, dares to come upstairs. He knocks on my door just before midnight, soft and somehow comforting. He doesn't come in—just whispers a quiet “Merry Christmas,” then descends the stairs in the telltale pattern of a natural athlete. The next morning, I find his gift outside my door: a new swimsuit, cap, and goggles, for the ones I lost on the plane. His card reads:
Some things never change. Love, Edward.

All I can think is,
Yes, Edward, they do.

•

The day after Christmas, Edward pounds on my door at dawn. “Time for a run!”

I'm awake, but that doesn't change my distaste for early mornings. “Go away,” I mumble.

“Not going away!” He opens the door a crack and tosses a pair of dirty running shoes inside. They land on the hardwood floors with a heavy thump.

“That's not going to convince me!” I yell after him.

“Then Dad'll take you to the ER for the day. You can deal with all the hungover Santas.”

Ten minutes later, I'm outside. The temperature is in the teens, with a biting wind that pricks my eyes. When we step off the porch, the dry chill takes me back to other things, other memories. Edward senses this and takes my hand, which he hasn't done since we were kids. “You'll be all warmed up in no time,” he says. “Trust me.”

I was never a runner. The rush of air against my face always made my eyes water—not that I was ever running fast enough to experience any great rush of anything. The rumble of cement under my feet made my bones ache, and every misstep turned into a stumble. Swimming suited me much better. In the water, I always felt at home.

But I have to admit, this isn't so bad. Edward has always run with the grace of a gazelle and the focus of a marine, but today, he falls into a gentle pace beside me. The air warms up a bit, or maybe that's just the blood in my veins. The sky is a pale robin-egg blue, the bluest it gets in December. Partially melted snow lines the sidewalks, shoveled aside to make way for a steady stream of pedestrians. For now, it's all ours. Brookline sleeps alongside its residents, awaiting the brunt of mall traffic later this afternoon.

Edward gives me plenty of time to find my stride, and much to my surprise, it finally happens as we cross into Allston. When Edward starts talking, I'm shocked to discover I can answer him without gasping for air.

“So,” he says, the hint of a smirk on his face, “had enough of Mom and Dad yet?”

I smile at this, relieved by the question. Edward gets it; he grew up with them, too. “I'd say that's a true statement.”

“They mean well, but they go about things the wrong way sometimes.”

“Yeah.”

“Most of the time.”

“Especially Dad.”

Edward nods, but he seems distracted by a memory. “I didn't ask them about you. Figured it's your business if you want to talk about it.”

We round the corner onto Commonwealth Ave and continue our charge toward the Charles River. The occasional early-morning riser—those of the nubile, female variety—steals a look at Edward, whose lean frame and natural stride have always turned ladies' heads. He's a professional athlete, after all.

“I'm quitting the team,” he says. I trip on a curb, and he rights me with one swift motion without breaking stride. “Are you okay?”

“Yeah,” I breathe, but it's hard to get the word out.
Edward's quitting?!
I thought I'd hear about my dad's conversion to naturopathy before Edward quit playing baseball. “Why . . . How . . .”

“I'm not enjoying it anymore.”

“
Enjoying
it? You make like a billion dollars a year.”

He smiles, but it's missing something. “Six-point-four million, actually. And you're right, no one plays pro sports for fun. At least, not strictly for fun. The money is king.”

“You don't like the money?”

He laughs. “Money isn't everything.”

“Dad would disagree.”

“Believe me, I know.”

“You told him?”

He nods. “Christmas morning, actually. Not the best timing, but it's hard to get his attention on a nonholiday.”

A thousand thoughts flood my mind, none of them coherent. “Wow.” I dodge the next curb, though I've lost all sense of direction at this point. “So what's the plan now?”

“I dunno. I've got a few things cooking.”

“Wow.”

“You keep saying that.”

We come to a red light, and Edward slows to a full stop. For the first time since we left the house, we're standing face-to-face. His eyes are a bright, familiar green, full of boyish wonder. It's no surprise he's devoted most of his life to a game. “Why, Edward? Why now?”

He sighs, his breath fogging white as the wind whips around us. “Because I want to make a difference. Do something I love—and not just for me but for somebody else. Life's too short to pursue selfish interests.”

“Baseball isn't selfish. You love it.”

“I do love it. But something's been missing for a long time.” The light turns green, but neither one of us moves. “Plus with my shoulder these last few years, always playing in pain . . . it's just not worth it anymore. I gave it a good go, and now I'm ready for other things.”

“A good go? Edward, you're amazing. I see kids all over the place with your jersey on.” Liam, for example. The image of his bloodstained jersey flutters to mind, then fades away.

He laughs. “Probably got 'em from the sales bin.”

I roll my eyes, but he doesn't see it. We start up again, a slow return to our previous pace. A renewed blast of cold air greets us as we come upon the Charles River. It finds the water, too, churning the surface with a savage anger. I turn away from the river, focusing instead on the blacktop under my feet.

“Did my, um, experience have anything to do with this?”

He slows but doesn't stop. I've shaken his stride—a first. “To be honest, yes. It had a lot to do with it.”

“How so?”

“I thought you were gone.” His voice falters, but I can't tell if it's from fatigue or something else. “I thought . . .” He finds his stride again. “I know it's cliché, but I realized how short life is. How unpredictable it can be.”

“So what are these things you've got cooking in LA?”

He shakes his head. “I'm moving back to Boston, actually.”

“Really?”

“Yep.”

“When?”

“Spring, if I can manage it. I have to sell the house, break up with the girlfriend—”

“You have a
girlfriend?
You never tell me anything anymore.”

“Sorry, lame joke.” His guilty grin makes me laugh. “No girlfriend. But I do have to sell the house.”

It's been so long since any of us lived at home—or even in the vicinity of home. After high school, we all fled to the West Coast: Los Angeles, Seattle, San Francisco. As Edward says, it's easy to move away; it's harder to come back. Temporary situations become permanent. Relationships complicate things and change priorities. Career goals dictate the future. At school, most rising juniors spend the summer on campus, doing internships that put them in a good position for senior year and beyond. I've already had a dozen offers. Everyone wants to work with Avery Delacorte, Plane Crash Survivor.

It would be nice, though, to see Edward more. To talk to him when the world feels like it's closing in on me, as it so often does these days.

“So what about you?” he asks. “Any big plans on the radar?”

“Aside from going back to school?”

“
Are
you going back to school?”

I shrug. “I feel like I've worn out my welcome around here.”

“Nah. Dad'll put you to work if you stick around.”

“Great,” I mutter.

“You know you secretly like it.”

“Medicine? With Dad? It's like boot camp that never ends.”

“Uh-huh.”

We run in silence for a long time. My knees ache, but it's a purifying kind of pain. With each stride, it feels as though I'm banishing a period of permanent stasis. I never thought Boston would be the place for this to happen, especially in December. It's cold; it's miserable. Everything's gray. And yet, when we round the corner onto our street, I'm ready to run another mile.

Our house pulses with a cozy wintry light, inviting us in. We go in through the back, so as to spare my mother's hardwood floors. Edward kicks off his shoes and rubs his hands together to warm them. As he tosses my hat and gloves into the dryer, I can't help but think that for the first time in weeks, my house doesn't feel like a cave. It feels like a home.

“Thanks,” I say.
Thank you for the present. For the run. For not asking questions. For being my brother.

“No problem,” he says.

Then he hugs the crap out of me, and I'm grateful for that, too.