With a pack of books on her back, weighing her down.
“And when the water hit my mouth, I started swimming,” she tells me. “Struggling as I tore through the water as fast and hard as I could, because I wasn’t strong, and I knew any second the weight of the pack would take me down, but I wanted to go farther. I needed it to be deeper.” She hesitates, whispering her words like she’s thinking out loud. “So deep I couldn’t make it back. So I wouldn’t be able to make it back. My feet no longer brushed the ocean floor. I was going. Farther and further.”
I know that feeling. The edge we dance when we want to get to the point of no return, so we have no choice but to keep going, but I always chicken out. I always fear doing things I can’t undo.
“I remember that last moment,” she says, droplets glimmering across her now-tanned skin. “When my muscles burned, because I’d used every ounce of strength to keep myself and the pack up. The last moment, knowing I was about to go under. The weight pulling me down.” She shook her head gently. “Let myself go. Let it happen, I told myself. Just do it. Just do it. Just let me go.”
I can see her, some pier close by as she fights to keep her head up and knowing there’s almost nothing saving her from the fathom below.
“I dropped the pack.” She blinks. “I didn’t even go under.”
Logically, I knew that. She’s still here, isn’t she?
But still, I’m glad to hear it wasn’t a hard decision to stay.
“Why’d you drop it?” I ask.
“I don’t know. Maybe I wasn’t serious.”
I reach out and graze her jaw with the backs of my fingers. “Or maybe you knew you had this and you were going to be okay.”
Everyone contemplates suicide at some point, even if it’s just for a minute.
And one thing is usually the root cause. Loneliness.
She should’ve been with us. Why didn’t my father make contact? Invite her for the summers? Her parents would’ve let her. Probably would’ve been happy to get rid of her.
And I would’ve been happy with someone to talk to, too. Less lonely myself.
“Did they ever realize you snuck out?” I ask.
She nods. “About a month later. When they got the bill for all the overdue library books I dumped at the bottom of the ocean.”
A laugh bursts out of me, and I tug on her braid again, seeing her smile, too. First lesson in stealing Dad’s car, sweetheart—cover your tracks.
I take another swig and pass the beer to her. “Do you ever go back to that beach?”
“Every time it rains,” she replies, turning to look at me. “Except now I just bring one book and my earbuds.”
She takes a big drink and passes the bottle back.
I like this. I can’t remember the last time this house felt this good.
“You’ve got this,” I hear her say.
I look up to see her watching me.
“And you’re going to be okay,” she finishes.
She repeated my words back to me.
And better yet…I didn’t have to tell her. If only my father could see anything beyond the end of his nose.
“Rinse off,” she says, standing up. “And hurry up about it.”
I down the rest of the beer, leaving it on the soap dish, and rise up, switching places with her. Our chests brush as she squeezes past, and I tip my head back, letting the water run over my scalp. She immediately turns toward the back of the tub to give me privacy.
“You might want to get out.” I tug her braid twice. “So I can get naked.”
“I’m dripping wet.”
Suit yourself.
I peel off my jeans and wring them out, tossing them out of the shower and seeing her eyes follow. Her back straightens as she locks her hands behind her back in some forced calm.
I wash and rub the muscles in my neck, but I can’t take my eyes off her back the whole time.
She needs a lot, and all of them are things you can’t buy. She needs to laugh and get drunk. She needs to be tickled and cuddled and carried and teased. I don’t want to see her cry, but if she does, I want her to know there’s comfort.
She has a home.
I shove the showerhead toward the wall, so I’m clear of the water, and grab a towel off the rack, wrapping it around my waist.
Approaching, I stand just behind her, enjoying her nervousness. She’s barely breathing.
And then a thought of what else a young woman might need occurs to me, and my smile falls.
How does she feel when she gets carried away?