The most beautiful days in summer come after a heavy rain. White cumulus clouds hover in a deepened blue; the air is crisp enough to drink. Today is one of those days. Yesterday’s storm has washed the skies clean. I wake up having forgotten—I may even be smiling before memory strikes and I wish it away. A stick cracks outside my cabin door, the steps sag with a hollow groan. My mother’s face appears in the screen door.
“Why is this locked?” she says, rattling the handle.
“It catches sometimes.” I jump up and unlatch the door.
“Put this stuff away, please.” She dumps a pile of fresh folded laundry on my bed. “Leo thought it would be fun to take my father’s old boat out today.” My grandfather’s sailing dinghy has been parked on a trailer at the bottom of our driveway collecting pine needles all summer. “We’re thinking eleven-ish to hit the outgoing tide, so up you get. No dawdling.”
“I think I’ll skip it, if that’s okay. I’m not really in the mood.”
“Leo wants a family day. We’ll have a picnic and then sail out to the Point.”
The Point is the literal end of the Cape, a dwindling spit of sand that curves around the wide harbor in a protective embrace, the final barrier between civilization and the wide-open ocean. From the launch at the town beach you can sail out to the Point, drop anchor in the warm, glassy shallows of the sheltered bay, watch scuttling crabs in the sea grasses, dig for clams when the tide recedes. But three minutes’ walk around the point and you are facing out to sea, nothing between you and Portugal but an occasional yacht coming in for safe harbor, fishing boats in the far distance heading out to the rich waters of the Stellwagen Bank in search of bluefin tuna and halibut, the breaching whales.
“Why do I have to come? Why can’t you and Leo go by yourselves? Anyway, we won’t all fit.” The dinghy is barely big enough for two, three tops. And Leo is so huge, he’s basically two people already.
“We’ll go out two at a time. Conrad’s coming.”
“No way. I’m not going sailing with Conrad.”
She sighs. “Elle, I’m asking you to do this.”
“It’s a terrible idea. He’s like a big fat cat in the water.”
“Don’t be nasty, it doesn’t suit you.”
“It’s true.”
“Why are you being so unpleasant? What has Conrad ever done to you?” My mother shakes her head in dismay.
“Fine. But only if Jonas comes, too.”
“I told you. It’s a family day.”
“Mum. Seriously. Think about it. If we capsize in the bay, Conrad will be useless. I won’t be able to right the boat by myself if the water gets remotely choppy. So, either you, me, Leo, and Conrad squeeze into the boat, in which case it will definitely sink, or I need Jonas to help me sail.”
“Fine,” she says. “It’s too beautiful a day to argue.”
In the driveway, Conrad and Leo are trying to hitch the boat trailer to the car, but it keeps slipping out of their hands. I watch them belly-laughing at their own ineptitude, transfixed by the strangeness of normality, the flat line of the everyday.
“Never ask a sax player to do a man’s job,” Leo says when he sees me standing there. “Come give us a hand with this. Conrad, you hold it in place while Elle puts the pin in.”
I hesitate, trying to think up some excuse, but nothing comes.
“Any time now, Elle,” Leo says. “This trailer isn’t going to hitch itself.” He hands me the metal pin. “Hold this while Conrad and I lift.”
“Okay, kiddly-winks.” My mother appears, smiling. She throws a cooler into the back seat.
Conrad and Leo slot the trailer into place. As he stands up, Conrad accidentally knocks the trailer pin out of my hand. He reaches down to get it for me. “I’m sorry, Elle,” he says, his voice so quiet I barely catch it.
Jonas is waiting for us at the end of his driveway, sitting on the verge of the road. He looks relaxed, shirtless as always, but there is a wariness in his eyes, a knitting.
“Hop in, Jonas,” Mum says. “Conrad, you squeeze over.”
Jonas gets in beside him, leans his body away against the car window, pretending to watch the trees go past. I have never seen Jonas look away from anything, never seen his body blanch. And I know it is because I have tethered him—taken away the whitetail dart, wild green-leaf spring of his marrow: forced him to collude, to carry my lie. It’s as if I have stolen his virginity.
“We may need to use the spinnaker,” I say to him, “so we can run in front of the wind.”
It was lovely and calm in the woods—only the perfect luff of a breeze—but when we get to the bay, the wind has picked up. Waves crisscross the harbor, chopping at boats on their moorings. There’s almost no one out on the water.
The first few times we try to put the boat in, it is whipped back to shore before we can get the dagger board down. Conrad yelps in pain as the boat crashes into his shin. My mother watches from the beach, calling out useless directions.
“You all hop in,” Leo says. “One last push.”
“This isn’t going to work, Leo,” I say from the boat. “It’s too rough.”
“You’re probably right. But we’ve come this far.”
“I think I’m going to bail.” Conrad is clearly nervous.
“Come with us. It’ll be fun,” Jonas says. But there is a meanness I’ve never heard before.
At that moment, Leo catches a break between the waves, shoves us hard, and suddenly we are heeling, ripping out to sea. The wind cracks the white sail taut. Conrad sits on the bow, his legs dangling over the edge, skimming the water like thick pink lures.
“I can’t look at him,” Jonas says to me under his breath.
“You have to pretend everything’s fine. You promised me.”
“Why?” Jonas whispers. “How can you even talk to him?”
“I can’t. But I don’t have much choice, do I? I live with him.”
“As a matter of fact, you do. If your mother knew—”
“My mother will never, ever know.”
“You can’t let him get away with it, Elle.”
“Shut up!” I hiss. “Pull in your legs!” I call out to Conrad. “You could get bitten by a shark.” Jonas turns away from me, his lips an angry pinch. The waves froth and nip at our little boat as it picks up speed.
Conrad pulls himself into a crossed-leg position. The bottoms of his feet are thickly calloused, and I can see small hairline splits running up his heels where he has picked the dead skin away. He looks over at me, smiles. “You were right. This is pretty cool.”
He spits his chewing gum into the ocean. I watch it sink in the foam of our wake. I pull a Fresca out of the cooler. “Want one?” I toss Conrad the can.
“Thanks.” He pulls off the aluminum pop-top and throws it overboard.
“You shouldn’t do that,” Jonas calls out. “A bird could choke on it.”
“Right. Like anyone can see me,” Conrad scoffs.
“That’s not the point,” Jonas says. “I see you.”
“I think I’ll live.”
“Asshole,” Jonas mutters under his breath.
The shoreline dwindles away behind us. I can barely make out my mother waving from the beach.
A large swell lifts us up and then drops us with a thud.
“Jesus,” Conrad yells at Jonas as the water soaks his clothes. “I thought the whole point of dragging you along was you know how to sail.”
“Be my guest,” Jonas says, and lets go of the tiller.
“Dick.” Conrad stands up and starts inching toward us.
I feel a shift in the sea as our little boat loses its grip on the waves. “Jonas, please don’t be an idiot. We’ll breach.”
Jonas says nothing, but he grabs the tiller.
Another wave brings us crashing down.
“We’re getting too far out,” I say. “Loosen the sheet, or we’re going to pass the Point.”
“Fine,” Jonas says. “I’ll come about.” He pulls in the ropes and prepares to turn. “Conrad, sit down. Watch out for the boom,” he yells.
Conrad gives him the finger. He smiles at me. His teeth look like Chiclets.
When the boom hits him, I watch him topple, then lurch into the sea. He comes up a moment later, flailing behind the boat.
“Stop,” I scream at Jonas. “Stop the boat.”
Jonas slacks the mainsheet, and our boat slows. There’s an orange life preserver in the well, and I try to untie it, but my fingers fumble on the wet knot.
“Help!” Conrad screams as our boat drifts farther and farther away from him. “Get me out of here!” He is panicking, gagging for breath.
“Take your sweatshirt off, it’s weighing you down,” I yell, struggling to get the life preserver free.
“Jesus Christ, you stupid bitch. Just throw me the thingy.”
“I’m trying,” I say. But I sit down, numb. Jonas puts his hand over mine, holds it still.
When the next wave comes, Conrad is lifted up out of the water, his face white with terror. He reaches for me.