When I get home from work the next day, I don’t even stop off at my room to check on Old Man before heading to the backyard and hoping that she’ll already be there. My skin warms from the sight of Rebecca in the pool even before I step out into the fading sunlight.
I linger by the bougainvillea and watch her for a moment. She comes over to swim most days, but after last night I’d felt this uneasy twinge all day that she might want to avoid me. I said some heavy stuff and so did she. I’m not sure where we pick up from there, but she’s been filling more and more of my thoughts lately and I’m okay with her filling more.
She spots me then and gives me that smile, the one I caught last night when she was gazing at the flower I drew her, and I have my shirt off before the invitation has fully left her lips.
I surface from my running dive and shake my long hair back, inadvertently spraying her.
“Nice,” she says, wiping the stray water droplets from her eyes.
I draw closer, closer than I normally do and she backs up a little to compensate. “Sorry. Long hair problems.”
“Try shaking-your-hair-like-a-dog problems.”
“You want me to cut it?”
“No,” she says too quickly, causing my mouth to quirk up. I know she likes my hair. She’s touched it more than a few times and never makes up an excuse like grabbing a stray flower petal or anything. I like that about her. “What’s that line from the Bible? A man’s hair is his crowning glory?” She flicks a tiny spray of water at me.
“I think that’s women’s hair.” It should be about hers at any rate. Right now she has her curls piled up in a bun on the top of her head with little wet tendrils clinging to her neck. Hers is still blue, but it’s faded more than mine so she looks like some kind of water nymph.
“You think? Don’t they teach you that in church?”
I lift one shoulder out of the water, still studying the curve of her neck. “For some reason, the pastor is always going on about stuff like the atonement and justification instead of focusing on hair.”
She makes a tsking sound. “You should really talk to somebody about that.”
I drift a little closer and she retreats as much until she bumps into the edge of the pool and uses a hand to hold herself steady without needing to constantly move her arms.
“You know there’s a whole lot of pool besides this exact corner I’m in.”
Yeah but where else would I want to be?
That thought hits me hard and I come to a stop so suddenly it makes a little wave in the water.
Needing to get back to my mom feels like a tight fist clenching in my chest.
Wanting to be with Rebecca is like that fist letting go.
Not because she needs me, but because I want her.
She’d been smiling at me, but when I don’t move away, it falters. “Ethan, what are you doing?”
I have no idea. What am I doing? “Swimming.” I can see her breathing pick up in that moment as though she can tell something has irrevocably shifted for me and I swear, I swear, her gaze drops to my lips for a fraction of a second before she jerks it away.
“Fine. If this corner is so important to you...” She ducks below the water and swims around me before resurfacing several feet away. “There. Problem solved.”
Not for me, not at all.
She glances over at me. “Why do you keep looking at me like that?”
“How am I looking at you?”
She frowns. “Different.”
“I’ve been looking at you this way my whole life.” I just didn’t realize it until now. I almost kissed her the other day when we dyed our hair. We’d been close and she’d been beautiful, and I remembered how she tasted like Creamsicles. But when she broke the moment, I let myself get distracted. I know the same thing’s not gonna happen now. I don’t see how it could ever happen again.
I swim a few feet toward her, mindful to still leave plenty of distance between us.
“No,” she says, curiosity lifting her voice. “This is something new.”
“And?”
“I don’t know if it’s good or bad.”
I grin at her. I can’t seem to stop. “Oh, it’s definitely good. You should try it.”
Her smile is puzzled. “You’re acting like you’ve got a secret.”
I cross to the side of the pool where she left her wheelchair and lift myself up until I’m sitting on the edge. I squint at her then shake my head. “Come over here and I’ll tell you.”
She sighs and the bottom half of her face submerges. When she fully surfaces, her smile is gone, taking mine along with it.
“What’s up?” I ask.
“This is nice, swimming with you.”
“Yeah...?”
“But I had a not-great day and I’m thinking maybe I should be by myself for a while.”
I hesitate because a not-great day could mean so many things. I know there’s something going on with her mom. Beyond what Neel implied, finding out her mom apparently moved offices without telling her means there are definitely issues there. Or maybe she’s just dealing with all the stuff I keep making her dredge up. “I’ll go if you want, or we can just swim and not say a word.”
“Or?” she says, because she can tell I’m not done.
“We can try that thing we sucked at as kids?”
She ducks her head to hide a teasing smile before meeting my gaze again. “Kissing, you mean?”
“That’s not what I meant.” My mouth kicks up into a half smile. “And since when did our kiss suck? I don’t remember hearing any complaints.”
Her smile turns sad. “That’s ’cause you left right after.”
I have no response to that. That was the first time I even mentioned the idea of staying longer to my mom. She hadn’t taken it well.
“I’m sorry,” she offers. “I don’t know why I keep saying stuff like that. I know you had no choice and even if you did, of course you had to go with your mom.” Then she lets out a huff of air. “Like I said, I’m not in a good headspace right now. I should probably just go.”
“Or,” I prompt even though she was clearly done talking, “you could tell me what’s bugging you today.”
She glances quickly toward her house and sinks a little lower in the water. “I don’t think that’s a great idea.”
“Why, because I’m the only one who’s allowed to have problems with their mom?” I take a guess and it turns out to be right, based on the way she starts. “Is it about her moving offices?”
She shakes her head, in response or just not wanting to talk to me about this, I don’t know. I could keep pushing and maybe she’d crack like she had before, but I’m not interested in another forced confession so I hold my breath and wait until she decides to lift herself up to sit beside me.
“I’m supposed to go to college.” Her gaze darts to me; she tries to hold it but can’t. “My mom picked out a school for me all the way in California, as far as she can reasonably send me...” Her voice trails off.
California. That fist tries to tighten around my chest again before releasing. It’s a big state and I have no idea what school she’s talking about, but there’s a chance that we could actually be close to each other, close enough that none of this stuff with my mom would matter. But even as that flicker of happiness hits me, I see how unhappy the thought makes Rebecca. I know how she feels about everything she’s building here, the job that she loves... She can’t give that all up.
“Can’t you—can’t you tell your mom you don’t want to go?” I know it must not be that simple but I don’t understand why. “I mean, not everybody has to go to college.”
“I do,” she says, her voice soft and heavy.
“But why—”
Rebecca’s eyes are shining when she looks at me, silently saying words that can’t possibly be true.
“No,” I say. “I know you feel like what happened to your dad was your fault, but nobody else does.”
“Doesn’t she?” When she speaks it’s in a voice so hoarse it sounds painful. “She only comes home to sleep and she’s gone every morning before I wake up. I had no idea she moved her office and every other week there’s something new in the mail from Cal State Northridge. We never even talked about it, but for almost a year now she’s been telling everybody I’ll be moving there as soon as summer’s over.”
“Maybe she’s got some other reason. I mean, what if—”
“She hasn’t hugged me. Not once since he died.” Rebecca presses her eyes shut and a fat tear drips down her cheek before she can dash it away. “How can I stay when she wants me gone?”
Rebecca’s mom worked a lot when we were younger. I guess her dad did too, but he always seemed around, invested. He was the one who drove us places, showed us how to make giant pillow forts, and helped with school projects. I always thought that was because he was a teacher, but it was more than that. Rebecca’s mom is there in a lot of my memories, but almost as a spectator, like someone watching a game they didn’t know how to play. I thought she would have changed after the accident, or at least tried. But if her answer to all the tragedy was just to pull away more than Rebecca shouldn’t be the one to suffer for it.
“Then move out. Get a place here. She can’t force you out of the state.” But even before Rebecca shakes her head I know she can. Because Rebecca thinks her mom is right to blame her, right to want her as far away as possible, and no amount of angry, hurried words from me is going to change any of that in one night.
“So yeah,” she says. “Not a great day. Hence the swimming.” Then she looks over at me. “And hence you too. I don’t want to cry anymore, but I needed my friend.”
I drop my gaze from hers so she won’t see...whatever the hell is going on inside me from her words and must be radiating through my skin. “Well, you have me, you know. Cry or swim or anything.”
Her answer is very serious, and almost sad? “You know it’s okay if I don’t always have you, right? Like right here, right now, no one is forcing you to promise more than that.”
I flinch at her words. “What does that mean?”
“It means...” She flounders, searching for the right words. “It means people should want—I,” she quickly amends, “—I want good things for you and your future, whether I’m one of those things or not.” Her eyes flick back and forth between mine, the setting sun catching the tiny flecks of green in her blue eyes. Every movement hits me harder and harder as her meaning sinks in.
“How could you not be a good thing?” Even hundreds of miles and more days apart than I ever want to put between us again, that’s never changed and it’s the one thing I know never will. “You’re the best thing. Rebecca...you’re—”
My gaze drops purposefully, intensely, to her mouth and I hear her soft sudden inhale as I lean in to kiss her.