THE TANGY BRINE OF DARK NIGHT

by Lucy Jane Bledsoe

Berkeley Marina

Kaylie's grandma weighed only ninety pounds by now, and so carrying her out to the car wasn't too difficult. She cradled the old woman, one arm under her knees and the other under her shoulders, and gently placed her, lying down, along the bench of the backseat. She saw that she'd left her grandma's sneakers untied, so she made secure knots in the laces and then straightened the purple windbreaker, which had bunched up around her bony hips. Kaylie gently shut the door.

Would the trunk be better? Just the thought sent a prickling uneasiness down the backs of Kaylie's arms. She would not put her grandma in the trunk. Period. Besides, she'd need to put the kayak in there. She pointed the remote at the garage door, afraid that it wouldn't open—her grandma hadn't taken the car out in months—but it did. The old white Pontiac started too, and Kaylie backed into the street, carefully straightened the wheels, and put the automatic transmission in park.

This whole plan was fucking crazy. So much so that, if she got caught, she could probably plead insanity. Which was worse, the psych ward or prison? She tried to think of a way out of the course she'd started down, but none came to mind, and so she quietly exited the car and walked over to her neighbor's side yard where they left the kayak, which hadn't been used in so long that lichen crusted its hull. She'd return it before they even realized it was gone. Luckily it was a short boat, with an open deck, none of those scary little hatches to get stuck inside, but it was heavy. Kaylie ended up having to drag it to the car, the pavement grating the plastic, as loud as a cement mixer. If any neighbors looked out their windows, who knew what they'd surmise. Thankfully the Pontiac's trunk was the size of a small room, and she managed to stuff about half of the kayak in, bow first. She put a hand on the stern and pressed down. It didn't wiggle. Not much. It was only a mile or two to the pier—and downhill. Gravity ought to keep the kayak in place.

Kaylie jumped into the driver's seat and began the short journey. As she turned left on San Pablo Avenue, panic fluttered in her chest. The stern end of the kayak angled out of the trunk like an erection. She should have attached a red flag. She should have secured a seat belt around Grandma.

Never mind. She was almost there, and no place calmed her frayed nerves more than the Berkeley Pier, the way that long wooden structure stretched far out into the bay, a lovely straight line conveying people into the world of fish and salt water and sky. Grandma and she had spent their happiest hours sitting in their short chairs, sipping iced tea, Grandma smoking Chesterfields, hands cradling the grips of their fishing rods, gazing at the most profound intersection on earth, the one between sky and sea. They rarely talked while fishing, not to each other, anyway. They didn't have to. Water, fish, air, time. What else did a person need?

Kaylie had almost relaxed, at least she'd regained that gathering of resolve right behind her breastbone, the knowledge of doing right, when that damn Jimi Hendrix guitar riff vibrated in her pocket. Her sister Savannah had been calling repeatedly all day, at first once an hour, and recently about every twenty minutes, as if by calling multiple times today she could make up for the weeks and months she hadn't called. When they had talked, the times when Kaylie thought Savannah would want to know about developments in their grandma's condition, Savannah liked to cite her three children, making it crystal clear that Kaylie's childlessness put her in a complete fog of ignorance about what real life entailed. "Three children," Savannah would practically shout, as if parenthood was on par with being the CEO of a prison. She'd also note her "handful" husband. Or her "high-maintenance" husband, if she was irritated with him. Or her "demanding" husband, if she was outright angry with the man, which she often was. And yet all of these adjectives were spoken with pride, emphasizing the heft of her family responsibility load, how full her life was with this man—all to communicate that helping with Grandma was inconsequential compared to what she had on her plate. A man. A family.

Kaylie had tried to keep her resentment, her anger, in check: she too might have had someone "on her plate," had she not spent the last few years caring for Grandma. Don't mind that ragged cough in the next room, that's just my grandma dying of emphysema. Very romantic.

Kaylie let the repetitive Jimi Hendrix phrase play out and then tried to return to her memories of hot summer nights, much like this one, on the pier with Grandma. But a siren, just a few streets away, pierced her thoughts. Even the sound of the Pontiac's big rubber tires peeling along the still-sizzling pavement unnerved her. Noises tonight were too loud, as if the god she didn't believe in had turned up the volume. Kaylie twisted on the radio and almost laughed at the sound of Frank Sinatra's voice. Her grandma's favorite. But of course Savannah wouldn't allow a moment of respite—oh no, the woman could be fucking telepathic when it came to moments of joy that needed to be destroyed. Jimi Hendrix began playing his bit, yet again, and Kaylie couldn't help it, she pulled her phone out of her pocket and looked, hoping it might be someone benign, like the woman she'd met at a conference in Dallas a couple of weeks ago, but no, of course it was Savannah. Again. She should have turned off her ringer, but somehow her sister's angsty presence was almost a comfort. At least it was familiar. And the only family she had left. She tapped Ignore and kept driving.

Stopping at the intersection of University and San Pablo, Kaylie put her head out the window and breathed deeply, hoping for a hint of that fishy rotten-wood smell of the pier. Of course she was still a half mile away, but knowing that it was just there, in front of her, another couple of minutes, relieved her. She knew she was doing not just the right thing, but the exact perfect thing. Savannah could go to hell.

A pulsing red light swarmed into the Pontiac. Kaylie was riding the crest of her confidence, and she felt sorry for the poor sop getting pulled over. She strained her eyes toward the dark horizon, toward the bay, pretended she could maybe see, if she looked hard enough, the Golden Gate. That put her in mind of the future, her future, and the possibility that, at long last, she'd be free to pursue a life. A real life. Maybe she'd take a trip to Dallas. She and that woman had had a lovely one-night stand, and it'd felt authentic, not like a quickie, more like a glint of possibility. Kaylie had told Grandma all about it when she got home and Grandma had said, yanking off the tubes running to her oxygen tank so she could speak as forcefully as she wanted to speak, "For fuck's sake, get on a goddamn plane for Dallas. I got a few months at best. Pull my damn plug and go get that woman."

Kaylie had laughed and lied, saying, "Nah. She wasn't my type. Besides, I'm not going anywhere."

"You can sell my house when I'm gone. That'll be a nice grubstake for you."

"I'll retire," Kaylie said, lying again. Her grandma's termite-infested house needed a new roof, a few coats of paint, and probably a new foundation. She wouldn't be leaving her job or chasing some woman in Dallas, at least not for a couple of decades.

The pulsing red light, as viscous and deeply colored as cough syrup, kept flooding the interior of the Pontiac. Of course Kaylie was that poor sop getting pulled over.

Breathe, she counseled herself. Just breathe through this. Make sure the cop doesn't try to wake up Grandma, that was key. For all Kaylie knew, the Pontiac's registration hadn't been renewed in years. She drove through the intersection, hands at two o'clock and ten o'clock on the steering wheel, and carefully pulled into the Blick Art Materials parking lot. The patrol car followed. The wait, both of them in their cars, felt interminable. Kaylie carefully took her driver's license out of her wallet, and actually found a paid, up-to-date registration in the glove compartment. The uniform finally approached, coming from the rear with a hand on the grip of her gun. Kaylie thanked all the deities for the pale shade of her skin, her fucking whiteness, an accident of fate that would increase her chances of finessing her way through the encounter.

The cop hefted a huge flashlight to shoulder height, as if it were a spiked javelin. She blinded Kaylie by shining it right in her face. Kaylie fumbled her license and registration out the car window as fast as she could. She might have white skin, but other variables in this situation—the contents of the backseat, the kayak in the trunk, and the ancient Pontiac itself—were not going to be helpful. As the cop turned the flashlight's beam on the documents, Kaylie tried to memorize the information on her badge. Officer Marta Ramirez was pretty, even with her hair pulled back in a tight bun, and wore no makeup—a hopeful sign—and carried a nice solid build. She might have been family, but Kaylie knew flirting would not be a good idea in this situation. Still, she might be able to signal sisterhood. Uh, did you go to Pride this year? Or, How does your wife like your uniform?

Of course that could backfire if she was in fact straight. Or even if she wasn't. Kaylie kept her mouth shut.

Marta (and why not be on a first-name basis in the privacy of Kaylie's own mind?) shined her light into the backseat. "Who's this?"

"That's my grandma."

"Why is she—"

"She's ninety-three. Full-on Alzheimer's. Sleeping is so difficult for her. You've heard of sundown syndrome?"

The cop's whole body loosened, slumped a little. Her eyes softened. "Oh, yeah. My grandma too."

"Really? I'm sorry to hear that. Anyway, Grandma's like a baby who can only fall asleep in a moving car. So I take her out at night sometimes, just drive her around so she can sleep." Kaylie was pleased with her quick thinking, and as she spoke, she tried to come up with as good of an explanation for the kayak.

"You should put the seat belt on her."

"I know! I usually do. I was just realizing that when you pulled me over."

"I pulled you over because the kayak is improperly secured." The cop shot the beam of her massive flashlight at the erect kayak stern. "That's a real hazard. It doesn't look like you've tied it at all. If it slides out, someone could get killed."

"God, I'm sorry. Stupid of me. Yeah, I borrowed the kayak from a friend this past weekend. I figured if I was going to drive Grandma around tonight, I might as well use the opportunity to return the kayak. I mean, she won't wake up when I get to my friend's house. I just have to slide the kayak out and drag it to her side yard."

Just shut the fuck up. Less is more, idiot. Stop talking.

The cop paused for far too long. Kaylie could see all the questions flashing through her mind. The woman took a deep breath of assessment.

"I'm sorry," Kaylie repeated, with lots of feeling.

Officer Marta Ramirez (Kaylie returned, in her mind, to the more respectful full title and name) began a slow circumnavigation of the Pontiac, using her flashlight to examine all four tires, and even look under the carriage. She shined her light into the passenger-side back window and gazed at Kaylie's grandma for a long time. A very long time. Long enough for Kaylie to wonder if prison was really like Orange Is the New Black, long enough for her to consider the possibility that behind bars she might actually, at long last, find a girlfriend. She wouldn't have to worry about fixing up or selling the house. She wouldn't have to lift anyone in and out of a bathtub, clean sheets soaked with piss or streaked with shit, listen to the painful sounds of someone she loved trying to breathe. That part was all over now—it was as if she realized this for the first time, just now as the cop stared at her grandma in the backseat—whether she went to prison or not.

When Officer Ramirez circled back to the driver's window, she pressed her lips together and made eye contact. "Okay. I'm not going to write you a ticket."

Wait. Kaylie had almost begun looking forward to prison. To not having a single job other than surviving. If she'd been given another few moments, she might have started fantasizing about prison sex. Maybe instead she should start fantasizing policewoman sex, gratitude sex.

"I really, really, really appreciate that," Kaylie said. "Thank you."

"Get Grandma home. And get a rack for that kayak."

"I will! Tomorrow. I mean, I'll get Grandma home right now, and a rack for the kayak tomorrow. I mean, for next time I borrow it."

Now that their official interaction was over, could Kaylie ask Marta Ramirez for her phone number? She imagined cracking that joke, if it was one, for Grandma, and Grandma's loud honking laugh. Do it! the ghost of Grandma shouted. Do it!

"Hey," Kaylie said as the cop started walking away. "I mean, I don't know if you're married or not. But I wondered if maybe some time you'd like—"

The woman spun around on the soles of her shiny black practical tie-up shoes. "Really?" she responded. "I just let you off. I mean, I just let you off, and—"

"And I said thank you. Good night." Kaylie rolled up her window and started the engine, the car lurched forward, and she almost hit a parked car as she tried to turn the huge tank around. Marta Ramirez was busy getting into her own vehicle and didn't bother to look up again.

Five minutes later, Kaylie parked the car in one of the spots along the Berkeley waterfront, on the east side of the pier. She rolled down her window and sat listening to the wavelets lapping against the giant stones which formed the barrier between the bay and the parking spaces. It was high tide, and the water splashed within feet of her car. At last she could fill her nostrils with the salty wet smell of the bay.

Twisting around in her seat, she couldn't see much of Grandma in the dark, but Kaylie knew exactly what she looked like: the sparse pale smoke hair, the tissuey skin with deep laugh lines, her thin frail limbs, knobby with arthritis.

"We're here, Grandma," she whispered, and a wave of grief rolled through her.

Only to be interrupted by Jimi Hendrix.

Savannah lived an hour away, in Vacaville, but Kaylie could count on the fingers of one hand the times her sister had been over to help with Grandma in the past six months. Oh, but she'd had plenty of advice. She'd done research. She'd suggested herbal remedies. New doctors. Just last month she proposed a trip to the Mayo Clinic. As if there were a cure for advanced emphysema.

When Kaylie let her know a few weeks ago that the end was near, and wanted to keep her in the loop about their options, Savannah had responded with outrage. She thought Kaylie's "predictions" were "premature." She specifically said that using the words "dying" and "hospice" were manipulative on Kaylie's part. As if she were maliciously trying to pry Savannah away from her blue-ribbon children and husband. At the end of her rant, Savannah announced that she'd "look into the situation," and hung up.

Late this afternoon, as Grandma had struggled to draw air into her lungs, her whole body racked with pain, Kaylie spooned doses of morphine into her mouth. One after another. Once Grandma lost consciousness, it was nearly impossible to get her to swallow more, but the other options for killing her were horrifying, and so Kaylie cradled her ancient skull in the crook of her elbow, wrapping her arm around so she could use her hand to hold Grandma's jaw open. She continued dripping morphine onto her tongue, sometimes massaging her throat to ease it down, until she finished her off at eight fifteen p.m., just as dusk softened the harsh light of day.

Kaylie knew, without a shred of doubt, that Grandma would want exactly that—to have Kaylie be the one—and exactly this, what she was about to do next.

But now that they'd at long last arrived at the pier, back at the pier, Kaylie's will began collapsing. Not her resolve. She knew this was right. But the physical energy necessary to carry it out went missing. She realized that she hadn't eaten anything all day, not even a bowl of cereal. She briefly considered stopping in at Skates Restaurant, just on the other side of the pier, for some sustaining nutrients, but the idea of sitting at a table clad with a starched white cloth and shiny cutlery, surrounded by the sounds of clinking cocktails, digging into sole meunière, while her grandma waited unguarded in the backseat of the Pontiac, just wasn't right.

Kaylie stalled by listening to her phone messages. In the first one, from midmorning, Savannah simply asked, "So how is she?" This one was followed by a couple of insistent demands of, "Why aren't you calling me back?" In the next, Savannah announced that she was coming to Berkeley, that she'd leave right after she put the kids to bed. Kaylie should expect her by nine o'clock.

She must have just missed her. By now Savannah had probably parked her Lexus in front of Grandma's house, keyed her way in the front door, and found the empty bed. Kaylie had made sure to bring the bottles, eyedropper, and even the spoon with her, to not leave anything sketchy at the bedside, but now she wished she'd stopped on her way to the marina to drop them in a garbage bin far from home, and also far from the marina. She should chuck them now, in any case. If Savannah called the police, and that would definitely be her style, then Kaylie needed to be free of evidence.

She grabbed the plastic bag into which she'd stuffed all the paraphernalia and got out of the car, locking Grandma in, as if that would be necessary. Walking at the pace Savannah used for exercise—she called it pep-stepping—Kaylie hustled along the harbor until she came to one of the public bathrooms. Perfect. Her bagful of gear looked like it belonged to any addict, and she stuffed it deep into the garbage bin, shoving it under some McDonald's bags. Then she crouched down by water's edge and washed her hands, the rank iciness triggering so many memories, though she refused to cry. She had to finish what she'd begun, and she had to do it quickly.

And yet, walking back to the car she couldn't resist stopping at the entrance to the pier, long fenced off due to structural issues too expensive for the city to fix. One of her most painful regrets was how, in the past few years during Grandma's illness, she hadn't been able to bring her to the pier. They'd come a few times to the water's edge, where the Pontiac was now parked, and even tried fishing from the rocky barrier, but it wasn't the same, not even close. Navigating a catch across those sharp, massive rocks was nearly impossible. Anyway, all their friends were gone.

Kaylie put a sneaker toe through one of the diamond-shaped openings of the chain-link fence barring admittance to the pier. It was an easy climb—only a few feet high, and no barbed wire—and a moment later she leaped down on the other side. Oh, how good it felt to walk that length, smell the barnacles clinging to rotting wood, the soft breeze a balm against the inland heat, its touch as intimate as a lover's. And beyond, the lights of San Francisco, blinking their friendly message of hope in a ravaged country. Best of all, though, was the splash of the bay, slurping and wallowing, concealing all its bounty, so much life swimming right below her feet, the perch, bass, crabs, halibut, and stingrays. Once they'd caught a small shark.

Duong and Tham Nguyen had helped them land the shark and that night Grandma invited their family over to dinner. It was one of the best nights ever. They brought a bunch of crazy Vietnamese dishes, and she and Grandma made potato salad and green Jell-O with canned tangerine slices. The adults drank a lot of beer and smoked lots of cigarettes. They all shouted jokes into the night.

Kaylie was fifteen that year. Savannah had long since disowned her sister and grandma. She hated that they ate fish they caught themselves, hated that Grandma chain-smoked, hated even her array of friends from the pier, claimed that they were just a bunch of homeless people. "Maybe," Grandma had answered the first time Savannah shouted that assessment, but actually they weren't. Duong and Tham Nguyen ran a framing business in Berkeley. Pamela Roberts, an ancient black woman who fished every single day, even well into her dementia, and who everyone watched out for, had had a union job at the Ford auto assembly plant in Richmond until she retired. Shelly, a young black woman, was a public librarian in Oakland, and always fished with her two terriers as companions. James and Frank, a couple of Irish brothers, who staged loud, funny arguments as they fished, mostly for the entertainment of others, worked construction when they could get it. Everyone shared food and drinks and stories, when they felt like it, and also respected a person's desire for solitude and quiet. Kaylie and her grandma knew everyone and their stories. Who'd recently arrived in the Bay Area, or even in the country. Who'd been left by a partner. Who was struggling to make rent. One white guy, probably around sixty, was reportedly a billionaire, and yet every Sunday he sat with his feet up on the railing, a fishing line draped into the bay, never talked to anyone, but never bothered anyone, either. Fishing was a community, and Grandma had been at its heart.

Once over the chain-link fence, Kaylie walked quickly to avoid being spotted by anyone on shore. The pier was no longer lit, and soon the tangy brine of dark night encompassed her stride. She didn't think Savannah would look for them here. Would she? It certainly made the most sense—that they'd come here—but it was a completely different kind of sense than the kind her sister possessed. If Savannah did call the police, it was possible that Officer Marta Ramirez had filed some sort of event report, even if she hadn't written a ticket, and they could be tracked pretty quickly. Kaylie shouldn't dally. Because once her sister decided on a course of action, good luck trying to divert her. At the age of twelve, Savannah had talked her way into a scholarship at a private school in Berkeley. Her biggest fear was that her classmates would so much as glimpse their grandma, with her wispy hair, the scalp showing through even when she was young, and her smoky breath and exuberant manner of talking, her loud honking laugh. Savannah moved out when she was seventeen and worked at Nordstrom to put herself through community college. She won sales awards with big bonuses. She now sold high-end furniture. She'd already said, well before it was an appropriate concession, that Kaylie could have the house. Now wasn't that generous, inasmuch as the house needed more work than its value.

Kaylie heard voices. The dark lumps at the end of the pier were people. Quietly, she started backing up. She'd heard of rogue youths robbing people out here. One time armed teens forced a couple to jump into the bay where the water is so cold, hypothermia claims a body in about ten minutes. Even if you're a good swimmer, you don't have a chance.

Unfortunately, that's when her phone rang again, Jimi Hendrix joyously making love to his guitar, loud and encompassing, as if he were playing the very night air.

"What the fuck?" a voice at the end of the pier said.

"Shit," said another. "We got company."

She heard the crinkle of cellophane bags, the clunk of dropped half-full aluminum cans. A second later, three youths sprinted past her, their bare chests—two white and one brown—skinny as hope. They passed so quickly she didn't even have time to be scared. She listened to their sneakered feet pound all the way to the end of the pier. She heard the faint clinking of the chain-link fence as they heaved themselves over it. Then she cracked up, laughed out loud: those boys were afraid of her.

Kaylie's laughter morphed into tears, and she collapsed onto the wooden planks of the pier, stretching out on her back and looking up through the blur of her tears at the few pale stars, the ones bright enough to shine through the city haze of artificial light. She wished she'd brought a fishing rod, longed for the feel of its grip in her hand, the jiggle of a bite, the tug at the beginning of the fish's resistance, and then the gentle, steady, focused reeling in. No one could clean a fish as expertly as Grandma, slicing through the fish belly with her boning knife, scraping out the guts. Of course the best part was eating the fried fish, usually with a side of chips or nothing else at all. Every single time, after cleaning her plate, Grandma would say the exact same words: "Nothing better than eating fish you caught yourself." Then she'd grin ear to ear as if it were an original comment or the first time she'd said it. Often after a good fish fry, they went to the grocery store for ice cream, which they brought home and ate straight from the carton. Once Savannah had made one of her rare visits as they were scraping the bottom of a tub of double-fudge caramel swirl, and she'd literally groaned out loud in disgust.

Kaylie wiped her wet face with the bottom of her T-shirt, got to her feet, and walked to the end of the pier. The kids had left half-drunk beers and half-eaten bags of chips. She was sorry she'd scared them away. Stupid kids trying to enjoy a summer night. Kaylie climbed up on the thick railroad tie that formed the bottom of the blockade at the pier's end. She peered through the vertical pilings at the long stretch of black water. A breeze ruffled the surface.

No, not a breeze. Something was there, in the water. A hard shiver shot through to Kaylie's core. Yes, it was a body, dark and wet, and apparently alive, as it slithered out of the water and then sank again. Someone was drowning. She grabbed her phone at the same time as she looked down the pier, trying to see if the kids were still nearby. She could call the police with one tap, but despite earlier fantasies, she didn't actually want to go to prison. The police were much more likely to book her than the kids, since she was here and they were gone, not to mention the dead body in the Pontiac. Anyway, the dark night, the teeming bay, the decaying wood, her jagged hunger, her grief, the crazy tsunamis of grief—these all converged to destroy any brain function she had left. She at least knew enough to not trust her perceptions anymore.

Kaylie pushed her face back through the pilings and studied the surface of the bay. Had she imagined the body? She reached into the bag of Doritos, tossed a handful onto the water, and then screamed as something surged to the surface, opened its whiskered jaws, and swallowed the chips. She tossed in another handful, and the beast was joined by two more, writhing, diving, snorting.

The fright manufactured by her traumatized imagination prevented Kaylie from actually laughing, but she might have at another time. Just sea lions. The fishing community hated them. Their ranks were growing, and they ate more than their share of the bay fish. Also, they'd become bold. Sometimes people fed them scraps, after cleaning their catch, teaching them that people meant food. Recently a sea lion literally boarded a docked fishing boat and bit a woman's leg. Another had lunged so forcefully out of the water that it had nearly inhaled a guy's arm as he tried to toss fish heads in the water. A swimmer had been attacked by a sea lion just last year. Kaylie threw them the rest of the chips, and then, what the hell, poured them what was left of the beers too.

Walking back down the pier, she figured she'd better call her sister. She should have much earlier, to ward off the search. To give Kaylie a bit more time.

"Where are you?" Savannah screeched. "I'm at Grandma's. She's not here."

Savannah had always had a sixth sense, maybe full-on telepathy, born of her desperation to ward off the dangers she saw and felt and heard at every turn. Especially the dangers of Kaylie and Grandma and their embarrassing presences in her life. Of course Savannah couldn't know that Kaylie—and Grandma—were at the Berkeley Pier. And yet, it was very hard for Kaylie to not believe that she did know.

"Answer me, Kaylie. Answer me now. Is Grandma okay?"

"Of course Grandma's okay. Why wouldn't she be?"

"Uh, maybe because she has emphysema?"

"I think she said she's having dinner at the Garcias' house tonight. Did you try there?"

"Of course I didn't try there. I have no idea who the Garcias are."

"Yellow house on the corner."

"I'm supposed to just go knock on their door?"

"If you want to see Grandma."

"It's after ten. She wouldn't still be there. Plus, she hasn't been out of bed in days."

"Can't help you." Kaylie tapped off her phone. Naturally, it rang again immediately. She debated the pros and cons of answering, and was not able to conjure logic about either choice, so she went with the pull of a ringing phone and answered.

"I'm calling the police," Savannah said. "Grandma better not be with you, because if she is, they'll find you. I can give them your phone number and they can track you."

"You're sounding crazy, Van," Kaylie said, using the nickname she knew her sister hated.

Even now, even with the prospect of their grandma being missing, her sister took the time to correct: "Sa-van-nah."

Kaylie tapped out of the call again and vowed to not answer until she'd finished. How long until Savannah checked the garage and discovered that the Pontiac was missing?

Back at the car, she realized that getting the kayak and her grandma over the giant craggy boulders would be next to impossible, so she drove quickly to the boat ramp on the other side of the marina. There, it was easy to slide the boat into the water. She gently hefted Grandma out of the backseat and placed her in the front of the kayak. She couldn't cry now. She just couldn't.

She dropped into the back of the kayak, placing a leg on either side of Grandma, and used the blade of the paddle to shove off the floor of the cement ramp, and just like that, they were adrift in the harbor. She paddled hard, and damned if a half-moon didn't rise over the hills just as she cleared the breakwater. It'd been plenty bright even without the moonlight, but now she could see perfectly well, maybe too well, because others might be able to spot them from shore too. But there was no turning back. She couldn't quite predict what her sister would do. She'd be crazy irate, and so it was possible she'd go full bore for a murder charge. But no, she definitely wouldn't want that publicity. One way or another, though, somehow someone would have to account for the missing person. Then again, maybe not. People died all the time and folks didn't ask for specifics on body disposal. The neighbors would just express their condolences.

The strong bay currents carried the kayak with its two passengers, the dead one resting against the stomach and chest of the living one, swiftly away from shore. The moonlight sparkled on the crests of the wavelets as a fresh breeze whipped up. Kaylie tugged the blade through the thick black water, but with the wind and the currents, her efforts seemed to have no effect at all. She looked over her shoulder at the Golden Gate where even stronger currents swept out to the Pacific Ocean.

She'd hoped to get under the pier, where she'd gently ease her grandma into a beloved last resting place. She'd imagined a quiet decorous ritual, a peaceful slip into the salty depths. But she didn't have the strength to fight the forces of nature, these strong bay currents. So she rested the paddle across her thighs and allowed the westward drift.

The Jimi Hendrix riff danced against her breast where she'd shoved her phone into her jacket's inside pocket. She reached in, grabbed the phone, and threw it as far as she could, the splash much too tiny to feel satisfying. Maybe they'd think she drowned. She could move to another part of the country, somewhere entirely unexpected, like North Dakota, and become a different person altogether.

The idea of disappearing, of faking her own death, reminded Kaylie that she did in fact have a life, a fairly nice one—sure, no girlfriend yet, but a decent job, a place to live. Funny how a person can keep functioning even when they think they can't. Life goes on. Hers would anyway. With its devastating disappointments. Its small joys. The occasional ecstasy. She didn't want to move to North Dakota. She wanted to stay here. Her grandma's death felt like obliteration, like suffocation, like too deep a hole to ever emerge from, but she would emerge. Kaylie knew that.

When a dark shape, like a colossal slug, surfaced alongside the kayak, Kaylie startled. The wet mammal was joined by another, and then another. Kaylie's brain quivered like a jellyfish, the fear squishing thought, until, all at once, she realized how much Grandma would love this. How somehow, in the midst of her confusion and grief, she'd taken all the exact right actions. There was only one left, and it would be brutal, clumsy, horrific. But she had no choice at all, and even if she did have a choice, this would be the one she'd make. She imagined Grandma's grin if she could see herself now, dead in the front of a small plastic kayak, cruising along a speedy San Francisco Bay current at night, a pod of sea lions swimming alongside, their snorts prehistoric, their smell as rank as rotten oysters, as they chaperoned her into the next life.

For courage, Kaylie gazed out at the Berkeley Pier, a thin black line in the distance, a horizon itself, splitting the moon-sparkled water from the pale gray sky. Then she laid the paddle along the length of the kayak; it wouldn't do to lose it now. Nor would flipping the entire boat be a good idea. She'd have to muster superhuman strength, and also be swift.

Kaylie shoved her arms under her grandma's shoulders and clasped her ribs. One, two, three, heave.

The kayak rocked to the side, nearly capsizing, but the body remained on board. Already Kaylie was sweating.

Ambulating on her hands and feet, she crawled over Grandma's body to the other end of the kayak, again nearly capsizing. Once there, she rested a moment, steadying her heart and mind, and then swung her grandma's stiffening legs into the water.

That's when the head of one sea lion rose up, the beast making eye contact with Kaylie. Maybe it smiled. Maybe its yellow teeth and deep maw gave Kaylie a shot of adrenaline. She pitched her grandma's body into the water with a single shove. The splash was modest, and the old woman sank instantly. Several dark hides mounded out of the water before diving after the body.

Kaylie paddled away with all her might, hoping for a tide change that would sweep her toward shore, toward her house and modest life, her decent job and the possibility of a girlfriend one day, maybe even Officer Marta Ramirez. You never knew. What she did know was that she wanted to live awhile longer. She wanted to be around when the pier reopened, if it ever did, and wondered if Duong and Tham Nguyen, Pamela Roberts, Shelly the librarian, James and Frank, the lone rich dude, all their friends, whether they'd come back, or if there'd be a whole new crowd. Maybe they'd gentrify the pier, bring in food trucks and artists tables. Kaylie didn't know. But she paddled as if her life depended on it, which it did.