Falling (5 page)

I reach down and untie the laces on my shoes. I pull them off my feet. “And I don't usually swim with my shoes on.” I tip them up for dramatic effect letting all the water gush out of them. Then I hurl each one at Keller's chest, he lets out a shocked sound as the first wet thud bounces off him, but he doesn't move, then makes the same sound as the second one makes a perfect bullseye on his green t-shirt. “That was a remarkably good aim.” He says.

“I am outstanding at everything I do. Modesty is an especially strong point of mine.” I say tossing my wet hair back, pulling my legs up and float on top of the water. The water feels surprisingly good on this warm afternoon.

“Clearly.” He dives in, over the width of my body, landing just behind me.

“What a show off.” I say when he surfaces. “You might want to save some of your energy for the actual race. I don't want to make you feel too bad when I beat you. So try to keep up.” I press the end of his nose like an adult does to a two year old.

“How far do you want to race?” He stretches his arms and swings them above his head like he is warming up.

“You pick, seeing as I'm going to win. It's only fair that way.” I add sweetly.

“That reedy twig thing, sticking out of the water a couple of feet back from the edge.” He points to the other edge of the lake. It’s not too far, maybe seven or eight hundred yards.

“Looks good. You know what? I will even give you a head start.” I say smugly.

“Great.” He launches under the water, and I dive at him at the same time. I am so baaaaddd. I watch through his eyes as he powers toward the reedy thing. He might have actually beaten me.

All right, one, two, three. I dive forward holding out my hand. We reach it at the exact same second. Of course. But I'm deep down in the water. I swim around him and come to the surface. “I told you I was good.”

“Whoa. Where did you come from?” He surges back surprised.

“I dived under you, otherwise you might have won. And I couldn't have that.” I squeeze out my hair.

He looks at me with a weird as look on his face. “You didn't even make any movement in the water. It was so weird. At the end I felt like I was swimming by myself.”

“That's why I'm fast, because I don't swim like a shark eating a seal like you do. I'm sleek.” I push my hands through the water. “No thrashing around.” I make a gliding line through the water with my finger, then I turn and dive deep under the water so he can't ask me anything else. Maybe that wasn't the smartest thing to do.

I stay under for as long as my lungs will allow me. Let him think about how I must have swum beside him. The lake isn't very deep, and I push off from the bottom hurtling myself up and out of the surface of the water.

“So, Mr. Keller. You want to race again?” The odd look is completely gone, and he is making himself float around in circles.

“I would, but next time I will beat you. And I don't want to make you feel bad about yourself.” He says sounding very concerned.

“And why would I feel sorry for myself?”

“Because I would have to swim back to the start line and go again just to make you feel like you could keep up with me. It's okay, I get it all the time.” He waves his hand like it’s nothing.

“What's that?” I ask already floating in circles next to him on my back, the sun coming through the trees warming the skin on my face.

“My awesomeness being too much for people.” He nods seriously. I laugh so hard I start sinking, I kick my legs down to right myself, but I just drop further. “You okay?” Keller asks sarcastically.

“Yip.” I answer still laughing, I push my arms the opposite way, trying to pull myself back to the top of the water, but I'm laughing too much and I end up going around in demented circles as I get deeper in the water, then my head is under. It shocks me into taking a shallow breath at the same moment and I am coughing and going deeper down.

A hand yanks on the back of my shirt hauling me to the surface. “You okay?” He asks seriously.

I cough over the words that are trying to form in my mouth, so I point to my face as I cough trying to say yes, as tears squeeze out the corners of my eyes from the effort of coughing.

Keller tows me to the side and helps me climb up the small bank where I threw my shoes. I lean over the side of the lake trying to get the last of the water out of my lungs.

“You sure you're okay? You don't sound too good.” He gets down on his knees and peers up at my face. Which makes me laugh again, and cough, then I let out a massive hiccup. Keller promptly makes the same sound, teasing me.

I look down at myself. “I think I'm too wet to get in your car.” I say trying to be serious, but I hiccup again as I say the last word.

“Mmm.” He answers with his face screwed up, and does his fake hiccup sound again. “Probably. My car is very special to me. It's all old and crusty. Very important.”

“This is your fault.” I say getting through without hiccupping, but now he's watching me for it. I breathe in long and deep.

“How?” He says laughing while he watches me trying to control the squeaking sound that keeps beeping out of my chest as I try to force them to not come out. “I didn't push you in, that would have been so unkind, and I am extra kind to people called Reid.”

“Only people called Reid?” I ask. Holding out my hand for him to pull me up. I don’t hear what he answers, my fingers have disappeared; they are inside of his. I can feel the cool hollow compared with the warmness of the sun out here.

“You going to get up?” He asks when I freeze.

“Yeah.” I breathe looking at his face, pulling my hand out of his smoothly so he doesn’t look down and see it. My body starts trembling as I force my legs to take steps toward the car. I have never melted into someone before. I didn’t know I could.

“You sure you’re okay?” Keller asks concerned. “You look pale, how much water did you swallow?”

“Not much, and I think I coughed it all back into the lake.” I laugh a bit hysterically as we walk back to his car. I circle it finding a sunny patch to lie down in, showing that there’s nothing wrong with me. It’s just my hands still shaking and I hide them by leaning my head into them on the ground. “It shouldn't take too long to dry off.” I look up at Keller standing right over me. “I can get in like this if you want.” I say, questioning his look.

“No, you’re fine.”

“Great, can you move that way?” I motion with my head not trusting my hands to not shake if I pull my head off them. “You’re in my sun and you're making shadows on me.” I smile up at him.

He doesn't answer, just lies down next to me.

“No way.” I shout as I lurch to my feet, kicking Keller in the side. “Keller. Wake up. It's night time.”

“Huh?” He cracks one eye open to look up at me. “What?”

“Darkness.” I say, moving my arms around me. “I am dry, but that one good point is being overshadowed by the heavingly giant amounts of trouble I am going to be in when I get back to school.” I ramble looking toward the sinking sun, the lake is only an outline of darkness now. “Please tell me it's before six thirty.”

He looks straight up in the air, dead serious expression on his face. “It's before six thirty.”

“Thanks.” I say kicking him again. “But I actually want it to be the truth.”

“Wouldn't you want it to be before five thirty, if you have to be back at six thirty? It took an hour to get out here.”

“Oh shut up. This is not good.” I rub at my face with both hands. I know what the punishment is for not being back on time after an out weekend. Gated, which means I can’t leave campus at all for any reason unless the nurse thinks I’m dying, for a month, and if I’m really late they will take me off the swim team for a week as well.

Keller jumps up, pulls the door open, dives in, lurches over to my side and shoves my door open. “Get in, it’s only five forty, we might make it back on time.”

I stand in the same spot looking at the open door. He leans over again, looking up to my face. “You have to move your legs. They will help you to sit in this really crappy seat.” He strokes the seat next to him. “Then the car can drive you back.”

“Right.” I answer nodding my head slowly. My brain isn’t working properly. “That sounds like a good idea.”

“Remind me never to ask you to save the world or make me breakfast just after you wake up.” He steps on the gas pedal and spins the car around.

“Do you list them with equal importance?”

“Of course.” Then he grows serious. “Sorry. I guess you should have stayed at school and read that book.”

“I wouldn't go that far.” And seeing as I'm not thinking straight. “So, how much trouble are you going to be in for ditching Hayden all day?”

I watch his face to see if he's lying. “I can't get in trouble, she's not the boss of me.” He looks at me. I’m not going to say anything. “Okay, fine. She's going to be filthy with me,” he says, and I crack a small grin.

“Mmm.” Is all I say, turning up the heater, my back is still a bit wet and it's making me cold.

“There's a blanket on the back-seat if you want it.”

I turn around in the seatbelt and pull the blanket over myself. Keller's pulling on the collar of his t-shirt.

“You could have just told me to turn the heater down.” I shove the dial back to air conditioning.

“It's not a problem.” He says sweetly.

“How come you’re not wet? My back is still soaking.” Maybe a bit of an exaggeration, but still, he is perfectly dry.

“I rolled over.” He says it with one finger up in the air, like he is passing on some great knowledge. I would love to say something smart back to him, but that's quite logical. I wish I had thought of that. But if I was thinking, I would have checked the time and got up before I was late.

“You going to be in heaps of trouble?” He asks screwing up his face so he’s cringing for me.

“Yip. It was a long weekend. So everyone has to be back by six thirty, all the teachers are on duty to make sure everyone gets everything together so that school can start as normal tomorrow.”

“So heaps of trouble.” He looks apologetic.

“Pretty much. Are you sure we came a whole hour out?”

He laughs, “Sorry, I'm going as fast as I can.”

“It's not your fault. I just can't believe I fell asleep, on the ground and I had this stone in my back the whole time too.” I hold up a strangely triangular stone that I picked out of my back. “It even stuck to me when I stood up.” I rub my back. “I think I have a dent in me. There is a hole in my back.” I say with my arm reaching up my back rubbing the small dent in my skin.

“Next time, you need to turn yourself. Like you’re cooking a chicken.”

I burst out laughing. “Like cooking a chicken. I'll remember that for next time.”

“So you want to come out with me for a next time even though I made you incredibly late and got you in heaps of trouble?” He asks, and my heart starts beating at triple the rate it was.

“I'll think about it. A lot depends on how much trouble you have got me in.” I announce, shifting all the blame to him.

We finally reach the edge of town, but I can’t bring myself to look at the clock on the dashboard, I don’t want to know exactly how late I am until I have to.

“You might want to ease up on my door handle, in a normal car you wouldn't have much effect, but in Ernie here, you actually will crush him.”

“I'm sorry, what?” I look down at myself.

“You are holding the door handle so tight your knuckles are white. Am I that bad of a driver?”

I release my hand. “Sorry, just nervous. And no your driving is fine. And who is Ernie?”

“My car.” He strokes the dashboard like he did the seat.

“You named your car? That's kind of lame.” I add apologetically.

“Have you seen my car? It needs a name so that people know what it is. It's so old, it almost doesn't look like a car anymore.”

“Poor Ernie. He can hear, you know.” I pat the dashboard, and whisper, “Don't make him feel bad for being old. It's not his fault. So mean.” I shake my head at him.

“So Reid, do you go to the library often?” He asks changing the subject after a minute. “I’ve never seen you around before.”

“A couple of times a month maybe, usually just if I need something for school that the school library doesn’t have.” I shrug. “Why?”

“No reason. Just thought I would have noticed you before now.” He pulls around a corner, then adds, “But I’m probably still at work when you are there.”

“Probably.” I say, holding in my happy dance for later. I want to say something back, but everything that comes to my head seems so cheesy. I settle for watching the houses move quickly past the window, and feeling him close enough to reach out and touch.

“Are you always this quiet? Or are you just too scared to talk to me because I am so awesome?” He asks once we are only a couple of minutes away from school, and I realise I haven’t said anything for twenty minutes.

“Clearly it’s because you are so awesome. It’s almost frightening.” I mock.

“I know, people tell me all the time.” He grins at me. He is so easy to be around, I hate that in thirty seconds I’m going to have to get out of this car, and I don’t know when or even if I will ever see him again.

“Thanks for taking me out, it was great.” I say once he pulls up to the end of the line of traffic waiting outside of school.

“Not a problem, we should do it again some time.”

“We should.” I can’t quite keep my voice normal as I say it and he laughs.

I drag my eyes to face school. This is just my luck. All the teachers are lined up outside welcoming the students back, translation, sucking up to the parents. They never wait outside to welcome us home from anything else.

“Bye.” I wave, blinking hard to break the hold his gaze has on me.

I drag myself up the path, forcing myself not to look back, even though I can’t hear his car drive away.

Someone slinks their arm over my shoulder. “So who was that?” Sara asks all excited, still looking over her shoulder at his car.

I look back with her. He's watching me walk in. “That is Keller.”