Girl Underwater (16 page)

When Colin speaks again, it's barely a whisper. “I cried when my mom got her diagnosis.”

Diagnosis?
That word has always carried a certain weight in my father's house, evoking clarity, and answers, and truth. In many cases, a diagnosis means treatment. But for others, it means the end.

I can tell by the wet, spiraling blue of Colin's eyes which of these it was for him. “I'd been back at school less than a week,” he says. “We all knew something was wrong last summer—she'd get these awful headaches, and she'd never had those before. She fell a few times, just kind of lost her balance.”

He takes a breath, conceding some deep, internal battle. “She's only forty-two, you know? Always been healthy. Never did anything to deserve what she got.” He steels himself before going on. “I try not to think about life that way, but it's hard. Some people get cancer. Some don't. We all die—I know that. And she's accepted that. I just wish I could.”

Colin never mentioned any of this to anyone on the team. I would have known, too, because this is the kind of information that gets people's attention. When Kai Landon's dad had skin cancer last year, she told the whole world. We all signed Get Well cards and sent them out en masse, even though he wasn't really that sick. He had a straightforward procedure and was cured the same day. Meanwhile, Colin has been suffering in silence, bearing his burden alone.

“The night before the Fall Qualifiers, my sister called me.” He puts his free hand on Aayu's back, tempering the rhythm of his shallow breaths. “She said Mom had wandered off that afternoon. When the police found her, she was way over in Quincy, completely lost and confused, asking, ‘
Where is Colin?'”
His voice falters. “‘
Where is
my
son?'”

“Colin . . .”

“I booked a flight that night,” he says. “I know it was bad for the team. I know it was selfish. But I wouldn't even
be
in college without her. I love my mom. I just wanted her to feel that, right up to the end.” He stumbles on that last word. “Whenever that may be.”

“I misjudged you,” I say. “Everyone did. If people knew . . .”

“It wouldn't have mattered.” He puts his head in his hand, his elbow on his knee. For the briefest of moments, it looks like he might cry.

I put my hand on his shoulder. Despite all that muscle, he feels fragile under my palm, a formidable structure on the verge of collapse.

“I hope she knows I didn't abandon her.”

And then I understand why he took my hand and willed me to survive, why I believed him when he said we'd be rescued. The false promises of survival have plagued him for months, the certainty of death right on the horizon.
This
he can control.
This
he can face.

“She knows, Colin.” I put my hands on his face, my thumbs tracing the trail of his tears. “She knows.”

I
t's after two when we pull up outside a pale blue house with white shutters. It's a small colonial-style home, with an aura of age and experience that radiates from its core like a beating heart. The thinning lawn is patched with snow, and the roof appears to be missing a few eaves. A crooked dogwood tree leans over the porch. In spite of its winter weariness, Colin's home exudes a warmth that overwhelms all its physical shortcomings. When he opens the door, it feels as though another part of him is letting me in.

We go in through the back, the hinges creaking to high heaven despite Colin's best efforts to quiet them. The kitchen offers a sprawling view of the backyard, spotted with snow. An old, noisy clock ticks over the oven.

“My mom's an early riser,” Colin says. “But, ah . . . she's probably still asleep now.”

“I can just wait in the kitchen . . .”

“No!” He flinches, peeking at the floorboards overhead, waiting for them to creak. “I mean, you should sleep. The thing is . . .” He shoves his hands in his pockets. “We don't have a guest room or anything.”

“Oh.” I look toward the living room. “I can sleep in there.”

“My dad sleeps downstairs now, so . . .”

I didn't realize this was going to be so much trouble for him. Then again, what was I thinking, asking to meet his mother in the middle of the night?

“You can take me home if that's easier. I can meet your mom another time.”

“There won't be another time.” For a long while, he just stares at his shoes, wet with melted snow. He's right, of course. I go back to California tomorrow.

“I mean, if you want to go home, I can definitely take you . . .”

“Can I sleep in your room?”

My voice echoes in the predawn stillness, magnified by the intimacy of the room and the delicate inches that separate us. Maybe it's the cold, or maybe it's him or me or us, but we're standing just inches apart. I don't dare look up. I don't know what would be worse: the cold finality of a rejection, or the complicated, irrevocable implications of him saying yes.

After a while, when the silence starts to transform into something almost painful, he says, “If you want to.”

Of course I want to. Every cell in my body wants to. He takes my gloved hand and guides me around the framed pictures of little girls; of Colin, their big brother, at baseball games and birthday parties. Each one captures a slightly different emotion—a playful wink or a probing smile. In none of the photos is anyone posing. This is Colin's family unfiltered, unembellished. His father looks like he did in the news clip: astoundingly tall with a grizzled beard and a shock of prematurely gray hair. His mom is her husband's opposite: petite, with a warm, lovely smile, and those familiar stormy-blue eyes. She loves her son dearly. I can see it in the photos, in the way she's glowing in each and every one, even when it's clear she has no idea she's being watched. The camera found her smiles because they were always there; her happiness was always real.

Colin's bedroom echoes the same spectrum of emotion, but in a different way. The walls are a pristine white, adorned with amateur watercolor paintings signed by his sisters. They provide a stark contrast with the hardback books on his desk, most of them old and weathered, as if tossed out on the street by some disgruntled librarian. But there is no sign of dust, no indications of long periods of disuse. In fact, two of them sit with their pages flapping open, waiting for their reader to return. Colin catches me studying them and gives a sheepish shrug. “I'm old-school, I know.”

“Dickens?”

He smiles. “You remembered.”

I walk over and inspect the flap:
A Tale of Two Cities.
An older, dusty edition, its pages a dry yellow. This one, too, has an “If found” message inscribed on the title page.

“Anyway,” he says, palming his bald head. “Anything I can get you?”

“A shower would be great, actually.”

He gives me an awkward look. “Uh, sure . . .”

“I mean, just me, you know . . . in there . . .”

“Sure.” As he hands me a towel, he has the decency not to acknowledge the blush raging on my face. “Anything else?”

“No.” I accept the towel with shaky hands. “Thanks.”

The bathroom is smaller than a closet and encased in linoleum, but like every other room in this house, it feels homey. The door sticks on the frame, and I have to muscle it closed. The interior evokes a decidedly pink theme: a pink curtain, pink seat cover, pink rugs. Three varieties of shampoo bottles, body wash, and pink razors crowd the shelves. On the windowsill, apart from everything else, is Colin's corner: a razor, a toothbrush, and floss. I smile, recalling the
NO BOYS ALLOWED
theme of Colin's childhood. Apparently he's made a few small strides.

As for me, I'm a mess. I can't meet Colin's mother like this: hair all over the place, dress damp with alcohol. I strip everything off and climb into the tub. It takes me a solid two minutes to figure out the showerhead, but the temperature's perfect—a rush of heat and steam. Booze and sweat and Old Gruder's grunge leak out of my pores and circle the drain. I steal some pink shampoo and rinse the gunk out of my hair. By the time the water starts to run cold after four, maybe five minutes, I feel like a new person.

Panic sets in when I see the towels without an accompanying pile of clothes. I can't change back into that dress. I never want to see that dress again.

As if on cue, a quiet knock comes at the door, followed by the slow fade of footsteps down the hall. I crack open the door and peek out. There's a change of clothes sitting on the floor—Colin's sister's, from the looks of them. Flannel pants, a high school sweatshirt. Nothing too skimpy or feminine. Then again, I can't imagine Colin would want me prancing around his house in lingerie, that's for sure.

Dressed, clean, and totally refreshed, I make my way back to Colin's room. The hinges creak with the slightest pressure, announcing my presence.

“I'm just, uh, making the bed for you—” He falls silent as he turns around, his gaze sweeping over me. He doesn't look away with apology or shame, nor do I want him to. He lets the moment linger, as if held there by long-denied desire, a kind of giving in.

My skin is already flushed from the shower, beads of sweat trickling down my forehead. I thread my fingers through my hair, suddenly desperate to pull it back. It's soaking wet.

“Thanks for the clothes.” I give up on my hair as it falls in wild strands across my eyes.

He clears his throat, manages a smile. “No problem.”

For a long time, we stand there in a different kind of silence, new and indefinable. He doesn't resume the task of making the bed; he seems to have forgotten about it altogether.

I don't understand his silences, but I feel like he knows mine. Conflict. Longing. Fear. Fear of the unknown, fear of the unfamiliar. Fear of interpreting the afterglow of tragic events as the real thing. Because isn't that what this is? Isn't that what
we
are?

I point to the thin swatch of carpet near the window. “I can just sleep there.”

“I don't think so.” He finishes stacking the bed with blankets; there must be a dozen layers, enough to warm a whole family of Eskimos.

“Colin, I'm not sleeping in your bed.”

“You can't sleep on the floor. I'm sorry. I just . . .” He skims his head again. “I don't feel right about it.”

“I don't sleep anyway,” I say, staring at my bare feet.

He looks up. “What did you say?”

“I can't . . .”

He crosses the room in three swift strides. Although we're closer now, so very close, he seems hesitant to touch me. Is it wrong that I want to feel him again? That I miss it more than anything?

“Avery, tell me.”

He uses the pad of his thumb to tilt my chin up, but it's enough. Enough to remember the longing in his touch, the fevered heat of his skin. I don't know how he can feel so
warm
all the time. His heart must be three times the size of a normal person's. Even now, it pounds in the silence.

“Nothing.” I manage a smile. “Just a light sleeper is all.”

“You still have the dreams.” He draws his hand away, and his sudden absence feels emptier than hunger, sharper than physical pain.

“No, not really . . .”

“Avery.”

“I don't want to talk about it.”

“That's fine, but don't lie to me.” His throat catches on that ugly, ugly word. Yes, I lied. I've been lying to everyone. Lying to survive.

Panic bubbles in my chest, images of fire and water and empty skies searing through my consciousness. I close my eyes, bracing myself against the force of those memories. Sometimes it brings me to my knees; other times, I wake up scratching at my own throat, gasping for air.

But this time it rears up, peaks . . . and simply fades away. I feel Colin's strong arms around me, his heartbeat thundering in my ear. He's lost weight, but he's still so solidly built: his chest, his shoulders, his back. Like he could withstand anything—wind, snow, plane crashes. The death of a loved one.

The memories come flooding back, a rush of experience and unresolved emotion. My mind doesn't know what to do with them, so it just gives in. I don't wither and die. I don't shatter into a million pieces. I'm still standing. I'm okay.

In the next room, something crashes to the floor. An alarm begins to sound—a low, melodious beep, which steals Colin's attention.

“I'll be back in a minute,” he says, glancing over his shoulder as he starts toward the door. “Would you . . .” He stops, breathing the question like it means the world to him. “Can you come with me?”

“I . . .” For a moment, I can't find the words. “Of course.”

We go down the hall together, my trepidation increasing with each step. Colin doesn't seem to be in a huge hurry. He walks at an easy pace, taking one stride for every two of mine. None of the other doors in the hallway are open.

The floorboards creak with our weight, but then I realize it's just me causing such a racket; Colin knows exactly where to step. I like that he knows his home so well. It grounds him somehow, gives me a place in which to picture him.

The master bedroom is only slightly larger than Colin's—a very modest size, the bed tucked against a sprawling bay window that looks out onto the street corner. A second dogwood tree obstructs part of the view, providing shade in summer and a burst of pink flowers in spring. It must be his mother who loves those delicate trees. I know it for certain when Colin turns on the light, and the woman sitting up in a lovingly made bed finds my gaze. Her eyes are an inquisitive, vibrant blue, two pools of life in a disease-ravaged body. Even from across the room, I can see all the bones in her hands, the ridges in her skull. She must weigh seventy pounds.

Colin turns off the alarm and picks up the oxygen tank that has fallen to the floor. The room is otherwise sparse, at least in terms of medical supplies: just a few pill bottles on the dresser and a commode in the corner, which is draped in a white sheet.

Colin sits on the bed and fixes the cannula so it's resting perfectly under her nose. She doesn't flinch, though her gaze drifts from me to Colin, a smile flickering in her eyes.

“Mom, this is Avery.” Colin takes me by the hand and pulls me a few steps closer. “Avery, this is my mom.” He studies her face, perhaps seeing the woman she used to be. “Her name is Caroline.”

Her hand is cold and slightly damp, mere bones and skin. She doesn't respond to my touch. Her hand hangs limply in my own, but it's okay, because I know she'd give me a firm shake if she could. “It's a pleasure to meet you, Mrs. Shea,” I say.

I wonder how long it's been since she's spoken. I wonder what she told her children when she realized that day had come; her voice all but gone, her final words spoken to those she loved the most. I imagine she had a beautiful voice, enriched by a lifetime of deep, genuine emotion. It's strange to think we've never met. I feel like I've known this woman a long time.

We sit with her until the sun comes up, a red dawn feathering the residential grays and blues of Dorchester. The only sound is the thin wheeze of the oxygen tank, but it calms me somehow, giving me the strength to face the day.

To face a future without the man who gave me one.