Moonglass (22 page)

“Hiieee! Get in, get in!” She patted the seat and scooted over to make room. I sat down. “Are you ready for your race?

And the spa? You are going to love this day.” The door closed, and she chattered on excitedly. “Sugar glow scrub, ocean algae body wrap …” I watched the turbulent gray water as we pulled away, still full of the empty melancholy I’d felt the night before, in my mother’s room.

“Anna? You okay? … You listening?”

“Yeah. Sorry. That all sounds great. I’m just a little nervous for this race,” I lied as we made our way down the highway toward the school.

She bumped my shoulder. “Oh, don’t be nervous. You and Jillian are, like, the best runners we have. You’ll do fine! Is your dad coming? Or Tyler? We could make a little cheering section.”

“No, Tyler has a water polo game, and my dad got called out early this morning for a missing boat or something. The waves are huge right now.”

“Oh. well, don’t worry. I’ll cheer for ya.”

I nodded and turned back to the window, watching the gray streak past me. “Thanks, Ash. I appreciate it.” When we pulled up to the course, I spotted Jillian right away. She wore a red plastic poncho over her uniform and stood stretching while Coach Martin went over something on his clipboard. I felt the slightest bit better, knowing we’d be running together and that I’d have to go all out. I needed to today.

We stopped in front of them, and Ashley squeezed my leg. “Good luck! I have Gatorade and snacks for when you finish. I’m gonna wait in here until the race starts. tell them all I said good luck!”

“All right.” I opened the door and stepped out into the cool, wet air.

Coach looked over. “You got a chauffeur service now, Ryan?” He tossed a small plastic package to me. “Put this on. It’ll keep you warm before you get started.”

I opened the snap and shook out the poncho, then slid it over me. “Thanks.”

He turned and put his hands to his mouth. “Coast High! I need you guys over here.” Over his shoulder I saw red ponchos move through the crowd of runners and tents.

Jillian walked over. “Hey. Hope you’re ready to kick some ass today, cuz we’ve got serious competition.” She motioned with her head to a blue team gathered beneath a pop-up tent. “Their number one has the record for this course.”

“Great.” I tried to joke, but it was forced. “No pressure or anything.” I didn’t want to be there. I didn’t want to go to the spa, and I didn’t want to be at home, either. I wanted to go far away from everything, somewhere my mom had never been or left.

The night before, I’d sat there on her bedroom floor for who knows how long, and something in me shifted. From the emptiness of the room and the sharp absence of her, anger rose in me. I’d never let myself be angry with her before, but now I couldn’t push it away.

Coach Martin clapped his hands together forcefully. “Okay, ladies, this is it. I know the conditions aren’t the best, but get over that. I need your heads in this race. Jill, you and Anna are going for one and two.” He looked over the rest of the girls. “We need to take as many of the top ten spots as we can, so stick together and go hard. It only hurts for three miles.” He put his hand out in the center of us, and we stacked ours on top. “Coast Breakers! Go!” Our tight circle disintegrated as we backed up and shed our ponchos. We walked as a group to the starting line, where runners from six or eight different teams jumped up and down, rubbing their arms to keep warm. The “Al blew his whistle, and we reigned in our nervous energy enough to listen as he went over the course. We had an advantage, having trained on it, but its hill s still made for a brutal race. A race that my head was definitely not in. The race “Al finished up his instructions, then walked the line, making sure we were all behind it. When he got to the other side, coaches raised their stopwatches out in front of them, thumbs hovering over the start buttons. The “Al held the gun high above his head and yelled the words that shot adrenaline through me every time. “Runners! Take your mark!” The sharp crack of the gun sent us off in a crowd of elbows and feet jostling for space. Jillian was a step ahead of me, and I focused only on staying with her. Within a few seconds the group thinned out as we took our positions with the top runners from the other teams. And then the rain started.

It wasn’t a drop or two that made you wonder if it was really going to rain or not, building until you knew. It was like someone had taken a knife to the clouds and let loose everything in them. Instinctively we all put our heads down as we tromped over the dirt trail that would be mud within minutes.

I thought of my dad then, out in the rain, looking for a boat that had been stupid enough to go out, despite the storm warnings, and I felt ill.

My dad.

The night she left, while I sat huddled in a blanket with my grandmother in our warm house, he pulled on his own dive gear and went out into the icy water to search for her. And later, while I slept, helicopters flooded light down into the black chop of winter and radioed to him that they saw nothing. And finally, as I bent in my dream to touch a hand that reached out of calm blue water, she disappeared into the cold blackness of the night, leaving behind only swirls of questions and ripples of guilt. The thought of him out there looking that night, when I knew what had happened, pricked holes in my chest, and I felt my legs waver. Jillian glanced over.

“You slip?” She was breathing hard, red-cheeked.

“No, I—”

“Come on,” she huffed. “You’re slowing down.”

I squinted and tried to match her stride as rivulets of water flowed into my eyes.

“Come on. Run away from whatever it is. We got a hill coming up.”

We both breathed hard, and water splashed up our legs now with each step. I couldn’t. I couldn’t leave it behind or run away anymore. I’d been the reason life wasn’t what she wanted it to be. She may have chosen it in the beginning, but the night she drowned herself, she made another choice. One that didn’t consider me, or my dad, or what we might live with afterward.

I stopped running. Just stopped. Right in the middle of the trail.

Immediately two runners passed me, and Jillian looked over her shoulder, completely taken aback. She didn’t have time to ask any questions, though.

She turned and kept running, looking back once, in time to see me walk off the course.

I inhaled slowly and willed back tears that sprung, hot, to my eyes. A short distance away I could see Ashley’s car in the parking lot, steam rising from the exhaust. Our tent was empty, and I figured everyone was out along the course, watching the second mile by now.

I needed to get away.

When I opened the town car door, the driver turned around, surprised. “That was quick. How’d you do?”

“I need to go home. I don’t feel well . Could you take me?” I was still breathing hard, water running down my face.

He looked around, confused. “Where’s Ashley?”

“I think she’s out on the course somewhere. But I really need to go home. Could you take me real quick? Please? I’ll call her and explain when I get home.” I knew I’d owe her an apology later, but I needed to leave.

He gave one last look around, then nodded once. “Hop in.”

Outside the town car’s window angry clouds loomed as far as I could see, and rain fell in translucent walls. I sat silently, but felt the driver’s eye on me in the rearview mirror.

“Not feeling well, huh?” I didn’t answer. “There’s always something going around. I tell ya what, though. You go home, get some sleep, then drink some yerba maté. You’ll feel much better. Ashley got me started on the stuff months ago, and I haven’t been sick since.” I nodded politely and tried to smile.

“Actually”—he reached across the front seat—”I’ve got some you can take with you. Here.” He handed back a brown bag, then looked at me again in the mirror. “It’s wonder stuff. Great for the memory, too, I read somewhere.”

“Thanks.” I looked down at the bag in my hands. I didn’t need any help with my memory, though. That was crystal clear.

She had paused as I’d trailed behind her in the wind. And when she did, I froze, suddenly afraid of how angry she would be that I had followed her. She paused and she looked out at the ocean, her hair and skirt whipping around behind her. And in silhouette she was beautiful, like a mermaid out of water, and all I wanted to do was make her happy again, so I looked down to the sand at my feet, hoping to find a piece of glass for her. And it was there, all by itself, next to the vague imprint of her foot. She had walked right over a piece of moonglass, a perfect delicate triangle with smoothed edges. I bent into the wind to pick it up, and when I held it up to the moonlight, it glowed a deep red. And I ran. Ran to show her what I had found, because I knew she would pick me up and spin me around and tell me I had found a treasure. She wouldn’t be mad once I showed her, so I yelled, ecstatic, as my bare feet slapped over cold, wet sand. “Mommy! Mommy! I found moonglass!” It would make her so happy.

And then I slowed down, confused and out of breath, until I stood digging my toes into the sand as I watched.

She stood knee-deep in the water, and her skirt clung to her legs. On sunny days we would sometimes wade in up to our knees and peer down in between the breaking waves to look for pieces of glass being tumbled around underwater. But she wasn’t looking down. She wasn’t searching for glass.

She was staring straight out at the ocean, like she didn’t even feel the cold or the wind.

I watched, confused.

I watched her walk out there. And the wind howled around me, and my toes went numb, and I watched. She loved to swim. She was the one who could coax me into the water when the sound of the waves scared me onto the sand. But on that night I didn’t follow her. I watched from the shore as she waded out into the frigid black water.

She didn’t flinch or turn back when it reached her chest. She didn’t raise her arms up to keep them from the cold. She didn’t swim.

She just walked out.

I stood there who knows how long, watching the spot where she went under, waiting. I didn’t take my eyes off it, because I didn’t want to miss her when she came back up. I would surprise her there on the beach, and she would be so proud of my red piece of moonglass—

“Miss? If you like, I could walk you the rest of the way to your cottage.”

We were parked at a sign that read FOOT TRAFFIC ONLY at the entrance to the park. The driver turned around, waiting for me to answer. Behind him rain streamed down the windshield and wind whipped the palm trees, threatening to break them apart.

“No. Thanks. I’ll walk.”

He looked concerned. “You sure you’re all right?”

I leveled my eyes at him and smiled. “I’m fine. really. tell Ashley I’m sorry and that I’ll call her.” He faced forward and eyed the dirt road that was now a minefield of puddles, before turning back to me. “Then take the umbrella, at least. And get into dry clothes as soon as you get home.”

“I will.” I nodded. “Thank you.” I opened the door and then the umbrella, waved good-bye, and stepped out into the wind and rain like I didn’t feel a thing.

As soon as I rounded the corner, I collapsed the umbrella and let the rain fall hard onto my face. It pricked my cheeks, then ran down like tears I wouldn’t let fall. She had seen me, I knew. And then she had left me, alone, shivering cold, waiting for her to come back.

Now a burst of white water on sand reverberated against the cottages, and I watched as the ocean, wild and angry, lined up waves, one after another. I gave up waiting for her a long time ago, and that was fine until we got here. Until she came back, like everything in the ocean does.

Another wave thundered down, and this time I felt it in my chest. Up ahead I could make out the blurry outline of the shack, which stood, cold and empty, in the dim afternoon. I forced my eyes away from it and up to our front window, where light warmed the room. Maybe dad would be back from his rescue, stretched out on the couch in his sweats, reading a book. He’d look up, smile, and give me a hard time for being soaked. He’d tell me to hop into the shower to warm up. Then he’d ask me if I wanted hot chocolate, mainly because he’d want some too but would never make it just for himself.

He had made it for me that night. After I’d heard him yelling over the wind while I sat huddled against it. The wetness of the sand had soaked up through my pajama bottoms and chilled me so that my entire body shook and twitched. But I squeezed my hand tight around my moonglass, and I lifted my head when I heard him close by. He pulled his work jacket off and scooped me up, protecting me from the cold and the wind and the flashlights swinging around with voices behind them, now calling only my mother’s name. He warmed me under blankets, then made hot chocolate that stood untouched while he held on to me tight and asked, over and over, “Did you see where Mommy went, Anna? Did she go into the water?” When I finally nodded, he went silent and stayed that way until my grandma arrived to take over.

I stopped at the end of the road and stood in the rain between the shack and our lighted window. And I hated her. I hated her for leaving us, and I hated her for coming back.

I dropped the umbrella into the mud, then checked our window again before kicking off my shoes. The rocks were barely discernible beneath the high tide and chaotic surf, but I kept my eyes on them as I bent my head to undo the clasp of the necklace. Then I walked over pitted sand, pummeled by raindrops, straight out to the rocks. Calm, like she had been.

A gust of wind smacked me on the back, and rain pierced my clinging jersey, but I only felt the weight of the moonglass, squeezed tight in my hand. And now the weight of it wasn’t enough to keep me searching for another little glimmer. finally I was finished with her, like she had been with me. She could have it back.

On the outer edge of the rocks, a wall of water stood up tall before it pitched forward and blasted them, sending spray high into the air, like rain falling upward. Frothy water churned and swirled around my ankles when I stepped onto the first rock, and I breathed in sharply, because of the cold. My feet found their way over craters in the rocks and the jagged edges of mussel shells, to a place that felt far enough out to leave her behind.