The Lifeguard (20 page)

When we’re in the front seat of the car together, I turn to Aunt Ellie. “Thanks.”

“Um hmm,” she singsongs lightly.

Points for not asking me why or telling me what I’m doing is stupid. She knows I have to.

She parks in the same spot that Mark did and gets the crutches out of the trunk. No wheelchair now. She knows I can go the extra couple of yards without it. She hands me the crutches and stands there, hands on hips.

“When do you want me to come back for you?”

“Pilot will take me home.”

“You sure?”

I nod and she gets back in the car.

She sits behind the wheel for a moment and slowly pulls out of the parking lot. I know she’s watching me in the rearview mirror. I start the trip across the sand, this time more experienced on the crutches, even though they are rubbing raw the blisters on my underarms. The sun is lower in the sky and I’m tempted to stop and sit in the sand. But I pause and then keep going, the marathon runner who gets a last burst of energy when the finish line is in view.

When I’m almost there I stop and watch as Pilot slides his tank top over his head. He grabs a white T-shirt and is about to pull it on when he turns and sees me. He stands there, frozen, his eyes widening.

I feel like I’m watching him strip and I can’t breathe.

He catches himself and pulls his shirt on quickly, throwing a towel around his neck. He lifts his backpack and walks toward me as I wait.

“I’ll take you back,” he says, matter-of-factly.

“We have to talk.”

He exhales and shakes his head. “Okay…I have the Jeep.”

He hoists me over his shoulder like he’s bringing home the catch of the day, and he heads for the parking lot. I can’t imagine what we look like, me holding the crutches out as if I’m bearing a divining rod.

I climb into the car and put on the seat belt. It closes with a loud click. He turns on the car and glances out his rearview mirror as he backs up and pulls out of the lot. I have no idea where we’re going. It doesn’t matter.

“There’s water in the cooler,” he says, pointing to an insulated bag at my feet.

I shake my head.

A few miles down the road, he pulls off the main road and heads down a narrow, unpaved path surrounded by tall beach grass.

“You’ll like this beach,” he says. “Very few people know about it.”

He goes to the back and takes out a blanket, then comes around to my side of the car and helps me out. “I can walk on my own, really.”

“It’s better if you don’t. Not yet. ” He carries me out to a beach with no one on it. The water is calm and the tide is low. I’m sorry that we can’t walk for miles together.

The beach is a sandy paradise that’s completely private and empty for us to share. It feels like he’s given me a gift. My own beach.

And then the anxious me rears her head. Does he bring other girls here? Is this where they hang out? I try to push those thoughts out of my head.

Pilot puts me down gently and shakes out the blanket. I sit down and he drops down next to me, propping himself up on his elbows. He stares at my leg where the gash was and then out at the water.

“What do you want to know?” he asks directly. He does not want to have this conversation.

“I want to know what you did. How you did it. They were going to amputate my leg and then miraculously, it got better.”

“It did,” he says, eyes wide.

I smirk and he smiles.

“You have to tell me. I have to know.”

“I learned things from my family, from my father and my grandfather,” he says, smoothing the sand between us.

“Your grandfather?”

“Tonio.”

“Who?”

“You
know
him,” he insists. “The painter.”

“Antonio…
He’s
your grandfather?”

“You honestly didn’t know?”

“He never told me anything.” I think of all the things I said to him about Pilot. Things I never would have admitted if I had known they were related. He knew I liked Pilot—enough to steal his painting of him—but he never mentioned that Pilot was his grandson to spare me the embarrassment. So now it’s clear why he was able to paint him more than once and how he knew his face so well that the picture almost spoke. They were flesh and blood.

Pilot shakes his head. “He never talks about himself,” he says, as though he knows what I’m thinking. “He never tells people what anyone tells him. He’s protective.”

“I love him.” I’m surprised by what I blurted out and more than that, that I’m telling his grandson.

“
Everyone
loves him.” He grins. “Especially women. No matter how old or young.”

“So what did he teach you?”

He narrows his eyes and looks at me curiously.

I feel my cheeks burn. “I mean about healing.”

He stares out at the water again. “It’s not so much
what
he taught me. It’s what he helped me discover… about myself…my family…” He hesitates. “Some people just have natural gifts, and our family…we have a kind of vision when it comes to seeing who needs help and drawing on powers inside us. It’s not something I can put into words. I don’t even understand it myself. I just know that sometimes…not always…I can help people heal.”

“Cody, too?”

“Cody, too.”

“I didn’t realize it at first, but after Cody got better when no one thought he would, and then the man on the beach started breathing again, I knew it was something you did.”

He stares ahead of him, lost in his thoughts.

“How did you know you could help me?”

He shakes his head and keeps staring. “I don’t always know and it’s so frustrating. Sometimes it doesn’t work. Or sometimes it doesn’t work as well as it should…I…I just don’t know all the time.”

“Yes, you do.”

He turns and looks at me challengingly. “How do you know that?”

“I can’t heal, but I can read your face.” I run my hand from the top of his forehead down over the side of his face like a blind person trying to understand what someone looks like. “And I know that you don’t give up.” A tiny muscle at the side of his jaw starts to quiver like a fine barometer, responding to the slightest change in the atmosphere.

“I want to know you. I want to know how you do it. You saved my life.” My face is so close I’m nearly kissing him.

“It’s something inside…I go outside myself to get help from the spirits.” He watches me to see how I react to his words. “You can’t put everything into words and make it knowable, Sirena…It’s a connection.”

“Antonio says when people get sick it’s because they lose their spirit.”

“That’s what he taught me,” he says. “Part of the soul escapes—the way people shut down to get away from pain or loss. Only sometimes part of the soul doesn’t come back. A healer works to make the person whole again.”

“And with me?”

“Your soul left your body,” he says. “You were almost dead.”

He turns to me and our lips accidentally touch. Instead of pulling back, I lean toward him, pressing my mouth against his. He kisses me back this time, his mouth deliciously sweet and salty. We seem molded to fit together. I fall back on the blanket and he comes with me, as eager for me as I am for him. Seconds go by and then something snaps. He sits up, abruptly.

“It’s harder to protect you if I’m close to you, Sirena.” His voice is hoarse and imploring. “That blinds me. I can’t let that happen again.”

“You have no choice.”

He drops down next to me, his arm resting over his forehead. I move toward him, leaning my head on his chest. His heartbeat is strong and rhythmic. I reach up and trace my finger along the side of his jaw. “I never met someone who performs miracles.”

“I just try to help people heal when things go wrong. It’s different. It has to do with infusing a spirit…”

“You said you hear my heartbeat—at least I think you did.”

“I can.”

“That scares me.”

“You wanted to know.”

“I’ve never heard anything like that before. Is it just me?”

“It’s with some people—people who I set my mind on knowing. I know it sounds strange. Abnormal. But it’s something I can pick up. When I heard you panicking, I swam out to get you.” He shakes his head. “But it was too late.”

I lean up on one hand and look at him, but he’s lost in his own thoughts, his face impassive, resolute.

“Why do you think you failed? I’m here, I’m still alive.”

“But you were in such pain, do you remember? “You lost so much blood. I swam out there too late. I didn’t see the stingray.” He bites at the corner of his lip. “It shouldn’t have even been there. Then after I pulled you out, you were almost dead.” He shakes his head. “Then the infection, what was going to happen to you. I couldn’t stand it. If I hadn’t pulled the power…”

“The power?”

“The power. The blackout.”

I sit up and stare at him. “I thought it was storm. The whole town lost power, they said.”

“The hospital has a generator. The hospital never blacks out. There was no other way for me to get you out of there. They were about to cut off your leg. I had no choice, so I turned it off.”

I stare at him and shake my head. “But what if someone had died? What if there was an operation going on?”

“There wasn’t. It’s a small hospital,” he says, reading my confusion. “What?”

“I sensed something…only I didn’t know quite what it was.”

“What
what
was?”

“I had this feeling of calm, of peace, even though my leg was killing me and I was burning up.”

“It was my nearness. That was part of it. I had to help you calm down or I couldn’t have focused. If you were in a panic, I wouldn’t have been able to connect with you…to heal you”

“But you did. That’s what matters.”

He turns away, staring out at the water, absentmindedly running his hand back and forth along the sand between us. I study his fingers, the shape of his hands.

Did I just see what I think I did? I lean closer. How is that possible? Tiny granules of sand rise up to his fingers as if he’s a lightning rod that draws the power of the earth to him.

He turns from the water and sees me watching. Quickly, he pulls his hand back.

“Did you just…?”

“Sshh,” he says.

He gets up and crouches over me. “Lie back,” he says. “Close your eyes.” He presses his hands on either side of my head. Immediately a flow of warmth spreads over me.

“This is how I do it,” he murmurs. “This is how I heal.”

I think he’s poured his heart into mine.

W
e have to get back,” he whispers. He brushes a strand of hair away from my face.

“What time is it?”

“Almost nine.”

It’s dark out. When did that happen? I rub my eyes, inhaling the scent of him on my skin. “I don’t want to go.”

“They’ll be worried,” he says, getting to his feet. The look on his face says it’s settled in his mind. It’s useless to argue. He reaches his hands out and pulls me to my feet.

“Let me try to walk.” I start to hobble on one foot.

“The wound was deep. It’s not healed up inside.” He lifts me and carries me back to the car. I press my head against his shoulder to hide my smile.

His car is the only one in the lot. We climb in and drive off, leaving our secret hideaway. We ride back in silence, connected now. There’s no reason to speak.

I can only imagine what Ellie and Mark and my parents are thinking. Knowing my dad, he’s combing the beach now for my body. I’d never tell Pilot what he’s like. If I did, he’d never take me anywhere again. When he pulls up to the house, my dad is standing guard on the porch, but he’s on his best behavior, I can tell. My mom probably shouted out a warning before she let him go out.

“Missed dinner,” he says, flatly. He looks at us coolly.

“I’m sorry, Dad. I’ll eat the leftovers, okay?”

His face is visibly relieved, though. I’m back and alive.

“I’m sorry, sir,” Pilot says. “I hope we didn’t worry you. It was a beautiful night so we were on the beach.”

He leaves it at that. Points for honesty.

My dad nods. He’s not about to lecture the lifeguard who saved the life of his only child.

As I walk into the house, I sense something is different. I feel renewed in some way. But how?

It only occurs to me after Pilot waves from the car and pulls out. And then it’s so clear. He didn’t help me out of the car this last time. He didn’t even walk around to help me. At the absolutely same moment I think of that, my dad stares at me as if he’s seen a ghost.

I’m walking perfectly on my own.

“Jesus, Mary, and Joseph,” he whispers, under his breath.