The Lifeguard (5 page)

What do I say or do?

I want to grab Will’s leash and run somewhere quiet to sit alone and collect my thoughts and go over what really happened, what it meant.

Or didn’t mean.

All the touchstones of normalcy, familiarity, and sanity have vanished. I’ve lost my center of gravity, sinking into a vortex of helpless longing like a pathetic adolescent with an aching, clichéd crush.

Does his face say I’m imagining this?

It’s stoically expressionless, giving nothing away. What did I expect? He isn’t short of breath. He’s ethereally calm, controlled, supremely confident, guarding the intimate thoughts in his head, and I am so totally out of my league with him. His face reveals the mildest curiosity, if anything.

“What about you?” says some other, sure-of-herself me who magically appears to rise to the challenge. My hand reaches up and strokes the side of his jaw.

Is he real?
I need to touch his perfect skin and find out what he feels like. My fingers lightly caress the spot where I landed on him. His skin isn’t warm, it’s hot, as if the heat of the sun in inside him.

“Here, right?”

A corner of his mouth curls up slightly. There’s the slightest flicker in his cool, green eyes. He shakes his head from side to side. “I don’t bruise,” he says, dismissively. His eyes offer a silent challenge to figure him out.

I cock my head to the side, not understanding. “What do you mean you don’t bruise?”

He shrugs. “It’s never happened.”

If he was human he’d have skin and blood and being slammed in the face ruptures blood vessels and causes bleeding and bruising, at least that’s what I learned in biology and I got an
A
. No one ever said any of that was up for discussion.

What do I say to that?

I stand there awkwardly, the silence widening, creating a larger and larger divide between us. Unintentionally, I sigh and look at him questioningly, instantly sorry I’ve given him even a hint of a reaction. He smiles slightly, enjoying putting me on edge, it’s so clear. I hate that. This time he holds my gaze.

Now
he’s
determined to win the staring contest.

Only alpha-dog Will comes to my rescue, breaking the impasse, convincing me he’s not only smart, he’s brilliant. He totally gets it. He jumps up on me and barks. It’s time to take him home and feed him. He knows in his bones when it’s supper time and his animal alarm clock has gone off. I start to lead him away.

“Well, then, you’re more than a lifeguard,” says that voice in me from I don’t know where. “You’re Superman.”

He shakes his head back and forth slowly. “I can’t fly,” he says, raising an eyebrow. “At least, not yet.”

I stand there and stare for another moment, and that sets Will off again.

“He’s jealous,” he says, amused.

I shrug. “Probably just hungry.”

He smiles slightly. It doesn’t derail him. Not the least hint that he felt the slight.

I lead Will away, waving with the tips of my fingers. “Bye, Superman.”

B
lack storm clouds hover over the beach, like dark smudges on a white page, darkening the silvery afternoon sky. Spiky waves crash over the sand where just the day before, bathers sat in the warm sun before a calm ocean.

Aunt Ellie stays inside working, sipping homemade ginger tea from a red mug she probably made in a pottery class. Her new book is on pterodactyls. I glance over her shoulder at an article she’s reading. Their wing spans ranged from twenty to thirty inches to over forty feet.

“As big as a plane!”

She smiles. “And particularly scary because they had sharp eyes.” She points to a picture. “Imagine him swooping down searching for prey.”

“Are you writing fiction or nonfiction?”

“I haven’t decided. I have to see where it goes.”

I read in the living room for most of the afternoon, but Will needs to go out so I volunteer. As we pass the lifeguard’s chair I glance up, half expecting to see him there in spite of the oncoming storm: lord of the beach watching over his domain.

But the chair is empty.

I unclip Will’s leash and let him run free.

What does a lifeguard do on his days off? I don’t see him hunched over Facebook reaching out to friends. He doesn’t seem like the type to have twelve hundred of them—not that he wouldn’t if he posted his picture. I can’t imagine what type he is at all. He isn’t like anyone I’ve ever met before. I climb up the side of the chair and sit in his seat to view the world from up high. I want to see the world through his eyes, and know what it feels like to be him. I look around. Did he leave anything behind that will give me hints about who he is?

Nothing.

And everything.

A dark blue plastic bottle. Sunblock, SPF 45. I unscrew the top and I’m flooded with his sweet, enticing scent—coconut, citrus, and jasmine. I cup my hand and fill it with the milky lotion, rubbing it into my face and neck.

Now I’m like Will who rolls on things to absorb their smell. I’m cloaked in his perfume, his essence, so as I stalk my prey I won’t be seen as an outsider. I place the bottle back where I found it and make my way down the side of the chair.
His
chair.

I examine the chipped, white weathered wood like a scientist who studies tree rings to learn about past events in history and changes in the climate. Only this chair isn’t parting with its secrets. It’s as inscrutable as he is, high above the ground, confronting the water. It reminds me of a still life about natural forces and isolation. The chair is the only clue of humanity. Like Aunt Ellie’s house, does it have ghosts, spawn by him or his relatives? What kind of stories would they tell?

Will barks at me. He’s jealous of whatever has stolen my attention. I take a tennis ball out of my pocket and throw it. He runs for it and then races back to me, dropping it at my feet. I toss it again and again. Will never tires of the game. Just to see what he does, I flip over and walk on my hands. I’ve studied gymnastics since kindergarten after my mom took me to the circus. I watched acrobats walking on their hands and doing flips and I came home determined to do it too.

Will cocks his head to the side.

“You’re not the first one who doesn’t know what to make of me.” I keep walking on my hands, studying the world turned upside down—the way it feels to me.

The sky darkens as we start to walk home. I hear distant thunder and walk faster, ready to break into a run. Will inhales something in the wind and then hurries along with me. He senses danger and doesn’t want to get caught either. Moments later there’s a deafening clap of thunder. In minutes the heavens come down and we break into a run. A wall of water washes over me and I look as though I’ve been swimming in my clothes. Will turns into a drowned rat and I look at him and start to laugh. He tries to shake the water off his head so he can see, but he realizes how futile it is. We start to cross the street, but it’s nearly impossible to make out whether any cars are coming because everything is shrouded in fog and my eyes are being washed with rain.

But off in the distance, I make out a yellow haze. Very slowly it becomes brighter. The glow of headlights, I realize, as a car approaches slowly and cautiously. It looks like it’s going to pass us, but it stops. The window on the passenger side rolls down.

“Get in, I’ll give you a ride.”

Does he patrol the beach by car when he’s not on duty?

Without hesitating, I pull open the door and get into the front seat. Will bolts into my lap. The side window closes and the air inside the car becomes as heated and heavy as the night air in Houston.

I inhale his sweet smell of jasmine, citrus and coconut —it must be in his blood by now. Water drips from my hair, soaking the seat. Will shakes his whole body, showering both of us, and nervous laughter bursts out of me uncontrollably. I feel wired, my pulsating blood buzzing in my head.

“Are you sure you want us in your car like this?

His face breaks into a half smile. “I’m not afraid of water.” He reaches into the back seat and hands me a towel and I begin to dry my hair, He glances over at me once, then a second time. I watch him back with the odd feeling that drying my hair has assumed some greater meaning and significance.

“So what do you do when you’re not saving people?” I say to fill the awkwardness.

“That’s…more than a full-time job.”

“Thanks for picking us up. I thought we’d have to swim home.” I start to laugh again for no reason. If he thinks I’m insanely crazy, he doesn’t show it. To do something with my hands, I take the towel and blot the water off the front seat.

I steal glances at him as he drives, his left hand on the wheel, the right lightly resting on the worn jeans covering his thigh, fingers spread slightly apart. Like a video camera, my eyes record every last detail and imprint it all on my brain’s hard drive. I absorb every bit of information I can from studying him, as if seeing him up close will let me understand who he is and what’s in his head.

Every part of him is impossibly perfect. The strong shoulders. The swell of his biceps, half hidden by the soft edge of his white T-shirt. The lean forearms lightly covered with blond hair. Long, slender fingers. Smooth, even nails cut short and rounded. I fight the urge to reach out and feel his skin.

The car stops suddenly, the engine dies. Where are we? I look up surprised as if I’m being awakened from a dream. In front of Aunt Ellie’s. Already?

I don’t want to leave.

We sit for a moment without talking, mesmerized by the deafening downpour. Will’s wet, doggy smell competes with the coconut and jasmine, like reality at odds with fantasy. In the warm, moist space of the car my senses feel overloaded.

He leans his head back and stares at the windshield. “Like being inside the car wash,” he says.

It’s almost impossible to see out. I drop my eyes to the idiotic orange poop bag wrapped around the handle of the leash, like a scarf around the strap of a designer bag. The rain pounds like hail on the roof of the car. Everything ordinary now vibrates with extrasensory significance—what it must be like to be high on acid. What is it about being next to him that does that? Every breath I take feels super-saturated with energy and oxygen, making me jittery and on edge. Does that happen to everyone around him, or is it just me?

“Do you want to come in for a soda or something?” I come up with, breaking the silence. “Just to get out of this?” It’s lame, I can’t help it.

He smiles. “I have to take off, but thanks.”

“Thanks for the ride.”

“Stay safe,” he says.

We dash from the car and his eyes are on me—I can feel them. And then for the first time, it occurs to me.

I don’t even know his name.

Will and I race into the house and I go upstairs to change, slipping into a dry T-shirt and shorts. I sit on the edge of my bed and replay what just happened.

There’s no way he would have come in. No way. What was I thinking, that he’d want milk and cookies and we’d hang out and watch TV or play video games like sixth graders?

I shouldn’t have asked him. I should have just shut up and acted cool. Now I feel stupid.

What else is new?

We have soup for dinner. Aunt Ellie’s pot of clam chowder could feed twenty. After we eat I go upstairs and turn on the TV. She never watches so she doesn’t have the cable stations we have at home. For lack of anything better, I sit through a rerun of
Friends
. My head is back on the pillow and my eyelids start to flutter.

That’s when I begin to hear them.

Strange sounds. At first I think they’re part of my dreams.

Only they’re not.

I sit up totally awake now, but they don’t stop. They’re eerie. Not animal, not human, moaning and then a disturbing higher frequency whistling. It sounds like the howling the wind makes when there’s a tropical storm so fierce the window frames whine and you can feel the vibrations in your bones, like scratching on a blackboard.

Only now it’s not the wind.

It’s something supernatural and less benign.

Only what?

I lean forward and turn down the TV. The sounds seem to stop. I ease the volume back up and it starts again. Will is next to me on the bed. I can swear he’s lifting his ears up straight as though he hears it too. Then I spot Nina, the most docile of Aunt Ellie’s cats. She’s curled up in the corner, eyes wide and shocked, shining like glass marbles. Is it my imagination, or does she look spooked too?

I hold my breath. Is someone or something playing with me? Or does it just feel safer, protected, when other house sounds muffle it?

“It’s freaky, right, Will?”

His ears shoot straight up again on high alert, but he hasn’t processed what it is. He cocks his head slightly as if he’s picking up something curious out of human range. I leave the TV on and edge toward the staircase. Will bolts after me.

“Aunt Ellie?” I break into a run down to her office, yelling out to fill the air with the reassuring sound of my own normal voice and presence.

She looks up, concerned. “What is it, Sirena?”

“Can I ask you something?”

She leans back in her chair and swivels around to face me. “Shoot.”