Poul shivered and glanced up. Savannah was on her stomach at the pier’s end. Her knees not touching wood, her weight precariously balanced. His throat seized up, and he walked quickly, almost a jog (although he didn’t want to scare her) to where she looked into the water. Poul put his hand on her back, holding her there.
Savannah’s hands were flat out, fingers splayed, nearly touching the surface. Without a breeze the lake was smooth as glass. “Look, Daddy. I’m underwater. Do you think she sees me?” Her reflection stared at her, its hands almost touching her own, the vision of a little girl six inches deep, looking up.
Poul’s tongue felt fat in his mouth, and it was all he could do to speak without a quiver in the voice. “Yes, dear. You’re lovely. Now let’s go in, and I’ll find the hot dogs.”
Savannah held his hand as they walked toward the cottage. The boards creaked underfoot. Through the wide gaps, water undulated in a slow, fractional swell. He shook his head. She’d never been in danger. Even if she’d fallen in, the life vest would have popped her to the surface, and he was right there. He wished he’d signed her up for swimming lessons during the winter. Poul kept his head down, watching his feet next to Savannah’s, her white sneakers matching his small steps. She gripped his little finger, and he smiled. After lunch, he’d break out the worms and bamboo poles (anything to avoid the clear-bottomed raft). He’d have to dig up the tall, skinny bobbers and show her again how to mount the bait on the hook.
He remembered fishing with Neal. Dad used an open bail casting reel, sending his lures to splash far away, but they had as much action tossing their bait a few feet from the boat. Poul would stare at the narrow, red and white bobber’s point, held upright by the worm’s weight and a couple of lead shot. The marker twitched, sending ripples away. It twitched again. “Something nibbling you, Poul,” said Neal, his own pole forgotten. “Yeah,” said Poul, concentrating on the bobber, which wasn’t moving now. He imagined a fish eyeing it below. Could be a bass, or maybe even a pike, like the stuffed one mounted on a board above the bar at Kettle Jacks, its long mouth open and full of teeth.
Savannah cried, “Help him, Daddy.”
“What?”
She pulled away, dropped to her knees and poked her head over the pier’s side, trying to look under. “Help him!”
“What, Savannah? What?” Poul knelt beside her; a splinter poked his shin. “Don’t fall in now!”
She sat up, her hair wet at the tips where it had dipped. “Where’d he go? Didn’t you see him? He was reaching up between the boards, Daddy. You almost stepped on him.”
The sun dimmed, and everything around them faded. Only Savannah was clear. Dimly children shrieked on the distant diving platform. When he spoke, it sounded to him as if they were in a bubble: his faint voice travelled no more than a yard away. “What did you see, Speedy? Who was reaching up?”
Her lip quivered. “The boy, Daddy. He was under the pier. I saw his fingers right there.” She pointed. “He was stuck under the pier, but when I looked, he’d gone away. Where do you think he went to, Daddy?”
Between the boards, the lake breathed gently, the surface smooth and untroubled. A crawdad crept along the muck. Poul watched it through the gap. “I don’t think there was anyone there, Speedy. Maybe your eyes played a trick on you.”
Legs crossed, her hands in her lap, Savannah studied the space between the boards for a moment. Slowly, she said, “My eyes don’t play tricks.” She paused. “But my brain might have imagined it.”
Poul released a long, slow lung full of air. He hadn’t known he’d been holding it. “If you’re hungry, sometimes your brain does funny things.” The sun brightened. Poul shivered, and he realized sweat soaked his shirt’s sides. “Let’s go in and have a hot dog.”
She nodded. He had to open the porch door for her; it was a high step up, and her fingers barely wrapped around the nob. Neal had been so proud his last summer when he could grip it.
Later, while Savannah put mustard on her meal, Poul said, “Why did you think it was a boy under the pier if all you saw was his fingers?” Savannah swallowed a bite.
“He had boy hands. Boy hands are different. I can tell.” She pushed the top back on the mustard.
In the evening, Poul walked to the end of the pier. A breeze had picked up, and on the lake, two sailboats glided side by side, their sails catching the sun’s last yellow rays. Now all the lake was black. If he jumped in here, the water would barely come to his chest—it would be just over a six-year-old’s head—but within a couple strides was a steep drop-off. The wind pushed waves toward him, a series of lines that slapped against the piles as they went by. He could feel the lake in his feet. Deep in his pockets, his hands clenched. Cottages on the far shore glowed in the last light, their windows like mica specks in carved miniatures. Behind them, forest-covered hills rose to the silence of the sky.
They’d found Neal ten feet from the pier’s end, his hands floating above his head, nearly on the surface, his feet firmly anchored on the bottom. Poul stood on shore, his fists jammed into his armpits, and watched them load him in the boat, wearing the face mask and snorkel, limp and small, his arms like delicate pipes, his six-year-old skin as smooth and pale as milk, black boots on his feet. They were Poul’s snow boots, buckled at the top and filled with sand.
Long after the sun set, and the boats disappeared and lights flickered on in cottages, music and voices drifted across the water, Poul came in to go to bed. On the porch, Savannah slept on the daybed. He checked the screens to make sure they were tight—mosquitoes were murder after dark—then locked the deadbolt, taking the key. Sometimes Savannah woke before he or Leesa did, and he didn’t want her wandering outside. In the kitchen, he shook as he poured a cup of tepid coffee. A humid breeze had sucked the heat out of him. The cup warmed his hands. Moths threw themselves against the windows, pattering to get in. Leaves hushed against themselves. Years ago he’d sat at this same table, sipping hot chocolate, laughing at Neal’s liquid moustache. That day they’d swam. The next they’d fish, and the summer at the lake stretched before them, a thousand holidays in a row.
Poul slipped up the stairs, keeping his weight on the side next to the wall so there would be no creaks. He left his clothes on a chair. Dock lights through the windows illuminated the room enough for him to get around without running into anything. A long lump on the bed, swaddled in shadows, was all he could see of Leesa. Except for his own breathing, there was no other noise, which meant she was awake. When she slept, she whistled lightly on each exhalation. From the beginning he’d found it charming, but never mentioned it, guessing it might be embarrassing. If he spoke now, he knew, she wouldn’t reply.
Three years ago when they were at the cottage, she began suffering headaches at bedtime, or sore throats, or stomach cramps, or pulled muscles, or dozens of other ailments. That same summer she went from sleeping in just a pair of boxer shorts to a full, flannel nightgown. She’d start complaining about her night time illness before lunch, and after a while, he figured they were all a charade. The last time they’d made love had been a year ago, in this bedroom. He remembered her back to him, and he pressed against her; he could feel her muscles through the flannel, her hip’s still delicate flare. She didn’t move away, so he pushed against her again. It had been months since the last time, and the day had been good. She hadn’t avoided him. She laughed at a joke. Maybe she’s thawing, he’d thought, so he watched her, and when she went to bed, he followed. No chance for her to be sleeping before he got there. But she undressed in the bathroom, came out with the collar buttoned tightly at her neck, didn’t look at him, and laid down with her back toward him. He didn’t move for a while. They’d been married too long for him not to recognize all the ways she was saying, “No.” Still, it had been months. He moved next to her. Outside, waves slapped upon the shore. The boat rattled in its chain.