I held my breath until she swam into view and waved. Her brown skin glistened in the sun, and she laughed exuberantly. After a moment she kicked away. Then she turned and swam toward the middle of the lake, a water nymph entirely in her element. I took off my own pack, grabbed her shoes and socks, and added mine to the little pile.
When I looked again, Christy had reached the far side. She frolicked and swam through the edge of the waterfall. Then she dived and stayed under for nearly a minute, until I began to worry. I shouldn’t have. She surfaced and blew out her breath. Then she swam toward me with a lazy backstroke, until she reached the gravelly slope of the beach.
“Aren’t you coming in?” She stood and waded toward me. Her brown nipples had shrunk to the size of dimes, and her wet hair looked almost sandy blonde instead of its usual sun-kissed flax.
“I don’t know if I should.” I waved my splint by way of explanation.
“Don’t be silly. Take it off. Just be careful. Besides, I’ll be doing most of the work.”
My eyebrows rose with a question.
“My mother said I should be more domestic.”
“Oh?”
“Mmm hmm. And I have a nice little house that needs warming.”
“Oh, you do, do you?”
“Yes. It’s very cozy. The garden’s nice, too. Not a single bush to spoil the view.”
“Ha!”
“Do you know anyone who wants to visit?”
“I might know someone,” I admitted.
“Mmm. So… what’re you waiting for?”
* * *
We spent the rest of the afternoon relaxing on the big rock. Well, I relaxed. Christy was in the water about half the time, swimming or diving. She started with basic dives and gradually worked up to somersaults and gainers.
“I can’t do the really fun ones here,” she explained. “Not without a springboard. Besides, the water’s only about twelve feet deep.” She squeezed water from her hair and nodded toward the waterfall. “It’s probably a hundred out there. I only went down about thirty feet, but I could see things on the bottom, like the crane.”
“I’m sorry, did you say ‘crane’?”
“Yeah. It’s sticking up. The whatchamacallit. The part that sticks up, the lifty part.”
“The boom?”
“Yeah, the boom! But it’s far enough down that you’d never hit it in a million years. The water’s really clear, isn’t it? So I could see the other stuff, too, like the bulldozer.”
“The bulldozer?”
“Hold on, I thought you’d been here before. Didn’t you see what was under the water?”
“No,” I said slowly. “I didn’t think I needed to.”
“Oh my gosh, yes! And you need to make sure it’s deep enough.”
“Deep enough? For what?”
“For diving! What’ve I been doing for the past hour? D’you think I’m going to dive if I don’t know what’s under the water and how deep it is? That’s crazy.”
“Well, yeah, I get that part,” I said. “But why’s it matter how deep it is out there?”
“That’s where the cliff is.” She frowned in genuine puzzlement.
“And…?”
Her frown turned into disbelief as realization dawned. “Hold on, haven’t you ever dived from the cliff?”
“Are you crazy? That’s, like, fifty feet!”
“More like thirty,” she said calmly.
“This from the girl who can’t do math?”
“I can do math. I just can’t multiply and divide. But I know what thirty feet looks like.”
I ignored the Christy-logic and simply stared at her.
“It’s the same as a 10-meter platform. Maybe a little higher, but close enough.”
“Are you serious?”
“Of course. I’ve done it a million times. It’s the best feeling in the world. Well, not as good as sex, but pretty close. It’s like flying.”
“Are you serious?” I repeated. “You really wanna jump off the cliff?”
“Dive,” she corrected. Then she thought of something and grinned. “Any idiot can jump off a cliff.”
“Well, I’m not an idiot.”
“No,” she said quickly, “that isn’t what I meant. It’s something you said to me, about how sex is a skill. ‘Any idiot can slide a dick into a pussy,’ you said. ‘But there’s a lot more going on than just Slot A and Tab B.’ Boy, you were right about that!” She flashed back to the original subject before I even had time to react. “Do you think we can go? To the top, I mean. And… um… maybe bring a ladder next time?”
“A ladder? What for?”
She frowned in thought. “Hmm, you’re right. That wouldn’t work. It’d have to be a rope or something. Ooh, I know, a rope ladder!”
“What’re you talking about?”
“How’m I supposed to get back to the top? I can’t walk all the way around. That’d take forever. And please stop,” she added. “Being slow on the uptake. I’m talking about diving from the cliff. So I need a rope ladder. Please and thank you.”
She made another logical leap. “Ah, now I get it. Why you say ‘your wish is my command’ to Wren. She’s very demanding, isn’t she. And that’s your way of making fun of her. Well, please don’t do it to me.”
“Furthest thing from my mind,” I said with absolute candor.
“Good. Now, are you ready?”
“To go to the top?”
“Yes, please. And maybe bring a blanket?”
“Because we’re going to need it? For a little housewarming party?”
“See? You do know what I want.”
* * *
We hiked to the quarry the following day as well. Christy ran the last hundred yards. I picked up her pack from where she’d dropped it and then followed the zigzag trail of shoes and socks to the little beach. She was already halfway across the lake.
I took off my splint and joined her, although I had to go easy on my pinky. I could still use my right hand for steering and gentle strokes, but I relied on my left hand and feet to get where I was going. Christy swam around and treaded water until I reached her. Then she beckoned me toward the waterfall.
“Come see.” She took a couple of deep breaths and went under.
I followed as far as I could, deeper than I’d ever been, even in the ocean. My ears popped after a couple of seconds, and I felt the pressure in my chest. I stopped and peered toward the bottom. The water was crystal clear, and I could make out the crane’s boom, far below. Other shapes leapt out, including a boxy white one, but I couldn’t tell what they were. Christy’s eyes were better than mine.
She kept going another fifteen feet or so, until she realized I wasn’t with her. Then she rolled to her back and hung motionless below me. Rays of light played across her nude body and made her look like a siren sent to lure me to the depths. At least I couldn’t hear her song, since I hadn’t thought to tie myself to the mast. I admired her lithe figure instead, until my lungs cried out for oxygen. I headed toward the surface and treaded water until Christy popped up beside me.
“How deep were we?” I panted. “Fifty feet?”
“I was. You only made it to about thirty.”
“I’ve never been that deep.”
“I can tell,” she grinned. She wasn’t even breathing hard.
“I didn’t expect so much pressure. At least, not so quickly.”
“One atmosphere every ten meters. That’s thirty-two feet, nine and three-quarter inches,” she added matter-of-factly. “I memorized it. And the inches are important. A girl needs a certain number of them, every day. They’re like vitamins, you know. Mmm, vitamin P.” She immediately scrunched her nose. “Oh my gosh! P as in penis, not the other pee.”
“What, no golden showers?” I laughed.
“Eww, gross, disgusting!”
“Stick to waterfalls and diving?”
“Yes, please.”
“Speaking of which, where’d you learn to dive like that? So deep, I mean.”
She shrugged. “I’ve always been able to. I don’t float very well. I used to think it was ’cause I’m so small, but Rich said I’m dense. No, not like that. It has to do with muscles and fat and… um… displacement! Yeah. Ask Rich. He’ll explain it. Anyway, he and I used to have contests to see who could hold their breath longest.”