through my body, but I kiss her. Not on the mouth. Not the way I want
to. I put my hand on the back of her neck and kiss the top of her
head. Her hand closes around my wrist, panicked. She says something
like, Nothing we can do. Let’s go , and pulls me away from the shore.
But I don’t listen. I can’t listen. I only see the flailing arms,
the face that comes up for air too quickly before getting sucked back
down. I brace against the ice coldness of the water and dive. It takes
me seconds to wait for the shock of cold to leave my lungs, breathe,
and dive back in. I paddle with strength and speed I didn’t even know
I was capable of. The water pushes against me hard, harder than any
water I’ve ever been in. I squint against the sting of salt water and
sand in my eyes. I can hear my heart in the silence of the even
strokes of my arms. For all the commotion on the surface, down here
it’s just a rustle.
When I surface for air, I’m a little more than halfway to her. The
tide has risen severely in seconds, and it isn’t stopping. I turn to
look back at the shore. I can make out a cluster of orange and blue
where lifeguards and cops crowd the beach. And then there’s Layla
screaming my name. It could be anyone, really, but it isn’t. It’s
Layla, screaming my name.
Coach Bellini always says, “ Know your finish line. It isn’t
getting to one end of the pool first. It’s making it back first. Swim
to it. Swim back. ” That’s not what I’ve done. When I turn around to
dive again, I can’t see the set of arms waving at me in the distance
anymore. I’m farther away from shore than I had thought. There is the
second huge wave. Green, dark, and cold.
It swallows me whole before I can catch my breath.
I was born at sea.
Or so my mother said. They were in my dad’s rented summer rowboat
having one of their seaside picnics way out on the peninsular nook of
Manhattan Beach and the rest of Brooklyn. That’s when she went into
labor. I’ve always pictured her in the middle of biting her sandwich,
then dropping it and putting her arms around her stomach with me
inside. And my dad all flustered with his glasses practically falling
off his nose, not knowing if they’d make it to the dock in time. Mom
said she grabbed at the sides of the boat, and he tried to row at the
rhythm of her breaths until they reached the dock and she could start
pushing. But they didn’t make it to the dock, and I was born right
there in the water.
When I was little, my mom would tell me this story every night
before I went to bed, after all the other fairy-tale books had been
exhausted. It’s funny-I haven’t thought about that in a long time.
•••
The morning sun lashes my eyes like a whip.
I roll over and cough up sand and water. I pick at something stuck
in my teeth. It comes off on the tip of my finger. It looks like a
contact lens. I start to think of what I must have swallowed in that
water, but it’s really best not to.
My body feels like I’ve been pressed together by a set of boulders
and then shaken-and then stirred.
I want to stand, but I can’t figure out what hurts more-the
dryness scratching its way down my throat, the salt burning at my tear
ducts, or my legs aching all the way down to the bone. I want to
burrow in the sand until the itch along my skin goes away. The back of
my skull is heavy. I can only lift it for a moment to see where I am.
The sky-overcast but still white-hot where the sun is hiding-spins. I
catch a glimpse of the boardwalk and the Wonder Wheel, and I’m a
little relieved that heaven looks a lot like home.
My ears pop, and there is a warm emptiness where the water was
clogged. My heart pounds, and it feels like someone is playing a bass
drum right beside my head. I can hear sirens and four-wheelers far,
far away. I can hear crabs making their way up the beach, the surf
racing to suck them back into the water. My eyelids are heavy but I
fight to keep them open. For a moment, just a moment, I fear I’m not
really alive, because I must have drowned. I must have.
I try to stand again, and everything hurts too much for me to be
dead.
“Down there!” someone shouts. A dude’s voice.
“Where?” A girl’s voice.
“By the pile of garbage.”
“Which pile?”
“Where all the wood is.” He sounds exasperated, like he’s too hot
and too tired to be out here.
“Ohmigod.” I know her voice. “Ohmigod. Ohmigod. Ohmigod.”
“Layla, stay in the car!” he says. “You’re not even supposed to be
on patrol with me!”
Feet hit the sand and run.
Engine turns off.
Guy grunts.
Second set of feet on sand.
Hands on my chest. “Tristan?” Her hands on my chest.
I keep my eyes shut, which isn’t hard to do, because I’ve never
wanted to go back to sleep so bad before, not even during homeroom
with Mr. Adlemare. My heart skips, because I know she’s going to do
it. She doesn’t even press her ear on my chest or check the pulse at
my wrist, which is the first thing we are certified to do. Good thing
too, because the bass drum has moved from my head to inside my chest.
Her fingers slide into my mouth and push my jaw open. Now, I can’t say
I haven’t dreamt about this moment before, because when your best
friend suddenly transforms into the girl every guy notices walking
along the beach, believe me, it’s the only thing to think about.
I press the back of my tongue to the roof of my mouth so her CPR
doesn’t choke me. I’ve had enough of nearly drowning for the day. Her
lips are warm, like leaning your face up at the sky and wishing the
sun would kiss you, and it does. It really does.
I can’t help it. I fight the ache in my arms and press her down
against me. I touch my tongue against hers and taste the salt on her
bottom lip.
Now, I should remember that the last time I tried to kiss her was
on my seventh birthday during pin-the-tail-on-the-donkey. She pinned
the sticker on my cheek, so I kissed her, because when you’re seven, a
kiss from a boy is the worst kind of punishment. That time she slugged
me on the chest and ran to my mom. She’s gotten stronger since then.
Her fist comes down on my chest like a hammer.
“Damn,” I go, “you hit like a dude.”
Her lips are open, all shocked like whatever she was going to yell
at me is lodged in her throat. I don’t know if I’ll ever be able to
look at her without thinking of this moment. Her entire face is red,
and her cheeks puff up in that way they do when she’s so angry she
can’t stand it.
“On the bright side, you saved me,” I go. I can’t stop from
grinning. “Right?”
“Looks like he didn’t need CPR after all,” says a strange guy’s
voice. I notice him for the first time, a guy so orange that his white
hoodie radiates against his skin. He’s got muscles that put boulders
to shame, even though his face doesn’t look older than mine by much.
He brings his radio to his lips and mumbles something into it. The
feedback pinches my eardrums.
“Hey, man,” I say. I try to nod my chin up in the universal
guy-salute, but my neck’s too stiff and I must look like a spaz.
“Don’t act like anything hurts all of a sudden,” Layla says. Why’s
she so mad anyway? It was just a kiss.
“Look, I’m sorry. I didn’t know it was you,” I lie. “I thought it
was some hot EMT coming to my rescue.”
Orange guy chuckles and talks into his radio some more. “The
actual EMTs are on their way if you want to play dead some more.”