A megaphoned voice bombarded the air.
“It’s my age group next,” Tammy said, then turned and walked towards the shoreline.
Orchid moved to a spot near the water’s edge, among other onlookers. She saw Phoenix wading into the chill sea with dozens of triathletes. At the starter’s sound, he took several long strides, transitioned into a neat dive, and then plunged with swift strokes into the roiling surface. He moved fluidly. Within minutes, his white cap and black tri-suit blended with the others, and she lost track of him.
She stood facing the water, shielding her eyes from the sun. Then, the phrase“risk of drowning”infiltrated her imagination. The undertow dragging him deep. His leg seizing into a cramp, unable to kick his way to the surface. Avid racers churning the water above him. Damn her over-active imagination! She executed the box breath Tammy had taught her, imagining the equal sides of a box with the number four on each side.
The first swimmers rounded the buoy and headed back towards shore. The early wave of swimmers emerged from the water, dripping, stripping off wetsuits and dashing to their waiting bikes. Phoenix sprinted by in the melee.
As she turned towards the bike path, she saw a hulking, dark-clothed figure approaching her. Something familiar in his appearance shivered goose bumps over her arms. His gait hunched forward, as if fighting a storm only visible to him.
The man vaguely reminded her of Phoenix. Except his straight nose flared at the bottom, his jaw clenched in a straight line, his hair waved coarser. A faded Harley tee shirt was shoved into black jeans, which fell in one dark line over boots the size of feral cats.
When he reached her spot in the shade, he slowed and pointed a meaty chin towards her.
Without meaning to, Orchid took a step back. Instead of warm blue eyes, inky black ones pierced hers.
“Phoenix in the water?” His voice emitted like a low growl.
“Um. No.” She felt like a slip of light in her Keds and hoodie against his darkness.
He stuck out a hand tattooed with a snake’s unhinged mandible. Serpents wound up both arms growing as wide as the circumference of his biceps until they disappeared under his short sleeves, and there were sharp tails emerging on either side of his neck. They slithered like twin protectorates.
“I’m Caleb.” He took her slender palm in his callused one.
“Oh, Phoenix’s brother! How’d you know who I was?”
“I saw you at the Pyramid Club.”
“For like two seconds. In the dark.”
He cast her a side eye. “True. Phoenix told me he was bringing you.”
The thought of being a conversation topic deepened her inhale. Validation by a darling of the advertising world. She tried to pay it back with the scant information she had on this taciturn brother. “Phoenix wasn’t expecting you here. He said triathlons aren’t your thing.”
He snorted and waved a humorless hand over his black-on-black get-up, down to his motorcycle boots. “I’m not exactly the tri type.”
It wasn’t just self-deprecation, or even judgment on the diverse athletes competing. Orchid sensed an edge of self-loathing. “I don’t know that there’s any one type. I’m sure– “
He cut her off. “I’m only here because our mom made me promise. Walkers stick together.” He high-pitched his voice in imitation of their mother.
Orchid pictured what must be a close-knit relationship… or not. “How nice to have family that cares. I’m an only child,” she added as evidence. Even though she knew her hurt bled darker than missing a sibling.
Caleb turned to study her shift in her tone.
“Do you have any tattoos?” he asked.
Her head swiveled. The snake tattoos on either side of his neck craned with their owner. “No. Why?”
“It’s usually the things that cause great angst or pride that drive people to tattoo.”
In that instant, she understood that feelings ran deep in this tough-looking guy. Below the faded fabric and armor of ink lay tenderness and insight. “Then your brother should have awards imprinted all over him.”
Caleb’s lips twitched.
She wondered if it was too late to take back her inane statement.
After a moment, he answered her. “If you knew him, you’d know it’s not about winning, but making people feel something.”
