The water tasted cold, like old stone and moss. Even in the summer, it was still so chilly it took my breath away. My body slipped through, went under, and I opened my eyes against the deep green. I stayed down as long as I dared.
When I came back up, Sam had already jumped in and come to the surface. He was looking for me. I swam away from the group, around the corner of the rock cliff, where the others couldn’t see us, and when I looked back, I saw that he had caught sight of me and was following, long smooth strokes against the water.
My feet hit the bottom near the shore, and I stood up. So did Sam. My hair was in my eyes and I pushed it away. His body was slick and wet and I thought about my T-shirt, sitting in the sun at the top of the cliff, and how it would feel to put it back on after being so cold. My sports bra would soak right through it, but the cotton would be warm on my skin. I thought these things so I wouldn’t think about Sam, but when he took a step closer, that became impossible.
Neither of us was smiling.
It felt like we were balancing on the knife’s edge of something bigger than we were, something we couldn’t control.
“Let me give you some advice about Lithia,” I said. “This town is beautiful. But be careful where you jump.”
15.
now
I’m back at my house. I open the door, praying.
Please. This time let it be different.
Please.
“Hello?”
Nothing,no one says back.
Okay. Okay.
Maybe this is a dream.
It’s not, I know it’s not.
Maybe I’m dead.
I’m not, I know I’m not.
The framed family photo on the wall is from last fall. The new bed we bought for our cat, Yolo, because he’d torn up his old one, is sitting in front of the fireplace.
We all thought it was super funny when we named our cat Yolo.
Because it stands for “you only live once” and cats have nine lives. Get it?
They don’t actually have to worry about YOLO.
I keep walking around the house. The bedspread in my parents’ room is the one they got this spring. Jack’s summer league team picture is up on his bulletin board.
I have the long thin scar on my forearm where a stick dragged across me sharp and neat when I was hiking earlier this summer, in June.
I still have all the marks from the last year. On the outside of me, and inside. I feel them. It’s still today.
I don’t think I’m dreaming
or dead
or trapped in the past.
Just
alone.
