Fen
Two summers ago
I was in a daze.That’s the only explanation I have for why I thought Eddie and I could sneak inside the villa without anyone noticing. It was nearly one in the morning—past house curfew. OfcourseMama was waiting in her nightgown on the bench by the staircase. I just didn’t expect her to be sitting in the dark.
She turned to us like a haunted doll in a horror movie, face lit eerily by her phone’s screen, and I couldn’t tell if she was angry or upset. That couldn’t be good.
“Don’t tell Dad I let you drive his car,” Eddie whispered as he closed the Mediterranean wrought iron security gate in front of the door. “I forgot the code. You re-larm it. Relarm. Ha! Rlaaarm.” He snorted a laugh and finally looked across the foyer. “Oh, shiiit… Mama. You scared me. What’s that movie where the doll is haunted? You know the one, Fen.”
I didn’t answer because he was obviously still drunk, and that was the main reason why tonight was such a disaster. The other being that my brother thought he was a god.
“Why haven’t you answered my texts?” Mama asked me. Not Eddie. Even though he was eighteen and would start college in the fall. He was the oldest. “I’ve been calling like the world is coming to an end. Do you think I enjoy leaving voicemails? I do not.”
“My phone isn’t working. It got wet. I need to put it in rice or something. So much for that waterproof thing.”
“It’s only waterproof to a certain deepness, duh,” Eddie said, kicking off his shoes.
“Depth,” I corrected wearily. And what would he know? Nothing, that’s what.
Mama hurried across the dark foyer, nightgown swishing, and stopped in a slant of moonlight that streamed through the door gate. As she pushed dark curls away from her face, her gaze jumped from Eddie (disgust—she knew he was drunk) to my face (angry that I was involved) to the watery footprints on the terra-cotta tile around my sneakers. “What is this? You’re soaked? What happened? Are you okay? Fennec? Why won’t you answer me?”
When Jasmine Sarafian asks Too Many Questions, it’s only a matter of time. She fires them like a volley of arrows, knowing one will hit its mark and kill you.
“He jumped in the dam.Kapoosh!” Eddie said. “And saved a girl who was drowning when we were checking out a band at Betty’s.”
You freakin’ peanut brain. I swear.… How could I help him when he wastryingto get us caught? I mean, that’s what it felt like.
Mama went very still. “You were out at the dam?”
“Sorry,” Eddie said, shrugging. “Some friends talked us into it. You know how it is.”
“Us? You took Fen? I know what kids do out there, Eddie. They drink and get high. Your brother just turned sixteen!”
“Never too young to be a hero,” Eddie said, golden face dimpling as he flashed her a drunken smile. “Be proud, Mama.”
Oh, how I was hoping to avoid this conversation. If Eddie had been smarter—and trust me, he was not—he would’ve lied. Because listening to a band that was playing at Betty’s on the Pier was exactly where we were not supposed to be. Betty’s was a bar with a pavilioned stage at the end of its pier. If you were old enough to pay the cover charge, you got to watch the show under its outdoor pavilion. If you weren’t? Well… you caught shows from boats around the pier—or a little way off, where Blue Snake River met the lake, up on the Condor Dam. BYOB, and bring your younger brother along to lug the beer from the car while you’re partying with your friends.
Is drinking on the dam dangerous at night? Yes. Is it dumb? Absolutely. Everyone’s gone there to catch free shows at Betty’s for years. It’s practically a Condor Lake tradition, and the cops only bust it up at the end of the month when they need to make their quotas.
“Fennec,” Mama said, “I think you need to explain about this girl. Is it true?”
I tried to make my voice sound calm. “The dam is dark at night. She fell over the railing and went in the water. I think shehit her head on the rocks—she floated down toward the lake, and no one was helping her.”
“The band was loud,” Eddie clarified unhelpfully. “We didn’t hear her.”
Weren’t paying attention was more like it. My brother never paid attention to anyone but himself. “Anyway, I dove in and swam. I found her.”
“She wasn’t breathing,” Eddie added.
She died. I think she died. For a minute. A few seconds. I think she was dead.
There was no breath.
No life.
“What?”Mama said, eyes widening.
I just wish Eddie would have kept that between us. He was the one who nearly had a breakdown back on the beach and begged me not to tell our mom. Now he was yapping like this? I didn’t know if it was because he was drunk or just not bright upstairs.
