Disbelief froze me solid before pure rage shook me loose. “What did you just say?”
And I suppose she had no real reason to fear me, so she kept going, didn’t read my sudden step toward her as aggression.
“I just…” She went quiet. “I just couldn’t give up UCL for Exeter. Not when it’s one of the best medicine programs in the world. And not when I can see what it’d be like, us at uni together. We’d close ourselves off, and—”
“You got in?”
At least she had the decency to look ashamed.
“You got into Exeter?” I tried again.
“Yeah, but like I said, it—”
“You told me they rejected y—”
“I just didn’t know how t—”
“You lied to me.”
“I’m sorry, James.” Her eyes were welling up, but she was just sorry she’d been caught.
“Why am I not good enough for you?”
She came toward me, tried to hold me, but I stepped back.
“I promise it’s not like that.”
“So it’s what? You just wanted to mooch off my family as long as you could and then disappear?”
Her face rearranged itself from sorrow back to anger.
“That’s a fucked-up thing to say, James. This fucking holiday was your idea. Your family’s idea! I didn’t ask to come.”
“But you were perfectly happy taking the handout.”
At this point, I could hear myself. I wanted to stop, wanted to apologize, but I couldn’t. All I could hear wasYou’re not good enough. You’re not good enough. You’re not good enough.On a loop.
“Fuck you, James. I’m going back to the villa.”
“You can’t go back on your own. You need someone to help you up over the verge and walk you back.”
“I’m sure Will can help. Either way, better than staying here and bearing the brunt of your fucked-up mommy issues.”
I physically recoiled from the blow. “Sure, leave. Just like everyone else does.”
Tears and rage filling her eyes, she stalked to the edge of the rock, prepared to jump down.
“How can you blame people for leaving, James, when you make it so hard to stay?”
It was the most painful thing she could have said. In that moment, all I knew was hurt and rage. It was reckless of me, but as she began to spring away from the rock, I gave her a solid shove in the back, with a “Fuck you.” But I’d mistimed it, shoved too soon. My aim was also a little too high, sending her chest keeling over, her whole body then twisting on her toes, as if to ensure she could give me that last look of shock and betrayal. I grappled with thin air as she fell, saw the back of her head crack against the rock, and the side of her body dash againstit, too, a moment after. She crashed into the waves, doubtless into more hard granite below.
For a moment, I was ready to spring, dive in, scoop her up, and swim back to shore. But I thought of her panicked, flailing limbs, thought of how likely they were to drag us both down, thought of what she might say if I saved her, how it could ruin my life. And so instead, I stood paralyzed, tears falling from my eyes. I just watched. Watched to see if her head of blond-threaded braids would reemerge. And I thought I caught a glimpse of a hand, heard a spluttered cry, but it was hard to be sure with the wind whipping around my ears.
In the end, I turned my back and sat down cross-legged. I watched the waves lapping gently against the shore. And when a minute or two had passed, I dove into the water. It was as I began to swim back that I saw her not far from the rock, the back of her head and stripy swimsuit bobbing face down in the water. I recalled absentmindedly a fact she’d once told me about things floating in salt water and sinking in fresh. We were in the pool where we’d first met, taking turns to see how long we could sit at the bottom. It was the day we’d shared our first kiss.
When I arrived back on the shore, tears still falling, not quite believing it had happened, I choked out the best story I could. Chioma swam out too far and got in trouble. I couldn’t save her. Will insisted on swimming back out but failed to find her. The local authorities never managed to retrieve her body and ruled the death a tragic accident, which everyone seemed to accept and quickly move on from. Except her parents, who kept pointing to her second-place swimming medal from when she was fifteen.
For a couple of years, I kept feeling like I’d get found out. But despite her parents’ appeals, despite the truth of what happened, I eventually accepted that I’d gotten away with it. And even though therewere days I still missed Chioma, I knew there were other girls out there who could think me special, worthy of love and attention. Girls like Chioma.
