Watch Over Me

by Mila Gray

  He’s quick to walk it back, shaking his head. “That’s not what I’m saying.”

  But it’s what he’s thinking. I scowl at him, angry but also wrong-footed, because I’m wondering if Franklin might be right. Is that why Cole ran away? Because he didn’t want to get into trouble? I can’t believe that Cole would ever do something like this. I mean … I don’t think he would do something like this.

  “You got renters’ insurance?” he asks. “The house has got a fair amount of fire and smoke damage.”

  “No,” I say, my heart sinking.

  He squeezes my shoulder. “The place isn’t going to be inhabitable for a while,” he says. “Do you have somewhere you can stay?”

  I stare at the broken front door and the soot-covered walls of the living room. “No,” I tell him. We don’t have anywhere.

  TRISTAN

  What the hell were they thinking?” Gunnie asks me as we hurry to the water’s edge.

  “They were thinking it was a great day to try kayaking for the first time.”

  Gunnie mutters under his breath. He has a low tolerance for “idiots and morons,” which in his mind refers to ninety-nine percent of the population.

  I’m grinning because, while two kayakers are now clinging to their capsized kayak half a mile from shore in freezing water and choppy conditions, I get to ride the Jet Ski. I can’t lie; bouncing over the waves on route to rescue people does make the Fast and the Furious soundtrack play loudly in my head. Officially, it’s not called a Jet Ski. It’s a personal rescue watercraft. But really, it’s a Jet Ski.

  “I’ll get to rescue people while riding a Jet Ski and flying helicopters,” I told my family when I joined the Coast Guard and they wanted to know what the hell I was thinking.

  “He couldn’t be Tom Cruise in Mission: Impossible, so this is his plan B.” My sister, Dahlia, smirked.

  I laughed along with them all, but to myself I had to admit that Dahlia had pretty much hit the nail on the head. I was thinking more Tom Cruise in Top Gun, though. It’s an old movie from the ’80s, and old movies from the ’80s are one of my many obsessions. No one does heroics, throws a bottle of liquor, or woos women like Tom Cruise in ’80s movies, except maybe Tom Cruise in movies today.

  Gunnie and I rev the Jet Skis and take off, following the coordinates from the helicopter team. I can see the orange bird in the sky anyway, hovering over the kayakers’ location. One day I’m going to be up there in the helicopter—that’s my dream, to make pilot one day—but for now, while I wait for a place to open up at flight school, I’m happy out on the water.

  This stretch of coast, just north of San Diego, is beautiful but also deadly, with strong undertows. Even experienced boaters and kayakers get into trouble, not to mention swimmers. We rescue dozens of people each month. But it’s not all rescue missions, as I tell people when they ask if a coast guard is the same thing as a lifeguard. Coast guards are a branch of the military; lifeguards are not. We seize drugs and weapons that are being smuggled by sea into the US. We deploy to war zones to assist in military operations. Lifeguards do not.

  Gunnie and I reach the kayakers in a couple of minutes. The water closer to shore is a brilliant topaz blue, but out here it’s the color of brushed steel, and the waves are being whipped by a wind that makes it hard to steady the Jet Ski alongside the people who need rescuing. They’re both exhausted from the cold and from treading water. The kayak must have sunk, and I wonder at how lucky they are that they were able to call for help. A few more minutes out here, and I bet the woman would have drowned.

  The guy is wearing a life jacket, but the woman he’s with isn’t. What a gentleman. I reach my hand to the woman, and she takes it gratefully.

  She climbs on behind me and slumps against my back, shivering so hard all I can hear are her teeth chattering. I hand her a life jacket to put on.

  “I’ll have you back on land in no time,” I tell her.

  “Thank you,” she says as Gunnie pulls the man onto his Jet Ski. He’s professional enough not to call the guy an idiot to his face, but I know that’s what he’s thinking. I turn around and tell the woman to hold on. She’s glowering at the guy, who I assume must be her boyfriend, and I wonder if this little misadventure is going to lead to their breakup and hope it does. Guy’s a jerk.

  After the couple is back safely on land and the incident report is all typed up, my shift is finally over. I grab a shower and change, pulling my motorcycle helmet from my locker and checking my phone.

  “Hot date?” Gunnie asks.

  I shake my head and keep my lips sealed. My love life is a constant source of entertainment for Gunnie and the rest of the crew. They think I’m some kind of player, and, as most of them are married, they like to live vicariously through me. They have the wrong idea. I mean, occasionally dates lead places, but mostly where they lead is nowhere. I’ve had a million first dates and no second ones.

  My sister, Dahlia, thinks I’m scared of commitment, which isn’t true. I’ve committed to a lot in my life: my job, for one, my friends, my baseball team, hunting down the best burger on the West Coast, and collecting baseball cards. The latter with a fervor and dedication that Dahlia used to mock me for when we were kids. She doesn’t anymore since the collection in my shoe box is worth close to eighty thousand dollars. She’d argue her own collection of shoe boxes is worth about the same, but I would argue mine brings greater joy, despite the fact I can’t wear mine.

  I’m not scared of commitment. I just haven’t found a person that I want to commit to, I tell her.

  I hurry outside toward my bike, where the girl I rescued just an hour ago is standing. I slow down a beat. She’s all dry now and wearing shorts and a white tank top. And, I can’t help but notice, no bra.

  “Hi,” she says to me.

  “Hi,” I answer.

  She smiles a little coyly. “I just wanted to say thank you. I’m not sure I told you how grateful I am for you saving my life.”

  “You’re welcome,” I answer, a little bemused. She’s waited for me all this time just to tell me that?

  She looks up at me through her lashes and bites her bottom lip. I smile. She’s flirting with me, and she’s pretty. Very pretty, in that blond Southern California way; maybe a few years older than me, around twenty-five. She twirls a strand of hair around a finger. “It was so scary. I thought I was going to drown for sure,” she says.

  I nod. “Yeah, rough seas today. You should have been wearing a life jacket.”

  She nods. “My boyfriend said we didn’t need them, but then when we capsized he took the emergency one for himself.”

  “And he’s still your boyfriend?” I ask her, resting my bag on my bike.

  She shakes her head and looks me straight in the eye. “No.”

  I notice she’s found the time to reapply her makeup—she’s wearing mascara that makes her eyelashes look like arthritic spiders’ legs, and her lips are a red gloss that matches my bike. She rests her hand on the handlebars. The gesture annoys me. It’s presumptuous, like she’s touched a part of my anatomy without my permission.

  “I was wondering if I could buy you a drink to say thanks,” she says to me.

  I pause, recognizing that part of my wants to say yes, but there’s a blurry professional line.

  “I’m busy tonight,” I tell her.

  Her face falls. She swallows her dented pride, and I feel bad. “But I really appreciate you taking the time to say thanks.”

  She brightens at that. “Well, maybe another time?” she asks hopefully.

  “We’re not meant to date people we rescue,” I tell her.

  “Who said anything about dating?” she answers, giving me a mischievous look that makes it abundantly clear she’s after one thing and one thing only—and it’s definitely not my brains or charm.

  “Here’s my number,” she says, handing me a piece of paper. She steps closer to give it to me, her breasts inadvertently on purpose brushing my arm. For a beat, I do thin
k about it. I mean, it’s been a while.

  “Call me if you change your mind,” she says, and presses the piece of paper into my hand, her fingers lingering for a moment on my wrist. I glance down. She’s written her name, Brittany, and her number, alongside a cartoon girl drowning.

  From the corner of my eyes, I see Gunnie exit the building, and so I go for the quick escape. Swinging my leg over my bike, I say a hurried good-bye before revving the engine and tearing out of the lot.

  ZOEY

  You can’t stay here,” Aunt Chrissy says, wringing her hands, twisting the half-dozen rings she’s wearing around and around as though trying to unscrew them from her fingers. “You know I would let you if I could, if we had space, but you know how Javi is.” She looks at me pleadingly as she says it, and I nod.

  “He gets home from work at five a.m., and he needs to sleep,” she goes on. “There just isn’t room for all of you here.”

  “We understand,” I say, forcing a smile. “We just didn’t know where else to go.”

  Chrissy walks over to my mom and puts her arm around her. My mom is looking shell-shocked, as though she’s just received news of a death in the family. “We lost almost everything,” she murmurs, bewildered. “Who would do this?”

  I haven’t told her what I suspect. That it’s the same person who’s been making the phone calls.

  Chrissy pats her on the shoulder. “Let me make you all something to drink. You want some hot chocolate?” She looks at Kate, who is sitting on the sofa, recovered from her shock and now texting like she has to make up for all the lost time, and at Cole, who is sitting beside her kicking his heels against the floor.

  “No,” he spits. “I want my things.”

  “We can’t get them,” I tell him. “It’s not safe there. Not until we find out who started the car fire.”

  “When’s that going to be?” he shouts.

  I take a deep breath. “A few days.”

  “Where are we going to stay until then?” my mom asks, and I realize she doesn’t have an answer. She’s waiting for me to supply one. Aunt Chrissy, much as I love her, can’t help us. She’s barely scraping by working housekeeping at a hotel on the Strip, and her boyfriend, Javi, is a creep.

  “I want to go home,” Cole yells, jumping up and running over to my mom. I intercept him, but he darts around me. “I want my Xbox,” he shouts in her face. She flinches backward, and I have to get between them again and pull him away.

  “Cole,” I say gently, “come on. We’ll get your Xbox, okay? Don’t worry.”

  He looks at me then, and I see the scared little boy hiding behind the angry little monster. I knead his shoulder muscles—taut as tightrope wires—and he starts to relax slightly. Sometimes touch, just a hand on his back or a gentle stroke of his hair, can be enough to defuse him. It doesn’t work this time—just as I think I’ve got him calm, he pulls away from me. “Get off me! I hate you!”

  I stare at him, taken aback. What did I do?

  I still haven’t confronted him about the fire. When the cops brought him back, he was sullen and untalkative, refusing to look me in the eye and claiming that he’d heard the smoke alarm, jumped out the window, then run away because he was scared. He wasn’t in his pajamas, though; he was wearing jeans and his sneakers and a hoodie. I didn’t question it, but I know that Franklin noticed.

  Was it him? I wonder about it, but honestly, I can’t even go there. Not right now. We need a roof over our heads. That’s the priority. I do a quick calculation. We have maybe enough money to pay for a motel for tonight and possibly tomorrow, but then what? I work in a coffee shop and make ten dollars an hour. My mom makes just a little bit more than I do, and between us every cent goes to rent, bills, and getting by. We don’t have enough money to put a deposit on a new place.

  “I guess we could try the shelter,” my mom says, looking at me as though she wants me to make the call.

  I grit my teeth. I’m not going back to a shelter, not with Cole and Kate. I’m not putting them through that again: the sense of uncertainty, the living with a revolving door of strangers, most of whom aren’t exactly the kinds of people you want to be neighbors with. My mom, dark-haired, petite as a sparrow, and delicately featured, looks like a teenager. People often mistake us for sisters, and right now I feel like I’m the oldest sister, and I wish to hell I didn’t.

  “What about Romeo?” Kate suddenly announces.

  “Oh no,” my mom murmurs.

  “Oh God,” I say at the same time.

  “Where’s Romeo?” Cole asks, almost as alarmed as Kate.

  “I’m sure he’s fine,” I say. “He’s a cat. Cats are smart. He probably jumped out the window.”

  “We have to go back for him!” Kate shouts, jumping to her feet. “He’ll be scared. What if he runs off?”

  Romeo is a house cat. He doesn’t ever go outside, given the traffic and other dangers lurking on the block in the form of two rottweilers and a Doberman.

  “We’ll go back for him,” I reassure Kate, who is now verging on hysteria, tears spilling down her cheeks. “We’ll go back, okay? I promise.” I put my arm around her, but she wrenches away from me in anger.

  Cole scowls at me too, and I see hate flash in his eyes—something I’ve never seen before. It shocks me to my core. It must be the fire that’s unsettled him. He’s looking for someone to blame. Or am I mistaking it? Is it guilt? He looks like he’s about to start yelling, but Chrissy intervenes and gives him the TV remote, which thankfully distracts him.

  Just then, Aunt Chrissy’s phone rings. She grabs for it and steps into the bedroom to take the call. I edge toward the door and crane to listen. After we got here an hour ago and I whispered my suspicions to Chrissy, she called a few friends back in Scottsdale to ask if they’d heard anything about my dad getting released from prison.

  “Did you … ? What? … Okay …” I can hear Chrissy talking, her voice breaking. And that’s when I know for sure. I peek through the gap in the door. She’s standing with the phone to her ear, her other hand pressed against her mouth. “Oh my God,” she whispers.

  My legs buckle.

  Chrissy exits the bedroom, her expression almost as fearful and afraid as my mother’s. She looks at me. “Your dad got early release,” she says under her breath so my mom and the others can’t hear. “My friend says he saw him in town at Jim and Rob’s—you know that bar?”

  I nod.

  He’s out. That’s all I can process. Why did no one tell us?

  “And then he vanished,” Chrissy continues. “Word is he left town a few days ago.”

  It feels as if a knife is being shoved between my ribs and right into my heart. He’s out. All I can see is his face—the snarl on his lips as he told me that one day he’d find me and kill me. The fire was no accident. It was arson. And it was him. A warning, a threat, or an actual attempt to kill me. I don’t know.

  Chrissy grips my elbow. “It’s okay,” she whispers.

  I look over at my mom sitting at the table, her mascara smudged around her eyes from the tears she shed earlier. I have to tell her that the man who almost beat her to death, the man I testified against and got sent to jail for eight years, is out after serving only three.

  “How does he know where we are?” I ask Chrissy, my voice trembling.

  She shakes her head. “I don’t know.”

  We changed our last name; we moved to where no one knew us, except for my mom’s sister, Chrissy. None of us are on social media, apart from Kate, but she uses an anonymous name and all her settings are private. She knows the drill. My eyes dart to the door of Chrissy’s apartment.

  I’m so stupid. We are not safe here.

  “We need to leave,” I say in a whisper. We need to get out of here right now.

  Cole is fixated on the TV, and my sister is on her phone. How can I tell them we have to go? How can I tell them that they need to abandon their friends and school and the life we’ve built and start over yet again?

&nb
sp; I have to fight the instinct to sprint for the door. But I can’t run. It’s not possible because a) I don’t have a car anymore, and b) even if I did, I have nowhere to run to.

  And I can’t leave the others.

  “I’m going to call the police,” Chrissy says. “You could get protection.”

  I shake my head at her. “The police? Really? You think they’ll do anything?”

  Chrissy looks away, down at the ground. She knows how I feel about the police. My dad was a cop. The police did nothing to help us before. They rallied around one of their own. It took him almost killing my mom and me and a neighbor providing witness statements for them to actually charge him with anything. So no, I have no faith in the police actually doing their job and helping us. And even if they could do something, it would only be a restraining order, and that’s not going to stop him. It didn’t stop him before.

  I hear a noise and turn around. My mom has pushed back her chair and risen to her feet. “He’s out, isn’t he?” she asks.

  Chrissy looks at me. I nod my head. “Yes.”

  Somehow, my mom manages to stay standing. After a moment, she clears her throat. “I’m going to call Will,” she says.

  I glare at her, angry and upset, but I can’t argue. What other choice do we have?

  TRISTAN

  You want another beer?” Will asks.

  It’s past midnight, and I have to be up at six to hit the gym before work (another thing I’m committed to—take that, Dahlia), but I say yes because this is the last time I’m going to see Will for eighteen months. He’s redeploying to Afghanistan in two days’ time.

  “Let me get this,” I tell him, pulling out my wallet.

  Will’s an old friend of mine from elementary school. When my parents divorced and I moved from Scottsdale to California with my mom eight years ago, Will and I stayed in touch. Will joined the marines straight out of high school. I joined the Coast Guard after I graduated college. Whenever Will’s back from a deployment, we get together to shoot pool and drink beer, sometimes with his friend Kit.