Swim to Me

by Betsy Carter

  “So, young man, you like to swim?” asked her father.

  He was clueless; he had no idea how to talk to anyone, much less his own son.

  Delores tried to move the conversation along. “Westie’s never seen an elephant before. This is his first,” she said.

  Roy pointed to Nehru. “She’s big, isn’t she?”

  Westie nodded, his eyes filling with the sight of the creature.

  “Would you like to meet her?” asked Delores. Westie looked up at her with a “Can I really do this?” expression on his face.

  “Go on,” she said. “Nehru’s real nice, you’ll like her. Your dad will introduce you.”

  “You think?” asked Roy, under his breath.

  “It’ll be fine,” she said. “Take him.”

  Roy went to lift up Westie, who held on to Delores’s legs. “It’s okay,” she said to him. “He’s going to lift you up so you can pat the elephant.” Westie tentatively disengaged himself from Delores’s legs.

  Roy scooped the boy into his arm and waded back into the water. Westie looked like a cub snuggled against his father’s broad, tan chest. He’s so pale and new, thought Delores, and it made her wonder when people started to look used up. With his free hand, Roy patted Nehru on her chest. He urged Westie to do the same. Tentatively, Westie poked at the animal with one finger. He poked again and again. Roy took his hand and held it up so he could pat Nehru’s flank. Nehru bent her head and Roy whispered something Delores couldn’t hear. The elephant sucked in some water and squirted it out her trunk. Westie giggled as the spray rained down on him. Contained within the arc of the spray was a perfect, fleeting rainbow. Now her father and Westie were splashing water back at Nehru. As they did this, Delores had the bizarre notion that maybe Westie might become comfortable with Nehru, Roy with Westie, and that maybe even the four of them could eventually add up to something that resembled a family.

  Before she went off to the television station that afternoon, Delores asked her father if Westie might stay with him until early evening. At first, he hesitated, saying that he’d have to run it by Wulf. Then he considered what it might be like to bring Westie to the Giant Café after work. They’d eat hamburgers and key-lime pie. He’d introduce him to Rex, and if Mr. Hanratty came by, he’d stand up and say: “Mr. Hanratty, I’d like you to meet my son, West Walker, though we call him Westie now.” He’d take him back to his trailer to show him where he lived, and if there was time, they’d visit Lucy.

  “Yeah, that’ll be okay,” he said to Delores. “I’ll take the kid.”

  THE AIR-CONDITIONING in the van breathed out warm air. It was so hot that, from time to time, Thelma and Delores would have to wipe the steam off their sunglasses. Thelma claimed she had better things to spend her money on than air-conditioning. Yet when Delores tried to open a window, she got annoyed. “I’m not paying to cool down all of Florida,” she said, yanking on one of her driving gloves. So Delores sat as still as she could, feeling the sweat under her arms and down between her breasts.

  They drove in silence for the first half of the trip. Then Thelma began talking as if they’d been in a conversation the whole time. “I must say, I used to have respect for Mr. Sommers, but over time I’ve come to think of him as something of an ass.” She kept her eyes on the road. “That nice man who runs the Giant Café has been setting up his new café at the Springs over the past week. Rex is his name, and I’ll tell you this, he’s a real gentleman, something you don’t see very often.”

  Delores jumped in: “Did Sommers give Armando my job?”

  “No,” said Thelma. “He just put him in your spot while you were gone.”

  “How do you know he didn’t give it to him for good?”

  “Oh, he’d never do that. Right now Sommers is golden. And it’s all because of you. He’s not going to do anything to change that.”

  Ever since her trip to New York, Delores had been thinking a lot about her television job. Her mother had called her “cheap,” and Delores couldn’t dislodge the word from her brain. And now that Westie was here, did she really want him to see her sitting half-naked in a bathtub on television?

  “I’m tired of the bathtub thing. And besides, it’s not dignified.” She cocked her head as she said dignified. She’d never used that word before.

  Thelma glanced at Delores. “The thing about dignity is that it’s more how you feel than how you look. If sitting in the bathtub humiliates you, then I would be the first person to tell you not to do it. People like us hold our dignity inside, and let the rest of the world judge us however they want. It’s humiliation that’s unbearable.” She banged her fist against the horn and shouted “You stupid louse” to the blue Dodge that had just cut her off. She went on: “You know Rex, the man I was telling you about? He’s almost eight feet tall. People stare and say stupid things to him all the time like ‘Hey, big fella, how’s the air up there?’ He’s always very respectful, no matter how insulting they get. Eventually, they come around to liking him just for him, and he never lets on that they’ve made witless fools of themselves. That’s what I call dignity.”

  When they pulled into the parking lot at the studio, Thelma reached across Delores to put her gloves in the glove compartment. “Whatever you decide to do, I’ll stand behind you,” she said, not wanting to make any more of it than that.

  They rode up to the eighth floor where they headed straight to Sommers’s office. His receptionist greeted them with a big hello, then buzzed her boss. “Fishgirl is back,” she whispered, then giggled over something he said. “You betcha.” She hung up. “Have a seat, doll. Thelma, he’ll be just a minute.”

  When Sommers finally called them in, he was sitting on his couch, his arm around the back of it. He was staring out the window and chewing on a Fig Newton.

  “So how was the Big Apple?” he asked Delores, still looking out the window. “Makes this place look like some rathole in the middle of nowhere, doesn’t it?”

  “I like it here,” she said.

  “Well, don’t get too used to it. You and I aren’t going to spend the rest of our careers in this swamp, I’ll tell you that.”

  Delores took a seat across from him. Thelma sat on the other side of the couch. “What about Armando?” asked Delores. “Is he going to spend the rest of his career in this swamp?”

  Sommers threw back his head and laughed extravagantly. “She slays me, she really does,” he said to Thelma.

  She caught a whiff of stale onions, then said: “Delores isn’t trying to be funny.”

  “Oh, I know what she’s getting at,” he said, turning to Delores and raising a finger. “He subbed for you when you were away. I told you before you went to New York that I’d take care of who would fill in for you. Right before you left, he came to me and said that our viewers tune in to see Delores Taurus, not just any mermaid. He said that no one could replace you, so we shouldn’t even try. He suggested we do something very straightforward and simple, then said he would like to try it. I figured, what the hell? He’s good looking; he’s got that ethnic thing going and a great head of hair. He did a couple of dry runs and was good. His timing was perfecto. Says he learned from the best.”

  “Hmm,” said Delores, scowling.

  A wormy smile crept across Sommers’s face. “You worried that your cute boyfriend’s gonna steal your job?”

  “He’s not my boyfriend.”

  “You’ve got that right. You know that your little friend plays on the other side of the street, don’t you?”

  “What do you mean?”

  “Excuse me, Mr. S., but this conversation is completely inappropriate.” Thelma sat up and put her hands on her knees.

  “Oh, come now, Thelma. Everyone knows that Armando likes boys.”

  Delores suddenly felt light-headed and had to grip the sides of the chair to steady herself. “I don’t understand.”

  “It’s okay, child, nothing for you to worry about.” Now Thelma was glaring at Sommers, who didn’t seem to
notice.

  “Would you like me to spell it out for you?”

  “No, not really,” said Delores.

  She remembered the night after the hurricane when they were driving back to the studio. Roberta Flack had come on the radio and he’d said something about her song being “X-rated.” She’d put her hand on his knee and he’d just sat there, didn’t react or make a move. She remembered thinking that it felt no different than resting her hand on a stack of books.

  “I don’t want to do the weather from the bathtub anymore,” she said.

  Thelma leaned forward while Sommers tried to dig a piece of the fig cookie from between two molars. Not bothering to take his finger out of his mouth, he said something incomprehensible.

  Delores and Thelma exchanged looks, and Delores thought about what Thelma had said earlier about dignity and humiliation. The news about Armando, Sommers mocking her to her face, this was the kind of humiliation Thelma was talking about. Unbearable.

  “Now I don’t understand,” said Sommers.

  “No more bathtub. End of story. That’s all she wrote,” said Thelma.

  Sommers took his finger out of his mouth. His face reddened to the color of clay. “Are you telling me what you will or won’t do?” he shouted at Delores.

  “Yes, I guess I am,” she said, not believing that she’d just talked back to him like that.

  Thelma nodded at Delores, encouraging her to continue.

  “Do you have any idea what you’re saying, who you’re talking to?” he was still yelling.

  “I do.” She brushed her bangs off her face with the back of her hand.

  Everything about Sommers—his wiry hair, rat-a-tat speech, jerky motions—bespoke a man whose fuse was about to blow. Delores could picture what it would be like when he finally exploded: fragments of his tiny, sharp teeth; shreds of his expensive shirts; bits of Fig Newton sinking into the shag carpet and splattering against the ceiling-to-floor windows.

  He turned to Thelma. “To what do you attribute her sudden change in attitude?” he asked, trying to contain himself.

  “Ask her,” said Thelma.

  “To what do you attribute . . .”

  “I heard you,” said Delores, gaining confidence. “It’s just that I have a job to do and I do it pretty well. But how can anyone take me seriously if I’m doing it in a bathtub?”

  “You’re a star,” he said. “I made you a goddam star. Do you know how many girls like you would give their eyeteeth to be where you are?”

  “If I may say, I think it’s the other way around. I think Delores has made you a star,” said Thelma.

  Sommers bit down on his ring. Beads of sweat bubbled up on his upper lip. Maybe he’d gone too far.

  Delores had never known what it felt like to be repelled by someone until this moment. So searing and absolute was her contempt for him that it bordered on pleasurable. Something deep inside of her went cold, and her words, when they came, were crisp and brusque.

  “I’ll wear a green, fitted dress that suggests a mermaid. I’ll keep the stupid stuff about it being a rainy day for Mr. and Mrs. Jones’s twenty-fifth wedding anniversary. I’ll even have my hair wet and slicked back if you like. But that’s it. No bathtub.”

  “Not a bad compromise,” said Thelma, folding her arms in front of her chest.

  “So that’s what it will take to keep you on the team?” asked Sommers, sounding relieved.

  “That’s it,” she said.

  “Wet hair, eh? That’s a nice touch. Wish I had thought of it myself.” His compliment was meant to breach the gap that had just been hollowed out between them. Although Delores smiled, they both knew that something had changed.

  PART THREE

  Twenty-four

  The Aqua Zoo would be the first of its kind—Dave Hanratty wasn’t interested in anything that wasn’t—and it would change everything that had come before it. The colors of the Springs, the familiar navy and white, had now become aqua and palm-frond green. The Giant Café had been redesigned in the shape of a carousel, with a bright blue and green metal roof.

  Over the past three months, boastful new signs had sprung up along the roads nearby promising things like: THE GIANT CAFÉ: THE BIGGEST AND BEST FOOD IN THE WORLD and THE AQUA ZOO: SPECTACULAR AND AMAZING BEYOND YOUR WILDEST IMAGINATION. Even the gift shop bragged about NEVER BEFORE SEEN TREASURES FROM EARTH AND SEA. Its inventory, which had always been skimpy, now overflowed with stuffed blue elephants and yellow chimpanzees with green and blue striped swim trunks sewn on their little bottoms. There were packets of magic flowers that sprang to life when you put them in a glass of water, and wooden pop guns with the words Aqua Zoo, Weeki Wachee Springs decaled onto them. The decals went on everything Hanratty could get his hands on: seashells, umbrellas, sun visors, coloring books, and boxes of taffy and pecan delights. There were bins filled with licorice, button candy, gumballs, and all kinds of chocolate treats. The faithful could buy banners and bumper stickers and big, glossy books with colored pictures of all the animals. Of course there was the mermaid inventory: little dolls stitched by hand, with red yarn for hair and with tails made out of sparkly material, and, for the overly zealous, full mermaid costumes to be spun to order by Barbara and Bobby Wynn, the finest, and only, mermaid tailors in the world.

  Hanratty’s genius was his ability to create a buzz months in advance of the actual opening without anyone having an inkling of just why they were so excited. As soon as he found out that Delores’s mother worked at Cool, he began sending her envelopes filled with press material about the Aqua Zoo, “just in case your mother might be interested.” He posted billboards on Route 50 that read: FLORIDA LIVE, LIKE YOU’VE NEVER SEEN IT BEFORE; WANT PLASTIC DUCKS AND MICE? KEEP GOING EAST. FOR THE REAL THING, TURN AROUND AND HEAD WEST; FLORIDA FAKE OR FLORIDA WILD? YOU CHOOSE. All had the Weeki Wachee logo of a mermaid silhouetted against a clamshell, the words Weeki Wachee Springs, and the site’s address. They were just the kind of provocative messages that would pique a person’s curiosity. The folks at Disney protested wildly, but what could they do? These were America’s highways, and even they didn’t own them.

  A master of psychology, Hanratty was mindful of the pride and solidarity that uniforms engendered. Even before the Aqua Zoo opened, he made everyone at the Springs wear green camp shirts with blue elephants lumbering over their breast pockets, aqua Bermuda shorts, and white tennis shoes with white socks. No one protested except for Thelma who, with some trepidation, told Hanratty that she was not a clown and therefore saw no need to dress in costume. “Of all people, Thelma, I thought it would be you who would embrace what I am trying to foster here,” Hanratty had replied. “You and I are kindred spirits, what they call old souls, don’t you think? I have always savored the understanding we have between us. But if you don’t want to wear the uniform, far be it from me to cause you discomfort. I value your friendship and partnership far more than I do your dress.” By the end of the conversation, Thelma had agreed to the shirt and the aqua pants—only hers would be full-length—and, of course, she retained the option of wearing a windbreaker, even if it did have a blue elephant over the left breast pocket.

  One afternoon, as she and Rex were going over purchase orders for new silverware for the café, they got to talking about Hanratty. Thelma said she thought he was some kind of a genius, though she couldn’t really get a grip on who he was. Rex said, “He’s a man who wears his head on his sleeve and keeps his heart to himself. He is quite conscious of creating his own mythology, and so he will act with his head despite his heart’s inclinations. That’s good for us.”

  Rex had a way of setting things straight in her mind. She’d never thought about anyone consciously creating his own mythology. But, of course, that’s exactly what Hanratty was doing. A man like that doesn’t construct an empire and leave his ego behind. Fine, she thought, let him do it. Just as long as my girls and the Springs are okay, let him build whatever empire he wants.

  WHAT EVERYONE WOULD alwa
ys remember about the summer before the opening of the Aqua Zoo was the smell in the air. It was sweet, like maple syrup. There was no explanation for it, other than that optimism and anticipation give off their own sweet aroma. So who’s to say that the trees and the air weren’t intoxicated as well? Even Roy, who normally kept his head down and went about his work, now had reason to talk to people. Thelma and Delores decided that, after a brief time living in the girls’ dorm, Westie would be better off sleeping on a cot in his dad’s trailer at night. Although he spent most of the daytime with Delores, the constant presence of a little boy on the campgrounds made everyone a little nicer, a little more playful.

  The clowns let Westie ride around in their cars with them and taught him how to make rude, honking sounds whenever he lifted his leg. The acrobats taught him how to do cartwheels and to fold himself up into a heap the size of a sand castle. Because Lucy and Westie were roughly the same size, the chimp thought nothing of grabbing the boy by the hand or rolling him onto the ground. And to think that Roy used to worry that Westie would become a mama’s boy.

  Dave Hanratty had never known a kid like Westie. He liked that he was squat and stubby like his father, and he seemed regular in the way that children of circus performers aren’t. Often, he would ask Westie’s reaction to things to gauge how they would work in the show. One afternoon, they sat down by the Springs together as the clowns rehearsed a new act. The clowns would squirt the elephants with water from their seltzer bottles until the elephants would get so put out, they would dunk the clowns with their trunks. Han-ratty watched Westie’s reaction. “Do you like it when the elephants dunk the clowns?” he asked Westie. “No,” said Westie, who seemed scared by the power of the elephants. “It’s stupid.” Later, when they changed the act to the elephants squirting water back at the clowns, Westie laughed so hard he had to lean forward. Hanratty knew the act would work.

  Like his sister, Westie couldn’t seem to bring himself to say “Daddy.” The best he could do was “Doy.” “Doy, watch this,” he’d shout, before jumping into a pile of hay. “Doy, I need hamburger.” “Doy, let’s go see Nehru.” “Doy” was so much more than Roy had ever hoped for that, at times, his heart would jump at the sound of the special name.