Breathless

by Jennifer Niven

  “I don’t care if you’re part dolphin.”

  It’s the boy from the bar, the boy from our luggage, and now, I guess, he will also be the boy from the beach. I start pummeling him, and he just tightens his grip and drags me toward shore.

  “I need you to chill the fuck out, Ariel.” He is gold from the sun. “You know this is the largest breeding ground for sharks on the East Coast.”

  And all at once I’m thinking about my cousin Danny, Addy’s son, and the rip current, and I see how far out we are, and I don’t know anything about these particular waters here, off the coast of Georgia, or what lives in them. I don’t know the currents, and I don’t know anything. And what if something happened to me? My mom would be completely alone.

  I put my arm around his neck and now I’m holding on, and there’s a tattoo there on his shoulder blade. A compass. Of course. So beautifully, stupidly, perfectly ironic. I’m facing him, my back to the island, and I’m watching all that ocean. I turn my head and there’s the island growing steadily closer and closer, but it’s still a long way away. I keep an eye out for fins.

  In the time it takes us to reach the shallows, I think about how stupid I am, how I can’t afford to be reckless, even as part of me is picturing my dad’s face when he gets the call. Neil Henry? There’s been an accident. If only you hadn’t sent them away.

  We’re close to shore when I let go and break away from him, and now I’m swimming harder and faster than I ever have. I am racing him because I suddenly have to get back to land and feel it underneath me, and because I won’t be outdone by a boy, and no man is going to save me, and he needs to see what he is dealing with. I pull ahead, and then he’s beside me and we’re pushing as hard as we can. I win by a hair, and we collapse onto the beach.

  My body sinks into the sand. Warmth all around me, reaching into my flesh and bone. It’s the first time I’ve felt warm all the way through since May 29. I am tucked away behind my eyelids, as if my head is a room and they are the doors that close me in. The sun is so bright that it’s impossible to shut it all out. One day, someone will walk down this beach and they’ll see an imprint of my body, like a chalk outline, buried deep beneath the sand.

  “What the hell is wrong with you?”

  I open my eyes and he is standing over me.

  “Listen, Calamity Jane, is that it for today or should I stick around? You know what, I’ll help you out. The marsh is that way.” He points in the direction of the trees. “Through there and across Main Road and keep going west till you run out of land. You can’t miss it. Take a swim while you’re there. You’ll love it. There are alligators and poisonous snakes just waiting for you.” He leans over, grabs the shirt lying on the sand, and starts to go. No mention of our interaction at the bar or the fact that I left him my number.

  “Claude,” I say. “My name’s Claude.”

  He turns, walking backward away from me. He holds out his arms. “I don’t fucking care.” And disappears through the dunes.

  * * *

  —

  I go back through the dunes, back through the live oaks, back onto the dirt road. I look for the boy, but I don’t see anyone.

  I pull off my cap, shake out what’s left of my hair. If I could collect all my hair and stick it back onto my head, I would. As I was chopping it off, it never occurred to me to remember that this island is only temporary and I am only temporary and I will need hair when I go to college in the fall. Now I will start freshman year being mistaken for a boy. I dig for my lipstick buried deep in the pocket of my pants. Rub it over my lips. Just in case I see him again. Then I hear a rustling in the brush and I start to run.

  DAY 2

  (PART THREE)

  My heart is still pounding by the time I get to Addy’s. The screen door slams behind me and I call out for my mom. No answer. I call out for Dandelion. No answer. For one terrible second, I wonder if they’ve left me too. I make a beeline for my mom’s room, and there are her things, spread across the dresser and the chair and the bed. There are her clothes in the closet. I breathe. Dandelion appears from nowhere, stretching, yawning. I pick him up and kiss him all over his face.

  In the bathroom, I shed my wet pants and shirt and hat and stand there in my bikini, legs and arms eaten up with bug bites. I scratch at them until they turn into welts, and then I peel off my suit and take the world’s longest shower.

  * * *

  —

  An hour later, I am parked in the window seat, fisherman’s cap hiding what’s left of my butchered hair. My notebooks—the ones holding my bad, overly long novel—lie beside me. I have too much to say and nothing to say and I’m staring at this towering pile that is my book as if it’s a long-forgotten loved one hooked to a ventilator. I think, It’s time to pull the plug on you.

  Someone or something bangs the front door, and I nearly jump out of my skin. There’s no one here I want to talk to, so I ignore it. They bang again, and I keep right on reading. But then there’s a rap on the window and the someone is standing there. The boy from the beach.

  I stare at him, unblinking, and wonder if somehow I can make myself invisible. Through the glass he says, “I see you.”

  I set the notebook down, get up, open the door.

  “What do you want?”

  “You’re alive.”

  “I am.”

  “I figured odds were pretty good you were lying somewhere out in the marsh half eaten by a gator, so I thought I’d better check. Just because this place looks like a version of paradise doesn’t mean it can’t also be deadly.” He turns away, jogs down the steps, comes right back up. “You know, it’s probably a good time to warn you about the snakes. Rattlesnakes, copperheads, water moccasins. Oh yeah, and never get between a wild hog and her piglets. That’ll also ruin your day. Watch where you’re walking and swimming and you’ll be fine. Especially at night, because some of the creatures here are nocturnal. The beach is okay, but you know what, I’m thinking you shouldn’t do that by yourself either. The last thing any of us needs is to have to call a medevac to come get you.”

  And like that, he’s down the steps again and heading for the road.

  I move out onto the porch. “Do you give everyone this little pep talk when they arrive?”

  He turns around to face me. “Only the reckless ones.”

  “Well, sorry you had to waste a trip. I’m planning to stay inside the rest of the time I’m here.”

  “And how long is that?”

  “Thirty-four more days, if you count today. Which unfortunately I do.”

  “I’ll be sure to warn the Park Service. You know. In case you change your mind.” He saunters away without a single look back. I stand watching the way the sun lights his hair and the way his shoulders move under his shirt as he swings himself up into the dusty black truck that waits in the road.

  * * *

  —

  That evening, my mom and I sit in rockers on the front porch of the inn, drinking lemonade. We are wearing nearly matching blue dresses. An accident that leaves me feeling irritated.

  Mom is overflowing with facts she picked up at the museum. “Did you know the history of the island is rife with strong women who had to rebuild after tragedy? Claudine and your great-grandmother Eva were descended from a line of them. Before the Blackwoods ever came here, women were running this place.”

  “Rife?”

  “Yes.”

  “So you’re saying we’ve come to Amazon Island.”

  “Pretty much. This is where we are right now. Here on Amazon Island, surrounded by the ghosts of strong women. Maybe there’s something we can learn from them. Maybe we can both find something to write about.”

  She lets these words linger, and when I don’t ask about the work—how long she thinks it will take her, what kinds of materials the Blackwoods left behind, what the most fascinating thi
ng was she learned today about the people who once lived here—she tells me about Doña Grecia Reyes, a Timucua Native American who married a Spanish soldier and fought with the Spanish for possession of the island. How she wrote a letter to the king of Spain demanding the money she needed to oversee the entire coast of Florida and Georgia. How he not only wrote her back but also sent the money to her, and how ever after they called her Princess of the Island.

  Behind her sadness, there is a brightness in my mom’s voice, a purpose. She is on the brink of a project again, and the research is giving her something to do.

  I don’t say anything, but some small part of me that is still me thinks, I need something to do other than wander around the island like rotten old Miss Havisham. And the part of me that is angry at her doesn’t want to tell her that these stories are interesting or that I care about them in the least.

  “It suits you,” she says, touching the ends of my hair. “It’s sophisticated.”

  “It’s too short.”

  “Why’d you do it?”

  “I needed a change.”

  “I’d cut mine off if I thought it would look good.”

  “It would look better on you.” Everyone knows I’m the Ron to her Harry.

  “The last thing you need is your mom trying to be your twin. I need my own thing. Maybe I’ll get a tattoo.”

  As she talks, I think about roles. How we all have them. How we all play them, whether we want to or not. Mine is the Good Daughter of Two Exceptional People She Will Never Be Able to Surpass. The girl who took an IQ test when she was six years old that said she was a genius, even though she’s never felt like one. She is a less glittering version of her mom, whose role is Famous Award-Winning Author and Everyone’s Favorite Person.

  My dad’s role is the One Not Like Us. Except that he’s creative too. He can play any musical instrument he picks up, even though he never had a lesson before he went off to Juilliard, back when he was twenty. He can pick out a tune on the piano or guitar after hearing it once, and he can paint, but he doesn’t. Mom says he’s a frustrated artist and that he belongs in a different era.

  My role on this island can’t just be Shunned Daughter of Father Who Can’t Have a Family Anymore. Or Lauren Junior/Lauren’s Shadow. It has to be more than that. And I think again about how Old Claude is dead and New Claude has taken her place, even though I don’t know the first thing about New Claude.

  A minute later, I tell my mom I need the bathroom. I go inside, where it is immediately five hundred degrees cooler, down the stairs, and straight to the gift shop, which is empty. I fiddle around with the books and the baseball caps and the cards and pretend this is all I want.

  Jared appears from somewhere. He’s dressed in a white button-down shirt and black pants, the uniform for kitchen staff. His sleeves are rolled up, and for the first time I notice the tattoo on his right forearm. He says, “Hey.”

  And I have to remind myself that this is an island and there are only, like, thirty-one people here.

  “Hey. I’m trying to find the guy who carried our luggage up to the house.”

  “You mean Miah.”

  “Maya?”

  “Jeremiah Crew. But we call him Miah. M-I-A-H. Some of the Park Service guys, back when he first came here, called him J.Crew, but he put a stop to that pretty quick.”

  “Can you tell me where to find him?”

  “Here, there, everywhere. Miah kind of goes where he wants and does what he wants.”

  “He seems like he’s in charge, or like he thinks he is.”

  Jared shrugs. “He’s been coming to the island awhile.”

  “What does he do, anyway? Like, why is he here? Does he work at the inn with you guys?”

  “He works for the Baileys—they live on the north end—clearing trails with Outward Bound groups. He runs errands. He goes to the mainland when people need supplies. He builds things.”

  “But why here?”

  “Maybe you should ask him.” Then he gives me this look like he knows the real reason for all my questions. “He doesn’t have a girlfriend. At least not as far as I know.” He grins, and I can tell he definitely knows why I’m asking but he’s not judging me for it, and in that moment I think, Maybe Jared and I actually can be friends.

  “That’s not why I’m asking. But thanks, Jared.”

  “You’re welcome, Claude.”

  I start to walk away and then I turn back. “What does your tattoo say?”

  He holds out his arm so that I can read it. August 12.

  “Your birthday?”

  “I got it in honor of a friend of mine who died.”

  And I can tell by the way he says it that he knows what it’s like to have the floor disappear suddenly.

  “I’m sorry about your friend.”

  “Thanks.” He blinks down at the tattoo, just for a second, then looks back up at me. “Hey, we’re hanging out tomorrow night, if you want to join us.”

  “Where?”

  “The Dip.”

  “What’s the Dip?”

  “Serendipity. It’s where the staff lives.”

  “Maybe. Thanks. I’ll see.”

  * * *

  —

  I sit at dinner listening to the rise and fall of voices, deep in conversation—the same conversations over and over again, so that I have both questions and answers memorized—and I am thinking about Jeremiah Crew. This is what I know about him:

  People call him Miah.

  He doesn’t like being called J.Crew.

  He’s been coming here awhile.

  Everyone relies on him.

  He probably doesn’t have a girlfriend.

  * * *

  —

  We’re walking back to the house when my phone buzzes. “Is that you?” Mom says, her face to the sky.

  I pull my phone out of my pocket.

  I love you more than Black Widow and peanut butter and “Umbrella.” When are you coming home?

  Rihanna’s “Umbrella” has been our song since we were little.

  I type the lyrics back to her as fast as I can, but my phone is now searching, searching, and it’s trying to send the message, and then, like that, Saz is gone.

  DAY 3

  I wake up early. Sometime during the night I’ve shed my pajama bottoms and I lie there in my top and underwear. I try to conjure Wyatt’s face. His mouth. But instead of Wyatt, I see Jeremiah Crew. Wise-ass expression. Compass tattoo on his shoulder. Hands, broad and strong. I push his image away, but he comes right back.

  Claudine, it says, that mouth of his, I want you. Don’t you know how I feel about you? Don’t you know how much I want you?

  Yes, I breathe. Take me.

  Something buzzes around my head and near my ear. With one hand, I swat at the mosquito even though I can’t see it. Buzz buzz buzz. I smack at the air with both hands and then I sit up, shaking my hair—damp from all that Georgia heat—in case it’s decided to nest there. The buzzing continues and, poof, Jeremiah is gone.

  I slump back against the headboard. You win, mosquito. Have at it. I hope I die of malaria here in this Georgia wilderness. It will serve my parents right. Jeremiah Crew will come to my funeral, and my ghostly vessel will stand beside him as he cries over my casket or urn, whichever. He will be forever haunted by me and the thought of what might have been.

  * * *

  —

  It’s raining by the time I emerge from my room. My mom is in the kitchen, rinsing dishes and stacking them in the wooden rack on the counter. She’s dressed in jeans and a bright summer blouse, hair pulled back in a ponytail.

  “Morning,” I say, reaching for the coffee.

  “Afternoon.” She brushes a loose strand off her face and nods at the window seat, where there is a large brown box. “From your father.”<
br />
  He’s no longer Dad. He’s your father.

  “What is it?”

  “I don’t know.”

  In the distance, lightning flashes. I count—one, two, three, four—and there comes the thunder. I lean against the counter, eating cereal, staring at the box as if it’s a bomb set to explode. Mom is talking, but I’m not hearing her because all I’m thinking about is that box. She says something about the museum and dinner, and then she is collecting her bag and an umbrella and heading out the door.

  I’m still leaning against the counter when she comes right back in.

  “Is this yours?”

  “What?”

  She stands in the doorway, staring down at something. I walk over to her and follow her gaze to the tube of cortisone cream and can of Off! that sit there. There’s a note taped to the bug spray: For Her Ladyship. It’s worse if you scratch them.

  I say, “Actually, I think that is mine.”

  I glance past her, but there’s no sign of him anywhere.

  She looks down at the note and then up at me, unable to hide her smile. “Do you want to tell me who it’s from?”

  “Not really.” I give her a smile of my own and go back into the kitchen, where I make a show of pouring myself more cereal. In a moment she calls out a goodbye, and the door clicks behind her.

  I wait three minutes before picking up the cortisone cream and bug spray and bringing them into the house. I examine the familiar-looking note, which was clearly torn from a certain notepad. I flip the paper over and there is my phone number, exactly as I wrote it. And below it: Phones don’t work here. If I want to find you, I’ll find you.

  * * *

  —

  My dad has sent me Edna, my favorite childhood doll, a journal of song lyrics that Saz and I wrote over the years, my vintage Nancy Drew books, and a clay cat I made when I was in fourth grade. All of it wrapped in Avengers birthday paper. And the following message: