A Thousand Shades of Blue

by Robin Stevenson

  “Oh.”

  There is a long, long silence. I don’t know what else to say. I can’t say much about my life back home because I 122

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  don’t want him to ask if I’m in col ege or whatever, and I don’t want to talk about my family. And I’d like to ask him more questions, but I don’t want him to think I’m being too nosy. So I just sit and listen to the wind in the rigging and watch the dark sky and the clouds rolling across the moon. No stars tonight.

  He opens his eyes and turns toward me. “How are you feeling?”

  “Good.” I manage to look him right in the eyes. His are gray and clear and make me feel dizzy. Or maybe that’s the pot, I don’t know.

  “Good,” he says. “Me too.”

  Then he pul s me toward him and his hand is on the back of my neck and his lips are on mine, and it’s nothing like kissing Paul McCoy. Nothing at al .

  Z

  I don’t know how much time has passed when it starts to rain. Ten minutes? Twenty? An hour? We’re lying on the deck, and Col is sort of beside me and sort of on top of me. One of his hands is under my shirt, touching me, cool against my skin. I ignore the first drops of rain that fall on my face and bare legs.

  Col slips his hand out from under my shirt and places it on the inside of my knee, then runs it slowly up my thigh. I watch his face. His eyes are half closed. When his hand slides inside the loose fitting leg of my shorts, I catch my breath with a gasp and then pull away.

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  “Col, stop.” When I try to sit up, I feel dizzy and disori-ented. “We’d better…it’s raining.”

  “Rachel…” He lifts himself off me and kneels there for a moment. “God. Come back to my boat with me.”

  I shake my head. “I can’t. I mean, my parents would freak out, and Becca won’t cover for me.”

  Col lets out a long slow breath. “Okay. You’re right.”

  He shakes his head. “We shouldn’t be doing this anyway.

  You’re so young.”

  “I’m eighteen,” I say quickly. “That’s not so young.

  Anyway, you should come inside and hang out for a bit. At least until it stops raining.”

  He shrugs. “Sure. The rain here never lasts more than a few minutes.”

  It is weird to feel disconnected after being so close.

  I snuggle up to him again, burrow my head against his chest. “Col?”

  He wraps his arms around me tightly. “Mmm?”

  “I didn’t real y want you to stop. You know?”

  He laughs and strokes my hair. “Me neither.” Then he pul s me to my feet. “Come on. You’re getting soaked.”

  Z

  Down in the cabin, Becca and Terry are playing cards. It’s warm and bright and the music is playing softly.

  “It’s raining,” I say.

  Becca laughs. “Yeah, we were wondering if you two were ever going to come inside.”

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  I peel off my wet sweater. “Sorry. Your sweater…”

  “Just hang it on the back of the door to the head. I’l grab you something dry to put on.”

  She finds me a pair of flannel pants and a gray hoodie, and I take the soft bundle into the head to change.

  The girl who looks back at me from the mirror is a different girl than the one I saw earlier. My hair is a wild wet tangle of black streaked with blue, my eyeliner is smudged darkly around my eyes, and my lips are swollen from kissing. And I can’t stop smiling, even when I try.

  I feel like laughing out loud.

  Z

  Terry and Col both leave when the rain stops a few minutes later. Becca and I stand in the cockpit, shivering, and wave good-bye. Then we climb back down below.

  “So?” Becca asks.

  I just grin. “What?”

  “Oh, boy. You’ve got it bad, don’t you?”

  I shrug and try to keep my grin to a more reasonable width. “Umm. Maybe.” I change the subject. “What about you and Terry? I didn’t know you were seeing him.”

  “We’ve been hanging out for a couple months,” she says. “Huh. That’s cool.”

  “Don’t change the subject,” she says. “We were talking about you and lover boy. What were you two getting up to out there in the rain?”

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  “Just talking,” I say. And then, because really I am dying to talk about this and Jen isn’t here, I add, “and kissing too.”

  “Uh-huh. I figured. And that’s it?”

  I nod. “This is kind of embarrassing but I’ve never, you know, real y done more than that.”

  “Why’s that embarrassing?”

  “I don’t know. It just is.”

  She lifts a stack of blankets out of a locker and starts making up a bed for me on one of the berths. “It shouldn’t be. I don’t want to sound like your mother or something, but your first time should be with someone special. Someone you really care about.”

  “Believe me, you don’t sound like my mother. This is not something we talk about.” I picture my mom in Will’s arms again and feel a flash of anger. “And I wouldn’t take advice from her anyway.”

  She smoothes down the sheet and tucks the corners under the cushion, and then shakes a blanket out over top.

  “Your mom seems so nice, Rach. She’s always so friendly.

  And when I talked to your folks tonight, it was obvious that she’s real y worried about you.”

  A bottle of wine is sitting open in the galley sink. “Can I have a drink of that?”

  “Sure.” Becca pours me a glass. She sits down beside me on the berth and hands it to me. She hesitates for a moment before speaking. “Rachel…are you sure you don’t want to tell me what is going on?”

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  through me. “I do want to tell you. I really want to tell someone. I just…I probably shouldn’t.”

  “Why not?”

  “It’s not just about me. And I don’t want anyone else to know.”

  Becca’s eyes are steady on mine. “I can keep a secret.”

  “I don’t know.” I wonder if I would tell Jen, if she were here. I don’t know who I can trust with this.

  “I don’t want to push you,” Becca says. “I just want you to know that if you want to talk, it’s okay.”

  Tears are welling up in my eyes and I rub my sleeve across them. “Quit being so nice,” I say. “Look what you’re doing to me.”

  She laughs. “Let’s go to bed, hey? It’s late.”

  I nod, drink the last of my wine and get into the bed she has made for me. “Thanks, Becca.”

  She’s climbing into the V-berth. “Aren’t you going to brush your teeth?”

  I groan. “No, Mom.”

  She laughs again. “Okay, okay. Sorry.”

  “S’all right.” I roll over on the narrow berth. “I’m kidding.”

  “Night, Rachel.”

  “Night.” I lie still, curled on my side. I close my eyes and imagine that Col is lying behind me, curled around me, holding me close to him. I imagine that I can hear his breathing and feel the beat of his heart. I’m tired of always feeling so alone.

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  Eighteen

  In the morning, Becca makes us scrambled eggs while we listen to the Georgetown morning show. Another cold front, another volleyball game, another Christian Fellowship meeting. Wil ’s thought for the day is this: The truth will set you free, but first it will give you a real y bad day.I can’t help letting out a disgusted snort. The truth would do a lot more than just give him a bad day.

  Becca laughs and scoops mounds of eggs onto two plates. “I thought it was kind of funny.”

  “I can’t stand that guy,” I say.

  “Mmm. I’ve noticed. You sure you don’t want to tell me what it’s all about?” She pushes one plate o
ver to me and sits down across the table.

  I poke the eggs with my fork. “I do want to.” I think about it for a minute. I didn’t want to last night. But I trust Becca. I don’t think she’d tell anyone else. It’s just that whenever I think about what happened, what Tim and I saw, I feel this awful sense of shame. But it’s not 128

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  my fault that we saw her. It’s not my fault that she was kissing Wil .

  “Then tell me.” Becca slides her plate to one side, puts her elbows on the table and leans toward me. “Come on.

  It’s not good to carry stuff around on your own like this.”

  I nod. “I know. I just…it’s hard. Promise you won’t tell anyone?”

  She nods.

  I try to think of the right words. “Wil …I think…no, I know…he and my Mom were…” I can’t say it.

  Becca’s eyes open wide. “What? They were involved or something?”

  Involved. “That’s one way of putting it,” I say.

  “You mean here? I mean, not like they knew each other back in high school or something?”

  I nod. “Here. Last week.”

  “How do you know?”

  “I saw them. Tim and I did. He was…well, Sheila’s always nude sunbathing, and I guess he was trying to get a look. He had the binoculars…”

  “Holy shit,” Becca says. “Holy shit. So what did you see?”

  I glare at her. “We saw enough.”

  “Hey, relax. I wasn’t being nosy. I wondered if…wel , could you have misinterpreted it?”

  I shake my head. “Not a chance. They were kissing. Like, full-on kissing. He was naked. And he had his hand on her ass.” I realize that I’ve never seen Mom and Dad do anything like that. Even the idea of Dad naked creeps me out.

  Becca sits back. “Wow.”

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  There is a silence. I stare at my eggs, which are getting cold.

  “You think they’re stil …?” She trails off.

  I’ve been wondering this myself. “I don’t know. Mom didn’t seem like she minded leaving Georgetown,” I say.

  Then again, she didn’t seem upset about coming back here either. “She and Dad went over to Freebird to watch a movie the other night,” I tell her. “How weird is that?”

  “Very.” She blows out a long breath. “What are you going to do?”

  I shrug. “Nothing, I guess. I mean, what is there to do?”“You could talk to your mom.”

  “Not a chance.” I don’t know why exactly, but I’ve never even considered telling Mom that I saw her.

  “So…you’re just going to go on pretending you don’t know?”

  “Yup.”

  “Wow. That’s some serious secret.” Becca takes a forkful of eggs. “What about Tim? How’s he doing with this?”

  I feel a flicker of discomfort. “We haven’t talked about it.”

  She stops and stares at me, fork and eggs hovering in midair. “You’re kidding.”

  “What’s the point in talking about it?” I say.

  “I can’t believe this. You both saw it, and you haven’t talked about it at all?”

  “There’s nothing to say,” I tell her. Then I take a mouthful of eggs and force myself to eat them like nothing is wrong and there isn’t a huge hard lump in my throat.

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  Becca doesn’t say anything for a minute, and I think maybe we’re done talking about this. Then she says,

  “Rachel…look, I feel a bit worried about you guys. You and Tim. He always looks kind of nervous and jumpy, and you’re…wel , obviously you’re not exactly happy.”

  “I’m fine. We’re both fine.”

  “Yeah. Wel , you know if you want to talk about it, I’m always happy to listen.”

  “Talking won’t change a thing,” I say.

  Z

  We spend the whole morning snorkeling. I love snorkeling—it’s like being in a whole other world, a peaceful blue world that most people don’t even know about. I listen to my breathing through the snorkel, steady and even, and I feel calmer. The water is so clear and it’s the same temperature as my body. I could swim all day without getting cold.

  Below us, a school of small yellow-and-black-striped fish swarms around: Sergeant Majors. People feed them sometimes, and they flock toward us expectantly. A larger needlefish breezes through their midst, and they scatter.

  The slight current carries us slowly over a huge coral head, multi-colored and covered with living creatures—

  spiny black sea urchins, purple fan coral, red Christmas tree worms. A parrotfish glides by, its iridescent greens and purples looking like they’ve been painted on with a fine brush.

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  Becca taps me on the shoulder and points silently. A big barracuda, maybe four feet long with gray scarred skin, is swimming right behind us. His mouth is slightly open, showing rows of razor-sharp teeth, and he’s watching us the same way we’re watching the smaller fish down below.

  Like we’re just as insignificant. It reminds me of what Col said about the stars.

  Everything reminds me of Col.

  Z

  Eventual y we get hungry and go back to Becca’s boat for lunch.

  “So, did you make plans to see Col again?” she asks.

  She’s slicing tomatoes onto a plastic plate.

  I frown. “Not exactly. Could I call him?”

  “Sure.”

  I try a couple of times, but he doesn’t answer.

  “He might be in town,” Becca says. “Or maybe he doesn’t have his radio turned on.”

  “We could go into town,” I say.

  She laughs. “You hoping you’ll run into him?”

  I try to sound casual, though I know I’m not fooling her. “I wouldn’t mind.”

  “Fine by me,” she says. “I have mail to pick up anyway.”

  “The rudder could be fixed any day now. I don’t know how much longer we’ll be here,” I say. I can’t imagine leaving here without seeing Col again. “If we don’t run into him, I’ll have to find a way to see him tonight.”

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  Becca raises her eyebrows. She puts the knife down and passes me the plate of tomato slices. “How would you swing that?”

  “Maybe my parents would let me go out if I said I was meeting you.”

  “I’m not going to lie to your folks,” she warns me. “So don’t put me in that position.”

  I shrug. “Fine then. I’ll wait until they’re asleep.”

  Becca picks up a block of cheese and starts to unwrap it. She doesn’t say anything for a minute. When she speaks, she sounds uncomfortable. “It’s just that I kind of feel like a big sister or something,” she says. “Like I’m responsible if anything bad happens. I can’t help it. I’m sorry. I know the age difference between us isn’t real y that big.”

  “It’s okay,” I say. “I mean, I wish you would cover for me, but I get it. It’s kind of nice.” I look away, embarrassed.

  “I wouldn’t mind having you as a big sister.”

  But I already have a big sister, and she’s not here. And if she was, I couldn’t talk to her anyway. I usual y try not to think about Emma’s accident, but now I find myself wondering what it would be like if it had never happened.

  I wonder what kind of big sister Emma would have been.

  I wonder what kind of family we would have been.

  Z

  We were on holiday in Florida when it happened. Mom was six months pregnant with Tim, Emma was six and I was four. So I don’t real y remember it at al , although 133

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  Tim says he does. Which is a typical freaky Tim thing to say, of course. He says that he somehow absorbed Mom’s memories in utero and that he remembers Mom crying all the time. He says he remembers that he came home from the hospital before Emma did.
>
  Anyway, everything I know—discounting Tim’s fantasies—is based on what Mom and Dad told me.

  This is what happened: We had spent the morning at the swimming pool at our hotel, which was near the beach.

  It was the first morning of our holiday, and so there are photographs of those last hours before everything got wrecked. We look happy: Mom big-bellied in a flowered maternity swimsuit with a ruffled skirt, Dad with a beard, Emma with long blond hair held back with barrettes, me half-naked in swim shorts, clutching my one-armed dol .

  The hotel was by the beach, but not right on it. It was on the other side of a busy street lined with tourist shops selling ice cream, beach toys and sunblock. Mom and Dad decided to take me and Emma to a restaurant on the beach, figuring we could dig in the sand when we were done eating. So we were all crossing the street together with me holding Mom’s hand and Emma holding Dad’s.

  We had made it across safely and were stepping onto the sidewalk when, for some reason, I started to cry, and Mom picked me up. Al of a sudden Emma pul ed free of Dad’s hand and stepped back into the road.

  The driver of the car didn’t even have time to brake.

  Emma stepped right in front of him. She was thrown through the air and landed headfirst on the road.

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  Dad says it was his fault—that if he’d been holding her hand more tightly, it wouldn’t have happened. Once, when he’d had a few beers, he told me he could still remember the feeling of her hand slipping out of his.

  There’s one more thing—something I’ve never told anyone, something I try not to let myself think about. Last summer when I was making the photo col age for Emma’s new room, I looked at all the photographs from that trip.

  I mean, I real y looked at them. And this is what I think: I think I dropped my dol , and Emma turned back to get it.

  Because that one-armed doll is in my arms in every single photograph up to that point. And after the accident, she never appears again.

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  Nineteen

  We hang around town until dinnertime, but we don’t see Col. I head back to the boat in the dark, feeling tired, frustrated and aimless. It’s January. Soon we’ll leave here—leave behind Will and Col and Becca—and it’ll just be our family again, crammed together on this boat for months and months. Sailing to the Turks and Caicos, maybe, and then turning around and sailing back through the Bahamas, and up the coast. Retracing our steps. Every single mile.