by Sarah Tomp
“And to cave?”
He looked confused.
“It seems like caving might bother you too. All that gooky mud. And the dark. Caving is kind of annoying . . . I mean in an amazing kind of way.”
“Yes. The amazing makes it worth the mess. Now I know what to expect. I can learn to like things that are at first unpleasant, if there’s a reason I should.”
“You could also learn to flip again. I could teach you.” She moved to the center of the trampoline.
“I think that center-of-gravity issue might be at odds with your plans.”
“Only if you let it be. Gravity is overrated.”
“I’m too scared.”
“You can’t be scared. Not if caving doesn’t scare you.”
“Caving? I told you, the mess doesn’t bother me. Why would caving scare me?”
“Because you go crawling through the dark. With hundreds of bats. You squeeze yourself into tight little crevices. You go marching off into a place where you might get lost. Or you could fall in a hole that goes to Australia.”
“I take reasonable precautions.” He tilted his head. “Why doesn’t diving scare you?”
“It does. When I think about it too much. But fear is part of getting better, too.” She stretched her arms over her head. “If my coach says I’m ready to do a dive, I know he’s right. My body might still have to figure out the details, but it’s going to happen. And if I smack, well the pain is only temporary.”
“Right. Your coach sets reasonable precautions. Like caving.”
She wasn’t sure she totally agreed, but she didn’t disagree, either. That sounded so cut-and-dried. Not like the swirly mix of colors and energy that she’d been trying to describe.
“Show me something, Ria. Make me doubt gravity. I’ve heard it’s overrated.”
She bounce-walked to the center as he crawled to the foam-trimmed edge, out of the way. She jumped. High and straight. Up, up to the treetops. She flipped backward, which was easy but impressive. Handsprings in both directions. The layouts—flips with a straight body—were the thing that made him say, “Whoa.”
She’d almost forgotten she had the power to impress. She knew her own sense of average was skewed, but she didn’t know how far.
She collapsed to her back on the springy bed of the trampoline, letting her breaths return to a steady state. She stared up at the stars beyond the tree branches. Looked at them with only her left eye. Then her right. Thanks to her contacts, the stars seemed closer with the left one.
“I looked for you this week, Cotton. I wanted to go caving again.”
“That was a good day,” he said. “I liked caving with you.”
It was a simple thing to say. Something she agreed with. Somehow it made her feel lighter. Like she could float.
“Where were you all week? Were you caving?”
“No.”
“Were you sick? You look good now,” she said, suddenly thankful for the shadows.
“We had to travel out of town to meet with the police. As part of the ongoing investigation.”
“For Esther?” She sat up.
“Yes. You’ve said her name to me. You remember her.”
“Well, yeah.” She tucked herself into a ball, facing him.
“No one ever says her name. My little brother and sister don’t even remember her. Flutie won’t say what she remembers. No one talks about her. Except for reporters, once a year, on the anniversary of when we couldn’t find her.”
“I think people don’t want to make you sad.”
He tilted his head, into his thinking pose. “I’m always sad about Esther.”
Ria hugged her knees even tighter against her chest.
“The first time I found the cave, I thought she’d be there. I was sure she wandered in and got lost. Or hurt.”
She held her breath, dreading his words, but needing to hear them, too.
“My dad and I searched and searched. The police came too. But we never found any sign of her. And now we’ve gone too far in. There’s no way she would have made it all that way. Not in the dark, not by herself.”
“Is that good or bad?” It was a stupid question, but she felt desperate for the answer.
“Both. Or, neither.”
She stared at the stars still peeking through the trees.
“I’m going to find her. She’s going to come home.”
The lump in her throat made her eyes sting. There was no way to answer. Even if she’d had the right words, they couldn’t possibly squeeze through the tightness in her chest.
“No one else believes that. Not anymore. My parents want closure. . . .” His voice faded into the darkness. Then it came back, stronger, almost harsh with its stiffness. “On Tuesday a man found a child’s bones buried near Lake Manning. But it wasn’t Esther.”
“Do they know who?” Ria wanted to bite back her words as soon as she’d said them.
“Her name was Rebecca Salisbury. She died ten years before Esther was born. But every time there’s a chance we’re going to get an answer, everything stops.”
She nodded, unsure if he could see the motion. Even more unsure if it mattered.
“That’s why I wasn’t at school.”
“That must . . .” Ria couldn’t find the right word but she felt it.
“Yes,” he said.
He gently slapped his hand against the bed of the trampoline, sending vibrations across the fabric.
She tapped in reply.
“I’m going to release stress.” He stood, suddenly, awkwardly, looking unsure but determined.
He got into jumping position, legs straddled, hands out. She kept her distance, so as not to throw off his balance. Finally, she had to laugh. “Jumping usually means actually going up. And then down. Off the surface.”
“Right! Like I’m doing.”
“Give me your hands.” She bounced lightly toward him.
“I can’t. I’m busy jumping right now.”
She bent her legs, pushed a little harder, rose a little higher, lifting him with her bounce. His hands reached toward hers, stopping an inch before they touched. Up and down.
When she took his hands in hers, he didn’t pull away. Under her thumb she could feel a rough, rounded spot along his. He had a hangnail by his pinky finger. They jumped together, slowly, barely enough to even be called jumping.
She bent her legs, pushed a little harder, rose a little higher.
They were a funny match. His weight brought him much lower, but he was less willing to release on the way up. She had to compensate for the space between the up and down. It added an unexpected thrill to the nothing kind of jumping.
They weren’t quite laughing as they bounced up and down, but the longer they jumped, the closer she felt to giddy. Silly. Buzzing. The dark of the night and the bright of the moon and the cool of the air, along with the funny little wrinkle between Cotton’s eyebrows added up to something she couldn’t name.
But then she pushed a little too much, went a little too high, and their rhythm was off. She came down a split fraction of a second later than he did. It wasn’t a big enough double-bounce to worry about, but there was a moment of off-centered movement in multiple directions.
Cotton collapsed on his butt, with his legs splayed out. She flipped over him so as not to land on top of him. She burst out laughing, and a second later, he joined her.
As their eyes met, something new—hot and surprising—hit Ria in her middle. She held the gaze, all the while feeling awfully close to breathless until he dropped his eyes.
“I’d better go home now.” He crawled toward the edge.
Ria balanced her weight on the narrow frame, then leapt, landing in the damp grass. The ground felt excessively solid and unforgiving after so much time on the springy trampoline. Gravity reminding her there was no escape.
“Leo and I are going caving tomorrow. You can come with us.” Cotton sat on the frame of the trampoline with his legs dangling over the ed
ge.
“I’d like that.” She held out her hand to help him down. A painful shock traveled between them.
“Ow!”
“Static electricity,” said Ria. “Sorry! It builds up.”
Cotton kept his hands tucked behind him, like he didn’t quite trust her. He was taking reasonable precautions.
“I can give you a ride home.”
“No, thank you. I’ll call my dad. It’s late. And you have . . .” They both looked over at Sean. “I think he’s going to feel ill tomorrow.”
“Probably,” she agreed. “But Sean doesn’t seem to mind hangovers. I can’t stand it when my body won’t do what I want it to.”
“He has no idea where he is. I could never let myself be that out of it. Not if I have a choice.”
He was thinking about Esther again. Still. Always. Esther had made the choice to go out to play, but something had happened to keep her away. She’d gone somewhere, expecting something, but then . . . At what point was her choice not her choice anymore?
After Cotton left, Ria threw a blanket over Sean. She stood near, watching him sleep. He mumbled something. Cotton was right. Sean had no idea where he was.
She brought her pillow and sleeping bag out to the trampoline, the way she and Maggie used to do. She looked up at the stars through one eye, then the other. Bringing them close and letting them go again.
Fourteen
Ria woke to the sound of the back door opening. She felt warm in her sleeping bag, but the outside of it was damp, and the air felt cool on her face. Fall was creeping in, bringing a new hint of chill to the air. She’d left her contacts in all night and now her eyes ached. She blinked to clear them, then lifted her head and saw Mom peering out on the patio where Sean still slept. Ria waved and slipped off the springy trampoline, into the wet grass.
Mom raised her eyebrows in question and mimed talking on the phone. Ria nodded to confirm that Sean’s parents wouldn’t be worried about him.
They’d had plenty of practice communicating through sign language. She’d learned from Benny, who could coach an entire dive list without saying a word. He’d simply gesture and point to the body parts he wanted her to focus on. She and Mom had created their own communication system during meets when Ria was stuck on the pool deck. Those conversations had been predictable. Good job. I’m hungry. I need a new towel. Having her passed-out boyfriend there in the morning was more complicated. There’d be a follow-up debriefing. But those had happened after meets as well.
Mom motioned that she should wake Sean and then went back inside.
Ria stood over him. His blond hair covered one eye. His lips looked chapped, but full. He was cute again now that he wasn’t wasted.
“Good morning.” When he didn’t stir, she sat on the lounge chair beside him and traced the line of his jaw with one finger.
“Mmm?” He opened his eyes a crack. “I gotta get outta here.” He swung his legs around to the ground. “Before your parents . . .”
“They know you’re here.”
His eyes grew wide and panicked. “They know?”
“Obviously. It’s fine.”
“What happened? Did we . . . anything?”
“You passed out before we even got here. I thought you’d turned boneless.”
“That’s harsh.” He frowned. “Did Cotton Talley carry me in here?”
“Mm-hmm.” She wondered what else he remembered. What he’d heard from the trampoline.
“That’s so weird. I was so trashed.” But apparently that’s all he thought. Because he turned to his phone, getting all his updates and missed messages. “Maggie’s taking me to work.”
“Maggie?”
“Yeah. Benny wants me to help set up some pads or bars or something for their workout today. Maggie said he’s going to pay me extra to get there early.”
“You talked to Maggie?” A sudden heat filled her cheeks. She scooted away from him.
“Only texting. When I woke up in the middle of the night, I freaked. I wasn’t sure why I was here. You were sleeping.”
“So you asked Maggie?” Irritation prickled her.
“I think your phone was dead.”
Ria stared at him, trying to comprehend. He’d woken up wondering where he was—actually, no, he knew where he was and where she was, only fifty feet or so away—but he’d had other questions. So when he couldn’t reach her by phone, he texted Maggie. Who apparently was also texting Benny. Busy night for Maggie.
“Seriously?”
Now that his eyes were open, she saw the red veins and bloodshot look of them. His breath didn’t have the liquor-y smell of last night, but something related, and sour.
She went to get her phone from the trampoline. It had been almost out of its charge by the time she and Cotton stopped texting last night. He’d let her know he made it home and then she’d had some questions about caving that somehow led to them trading funny memories of Ms. Q’s room, and, well, now it wouldn’t turn on. So Sean was right about her phone. But apparently, he couldn’t make it across the yard to ask her what had happened. And now he and Maggie were going to go to the pool.
“I’m sorry about last night, Ria. Please don’t be pissed.” He sounded truly remorseful. Pitiful. He looked like he was honestly suffering, even if that was his own fault.
“I’m not mad.” It was the easiest way to end the conversation. And besides, since he’d been such a mess, Cotton had to help. And that meant she was going caving today.
After Sean left with Maggie, Ria headed inside. She could hear her parents in the kitchen, their voices blending in and out of their oldies songs playing in the background. The smell of breakfast made her mouth water as she paused outside the kitchen, getting ready to face them. They were going to have questions, but she wasn’t sure where the focus would be.
“Is Sean gone?” asked Dad.
“Yeah,” she said as she took the plate of eggs and fruit from him, settling in the sunniest spot of the kitchen table.
“That sounds like the start of a new hit song. Sean is gone. Gone, gone, gone. It works on multiple levels. As in gone drunk. Gone, gone. Gone so long.”
“All right, Dad. Don’t quit your day job.”
“Did you have fun last night?” Mom leaned back in her chair.
Ria thought a minute. There had been moments. Sean had been funny before he turned completely useless. The football team had won. Jumping on the trampoline with Cotton had been the best part. “It was okay.”
“Okay?” Mom said with a definite edge to her voice. “Your boyfriend was passed out on our lawn furniture. Don’t tell me he wasn’t drinking.”
“I won’t.”
“I hope you weren’t drinking too.”
“Of course not.”
“I know it can be tempting when everyone else is doing something,” said Dad. “Especially when you’re feeling unhappy. . . .”
“I was driving. I’m not completely stupid.”
Dad handed her the bottle of meds. It was as if she’d reminded him to, simply by saying the word. Even after all the promises that her ADHD didn’t mean she was stupid, somehow the two ideas always ended up together.
While Ria swallowed her pill, Mom went on, “Do you know how many calories are in a beer? Wine coolers and mixed drinks are even worse.”
Mom wasn’t counting calories. It was the days of no diving and what they’d all lost. If Ria had been drinking, maybe Mom could admit she was mad.
“You miss Benny keeping me in line, don’t you?”
“We miss you doing what you love,” said Dad.
She got up and took her plate to the sink, dumped the food down the garbage disposal, let the grinding roar drown out her parents’ worries.
She was used to their concern wrapped up in irritation. But, as usual, they had their focus on the wrong thing. They saw what she told them to see, and yet she was still amazed at all the things they ignored. But then again, bruises from smacking the water look the same as bru
ises from getting smacked from a hand. Or pushed into a wall. Being held face-up in a shower of cold water didn’t leave any mark at all. They still didn’t know she’d chipped her tooth.
Sometimes she’d picked fights with them, thinking they’d see how she was hurting, but all the while afraid of what would happen if they did. They’d be so disappointed, so disillusioned if they knew everything she’d been through. She couldn’t do that to them. So, she’d learned to swallow her frustration, to ignore their blatant obliviousness. She couldn’t blame them. She knew how easy it was to miss what was right there.
When she turned around, Mom was beside her, waiting. Looking weird, her cheeks all red and blotchy. “Did Benny do . . . something . . . inappropriate? Did he try something sexual?”
“You can tell us,” said Dad. “No matter what happened.”
“God. No. You know he’s not like that.” Ria needed to do something, anything, with her arms and legs. She paced back and forth in front of them, her mind a swirl of confusion. “He would never.”
And he wouldn’t. He was the one who insisted everyone wear clothes over their suits whenever they went anywhere at meets. He’d broken a reporter’s camera when he took a picture of Ria on the deck. Photos of her in motion, at work, were acceptable. Photos of her posing in her suit were not. Benny was obsessively, passionately, desperately all about the diving. He was far closer to a rubberband-man than seducer. She’d never even thought to worry about anything like that.
She headed out of the kitchen.
“Where are you going? We’re not done talking to you.”
“I’m going to go for a run. To look for fun. In the sun. Won’t come back until I’m done. Look, Dad, I can write a song too.”
“Don’t go. You didn’t even eat your breakfast.”
“I had enough calories.”
“Well, all right,” said Dad. “Running will be good for you. You know that exercise produces endorphins. You’ve been missing that.”
Except she had been exercising. Running, jumping on the trampoline, but even more, caving. That was a full-body workout.
Her parents didn’t know all the things they didn’t know.
