“I think so,” she said, her voice impeded by her inflamed lips.
“Your throat isn’t closing up, is it?”
She shook her head.
Abcde and Ben burst into the room. I wanted to run straight into Ben’s arms, but I also didn’t want to leave Quinn’s side.
“Hey, Angelina Jolie,” Ben said to Quinn, and she smiled, even though it looked painful.
“She needs to see a doctor.” I clicked the EpiPen mindlessly in the air—this time it worked, but it sent its cache of medicine out into the room.
“You shouldn’t go.” He understood immediately.
“Why not?” asked Abcde.
“I’ll tell you later,” I said.
“Izzy!” I could tell she was ready for some juicy gossip.
“Can Abcde come with us?” Quinn asked.
“Of course, sweetheart.” Abcde tossed a filmy sundress over her bathing suit. “But that doesn’t mean your mom’s off the hook.”
On the hotel stationery, I quickly scribbled a letter giving Ben and Abcde permission to make medical decisions for Quinn on my behalf, gave Quinn a huge hug that made her squawk, made sure they all had my cell number, and they took off for Ben’s truck. I ran out to the balcony and watched them drive away, waving until long after they were out of sight.
I DIDN’T KNOW what to do with myself in the hotel room. I paced and paced, my limbs frantic with worry, and finally called Ben on his cell and asked him to hold it up to Quinn’s ear. She wasn’t comfortable talking, but I was happy to listen to her breathe, to hear Abcde and Ben joke around in the background; their laughs made me less concerned—they wouldn’t be laughing so hard if she were in dire trouble.
Ben finally got back on. “We’re in the ER,” he said. “We can’t use our cellphones inside, but I’ll come out to give you updates.”
“Thank you so much, Ben,” I said.
“No problem,” he said. “Just watch out for yourself.”
I CONTINUED TO pace around the room, restless, bereft. It made me feel crazy to think of Quinn being so far away from me, especially with something scary happening. I made myself a cup of tea to try to settle down and noticed the pen and stationery still out on the table. Abcde had said we all wanted to write about the whales—I figured I might as well take a stab.
A whale is surfacing, I wrote. Breaching, really. Comice has whales—who would have thought? Daughter, don’t be afraid. Everything will be all right. Fear has a way of shutting us down—don’t let it. Grow toward courage. Here, there are whales. It’s almost a miracle, if you think about it. Just amazing. Kiss the air when they spray and it’s almost like kissing the inside of their bodies. Let yourself imagine the inside of their bodies—you are Jonah, you are Pinocchio, but a girl, the first girl inside the belly of a whale. Maybe inside the heart. Never fear, my girl; even giants have hearts under their skin. Only we get to see them—aren’t we lucky? Prepare yourself for amazement, my sweet one. Quinn, I know I sound crazy, but it’s true. Ripe pears are all around us. Serious beauty there. Trees full of beauty. Under the Delta sky. Vivid vivid blue. Whether the whales are here or not. X marks this spot, right here, right now. You need to live this moment, Quinn, live it fully. Zero fear, that’s all I ask of you, of us; zero fear.
———
I FELT EXHILARATED when I put down the pen, as if I had just swum with the whales myself. I wondered if Abcde ever had that feeling when she wrote, that feeling where you think you’re writing to someone else, but it turns out you’re really writing to yourself. It turns out you’re really writing to teach yourself what you need to learn.
THE CELLPHONE RANG.
“It’s an allergic reaction,” said Ben. He sounded calm, which comforted me. “They’re not sure to what—something in the water, probably.”
“Is she okay?”
“She’s doing great. They’re giving her Benadryl by IV—her lips are going down already, but they want to keep her here a few hours just to be on the safe side.”
“I wish I could talk to her,” I said.
“I wish you could, too,” he said. “Maybe there’s a hospital phone we can use—I’ll find out. But she said to say hi, for now. Oh, and she wants you to find her Norse mythology book. She said she left it on the boat, but I don’t think you should go over there by yourself right now, Izzy. I can look for it when we get back.”
I KNEW BEN was right—I shouldn’t go back to the Vieiras’ by myself, but I was going stir-crazy in the hotel room. I tried to write a second piece, but I couldn’t concentrate. I needed to get out, to do something that would help Quinn, even in the tiniest way. I knocked on the door of Mrs. Vieira’s room, the room next to Ben’s. I hoped she hadn’t been able to hear too much the night before.
“Would you like to go back to the orchard for a little bit?” I asked her. “I have to get something in the houseboat.”
She was wearing the same loose floral dress she had worn the day before. She nodded.
IT WAS COMFORTING to have Mrs. Vieira in the car with me, even though she didn’t speak, even though she looked as if she had been crying all night, her lopsided eyes red and inflamed, her hair a mess.
The distillery was surrounded by police tape, but no police cars were in sight.
“Do you want me to go into the house with you?” I asked Mrs. Vieira, but she shook her head. “Do you mind if I go down to the houseboat to get my daughter’s book?”
She waved me forward.
The levee was covered with spectators—the Vieiras hadn’t been there to take the entry fees, to control the numbers. Thankfully, the whales were a few hundred yards to the west of my boat, so there wasn’t anyone hanging out right where I parked.
I sat in the car, heart pounding, while I scanned the crowd, looking for any familiar body language. It seemed as if there were more men than usual, which made me nervous, especially since some of them had big cans of beer, but they didn’t pay any attention to me. There was too much going on with the whales.
THE MOTHER WHALE looked like she was having some sort of fit. She was slapping at her baby, the white underside of her long fin making a resounding smack against the baby’s skin, a resounding splash in the water. The baby tried to nurse, but this time, the mother shoved it away, a more gentle shove, but a firm, insistent one. She kept shooing the baby off, her motions increasingly frantic, until the baby did leave, its body a dark submarine torpedoing down the Delta. Faster than I’d ever seen her move, plowing forward with clear determination, hopefully toward the sea. A group of young men raised their beer cans and cheered.
I saw the people on the other side of the slough lean toward the water, craning their heads to watch the baby enter the Sacramento River. The mother whale turned onto her side, her fin straight up in the air, a stiff white flag. Surrender more than farewell.
When the rumbling began, I thought it was from the whale, her giant organs churning, a wail of grief rippling through her body as her baby swam away. But then the screaming started, the very human screaming, and the levee across the slough crumbled liked dry bread, the whole twenty-foot face of it falling into the water—stones, dirt, all the people on it tumbling down, toppling into the slough, water racing over the levee, flooding the much lower field of dead pear trees in a great whoosh, carrying people with it, the Coast Guard boat with it, the whale with it, sliding sideways over the old orchard like a train off its rails.
I ran to my edge of the levee, wanting to jump into the water, help the people bobbing, crashing into the piles of wood, crashing against the side of the whale, who was stuck up against a heap of trees herself, but I knew if I jumped in, I would get swept away, too.
My houseboat strained at its anchor below, like a dog pulling at its leash. I ran down the metal steps to the dock, unlashed the rope from its post, and jumped onto the deck. I had never driven the houseboat before—I didn’t even know if the engine worked—but it didn’t matter; as soon as the boat wasn’t anchored, it started to mov
e, sweeping across the slough, over what used to be an orchard. I tried to steer as best I could, but the current was too strong. The boat sped toward the whale, its fin still up in the air, waving weakly now. I tried to crank the wheel, but the boat kept barreling forward, and the whale kept looming larger. There was nothing I could do but drop to the floor of the cabin, curl into a ball, brace myself for impact.
———
THE BOAT HIT the whale with a thwomp that sent me reeling, my back crashing against the wall of the cabin. I got up and stumbled to the window; the bow had left a gash in the whale’s side, pink and white beneath the dark skin. I walked onto the deck, slipping on her blood as I made my way to the railing. People were thrashing in the water, some floating facedown. I pulled two life preservers off the side of the boat—they had probably been affixed there for decades—and heaved them over the edge. I hoped they weren’t crumbly inside, like old Styrofoam.
A woman, coughing, sputtering, grabbed onto one, and I pulled the raspy yellow rope to bring her toward the boat. It cut, burning, into my palms.
“Are you okay?” I yelled down at her, but she didn’t appear to hear me.
“Can you climb up the ladder?” I asked. She looked up at me, dazed.
“Just hold on to the ring,” I told her, and thankfully she did.
A man and woman fought over the other life preserver, trying to push each other away.
“You can both hold on to it,” I shouted, even though I wasn’t sure it would support both their weight.
I remembered the life vests inside the box built against the wall; I lifted the hinged lid. The orange vests were dusty, covered with spiderwebs, with spiders, but still might have some life inside them. I tossed them into the water, watched them bloom back into bright orange, watched them bob away from the people who needed them. I grabbed a broom and tried to push the vests back with the handle—they felt heavier in the water, like sweeping wet laundry. I gave the broom a big slogging push and the vests started to drift in the right direction.
And then I saw him. Pushed up against one of the piles of wood, limp. The collar of his T-shirt hooked onto a branch, holding his head above the water. I couldn’t tell if his eyes were open, if he was awake, conscious, alive.
“Nathan!” I yelled, but he didn’t seem to be able to hear me.
I called 911 on my cellphone. I’m sure others from our side of the levee had, too, because the operator said, “We’re on it. We’re on the way.”
The life vests were finally reaching people, who clung to them desperately, some of them struggling to get their arms through the holes. I could see the Coast Guard tossing more life vests out a few hundred yards away. A couple of the pickers who had stayed at the orchard appeared in Mr. Vieira’s metal fishing boat. I watched as they pulled a couple of people, including Roberts, from the water onto the boat.
The emergency vehicles began to arrive—helicopters, more Coast Guard boats, ambulances on the levee road, sirens everywhere. The back of my head started to pound; I had banged it fairly hard when the boat crashed into the whale. The whale whose blood continued to flow onto the deck. I managed to slosh through it to the railing, and pressed my face against the whale’s side. Its skin was cool and smooth. I rubbed my hand along it, and could feel the giant heart drumming; it thrummed through my entire body. I felt the rhythm stutter, felt it slow, felt it stop, until all that filled my ears was something that sounded like wind.
“MA’AM,” I HEARD someone call. “Are you okay?”
I opened my eyes. I felt dazed, drunk.
“You’re covered in blood.” It was a member of the Coast Guard. Their boat idled next to mine now; it was already full of people, some lying on the deck, some sitting, looking stunned.
“It’s not mine,” I said.
“Come on,” he said. “We can give you a ride to the hospital.”
“I don’t know,” I said, but when I stood up from leaning against the whale, I got so dizzy, I had to plunk down on my butt on the deck.
“Come on, ma’am,” he coaxed.
“I have to get something first,” I said, and slipped through the blood into the cabin, where I found Quinn’s book. I hugged it to my chest with one arm as I reached out to the coastguardsman with the other and he pulled me over onto his boat. I could see Sam tending to someone else, someone who no doubt would see her as a heavenly angel swooping down to save their life.
I TRIED TO avoid the bodies that someone had covered on the deck. I sat down and closed my eyes, my head throbbing like crazy now.
“My mother killed herself, you know,” said a familiar voice. I looked over; Nathan was lying on the deck next to me. His legs were bent at unnatural angles; his eyes looked as unfocused as mine felt.
“You never told me that,” I said. It felt weirdly normal to talk to him after so many years, under such strange circumstances, even though both of our voices were tired, strained.
“I was ten,” he said. “She couldn’t take it anymore—my dad’s drinking, screwing around.”
“I’m sorry.”
“When I heard you killed yourself, I wanted to die, too.” His speech was starting to slur.
I looked around to see if anyone was listening, but most people around me were either crying or catatonic. Part of me wanted to comfort Nathan and part of me wanted to push him over the edge of the boat.
“And then I see a picture of you in the paper, nine years later, after I get out. And I am so happy and so fucking angry, so happy and so angry all at the same time.”
“What were you planning to do when you found me?” I clutched the book tighter to my chest, the blue cloth cover mottled now with water, with blood.
He didn’t answer, although his fingers lightly brushed my arm.
“Nathan,” I said. “What were you planning to do?”
I looked over, even though it hurt my head to move. Nathan’s eyes were closed. He must have passed out. I tapped his cheek a couple of times with the back of my hand; the bristles of his stubble prickled my skin, but he didn’t wake up.
MY CELLPHONE RANG.
“Quinn’s going to be discharged soon,” said Ben before I even said hello. “They said they need the beds. Plus she’s doing great.”
“I need one of those beds,” I said.
“Sounds good to me,” Ben said playfully.
“No, really,” I said. “I hit my head. They’re bringing me in.”
“Oh my God, Izzy. Are you okay?”
“The levee broke …”
“What were you doing at the levee?”
“Quinn’s book …” Talking suddenly felt too difficult. “Just wait for me,” I said. “I’ll be there soon.”
THE HOSPITAL WAS a mad rush as they wheeled me and other people in on gurneys. I seemed to get extra attention because of all the blood, even though I kept insisting it wasn’t my own.
Ben, Abcde, and Quinn caught sight of me and ran next to the gurney as they took me back into the ER, all their faces concerned, Quinn’s mouth thankfully back to its normal size.
“I’m okay,” I tried to convince them. “It’s the whale’s blood.”
“The whale was bleeding?” Quinn suddenly looked even more concerned.
“Seckel is fine,” I said, blinking from the bright fluorescent lights. “She swam off. But Bartlett, not so much. I’m so sorry, honey.”
Quinn wailed. I was glad Abcde was there to hold her.
I did my best to describe what had happened at the levee.
“It sounds like Ragnarok,” said Quinn, snuffling. “The final battle between the gods and the giants.”
I handed her the bloodstained book and wondered if I had yet to face my final battle.
AFTER A CT scan, an MRI, a good old-fashioned head X-ray, plus some sponging off, it was determined I had a concussion, some whiplash, a few contusions, but nothing too serious. The doctors wanted to keep me overnight to observe me, so they moved me into a room upstairs. Quinn went back to the hotel wit
h Abcde and Ben—who had brought me some pajamas from my luggage—after visiting hours were over.
They unhooked my IV long enough for me to take a shower; after they hooked me back up, I wandered around the hallways in my flannel cupcake pajamas and slippers, pulling my IV pole, to see if I could find anything out about Nathan’s condition. A nurse pointed me to his room after I said I was an old friend; I was grateful she didn’t seem to recognize me.
When I poked my head inside the open door, I was shocked to see my mother sitting on the chair next to the bed where Nathan was sleeping or unconscious. She wore a gold sleeveless V-neck top, ivory slacks cinched with a thin gold belt, high-heeled sandals. Her arms were sinewy, her cleavage rising up to her throat. The breasts were new and startling, tan skin crepey between the hard-looking orbs. Her face appeared to be freshly tightened, her hair a brassy auburn, arranged in carefully blow-dried layers.
We stared at each other for a moment, all the air sucked out of the room.
“Well, you’ve certainly let yourself go,” she said. Almost ten years, and this was the first thing out of her mouth. But there were tears in her eyes, a softness in her voice.
I wanted to tell her it felt great, she should try letting herself go sometime, but the words didn’t reach my lips. My head pounded. I couldn’t seem to find my voice. Besides, she was wrong. I hadn’t really let myself go. I had let her idea of me go, which was a totally different thing. I had let her idea of me go so I could figure out who I truly was, myself.
“It’s good to see you, too, Mom,” I said. When I hugged her, she felt brittle, as if she might shatter in my arms, but her perfume smelled the same as always, and it took a long time for us to let go.
Nathan was still unconscious. He looked older in the hospital bed; I could see the silver threaded through his hair when my mom pushed it back at his temple, the lines etched next to his eyes.
“They’re not sure he’s going to wake up,” she said. “Or if he’ll have the use of his legs if he does.”
He was in casts up to his hips, a catheter snaking out, leading to a bag filled with pee strapped to the side of the bed.
Delta Girls Page 24
