On every side table are arrangements of shells that seem too perfect to have come from the beach outside, smooth stones that sparkle with mica, and coasters printed with starfish and sand dollars. In the bathrooms are dishes of small blue and green and pink soaps in the shapes of shells that have never been used and towels with beach umbrellas embroidered at the hems. Paintings of palm trees and herons in seashell-crusted frames are scattered around the walls of the breakfast room. The trivets look like they’ve had shells pressed into them to leave imprints, and there are vases in the corners filled with tall, stalky grasses.
The bedspread in the master bedroom is striped in shades of blue like the ocean and the sheets are the color of the sand on the beach outside. Last night as I fell asleep, I imagined that I was lying on the beach and the blanket was the ocean slowly covering me, pulling me into its dark.
Rafe ordered pizza, and though I can taste it, I can’t remember eating it. He’s talking about Javier, and I don’t know if I asked him a question or not. Then I realize he’s talking so I don’t have to. To distract me.
He tells me how Javier bought this place with his partner before the area was developed. When the beach was empty. How he’d tease Clive for the way he decorated: like the beach took a shit in the house. How Javier brought Rafe out here and it was the most peaceful place he’d ever been.
How the ocean makes him feel small. “You look out over the ocean and you know that the water you’re seeing, no matter how far out you look, is only the very edge. It’s like space or something. Scary big. It’s kind of strange to know you’re only experiencing the very outside of something. All those kids in the summer, wave-jumping, swimming, surfing in the sun. They’re just playing on the very edge of this giant monster. But I like it. The sense that there’s something bigger than me that connects me to someone far away, on the other side, looking out over the water thousands of miles from here, from a totally different place, living a completely different life.”
It’s how I think about cars sometimes. That I have a hand in something that someone is going to drive far away, into another life.
Rafe’s arms slide around my waist from behind and he rests his chin on my shoulder, squeezing me. For a moment, I think the rushing in my ears is a sign I’m feeling woozy, but it’s just the waves outside, ever-present, even with Rafe’s breath in my ear.
“How are you doing?” Rafe asks softly, and the sympathy in his voice is almost painful.
I shrug and his arms tighten around me, holding me up when I sag back into him.
“COLIN! COLIN! God damn it!”
I’m wrenched around and yanked against Rafe’s chest. He’s squeezing my wrists hard enough to bruise but I don’t even feel it.
“What the fuck are you doing?” Rafe shakes me, looking down into my face fiercely.
“I—I’m—nothing.”
The lightening sky is white and the ocean is gray, the world like a black-and-white picture.
Rafe shakes his head, teeth gritted and jaw clenched. He drops his forehead down on my shoulder, shaking.
“Come in. It’s freezing out here.”
The sand coats my wet feet as we walk out of the ocean and up the beach onto the deck. I’m shaking with cold, my feet and legs numb. Rafe tries to brush the wet sand off of them but only succeeds in getting it all over his hands.
Finally, he just pulls me inside and upstairs, stripping off my underwear and T-shirt and shoving me into the shower. He takes off his coat and the flannel pants and T-shirt he was sleeping in, and steps under the water with me. If I close my eyes, I can almost pretend that the too-hot water pouring down on me is the too-cold water I was wading into. Rafe’s arms are wrapped around me and he’s murmuring something in my ear, but I can’t hear it because the shower is even louder than the ocean.
He dries me off like I’m a kid or a stray dog and wraps me in the bedclothes. The ceiling is that weird stucco that looks like someone bounced a ball into it while it was wet, leaving little smacks of texture. We lie there in silence for I don’t know how long.
When Rafe finally speaks, his voice is tight, weary.
“You could’ve died,” he says to the ceiling.
I shake my head, the sound of my hair scratching the pillow almost deafening.
“Oh, you don’t think so?” Rafe goes up on one elbow and turns to look at me. “You walked into the ocean in December in your fucking underwear, Colin!”