And I snatch it out of her hand, feeling that it’s still half-full before I take a swig.
She shakes her head, but I spot the smile in her eyes.
We’re quiet for a few seconds, and I kind of feel like she doesn’t want to go out there, either.
“I love the beach,” she finally murmurs.
I shoot my eyes up to her.
“In L.A,” she clarifies, not looking at me. “It was my only favorite thing, I think.”
Oh, right. I asked her about her life in California.
She glances at me, a smile peeking out. “I can see you there,” she muses.
Damn right, you can. I fit in everywhere.
She pauses as she stares off. “When I was fourteen, I was obsessed with oldies music. I don’t know why.”
I listen, liking having someone to talk to in the house.
She continues, “I found out that Surf City, U.S.A. was actually Huntington Beach, California. So one rainy morning, I took my father’s ’47 Ford Woody,” she laughed a little, “—the only thing he owned that I loved—and I drove to Surf City. My parents were still in bed, and I was on spring break from school. I had never taken one of his cars. I didn’t even have a license yet. I just grabbed a backpack stuffed with books and… drove.”
She drops her eyes, something I can’t read creasing her brow. I narrow my gaze as I watch her absently fiddle with the hem of my shirt that she wears.
Something happened that day.
When she speaks again, her voice is almost a whisper. “It was still early when I got there. I sat down on the
beach, watching the morning waves roll in.” A wistful look fills her eyes. “It was so beautiful. People love looking at the ocean at sunrise or sunset, but I love looking at it right before the sun is up or right after sundown.” A glint of excitement lights up her gray eyes as she looks over at me. “Everything is so calm, and the water has this blue-gray hue, like storm clouds. An ocean of storm clouds,” she muses. “The sounds of the waves are like a metronome through your body. The rain tapping your shoulders. The infinite horizon and the dream of just going and losing yourself somewhere out there. No one’s there. It’s peaceful.”
A solemn look comes over her, and I hold my beer in both hands, watching her.
“After a while,” she continues, “I finally stood up, lifted up my backpack, and strapped it on. It was so heavy with books, my knees almost buckled.”
She swallows.
“But I stood strong,” she mumbles. “And walked into the water.”
I tighten my hand around the bottle. Walked into the…
“I walked until the water came up to my waist,” she says quietly, staring off. “And then up to my shoulders.”
With a pack of books on her back, weighing her down.
“And when the water hit my mouth, I started swimming,” she tells me. “Struggling as I tore through the water as fast and hard as I could, because I wasn’t strong, and I knew any second the weight of the pack would take me down, but I wanted to go farther. I needed it to be deeper.” She hesitates, whispering her words like she’s thinking out loud. “So deep I couldn’t make it back. So I wouldn’t be able to make it back. My feet no longer brushed the ocean floor. I was going. Farther and further.”
I know that feeling. The edge we dance when we want to get to the point of no return, so we have no choice but to keep going, but I always chicken out. I always fear doing things I can’t undo.
“I remember that last moment,” she says, droplets glimmering across her now-tanned skin. “When my muscles burned, because I’d used every ounce of strength to keep myself and the pack up. The last moment, knowing I was about to go under. The weight pulling me down.” She shook her head gently. “Let myself go. Let it happen, I told myself. Just do it. Just do it. Just let me go.”
I can see her, some pier close by as she fights to keep her head up and knowing there’s almost nothing saving her from the fathom below.
“I dropped the pack.” She blinks. “I didn’t even go under.”
Logically, I knew that. She’s still here, isn’t she?
But still, I’m glad to hear it wasn’t a hard decision to stay.