RIPTIDE

By

Rekha Ambardar

“No eight-month emergency funds for you, young lady,” Everett Stanton, my financial advisor, told me when I met him at his high-rise office building in downtown Duluth. “Your father provided well for you. You have a great job as a PR consultant for a biotech firm. Everyone else should be so lucky in this economy.”
“Thanks to your financial wizardry, Everett.” I slipped in the name with a caress in my tone. After all, the man was successful, mature, handsome, and confident. And I was looking for a husband. Enough with those young wannabes who were dazzled by my inheritance and didn’t care a fig for me. You see, I had more money than looks. I’d been to a cosmetic surgeon or two, but at twenty-nine, I didn’t look any better than I did at twenty-two. I was a reasonably good swimmer but I relegated my exercise to swimming now and then at the pool at home.
My father had left my mother, sister, and me quite rich, but I was his favorite. We had the same temperament – we went after what we wanted, and we cultivated people. I’m Jocelyn Durocher. My sister, Elise, at thirty-five, was as serene and graceful as a Siamese cat. She was content to be an elementary school teacher, and she and my mother lived together, satisfied for the rest of their lives. She was adopted when my parents thought they might not have any children. Then I came along, the temperamental equivalent of my father. I was his princess although Elise was the selfless one.
Me, I was different. I wanted to find the love of my life, and he would be it. After the immature men I’d met, he was the one I wanted to marry, and the realization hit me after Father died. At least, he would not be after my money because he had his own; that qualified him. Moreover, he could manage my money and take care of my affairs. There was just one problem – he had a twelve-year-old son, Toby, whom he had custody of, and whom he doted on – all the more because Toby had a congenital heart problem.
I had never been able to woo over Toby, spoiled Toby, but I tried – offering to go bike riding with him or hiking through the trails on the hills that skirted the lake. No dice. Elise, on the other hand, had no trouble getting him to skip stones on the lake’s surface.
I was determined to win Toby over, somehow, if only by seeing him and his father more often. Maybe Toby would get used to me.
We had a cottage by Bear Creek Lake, a fairly large body of water, with eye-catching scenery around it. Bear Creek Cottage and the beach were my retreat when I wanted to spend time by myself, reading or sun tanning by the water. What better place to have Everett propose to me but at this “other Eden,” where gulls swooped and loons called while skimming the cobalt blue water? I’m not saying he’ll propose right away but a few such trips there and it’s a cinch. You see, he’s a sucker for breath-stopping scenery.
“Everett,” I said. “You’ve been working too hard managing mine and everybody else’s money. Why don’t you come out to our cottage this weekend and I’ll barbecue some steaks?”
“Sounds like a great idea, but I have some catching up to do on work,” he said, running his fingers through his salt-and-pepper curls. Did I tell you he was attractive?
“Oh, try to come. You need to get away from the work sometime.…” I pleaded.
He let his hand fall on the papers and his shoulders slackened. He was relenting. “We-ll. I could use a break,” he said. “Besides, it’s been a while since I saw Mrs. Durocher and Elise.” Ever the gallant cavalier, he thought the world of my mother and sister. He was a family friend, at least fifteen years older than I. He’d been through one marriage and had come out mellow and mature.
Everett shuffled some papers and then looked up. “Guess I’ll get to see them too at the cottage.”
My head jerked toward him. See my mother and sister? That wouldn’t do. It was to be just him and me, the lake and the barbecue so we could get acquainted without the talk of midcap funds and investment portfolios.
“They’re going to be busy,” I said, smoothing lock of hair behind my ear. “Mother has her event with the Women’s Auxiliary and Elise said something about a teachers’ retreat.
“Too bad.” Disappointment laced his voice, and my glance caught the furrow in his forehead.
Everett had just gotten to know my father when he had consulted Everett briefly, and the two had hit it off. Everett was married then. His wife was quite the stunner, a tall, smoldering brunette, who caught the eye of a hunk in the entertainment business, and ran off with him.
That was just before father died. Our two families were in mourning then – ours for losing my father, and Everett and his son for being abandoned by a faithless wife and mother. I would be good for him, steady, under no illusions, given to no temptations, with only my money to act as a male magnet, which was, for me, easier to deal with than drawing them to me with looks and allure.
“They’ll be over another time. I’ll let them know we’re going there, and that way they can come when they can,” I said soothingly. He leaned back in his chair. He was looking for a surrogate family and recognized it in the placid world my mother and sister created around them. My mother with her incessant crocheting and my sister with her landscape paintings and her langorous contentment.
Saturday dawned warm and golden, a typical early autumn day. Leaves had already turned a delicate orange and red, and against the blue sky. One could envision Paradise, if there was such a place.
Simon, the caretaker, came out to meet us as we drove up – me in my Lexus SUV and Everett in his Land Rover. He wanted us to drive separate vehicles in case one of use had to drive into town for some reason. Ever the detailed planner, he thought of everything, as my father did. But Everett had the soothing composure that Father lacked. Father hadn’t made it big in Durocher Plastics by being the epitome of serenity.
Simon extended a gnarled hand to Everett. “Bin a long time, Mr. Evert,” he said. He’d never learned to pronounce the name correctly.
“That’s all going to change. Mr. Everett needs a break from work,” I said, handing Simon a traveling bag. He took mine and then grabbed Everett’s bag from him.
“Nice weather we bin havin’.” Simon squinted across the lake at the thick clump of pines and maples, the sun lighting flinty sparks on the leaves.
The lake rippled like shards of glass rubbing against one another, and a soft breeze rustled up from the across the water.
The glass-topped patio table and white wickerwork armchairs stood on the sun-dappled tiles, screaming for occupiers, or so it seemed.
“Could you bring sandwiches out here for lunch?” I asked Simon.
“Shore will, Miss Jocelyn. I have lemonade and coffee ready,” Simon said as he shuffled off into the cottage, a bag in each hand.
Everett took a deep breath and glanced at the tall maples and elms forming an umbrella of shade over the patio. A few gulls swooped and skipped through the shimmering water. “I had forgotten what a great place this is,” he said.
So he did remember something about the times he came out here to visit Father. He never seemed to notice me much. Ever the professional, he and Father would discuss portfolios and then, when Mother announced dinner, he’d reluctantly get up to go into the dining room.
Half an hour later, bags put away, Simon brought a refreshing repast out to the patio – ham and tuna sandwiches, lemonade, and a carafe of coffee
“You spoil us, Simon,” Everett said with a chuckle.
I watched Everett, studying him closely. He seemed content, with none of the restless go-getting compulsiveness of some of my former boyfriends. I had never thought of him as husband material, but after Father died, he seemed like the one I wanted to spend the rest of my life with. Was I in love with him? I couldn’t say I was, but there were worse things than not marrying for love. Besides he knew my father well, and it seemed to me, Everett preserved a side of my father’s character - the gentler side.
“Maybe I can do some fishing,” Everett said.
“I didn’t know you liked fishing,” I said, a bit surprised. Financial advisors and fishing somehow didn’t seem to go hand-in-hand, but I could be wrong.
“Nothing like spending a few hours on the lake to clear your head,” he said with a grin As we sipped coffee, the roar of a car sounded in the distance. I strained to look in the direction of the long driveway beyond which a dirt road snaked up toward the cottage.
It was Mother’s silver gray BMW. And with her was Elise. I swallowed my annoyance. What were they doing here when I’d told them I’d call later?
Everett strained his neck to look in the direction of the approaching vehicle.
“It’s Mrs. Durocher and Elise,” he said, an inflection of anticipation in his tone, betraying his fondness for Mother and Elise. In fact, he behaved in a special way around Elise – more solicitous, gentle, and attentive. The more self-effacing she was, the more intrigued by her he appeared. I made a mental note to try that sometime myself.
Martin, the driver, parked the car and sprang out to open the door for the my mother and sister.
Elise carried a couple of huge plastic bags, which she held up like Exhibit A.”See what we found for the bedrooms – lovely floral bedspreads. At a nice bargain too,” she said.
“I didn’t know we needed any here,” I said as mildly as possible. Elise was the domestic one between us. She and Mother had a field day going through stores on weekends. Me, I didn’t know a bedspread from a wheelbarrow, and didn’t care either. That was why there were interior decorators – to take care of such mundane details.
Everett gallantly hauled the bags in. “Join us for some lunch?” he said, setting the bags on the landing to the stairs going up..
“No, we just ate. Thanks, anyway,” Elise said. “But you two finish your lunch and we’ll put these away.”
Did Everett’s gaze linger for a moment on my adopted sister’s languid beauty, savoring her calm demeanor? She was never flustered or in a hurry. Never demanding.
They joined us later in the patio, and Elise poured coffee in two cups, handing one to Mother.
The golden afternoon and the breeze off the lake were heady, lulling us into a mild alpha state.
“Jocelyn is a good swimmer, did you know, Everett?” Mother asked.
Everett turned to me. “No, I didn’t know. This sure is the place for it. Do you swim here?”
I nodded. “When we used to come here with Father,” I said. I liked lashing out with strong strokes, challenging the water when it was choppy. Once or twice I had barely escaped a riptide, but the experience had left me heady with the feeling that I could take on anything in the water, even a riptide. It had been a while since I swam in the lake, using a pale substitute instead – going to the gym now and then, when the mood struck, which wasn’t often. “Father was a good swimmer too. He taught me.”
I relived the dives and swoop of the gulls nearby when I lay still in the water. When one of them close enough, I’d try to catch it.
Father would scold me for that. “Watch, it. They have sharp claws,” he’d say.
But while Elise sat on the pier and dangled her feet delicately in the water, I grew stronger as a swimmer everyday.
The late afternoon sun slanted benignly over the patio as we sat watching loons skim the water’s edge on the far side of the lake.
“Paradise,” Everett said, half to himself. He borrowed my binoculars to survey the scene.
“We’ve enjoyed the times we’ve been out here when my husband was alive,” Mother said, smiling wistfully. “Jocelyn took the most advantage of it, improving her swimming.”
Mother had brought out some embroidery to work on.
“This place has history. Did you know?” I asked, turning to Everett.
“Oh?’ His eyebrows rose as his interest peaked. “How so?”
“This is where Father proposed to Mother,” I said, watching him.
“The place must bring back some memories for you, Mrs. D.” he said with a grin.
“Yes,” she said, looking down at her sewing. “Some good, some so-so.”
“How can you say that, Mother,” I said sharply. “They were all good.”
“Speak for yourself, dear,” she said.
She was probably implying that Father and I had similar interests – fishing, studying rocks, swimming – while she and Elise had more ladylike hobbies.
“Cherish the good memories and forget the rest,” Everett said.
Later, when Mother and Elise were busy washing curtains, I talked Everett into playing Monopoly.
“You have a keen eye for strategy,” he remarked when I made an investment on property at a critical juncture.
“Thanks.” A glow of pleasure burned in my face. Any compliment from Everett was a coup. Was I his type? I wasn’t sure now, the way I’d seen him watch Elise.
Dinner was courtesy of Elise. The enticing aroma of a chicken casserole wafted across the living room. As if that weren’t enough, the mouth-watering smell of a bundt cake followed. Everett lost his interest in claiming more territory, be it real estate or finance. “Enough of this,” he announced.
“I was going to plant the dahlia bulbs after dinner,” Elise said. “Want to help me, Mother?”
“Afraid not, dear. I have the embroidery I want to finish,” Mother said sipping her coffee. “I can help you tomorrow.”
“Let me,” Everett said. “I can dig up the soil for you. Just tell me where.”
“That would be great,” Elise said. Her face was flushed from the activity of producing the delectable dinner and it became her, judging by Everett’s lingering glance. I turned away abruptly.
After dinner, Everett strode off into the shed in search of a hoe and rake. “Everett, the gardener,” Elise said as she removed the plates from the table. Mother and I did the dishes while Elise went looking for Everett.
My guts roiled with envy. Elise had managed to snag Everett’s interest in something. I never guessed he liked gardening, but then I hadn’t had the chance. Elise had grabbed it. Or had she? She couldn’t have known Everett liked gardening, he was more the city guy, as far as she knew.
I got up and gathered up the Monopoly pieces, not wanting to witness the cozy camaraderie developing between them, stashed them in the container they came in and placed the large, square box on the shelf in the den.
I returned to the living room with my iPad to check stock quotes for the day, and my email, while I was at it. A listless, pointless feeling washed over me as I sank onto the sofa. How convenient to disappear into cyberspace when you didn’t want to face reality. You could live a virtual life nowadays if your real life didn’t go the way you wanted it to. I could lose myself in a variety of “avatars” and carve a new life for myself. I could – but it would be futile, nothing more than figments of the imagination. I sighed and turned to the square, colored patches on the iPad screen.
Then an idea hit. Toby! That was the answer. I would invite Toby to spend a few day here by the lake. He loved fishing and swimming, and I was a mean boater and swimmer. I could try to bond with him over the things we could do together – Everett would like that.
The idea prompted a feeling of elation I hadn’t experienced in a long time. There was something I could do to nudge Everett to see me in a new light.
“I’m making some tea.” Mother’s voice pierced through my reverie. “Do you want some?”
I sprang to my feet. “Oh, yes. I’ll even help you make it.” My lethargy had gone, even though I heard chirpy, chuckling voices waft over from outside. Everett and Elise were obviously thoroughly enjoying their gardening chore.
Let Elise enjoy her little victory. I had my own plan. I felt a little guilty. It wasn’t Elise, and I knew it. She was too noble to connive in any way. If she attracted Everett, it was unconscious on her part.
I glanced out the long kitchen window toward the far side of the gray stone-rimmed garden. Everett and Elise raked and hoed the soil, apparently enjoying themselves immensely. They threw dry leaves at one another. Elise’s straw hat had flown away in the wind and Everett hurried after it, captured the errant chapeau, and placed it firmly back on Elise’s head, both in the throes of giddy laughter, lost to their surroundings.
I dragged myself away from the window, a heavy feeling in my gut. Elise had appropriated my mother’s affection, and now, Everett’s. But was it her fault entirely?
“Elise and Everett get along very well, don’t they?” Mother’s voice pierced through my gloomy thoughts. She was pouring boiling water into two cups with teabags in them, and pushed of them toward me on the kitchen counter.
“Oh? Why do you think that?” I said, trying to sound nonchalant.
“Why, they seem to like one another,” she said. “They’d make a good couple.”
“Oh, Mother. Stop forcing things on people,” I said, exasperation surging wildly through me. “Leave them alone.”
“I was just saying…” Her voice trailed away and she took a sip of her tea.
“Toby should come over one of these days,” I said casually. “He’d love the lake. He hasn’t been to the cottage in a long while since Everett usually comes by himself.”
“That’s a wonderful idea,” Mother replied. “There’s a lot Toby could do. Everett could take him fishing or swimming.”
“Hmmm.” Everett would see how good a mother I’d be, if things went well. I’d genuinely try to bond with Toby. I hadn’t had many opportunities for that before.
Nearly half an hour later, Everett and Elise trudged into the house, after having put away their soil-crusted implements in the shed.
“Invigorating exercise, that,” Everett said, shrugging out of the light jacket he had on.
“We got all the dahlia bulbs planted,” Elise said, her face rosy from being outside in the strong wind. She ran the faucet in the kitchen sink and washed her hands in the flowing water. Everett was close behind her, obviously intending to do the same. Their body language told me that they had thoroughly enjoyed their outdoor activity together.
When Elise went upstairs to get cleaned up, I intercepted Everett as he made himself some tea.
“Toby would like it here,” I said lightly. “You should bring him over next weekend.”
Everett nodded and grinned. “He likes to visit his cousins on weekends. He looks forward to it, in fact. They’re all hooked on video games,” he said, placing his steaming hot mug on the coffee table. Might be a good idea to get him away from them a bit.”
“I could take him boating,” I said, pleased that I could show off my prowess in boating and other aquatic activities. “And swimming. Maybe fishing too..”
“He needs to get re-acquainted with nature and its pleasures. Too much technology for his own good,” Everett said, a crease clouding his forehead. So Toby was a technology freak. He probably had every kind of electronic gadget for the asking, fond father that Everett was.
“Then it’s settled,” I said, eager to firm up the plan. “Next weekend, you’ll come over with Toby.”
A jolt of pleasure and satisfaction rang through me. I had managed to cajole Everett into coming to the cottage with Toby. Including Toby in all our activities by the lake would surely please Everett.
I’d have to plan ahead a bit – tell Simon to get the boat ready. I already knew what he’d say. “Miss Jocelyn, you haven’t taken the boat out in a while.”
“A big mistake,” I’d say.”And me the avid boater.”
I chuckled to myself.
***
I planned for the next weekend with the energy of a kid planning presents for Christmas. Toby would be coming for the first time in a long while.
The weekend promised to be warm. We were to have an Indian summer week and weekend in early fall. Swimming. I’d take him swimming – I’d be his mentor.
“Be sure to pack Toby’s swimming trunks,” I told Everett over the phone. “The weather forecast says ‘very warm.’”
“Good. Toby likes swimming. That should get him away from the video games and texting his friends.” Everett had certainly joined the ranks of parents concerned about their kids’ over-attachment to technology. I shook my head at his over-protectiveness. Everett needed to loosen his hold on Toby.
That’s where I’d come in. He hadn’t been in a relationship – to my knowledge – for a long time. That was the problem. If we were together more, he’d stop worrying about Toby so much. After all, he was almost a teenager.
I told Mother and Elise of my plans for the next weekend over the phone. “Toby would like that,” Elise said over the phone. “And he’s such a great kid.”
“Would you like to come over too?” I said cautiously.
“No. Mother wants to invite her quilting friends over for light snacks on Saturday,” Elsie said.
I blew out a breath of relief. I wanted Everett and Toby to myself next weekend. “Well, maybe next time,” I said.
We were all together so much, Mother, Elise, and I when Father was alive that it continued even after he passed away. Moreover, Mother was closer to Elise than me, something I could never get out of my mind, even though she was the adopted one. It challenged me to include them in all my plans at the cottage. I felt a distinct stab of jealousy at Elise now and then. Her serene, imperial manner was more conducive to Mother’s nature than my volatile personality.
Saturday dawned warm and loaded with sunshine. I’d reached Bear Creek Lake the evening before to open up the cottage and give it an airing. Simon would not be on duty during the weekend; he’d been given the time off. Mother, Elise, and I would often use the cottage without Simon’s solicitous help and thoughtful ministrations.
I brought my steaming coffee mug out onto the patio on and sat on the wickerwork armchair. A soft, warm breeze sifted off the lake, bringing with it the earthy smell of dried grasses and moist earth dampened with overnight dew.
Everett and Toby arrived around ten o’clock. Toby seemed more tanned I’d seen him last, almost a year ago, when Everett had picked him up from a friend’s and then dropped by my house to pick up a book I’d lent him. Toby was a bit chubbier, with a shock of sandy-colored hair flopping over his eyes, still aloof. He had an annoying habit of not looking at me when I addressed him or if he spoke to me.
“You certainly picked a great day to have us over,” Everett said, sniffing the air as he and Toby walked in the door. “Nice out here, eh, Sport?” He ruffled Toby’s already tousled mop.
“Oh boy – a boat,” Toby said as he spied the boat in the boat house. His face was flushed with seeming anticipation. “And loons.”
A loon swooped down, skipped on the lake’s placid surface, and then took off like an errant two-engine plane.
Toby chuckled. “Silly bird,” he said, shaking his head.
I left the guys outside to take in the delights of a cottage by the lake and went inside to fix some light lunch of tuna sandwiches, a fresh salad, and lemonade in a pitcher.
Half an hour later, we sat at the patio table enjoying lunch.
“Where do you see loons wanting to water-ski,huh?” Everett grinned at Toby, who crammed a hug bite of the sandwich and licked the dressing that dribbled onto his fingers.
“Want to go for a walk along the lake after lunch?” he asked Toby.
“Sure.”
They chitchatted about nothing in particular, until it looked as though they were not even aware of my presence. I seem to have that effect on people. I smiled wryly to myself.
After lunch, Everett and Toby got up and ran toward the water’s edge.
From a distance, I saw them playfully punching each other, and then gathering stones to skip across the water.
I sipped the last dregs of my coffee. Should I have joined them in their play? No. I liked being able to watch them together and see how they interacted. I saw Toby so seldom that I hardly knew him, yet the closeness between father and son was unmistakable.
I carried the plates, pitcher, and silverware back inside, washed and put them away.
An hour later, the guys came in, hot and bushed.
“Have fun?” I said, drying my hands on the kitchen towel. It was a happy, domestic scene, to my mind, surreal also, somehow, because we weren’t really a family – yet. Would it be like this after Everett and I were married?
“Sure did,” Everett said. “We had to fight off the loons to skip stones.”
“Maybe we can feed them breadcrumbs sometime, huh?” Toby said to Everett, then looked at me.
“They’d like that,” I said.
“I have to run into town to pick up a file I forgot,” Everett said.
I nodded.”Don’t worry. Toby and I’ll find something to do.”
Everett fished out his car key, and drove off a few minutes later.
“How would you like to go swimming?” I gave the kitchen counter a wipe.
Toby had taken out his smart phone and was running his thumb over it like a crazed fly looking for a place to land. An afternoon in the lake would detach him from his small-device addiction.
“I guess.” His thumb hovered in the air temporarily.
“Did you bring swimming trunks?” I asked him.
He nodded.
“You might want to change into them,” I said. “I’ll get the boat.”
I exited through the side door of the kitchen and went in the direction of the boathouse. The small outboard motor boat was no longer new, as it had been when Father first bought it all those years ago. Simon would use it once in a while for fishing, but that was all.
It rocked gently in the water, almost as if it were a living thing, waiting for me to untie it and putter it out of the boathouse. I grabbed the life jacket sitting on the ledge and drove the boat toward the dock. It purred softly as it negotiated the lapping waves.
Toby waited on the dock as I eased the boat flush with it. “Ready?” I said.
I helped him in. Toby sat on the side seat and looked around him with interest. “Can I go swimming?” He asked.
“We’ll see.”
The lake broadened in the middle, meandering in swirls toward private docks and piers. Small sprays of water dotted our faces like someone sprinkling us with a watering can.
“Nothing like a boating expedition,” I said, my hand on the steering wheel. “Unless it’s swimming.”
“Can I, huh?” Toby sprang up and pulled off his tee shirt. “I have my swimming trunks under my shorts.” On his neck dangled a medic alert locket on a silk cord.
“What’s that for?” I asked him.
He was nonchalant. “Oh, that. Dad told me I was born with a heart defect. I have to wear this in case I need help.”
I remembered Everett talking about the surgery.
“I’m not sure it’s a good idea for you to go swimming.” I didn’t want to be blamed if something happened to Toby.
“I go swimming all the time.” Toby’s mouth dropped in disappointment.
On the other hand if he swam to his heart’s content, he’d go home happy – and I’d be the person of the hour, the hostess who enabled Toby to shine.
Toby stood with his foot on the rim of the boat.
“Better put on a life jacket,” I said, handing it to him.
He put it on. “Just for a while. I don’t need this.” No doubt he thought a life jacket was for babies, but I wasn’t taking chances.
He dived into the water and swam around the boat like a curious eel.
We were a few hundred yards near the middle of the lake. The warm, buttery sunshine still poured its golden warmth on the lake and its surroundings. I basked in the thought of Everett’s pleasure in Toby’s accomplishment today, all because of me….
He came up against the side and hauled himself into the boat. He then pulled off the life jacket.
“Better keep it on,” I said.
“No, it’s getting in the way,” he said and placed it on the seat. Did I detect a note of contempt in his tone? I wasn’t sure. Was it because of my concern or his general dislike of me?
Soon he was in the water and off again.
I leaned back, my face uplifted to the sun, enjoying the peace and quiet, except for the sound of Toby splashing around the boat.
He raised his head for a second and pointed to the shore. Obviously he was going to swim to the shore breadth-wise from the boat – either to show me or for his own satisfaction.
I shook my head. “No!” I yelled.
He nodded “Yes.”
He was going to be oppositional with me. Fine.
I waited and watched as he made for the shore with long strokes. What if he became exhausted? Maybe then he would turn back. I almost wished he would get tired and change his mind.
I pulled out the binoculars from the wooden box under the steering and peered into them. Toby was still going strong, as far as I could see.
I place the binoculars beside me on the seat, and looked above. A wind had twisted off the far side of the lake and seemed to be headed in this direction. The sun was playing coy, and hid behind some wandering clouds.
Toby was a dot on the lake’s surface, like a swiftly moving tadpole. Maybe he was a strong swimmer, and I was being anxious for nothing.
I was lulled by the haze and the cooling breeze.
Then, suddenly shouts of “help” jolted me. Toby was flailing in the water. A cramp? He was facing the boat and was attempting to swim back.
For a split second I couldn’t think. Should I plunge in and try to pull him out? An image thrust itself into my mind – that of a sullen, recalcitrant adolescent, oppositional to anything I said. What ally would I find in him? The thought froze me, gaining momentum.
My glance was suddenly diverted by a movement at the dock. Everett! He had returned an dwas watching.
I pulled off my jeans and shirt. I had a swimsuit underneath it. I dived in and swam toward Toby, who was still flailing instead of swimming toward the boat. He had obviously lost his ability to stay afloat. He appeared to be sinking fast. I dived under water to where he was and attempted to grab him. I caught him by the waist and dragged him to the boat. His flailing had stopped. He was now limp.
With immense effort, I lifted him into the boat and then climbed in after him. Laying him on a blanket, I wrapped him in it. I wasted no time in steering the boat back to the dock at raving speed.
Everett met us at the dock, his face pale with anxiety. “What happened?”
“Toby insisted in going for a swim. He must have had a cramp,” I explained. It sounded futile, even to me.
Laying him on the grass, Everett attempted to revive him. He turned him on his side to let the water drain out of his mouth.
A few minutes later, he picked Toby up in his arms. “I’m taking him to Emergency.”

***
It has been a year since Toby drowned. I changed careers, now working for non-profit organization that sends nurses overseas to third world countries that need their services.
Everett and Elise got married, and Elise is expecting their child, and they live close to Mother. I live in another town, seeing Elise and Mother as time permits.
Toby’s death was ruled “accidental drowning.” And Everett? He is cordial toward me, but his manner hints that he holds me responsible for Toby’s death.
THE END