The Lifeguard (18 page)

My leg is throbbing, only I don’t think of that now. I’m out of there, away from the bright lights, the blue tray with the steel instruments, the sharp knives, the hardware meant to slice people open and take out their insides and cut off their legs. Knives that can cut into your soul. And ruin your life.

Forever.

Something has changed, but what. Am I sleeping? Dreaming? Or dead? It feels like the atmospheric pressure is different and we’re cruising over the clouds. I’m a balloon being filled with helium so I can rise and float over the universe. It’s not as scary now. Nothing bad can happen to me. Has someone given me anesthesia? Am I going to sleep? What is it? What has changed?

Antonio? The figa?

Immediately I reach inside my hospital gown and buried inside it, around my neck, is the chain. I follow it until I reach the charm. Still there. They haven’t taken it from me. They probably missed it.

I close my hand around it, and then I realize that my arms are free. When did that happen?

It feels like Antonio’s near me. I knew he would keep me safe. It
was
him, or at least his power. He gave it to me, he helped me. Somehow he knew. Nothing bad can happen to me when I’m wearing it, when Antonio’s watching out.

Do you hear my thoughts? Do you know what’s happening?
A silent voice inside my head asks him.

I feel myself smiling just before I slip back into unconsciousness.

I stare out a window.

Night.

The moon. The hospital room, I’m back there again. My heart starts to quicken. Did I have the surgery? Machines are attached to me again and I jerk my head up. Oh God please, please, please, I don’t want to spend my life in a wheelchair. I don’t want to have one leg and have people pity me. I feel beneath the sheet and then I stare down and see my toes. All of them. I lie back again and exhale. Was it all a nightmare?

The soft blips of the machines are everywhere. Does that must there’s power again? Then I remember the blackout. People yelling out orders.

“Why didn’t the generator kick in?” I heard someone say. “What if we were in the middle of the operation?”

I would have been dead.

I would have bled to death.

I rest my head back on the pillow. From behind me in the darkness something stirs.

“Who’s there?”

Nothing.

Seconds go by and no one answers. I think of Aunt Ellie’s house, the ghosts. It couldn’t be, please.

“Who’s there,” I say, louder. “Please.” My voice cracks. Not the ghosts. I can’t stand the idea of their moans, the damp fingers that reach out to touch me. I startle when a figure steps from the dark. A hand touches my shoulder.

“Me,” he whispers. “Pilot.”

He steps around to the side of the bed and looks down at me. He has a light beard and shadows under his eyes. The air around me seems filled with his sweet perfume.

“I’m glad you’re here.” I reach my arm out and he takes my hand in his. It’s solid as the earth. “I’m glad you’re here.”

He smiles. “You already said that.”

It must be the medicine. Or him. I can’t think straight. He eclipses my sanity.

There’s a chair next to the bed and I lift my chin toward it. “Sit, please.” I study the way his dark, blue T-shirt outlines his lean, hard chest. He sinks down and leans back, closing his eyes, his hand tightly wrapped around mine. I watch his face. Is he asleep? As if in answer he opens his eyes. He looks at me and then turns and studies all the machines. Does he understand them? Can he read the patterns? He shakes his head slightly in disbelief.

“The day before yesterday you were sitting on the beach sketching…” he says, almost to himself, in a hoarse whisper.

“Do you know what happened to me?”

He looks at me and looks away.

“What?”

“You nearly drowned.”

“Tell me what happened. Please. My mind’s all muddled. I can’t remember anything clearly.”

He bites the side of his lip momentarily, but doesn’t say anything.

“You saved me. It was you, right?”

He doesn’t say no.

“I know it was. How did you find me? How did you know?” All I can remember is being angry at him. I wanted to swim and get cool. I’m overwhelmed with guilt for all the horrible, awful things I thought about him. All the blame. If he knew, he wouldn’t look at me.

“You were calling, yelling out for help.”

“But no one came. I thought I would die.” I remember that now. “How did you hear me?”

“Sssshhh,” he says, withdrawing his hand from mine. He leans over me and lightly places his hands over the blanket. I study the leather cuff that he wears wrapped around his wrist and realize for the first time that there’s an animal tooth of some kind attached to it. But then I look closer. It’s not an animal tooth—it’s a figa. It made out of clear crystal—the exact duplicate of the one Antonio gave to me. I’m about to ask him about it when I feel a deep, comforting wave of warmth spreading over me, like stepping into a hot bath on a cold, winter day. He closes his eyes. Is he sleeping? Praying? He keeps his hands there and breathes harder as though it’s an effort that takes all of his strength. I watch his jaw. His muscles tense. His hands reach up to the top of my head. Slowly, he begins to massage my scalp. He leans closer, his warm breath on my forehead.

And then a nurse comes in. She looks at him curiously.

He pulls back casually and looks up at her, wide-eyed, but there’s a pulsing in his jaw.

“She has to get some sleep,” she says. She shakes her head disapprovingly.

“I’ll leave in a minute.”

She stares at him, waiting.

“A minute,” he insists, his jaw tense. He stares back, unflinching.

She walks out and his face relaxes. He leans over me again, touching my leg now and leaving his hands there. Is it my imagination, or do I feel the blood pulsing through his fingers as a healing energy seems to flow between us like an invisible transfusion of strength?

Only, that’s crazy, it can’t be.

He bows his head, finally dropping his head into his hands. He looks exhausted from the effort.

“What is it? What’s wrong?”

“I’m so sorry. It was my fault.”

“What was? You saved me.”

“I should have known,” he insists. He gets up and looks at me as though he’s done something wrong, something he has to be forgiven for. “You don’t understand, of course,” he says, “but it’s all right.” He heads for the door. “I’ll come tomorrow.”

“Pilot, wait,” I call, as the nurse comes in again.

“How did you know? I mean, I was under
water
, so how could you
hear
me?” He turns back to me, studying me for a few seconds.

“I hear your heart,” he whispers, as he disappears through the door.

“What?” I say, almost to myself.

I look at the nurse, who’s checking my IV. “Did he say what I think he did?”

She studies me curiously and shrugs. “He didn’t say anything,” she says. “Not that I heard.”

T
here’s a yellow light behind my eyes, a warm light. I open them and see sunlight. It pours through the window and I squint. Was that what woke me? I lie back on the pillow. Something is different. But what? I’m stiff and uncomfortable. I shift and try to sit up.

Then I know.

The deep wrenching pain. It’s gone.

The whole world feels flooded with sweetness and renewal. The impossibly blue sky that follows the darkest storm—a miracle like a green sprout that has burrowed its way through blocks of cement. Bad things wash away, the world turns and dark becomes light.

Someone thrusts a balloon bouquet into my hand and I look up. The hand that reaches out is my mom’s. Next to her is my dad.

“Omigod!” My eyes flood with tears.

“Baby,” my dad says, stepping toward me. He leans over and kisses my forehead. My mom sits down and hugs me. Tears stream out of her eyes.

“Don’t cry, Mom, please, I’m okay.”

“I know you are,” she says, hunched over me, “but I was so scared.” She stares out the window. I know what she’s thinking, but she’s wrong. It wasn’t
her
fault, it had nothing to do with her. But I don’t say anything. It’s not the time to talk about what happened.

I look at them together. Is there a chance? Are they closer now because of what happened? But my dad’s not putting an arm around my mom. They’re next to each other, but they’re not together.

“When did you get here?”

“Yesterday,” my mom says. “Ellie called us as soon as it happened.”

No one says anything.

It.

No one’s exactly clear on
it
—not even me.

How much do they know? How much do
I
know? They’re afraid to ask me anything, to upset me. They don’t want me to talk about
it
. Unease washes over me, though. What if they want to take me home with them? I tackle it head on.

“I want to spend the rest of the summer here,” I look directly at my mom and then my dad. They can’t say no to me now. I have the advantage. My dad stares at his feet. He doesn’t know what to say.

“We’ll do whatever’s best for you,” my mom says.

The nurse comes in, as if on cue. She’s carrying my lunch tray. “Roast beef,” she says, brightly. “Get it while it’s hot.”

It helps break the tension. My dad scratches the back of his head. “Do you serve parents?”

“They’re not on the menu,” she says, deadpan. Then she smiles. “There’s a cafeteria downstairs.”

I hear Aunt Ellie’s voice outside. She’s talking to someone else. “Four inches of rain,” she says. “Half the state lost power.”

I remember the OR and how everything shut off. What if there hadn’t been a blackout, what would have happened to me? I’m also trying to figure out something else about the night, but Aunt Ellie comes over to my bed and puts a bouquet of daisies in a violet vase next to me and I forget.

“A still life,” she says, with a half smile. “You can do a picture to brighten up the room. I brought your pencils.”

The doctor comes in next with two medical students trailing him like baby chicks. His face lights up when he sees me now, the waxy mask of pity gone.

“Quite a turnaround, Sirena,” he says, shaking his head. He lowers the blanket and gently lifts the tape on the bandage to show the students. We all stare at the foreign object that’s my leg. There’s a long, thin line where they stitched the gash, but the redness and infection are gone.

“She’ll have full use of the leg,” he says. He’s bragging, as if he’s the one the credit goes to. I shoot him a dark look that I hope his students will see. One of them is too busy taking notes, writing everything down, even when I sneeze. I guess he’s preparing in case my leg and its fate will be the essay question on his final exam. When they all trail out, I try to swing my legs over the side of the bed, but it’s impossible.

I surprise myself by finishing my entire lunch.

My dad smirks. “She never had a problem eating. Nearly had to take out a second mortgage on the place to pay the bills.” My mom smiles. “That’s not exactly the way I remember it.”

My parents work hard at keeping the conversation going as if a dead space would draw us back to focusing on
it
. They must have vowed to do whatever had to be done for me and put all their feelings about each other out of the way. Still, their act is convincing. I push back the table with the empty plate.

“Aunt Ellie, is Pilot here today?”

She shrugs. “I’ll ask.” She jumps to her feet and leaves the room, probably glad I’ve given her something to do other than sitting with our sad party.

“Pilot?” my dad says.

“The lifeguard…The one who pulled me out.”

“Why would he be here?”

“He’s an EMS tech.”

My parents exchange a glance that I’m not supposed to see. Just then Aunt Ellie comes back in. “He’s at the beach, Sirena.”

I look at all of them. “Then I have to go there—right now.”

“What?” My dad looks at me in disbelief. He shakes his head, afraid to protest.

“Sirena, you’re getting over a very serious accident,” my mom says, gently. “I don’t think they exactly want you going to the beach.”

I look at my mom and dad and then Aunt Ellie. “If it hadn’t been for him, you wouldn’t have a daughter anymore.”

They exchange glances without another word.