Water Born (12 page)

TWENTY

E
arly morning. First light making a pale oblong of the window at the end of the pool. A hush in this rectangular space. A moment of peace.

Training was cancelled. None of the other girls are here. And so I can just swim, do the thing that I love, feel normal for a while.

Unbelievably, Harry is at the lifeguard post. He's slumped in the chair, staring across the pool. I stop near the bottom of the ladder.

‘What are you doing here?' I say.

He looks down at me, and there's no light, no spark. He could be looking at something on the bottom of his shoe.

‘Couldn't sit at home any longer looking at the walls.'

‘She was your girlfriend, wasn't she?'

He nods. ‘She was the best.'

I thought I could handle this, but I'm stung.

‘Gee, thanks,' I say.

‘What?'

I look round. No one else is here.

‘What about us?' I hiss.

‘What do you mean?' He looks genuinely confused. ‘There was no “us”.'

‘All the phone stuff. The photos.'

I can see the truth dawning on him. Maybe now I'll get an apology, or maybe he'll express some guilt over doing the dirty on Christie.

‘Oh, that. That was nothing. Everyone does that.'

‘I don't believe you. It wasn't nothing to me.'

He smiles and shakes his head.

‘It's time somebody grew up. Some people . . .'

‘It wasn't nothing! And I had no idea you were seeing Christie. I'd never have—'

‘Oh, come on. Everyone knew. Christie couldn't keep a secret to save her life . . .' He stops, realising what he's said, then continues: ‘She was the real deal. She was awesome.'

His eyes glaze over and although he's looking in my direction, I know he can't see me. He's seeing Christie, hearing her voice, remembering . . .

I walk towards the deep end with his words ringing in my ears.

That was nothing. Nothing. Nothing
.

I don't want to cry. What right have I got? Christie's dead. All that's happened to me is some waste-of-space
boy has hurt my feelings. He's not worth crying over. I wipe my arm across my eyes, stand at the edge of the pool, look at the perfect flat water, and dive.

I stretch my body, reaching forward through shades of turquoise. Light filtering through the water. A dark blue highway of tiles between me and the other end.

He's there, beside me. The boy called Rob. He doesn't seem to be moving his arms and legs, yet he swims alongside me, keeping pace, his pale body parallel to mine. He's so close I could almost touch him.

Rob.

You know my name
.

I know who you are.

Was. That was a long time ago
.

Seventeen years. So why are you here now? What do you want?

I've been looking for you. I've been playing our game, Nicola. Hide-and-seek. Remember?

I don't know what he's talking about. Hide-and-seek?

I found you before, and then I lost you. Someone took you away from me. I've been looking ever since
.

What do you want?

I want what's mine. I want what's owing
.

His face looms nearer. I can see the pores on his skin, the spots and sores, the streaks of mud.

I don't understand.

Just swim. You belong in the water, Nicola. You belong here with me
.

I shouldn't have come here this morning. It feels wrong now, trying to carry on as if nothing has happened. Disrespectful to Christie. And if I hadn't come,
I wouldn't have seen Harry. And I wouldn't be talking with my dead uncle. He wouldn't be in my face. Close. Too close.

I want to get out.

You're upset
.

I think . . . I think I've made a mistake.

This is your place, Nicola. The water is yours
.

I shouldn't have come here today.

Give me those feelings. Give them to me
.

Trust me, you don't want them.

Trust me, I do
.

I need to breathe.

Who's upset you? Give me their names
.

Harry. Mum. Dad.

There's a noise in my ear, a breath, a hiss.

Forget them. You're better than all of them. The best. Just breathe. And swim. Give yourself to the water
.

I break the surface, take a long breath in and dip under again. And the more I swim, the better I feel. My limbs feel longer and stronger. There's power in my shoulders and hips.

I cut through the water, lap after lap. Everything else falls away. There's only the physical movement of arms and legs and neck. The rhythm of breathing. Break the surface, breathe in. Under again, push the air out, long and slow.

I swim until the pool starts to fill up with the early-morning casual swimmers: old women and men who have already been awake for hours, walking in the shallows or breast-stroking ponderously to the deep end;
hairy-backed men in too-small trunks and nose clips; professional amateurs who line up a water bottle and a couple of floats at the end of a lane. I don't let any of them put me off. I just plough up and down, hardly feeling my body any more, numb through repetition.

Rob is still with me, but I can't see him. He's quiet now, but I know he's here.

I pause at the deep end, holding on to the side, pushing my goggles on to my forehead. I glance up at the clock. It says eight-forty. That can't be right. I screw up my eyes and look again. I've been swimming for more than two hours! Now that I've stopped my limbs feel heavy in the water. My fingers are pale and corrugated. It's time to get out.

It takes a couple of attempts to pull myself on to the side. I'm just starting to wonder if I'm going to make it when I manage to get the balance of my weight over the lip and I haul my legs out.

Harry's a few metres away, pulling in the lane marker. He'd seen me struggling but didn't offer to help. At the other end the second lifeguard, Jake, is unhooking his end and pulling ropes too. Rope is coiling around Harry's feet. I have to walk past him, or walk the other way round three sides of the pool, and that would look stupid.

The hypnotic calm that I found in the water evaporates. I don't know what to say, what to do. Perhaps I can just get past without saying anything.

‘Hey, Nic,' he says when I get close enough for him to talk softly without anyone else hearing. ‘What we said earlier. We should just forget about it, yeah?'

‘I—'

‘No one needs to know about it. Like, it wasn't anything anyway, was it?'

I'm too tired to take any more hurt. I take a step to one side, but he's not done yet.

‘So those pictures. You're gonna delete them, right?'

‘Oh, yeah. Because you wouldn't want anyone seeing them, would you? You wouldn't want anyone knowing what a two-timing loser you are.'

He's looking at me with undisguised disgust now.

‘Do you want
your
pictures on the internet? Do you want me to tweet
them
? Have everybody know what a little whore you are?'

Behind him the water is a choppy mid-blue, stirred up by all those arms and legs. But I can only see red. A red mist of embarrassment and humiliation and fury.

He's the whore. Give him to me
.

Rob's voice is in my head.

Without thinking I raise both hands quickly and shove them into Harry's chest. Hard.

And life switches into slow motion. Harry's top half reels away from me. Arms flailing, he takes a step back to try and regain his balance. His back foot is on the edge of the pool. He teeters on the brink for a second or two, his face contorting into a series of comic-book expressions. He seems to be recovering himself. His arms stop wind-milling, and he's still upright – more or less stable – when his feet get whipped from under him. I see him suspended in mid-air, and then his legs hit the water and his head smacks against the tiled edge of the pool.

The noise isn't like anything I've ever heard. I've seen acts of violence on TV and in films, of course, but in real life the sight of it, the sound, is more shocking than you can ever imagine. A rifle shot? A watermelon dropped from a top window? I don't know what to compare it to, but I know I'll never forget it.

He's flopped face-down in the water now. Blood fans out from the wound on his head, like red smoke in the water. His body is surrounded by a tangle of blue rope and orange floats – all in a sea of red.

There are screams from other swimmers. I hear a shout from the far end of the pool. Jake's running round the edge. He dives in halfway along the side, just as I come to my senses and jump into the water next to Harry.

I grab hold of him under his armpits and turn him over. His eyes are open. His mouth is, too. Oh, God.

I pull him up to the side. I can move his body in the water, but out of it, he's too heavy for me to lift. The blood makes him slippery. Blood all down his face. Blood on my hands. Blood pulsing out of him.

Jake's here. ‘'S'okay, I'll take over now.' He heaves Harry's body up towards the reaching hands on the edge. They pull Harry clear of the water and lay him down. I stare as someone puts their hand on his neck, then leans their head on his chest.

‘Is he breathing?' Jake asks.

I turn to look at him, and I'm transfixed by his hands. Why is he wearing gloves? He wasn't wearing them a minute ago. And then his hands find the water and the gloves dissolve. Not gloves, blood. And I look at my
hands, resting on the edge of the pool, and I've got red gloves too.

Jake's looking at me now.

‘What the hell happened just then?' he says.

But all I can think of is the blood, the blood on my hands, and then everything goes black and I slip under the surface.

TWENTY-ONE

T
here are hands on me: behind my neck, under my arms, at my waist and my hips. I'm lifted clear and laid flat on my back on the cold, hard tiles. Someone puts something under my feet, lifting my legs up.

‘Her eyes are flickering.'

‘She's okay. Just a faint. Give her some space.'

I turn over on my side, bringing my legs up as I cough the water out of my windpipe.

Faces looking down on me, shifting in and out of focus. Strangers, Jake and . . . Dad?

I can only have been out for a matter of seconds. I remember it all: Harry falling and cutting his head open. The blood.

I turn my head and Harry's there, lying flat out a few metres away. Someone's found a first-aid kit and is holding
a thick pad of white wadding to his head. A dark stain is showing through the layers. His eyes are closed.

‘Is he—?' I say.

‘What, love?' Dad scrunches up his face and leans closer.

‘Is he okay?'

‘The ambulance is on its way,' Dad says. He strokes my forehead, over and over. Does he mean the ambulance is on its way for me or Harry? I don't want to be taken off anywhere.

‘I'm fine.' I try to sit up.

‘Just rest for a little while.'

‘No. No, really I'm fine. I want to get out of here.'

Dad helps me to sit up.

‘Can we go home?'

‘You need to be checked out, but after that, yes, I'm sure. In a little while.'

The people gathered round me start to drift back to Harry. Dad helps me to my feet. ‘How are you feeling?'

Truthfully, I feel disconnected, like all of this is happening to someone else. I look down at my fingers. I make them move, clenching and unclenching both fists. I must be here, alive. This must be real. But it still feels like I'm in a dream, or watching a film.

‘I'll get a shower,' I say.

‘Someone should come with you.'

‘I'll come,' a woman nearby says. She's grey-haired, stout, in a flowery costume with a frill of material around her hips. She links her arm through mine, and we start to leave the pool. I catch Jake watching us – me – stony-faced.

The woman, Shirley, helps me fetch my towel and shampoo from my locker. ‘Don't lock the door in case you faint again, love. I'll wait outside so no one comes in,' she says.

I push the door to, hang up my towel, put my shampoo bottle down and press the metal button on the opposite wall. The shower starts, running cold for a few seconds, then warm. I step forward, shut my eyes and tip my face into the stream. I squeeze my hands over my head, pushing my hair away from my face, scraping it close to my skull, then – eyes still closed – I peel off my swimsuit and drop it on the floor. I let the water fall on me for a while, like rain, until it dwindles and stops. I reach for the button again, push it, turn round and crouch down. Time to shampoo this day away, get clean.

I open my eyes to see a pair of feet by the door, blocking my way out. Naked feet. Bruised. Marked.

I can see through them, see the tiles he's standing on.

I gasp.

I can hardly bring myself to look up, but I do. Hairy legs with deep scratches in the pale, translucent skin. Wet white boxer shorts clinging to him. Skinny torso, ribs visible. And his face looking down.

Rob.

Hunched over as I am, my naked front is shielded from him by my head and shoulders, knees and shins.

‘You shouldn't— You can't—' I stutter.

Ssh
. He holds his index finger up to his lips.

‘You all right in there?' Shirley shouts.

‘Yes. Yes. Just dropped my shampoo.'

In the pool he reads my thoughts.

You can't be in here, I think, making the words as forceful as I can, trying to keep calm.

It's okay
.

No! Not like this. It's not right. Please, go away.

Two down
, he says.
Two to go
.

What?

We did it. Job done
.

I don't understand.

You and me. We solved one of your problems
.

Harry? It was an accident. I didn't mean him to hit his head . . .

He got what was coming
.

The shower's stopped again. Water trickles down my spine. It drops from my chin on to my knees. And Rob starts to disappear. Everything behind him – the grain of the fake-wood door, the pattern of my towel hanging on the hook – is becoming clearer.

What the—? Where are you going?

Press the button, Nic
.

No. I'll see you in the pool. Tomorrow. I'll be there, I promise.

Press. The. Button
.

The menace in his voice is unmistakeable.

I can't reach. I uncurl a little and, keeping one hand over my boobs and covering my crotch with my elbow, I reach for the button.

The water rains on to me again and he's back.

Good girl
.

I really want to get dry now. I want to go home.

Home. With Mummy and Daddy
.

Yes.

Neisha and Carl
.

Of course he knows their names, but it still unsettles me to hear him say them.

I've missed them
.

Of course you have. They're your family as much as mine. He's your brother. Seventeen years is a long time.

A long time. Coming to an end soon
.

What? What is?

The water's running out again.

Rob, I'll see you tomorrow, okay?

He doesn't reply. He just looks down at me and keeps looking. Staring, with his pitiless eyes, at my naked body.

My cubicle door drifts open an inch. I stretch my hand forward to close the gap again.

‘Are you nearly done?' Shirley says.

‘Yeah.'

The last suggestion of Rob's shape has gone now. I'm alone in the cubicle. I haven't washed my hair, but I don't care. I'm not pressing that button again. Not today.

I stand up and wrap the towel round me.

Shirley's still on guard outside. ‘You feeling all right now?' she says.

‘Yeah,' I say. I can't put into words how I feel, and if I could, I wouldn't tell anyone.

‘So it's okay if I have a quick shower now, while you get dressed?'

‘Yeah, sure.'

Someone comes into the changing room and the
opening of the door brings a brief burst of noise – the distant wail of an ambulance. Harry on his way to hospital, no doubt. Do they keep the sirens going if someone's died? I don't know how anyone could survive losing that much blood.

He got what was coming
.

We did it
.

Job done
.

It was an accident, wasn't it? Okay, I pushed him. But how could I have known his feet would get caught up in the rope like that? How could I have known he would hit his head?

We did it
.

Rob asked me to give him my worries, to tell him who was bothering me. And I did. Mum, Dad and Harry.

Two down, two to go
.

Two down – does he mean Christie as well? Oh God. What have I done? What the hell have I got myself into?

Shirley emerges from the shower.

‘You haven't made much progress. You all right?'

I look around me. My clothes and toiletries are laid out on the bench, just like they always are.

‘Yes. Yes, I'm fine. Bit shaken up.'

‘Do you need some help?'

‘No, I can manage. Thank you.' I switch on to autopilot, go through my daily routine, until I'm dried and dressed, my hair is brushed and everything's packed away in my bag.

Dad's in the corridor outside the changing room, pacing up and down. As soon as he sees me he rushes
over, takes my bag from me and puts his arm round my shoulders.

‘Are you all right? Let's get you home. I've rung for a taxi.'

‘How did you know I was here? You must have got a text saying training was cancelled.'

‘Yeah, and I went back to bed, but when I woke up again and found you were missing, this was the first place I looked. I know you, Nic. I can read you like a book.'

‘Are you cross?'

‘I was, but when I saw you in the pool and the blood all round you, my heart just stopped. I wasn't angry any more, I just wanted you to be okay.'

‘And I am. Except . . . except . . .'

‘What is it?'

‘Oh, Dad. I'm scared.'

His hand tightens on my shoulder and I bury my head in the curve of his neck. He kisses my hair.

‘I was scared too, but it's okay,' he says. ‘You're okay now. Let's get you home.'

Maybe he didn't hear me properly, doesn't realise that the fear is still with me.

I think I'm starting to feel what he feels.

I'm scared of what I've done, and what I'm capable of.

I'm scared for him and for Mum.

I'm scared for me.