Presents tan and healthy—bright shorts over a one-piece swimming suit, which means she’s decided to repeat a behavior that didn’t yield the best results, athletically, at this same time last year. This girl is a kick.
Me: Swimming again.
Annie: It’s that time of year!
Me: If memory serves, your swimming should be done in water too shallow to actually swim in. On a towel. In the sand. Lots of sunscreen.
Annie: Funny. Swimming’s good for me. It uses completely different muscles.
Me: Which, if that were your goal, would be good.
Annie: Don’t know what you’re talking about. (she’s being sarcastic)
Me: Uh-huh. Annie, since I started working with you, at age nine, you’ve been doing this thing I call oddball sports. You did soccer—that one made some sense, athletically—field hockey, not so much; lacrosse, where you almost killed a girl; cross-country . . .
Annie: Don’t forget curling.
Me: (cannot prevent my own teenage eye roll) Right. Curling. And no matter if you had to win to play more games, or lose to play more games, how many contests have your mother or Sheila or your father attended?
Annie: (big sigh) You think there’s something wrong with me?
Me: You are in a therapist’s office once a week. (gets me a laugh) What’s bringing this all up again? Maybe that’s what we should be looking at. We’ve agreed your responses are . . . a little bizarre . . . but over the years they come and go. What’s going on now?
Annie: I’m not sure. I have some of those dreams, or flashbacks or whatever; you know, where Rance has come out of his coma and is threatening everyone; Nancy grabs the bread knife. Sheila jumps in on one side or the other and I just stand there. I know I’m supposed to do something, but my feet are stuck and I’m yelling but no sound comes out.
Me: And when do you get those dreams?
Annie: I know, I know. When I haven’t seen anybody, so I don’t know if everyone’s all right.
Me: And when you do see somebody and figure out everyone is all right . . . relatively speaking . . . what happens?
Annie: I fight with them.
Me: Because . . .
Annie: I’m mad that they made me worry.
Me: And . . .
Annie: I know, I know. I hate that they’re okay without me.
Me: And . . .
Annie: That they don’t need me.
Me: And . . .
Annie: They don’t want me. (tears well; but she’s showing me the tough Annie, willing them back)
We sit quietly. In one form or another this is a repeat, but naming it usually relieves pressure.
Me: It’s circular. You engage in behavior that yields little, and the less it yields the harder you try.
Annie: The definition of crazy, right?
Me: The definition of spinning wheels. So what are you going to do about this swimming thing?
Annie: (stands, pops her forehead with the palm of her hand) Workouts start tomorrow noon.
Me: Bye, Annie.
Annie: Same time next week?
Me: Same time next week.
Impression: Coming into her last year of high school, then headed into truly uncharted territory. Her trepidation clashes with her need for control. Not unusual given her history, but could be in for a rough patch.
Emily Palmer, M.A.
Chapter
Four
With Hoopfest behind me, I’m headed for uncharted waters. Literally. I could play AAU basketball for the rest of the summer, but I’d be on an elite team, which would mean games out of town pretty much every weekend, which would leave me a lot fewer chances to hook up with my roots.
Tomorrow I hit the water.
Lesson in relativity: To gauge my success in basketball I consider points, assists, percentages of field goals and foul shots made, rebounds, and fouls. In swimming it’s fear on the face of the lifeguard.
This is Leah, talking me into turning out the first time: “You practice every day, so if anybody from your crazy family wants to be there to claim your body when you drown, they can. You’ll never make the A team—my team—we have an out-of-town meet every week. You’ll be stuck right here in the city park, swimming with the suck team.”
“How can I refuse?”
She holds up a finger; there’s more. “If you qualify in the prelims of an event, you swim later in the finals. So pick events nobody likes to swim. Like the fifty fly or one hundred I.M. Almost nobody on the suck teams can do all four strokes, so all you have to do to place is not get disqualified. I can help you with that.”
“What’s an ‘I am’? I am what?”
Heel of the hand to the forehead. “I-period, M-period,” she says. “Individual medley.”
“Which doesn’t increase my fund of knowledge one bit.”
“Twenty-five yards of each stroke,” she says. “It’s awful for beginners. Sometimes you’ll be in the water alone. Finish alive, you get a blue ribbon.”
I don’t mind hard work. I don’t even mind turning out for a sport at which I know I’ll be abysmal, but the universe did not engineer my body for the butterfly.
“Doesn’t have to be pretty,” Leah says when I tell her that. “Just legal. Plus, you get to dazzle some young horny Michael Phelps never-be studs laying out on a blanket in your skimpy Speedo two-piece between races. They’ll come around telling you what a good race you swam or asking if you saw theirs, and since you’re completely uninterested you’ll tell them how good they looked and give them that smile you give that you know will drive them crazy.”
“What smile . . .”
“I’ve seen you at work, girl. You aren’t me in that suit, but you’re the next best thing.”
There is something powerful about making guys drool, even if they’re doughy little boys three to six years younger, walking around between races with their beach towels high up under their boy boobs to hide their cottage cheese love handles. I’m pretty sure this sick little part of me has something to do with what Nancy calls my “Boots wiring,” which is designed to “git yourself a man.”
Our coach, though, presents a greater challenge. This guy turns heads. He’s a student at Whitworth University, probably the best swimmer in our region, if you don’t count Leah, and dead serious about this swimming thing. He’s built like a real swimmer, and it’s a challenge to make him look at me the same way the little boys do. His name is Rick Sebring, and if there’s a straighter arrow anywhere, it’s gotta be his girlfriend, Janine, also a Whitworth swimmer and Rick’s assistant coach. She’s really nice and really patient and every bit as pretty as she is tough, or vice versa, which kind of makes me jealous.
I’m not really trying to take Rick from Janine. In fact, I know from a couple of bad junior high experiences that “Boots wiring” is just another term for “trouble.” I was a victim of “early development,” and Nancy told me every chance she got that “them titties” could get me all of what I needed and most of what I wanted. I’m not going into it, but mostly they got me fingerprints and lies. So even though it would be easy to travel that road, I am not going down it. I never go out with a guy more than three times, and only then if he keeps his hands in his pockets. But I have an overdeveloped yearning to be wanted, which doesn’t speak highly of me, and I do like making another girl nervous.
So I’m walking out of the dressing room at Witter pool, net bag slung over my shoulder with my wet Speedo, swim cap, and goggles inside, scanning the parking lot in case there’s a misplaced Boot hanging around.
“Annie, hey!” Rick. Coach.
“Yeah?”
“Got a minute?” Janine is headed toward his car.
“Yeah.”
He catches up to me. “Listen, what are your goals?”
“Dancing With the Stars,” I say. “My own reality show.”
Slight grimace. “For swimming.”
“Stay on top of the water; move toward the far end. Repeat.”
??
?Didn’t I see your name in the Review for winning your division at Hoopfest?”
“Yeah.”
“And weren’t you All-City last year?”
“Second string,” I say.
“So what are you doing in the water?”
“Staying in shape?” I give him a look.
“You put that as a question. Why aren’t you on an elite summer basketball team?”
“I like to try new stuff. Is that okay?”
He shrugs. “It’s okay by me, but I’m going to be cranking up the yardage once some of these younger kids look like they can take it. Coach Cole is looking for the studs who can move up. Your stroke isn’t exactly . . .”
“Olympic?”
“I almost jumped in to pull you out twice today.”
I murmur. “That’s good to know.”
He frowns. “What?”
“I’m in less danger than I look. Don’t worry, I’ll get the hang of it and I’ll put in the yards.”
“Long as you know what you’re getting into.”
Janine hollers from the car, “Hey, sweetie. You coming?”
He turns and jogs away. They talk for a minute before he starts the engine, while I convince myself I caused a little trouble.
Marvin meets me at the door. “Man, am I glad to see you.”
“What’s up?”
“Frankie’s up.”
“He’s back already?”
He nods. “And Sheila looked quite roughed up.” What seventh grader says “quite roughed up”? I never quite get used to Marvin. He dresses like a kid—sandals and baggy shorts and T-shirts, though his T-shirts are often telltale. Today’s says, “There is a reason for everything, and that reason is science.”
“How bad?”
“Facial bruising, swollen lip; you know . . .”
Sheila does like the bad guys. “But Frankie’s okay?”
“Relatively,” he says, and smiles. “I mean, he’s still Frankie.”
“Is he doing his Frankie thing?”
“Uh-uh, but only because I’m following him like a secret service guy. Man, I don’t get it. How come it doesn’t bother him as much as me?”
I shrug, punch his shoulder. “Frankie runs on negative feedback. You look like you’ve had enough. Where is he?”
“In the bathroom.” He points to the closed door. “At least he’s close to where he should be putting it.”
“Never let him close the door,” I tell him, and bang on the bathroom door. “Frankie, open up!”
Silence.
“Frankie!”
Nothing.
“You better not be doing what I think you’re doing!”
From behind the locked door: “I not.”
“Yeah, well, you were thinking about it.”
Silence. Then, “How come you know?”
“I know everything. Open up. If I have to jimmy this door, you’re really in trouble.”
Laughter.
I say, “You’re gonna think funny.”
“Jimmy,” he says, and laughs again.
“It means ‘break in,’ Frankie. Open the door.”
“I don’t like bosses,” he says. “If I open this, you don’t be mean to me.”
“I don’t like bosses, either,” I say. “If you open it, I don’t be mean to you. If you don’t open it, I do be mean to you.”
Silence.
“Frankie?”
Nothing.
“If you’re smearing . . . if you’re doing the bad thing, I’m going to tie you to your bed.”
“That’s mean!”
Uh! “You’re right. If you’re doing that, you and I are going to get a rag and some soap and scrub everything till it smells like roses.”
“Not smearin’ nothin’.”
“Good. Then we can go play. Open up.” No wonder Sheila dumps this little Martian off so often; he’s exhausting.
I hear water running. “Frankie, will you open this door? Please?”
“I might take a bath.”
“You can take a bath if you want, but you gotta open the door first.”
“I just like bosses what don’t boss me,” he says. “My teacher bosses me but I just don’t do what her say. Her gets mad.”
“I’m not your teacher, Frankie. Neither is Marvin. Open the door and we promise we won’t boss you.”
“Marvin bosses me.”
Marvin is shaking his head. He whispers, “I will vacate.”
“Marvin won’t boss you.”
“He say I drivin’ him crazy,” Frankie says.
Marvin’s nod affirms it. “That’s why he won’t boss you. He doesn’t want to be crazy. Frankie, Open. The. Door.”
After a brief silence the knob clicks. I wait for him to come out.
Marvin smiles, puts both hands in the air. “See, buddy? No boss here. I’m leavin’ you with the Goddess of All Things Strange.”
Frankie says, “See ya.”
Marvin whispers as he passes, “Dismissive little shit.”
“So, wanna go play?”
“Uh-huh,” Frankie says.
“Inside or out?”
He looks through the window. Bright and sunny. Warm. “In,” he says.
I say, “Out.”
He wrinkles his nose.
“Go downstairs and grab some trucks and a couple of superheroes. Get the bucket and the shovel.” We’re only a few minutes from Manito Park playground. There’s sand there. Swings. A little water park. “Get your suit.” As often as Frankie shows up here without notice, Momma keeps an “emergency Frankie drawer” full of clothes and toys, etc. He comes up in shorts and a long-sleeved shirt that looks way too hot to me.
“No suit,” he says. “No water.”
“Bring it anyway. We don’t have to use it.”
At the sandbox at the park I snatch Frankie by the back of his shirt as he tries to take another kid out for messing in his sand and getting close to his trucks, and plop him in a corner facing away from all possible combatants. He plants a super villain figure upright in the sand, crashes into him from behind with a dump truck. “Fuck it for you, Butch!” he yells, and runs him over again.
“You gotta whisper that word,” I tell him.
He crushes Butch once again and in a very loud whisper, says, “Fuck it for you, Butch.” He hides “Butch” behind a sandy mound, but the dump truck plows through and mows him down.
“Is Butch real or pretend?”
Frankie glares, brings a foot down on Butch.
“Frankie, who’s Butch?”
He seems not to hear.
“He a boss?”
“Not my boss,” he says, stomping Butch. “I kill him.”
“You don’t like bosses.”
“Nobody’s the boss of me. I be my own boss.” Stomp!
“Is Butch at your mom’s place?”
He looks away.
“Does he live at your house, Frankie?”
“He’s not the boss of me!” Frankie yells, and jumps up and down on Butch’s sandy grave.
I flash on the fights that have turned physical in my life, shake it off, and nod toward the water station, where kids splash, man the rotating water machine gun, stand under revolving, randomly tipping buckets of water. “Hey, guy, I’m hot. Let’s get wet.”
He absently touches the upper arm of his shirt. “Huh-uh. Too cold.”
“Frankie, it’s ninety-five degrees out here.”
“NO!”
“YES!” and I wrestle him into the sand, bounce up, and crouch into a wrestler’s stance.
Frankie charges and crashes against my leg, and I let him pull me down.
“Great tackle! You’ll be drafted out of grade school.”
I’m on my back, Frankie straddling my chest, fist cocked. I catch his arm mid-swing. “Illegal use of the hand! Come on, buddy, you can’t play like that. Somebody gets hurt.”
He swings with the other arm. I block it, jump up, and haul him toward the water. Frankie squ
eals in fake protest, obviously forgetting his aversion to cool water in ninety-five degrees. In seconds we’re standing beneath a bucket, soaked to the bone. I run to the mounted water machine gun, swing it around, and fire; Frankie drops to his belly, crawling like a soldier through the stream yelling soldier threats. I throw off my soaked outer shirt and kick it out of the way. Frankie does the same, and I cease fire.
Frankie yells, “Keep shootin’!”
I drop to a knee, take his arm. A dark bruise over swelling covers his entire biceps. He tries to cover it.
“Lemme see.”
“I forgot,” Frankie says, staring at his arm. “I done it. I falled down. It wasn’t Butch. It doesn’t even hurt.”
I touch the wound and he flinches.
“Is this why you were driving Butch into the ground with your truck, Frankie?”
“Butch don’t hurt nobody,” Frankie says. “Him a good guy.”
“Who told you that?”
“Butch.”
“Frankie, how did this happen?”
“We was tradin’ punches.”
I close my hand gently over the bruise. “Come on, bud. Let’s go back. You can watch a show.”
“That didn’t take long,” Marvin says as Frankie scurries up the front walk.
“Breaking news,” I say. “Sheila’s not the only one scuffed up.” I don’t explain, and instead ask Momma if it’s okay to take the car, then hurry into my room to grab my cell.
Me: Sheila’s address
Nancy: Who wonts to no
Me: I wonts to no. Give me the goddam address
Nancy: Don’t be snoty
Me: Sorry. Give me the address please
Sheila’s address pops up on my screen.
“Hey, Sheila.” I stand on the porch staring at her through the broken screen. She does look rough—bruised cheek and swollen lip, dirty jeans with a hole in the knee that she didn’t buy to look that way, ratty blouse that I recognize came from Nancy.
“How’d you find me?”
“Siri.”
“Who the fuck’s Siri? What are you doing here; is Frankie okay?”
“Depends on what you mean.”
“I mean is he still at your place?” She looks at the ground.
“Yes.”
“So why are you here?”
“Somebody here named Butch?”
“No.”
“You lying?”