Chapter 9 #2
‘Splints. She has cerebral palsy, they help stabilize her legs when she’s walking. But she doesn’t wear them in the water.’
‘Ah OK, la paralysie cérébrale.’ He stared at Rue, thinking for a second as she waited impatiently beside Wren. ‘Bon. We will adapt a few things. I will take your sisters myself and Sébastian can take the other children. You will watch from the sand.’
‘Em. Yeah. Thanks,’ I said, not happy about being told to watch from the sand, which I was going to do anyway, but so happy about the way he talked about Rue’s disability.
Or maybe it was because of the things he didn’t say.
Sometimes when I told people what she had, you’d get this sympathy face and stock phrases about things being ‘so hard’ or a million other variations of that.
And maybe that would be OK if it was a different kid, but Rue didn’t want people feeling sorry for her; she wanted to be the best at everything she could.
I leaned against the beach hut and watched their whole lesson. How Antoine helped Rue take off her splints and helped her and Wren on to big foam boards on the sand.
Sébastian was the guy he’d been talking to earlier.
Tall, thin, with long, blonde, beachy hair and a goofy smile.
He was on the other side of the hut with the other children, and they were all laughing about something he was saying, or maybe just laughing at him when he pretended to fall over, it was hard to tell. I turned back to Antoine and the girls.
He made them sit on the surfboards on the beach, practising balance. Then he got them to lie down, helping Rue gently. And she didn’t complain when he did. Then he made them stand up beside the boards, while he scanned around him. Then his eyes landed on me.
‘The sister. I need you for a second. Please.’ He waved me over, and I looked behind me in case he was looking at somebody else.
‘Who, me?’ I asked as I got up and walked towards them.
‘Yes. You. You are the sister? Lie down. Please.’ The please an afterthought.
Antoine motioned to the board, and I replied with a shrug. And he just stood there and waited until I did what he said. I lay down face first on the board, feeling like a total idiot.
‘OK. Girls, watch your sister. It is easier to watch someone try, so I can show you the mistakes.’
Ugh. And how was he so sure I was going to make mistakes?
‘OK, move back so your toes are at the bottom.’
I shuffled backwards.
‘Chin up. You need to see where you are going. OK, now practise the paddling.’
I could not have felt more stupid, pretending to swim on the sand. But I did what he said.
‘More wide. And this?’ Antoine grabbed my hand and covered the back of it with his. He squeezed it into a cup. ‘Like this. Not flat. But you know already? From swimming.’
‘Margot likes to swim a lot,’ said Wren. Correction: I did like to swim.
I did what he told me – cupped my hands and pulled them through the sand.
‘So it is like swimming, but you are pushing the board through the water, not just you. Do you see, les filles?’
‘Yes, Antoine!’ Rue and Wren said together.
The sun was hot on the back of my legs and neck, which was exposed by my high ponytail.
‘OK, now the pop-up.’
I’d show him mistakes.
‘Hands under your shoulders, like a push-up.’
Easy.
‘OK and now you want to push up with both arms and slide your foot in between them. Right here.’ Antoine tapped the space between my hands.
I took a deep breath and pushed myself up, sliding my foot in between my hands. I smiled, because I knew I’d got it right.
‘OK, Princesse, good job. But maybe that was lucky? Try again.’ He pointed back to the board, and I lay down again.
I repeated the same motion about five times, and I got it right five times.
And on that last time, I lifted my head and stared out at the sparkling water.
And I felt something. Like a rush of warm nostalgia.
Of a past that felt so far gone that I thought it would always be a distant memory.
Rue and Wren clapped for me when I pulled myself back up to standing. Antoine just stood there, eyes blocked by his glasses, so I couldn’t even guess what he was thinking.
‘You can stop calling me Princess now.’ I brushed sand from my legs and tightened my ponytail.
‘But you are a princess.’ Wren smiled at me, then turned to Rue, like she was embarrassed she’d said the wrong thing. Which she had. But I forgave her.
Antoine just nodded towards Wren and shrugged, pulling a face and making her giggle.
‘Let us try again, les filles.’ Antoine clapped his hands and Rue and Wren lay down on a board each.
Then Antoine whispered something that made them laugh so hard that Rue almost fell off her board on to the sand.
At the end of the lesson, I watched as Antoine helped Rue put her splints back on. Both the girls went to the beach hut, where Sébastian was handing out little cups of water, and Antoine came over to talk to me.
‘Your sister Rue. The smaller one. She is determined. More than my adult students. Stubborn. La petite guerrière,’ he said.
‘That means warrior. And Wren, the bird, le petit oiseau, she watches everything. I noticed how she would not relax until her sister was comfortable. She is the peacekeeper between you two, non? She puts out the fire?’ Antoine said, a serious look on his face.
I just stared into his black aviators, shocked that he’d picked up so much about the girls in so little time, and even more shocked by the state of my curly half ponytail hair in their reflection. I pushed rogue strands behind my ears.
‘Do you notice this much about all your students?’ I asked.
And by the way he looked down at me and smirked, I knew he knew what I was asking.
‘Not all of my students, non. Just the interesting ones. Do you want to know what I noticed about you, Princesse?’
‘That I’m not a princess?’ I said, without half the conviction I’d intended.
‘What I noticed was that there was a split second when you stood up on the board and I could see that you were not thinking any more. You were only feeling. Where everything around you disappears, and you had not even gone into the water. I am right?’ He cocked his head and studied my face as I tried not to give away the fact that he could not have been more right.
‘Peut-être,’ I said with a shrug. I didn’t smile. Two of us could play that game. He was just so sure of himself. And I wasn’t giving him anything else to feed his ego.
‘Maybe you do want a lesson?’ he asked, looking down at me over his sunglasses.
‘Why would I want a lesson?’ I shot back, too quickly. Because behind the desperation not to let him be right, I couldn’t ignore the longing. The one that tugged on something inside me, begging me to follow it. Into the water.
‘It is up to you. But I will be here. Tomorrow. Early. Maybe six thirty?’
He let the question linger in the hot air. I scanned around to look for Rue and Wren, trying to buy myself some time. But by the time I’d seen them digging a hole and looked back at Antoine, he’d turned away from me and started walking back towards the hut.
I guess that was that then.