Chapter 7 #2
All the color drains from his face. “Float? As in, take my feet off the ground? No. Absolutely not. I’ve barely gotten comfortable standing.”
“Ryan, you can’t swim if you can’t float. It’s like trying to play hockey without knowing how to skate.”
“I don’t play hockey.”
“Exactly. Which is why you’re going to trust the guy who does.
” I position myself in front of him, the water warm against my stomach where the sun has been heating the shallow end all morning.
A dragonfly skims the surface near us, its wings catching the light before it zips away.
“Here’s what we’re going to do. You’re going to lean back, and I’m going to hold you up.
My hands will be under your back the whole time. You will not sink.”
“You don’t know that.”
“I do know that. Humans are naturally buoyant. It’s physics.”
“Physics also says I could drown.”
Ryan pushes his glasses up—they’ve fogged from the humidity, giving him the appearance of a tiny, anxious mad scientist. “What if my glasses fall off?”
“I’ll catch them.”
“What if water gets in my nose?”
“You breathe through your mouth.”
“What if I panic?”
“I’ll be right here.” I hold his gaze, steady and sure. “I’ve got you. Okay?”
He stares at me for a long moment. Somewhere behind us, the PA system switches to “Summer of ’69” by Bryan Adams, and a group of teenagers starts singing along, off-key and delighted.
“Okay,” Ryan says. “But if I die, I’m taking you with me.”
“Deal.”
I move behind him and place my hands flat against his upper back. His skin is cool from the water but feverishly warm underneath, and I can feel his heart hammering through his shoulder blades.
“Lean back,” I say. “Slowly.”
He leans back approximately one degree.
“More than that.”
Another degree. Maybe a degree and a half.
“Ryan, you’re still standing upright.”
“I’m easing into it.”
“At this rate, you’ll be floating by Christmas.”
“Don’t rush me.”
I bite back a laugh—I promised I wouldn’t—and keep my hands firm against his back. “Okay, here’s what I want you to do. Look up at the sky.”
“Why?”
“Because it’ll help you lean back naturally.”
He tilts his head back. Above us, the sky is that impossible shade of blue that only exists in July, cloudless and deep and stretching forever. A hawk circles lazily in the distance, riding thermals, and the tops of the oak trees sway in a breeze we can’t feel down here.
“Let the water take your weight,” I say. “Don’t fight it. Let your legs come up.”
“My legs are staying where they are.”
I take a breath. The patience muscle flexes. “Okay. How about this? Keep your toes on the ground, but lift your heels. Baby steps.”
He considers my suggestion for longer than I’d like him to, but I don’t rush him. We’ve gotten this far.
The water shifts around his legs, and he lets out a small, strangled sound that lives somewhere between a whimper and a hiccup.
My eyes widen with delight. “Good! That’s good!”
“I don’t like this.”
“You’re doing it, though. Now let your toes come up too. Just a little. I’ve got your back. Literally.”
His toes lift, and for exactly two seconds, Ryan Abrams is being supported entirely by my hands and the water. His body goes horizontal—stiff as a two-by-four, arms clamped to his sides, jaw clenched, eyes squeezed shut—but he’s floating.
Then he opens his eyes, realizes what’s happening, and panics. “Put me down! Put me down! Put me down!”
His arms windmill. His legs kick. A wave of water slaps me directly in the face, and I sputter as Ryan thrashes himself back to a standing position. Water sloshes over the edge of the pool, drenching the concrete and the shins of a woman who’d been walking by.
“Sorry!” I call to the woman, who tosses us a glare that could curdle milk.
Ryan’s chest heaves, his hair is plastered to his forehead, and his glasses are hanging off one ear. He reminds me of a cat that fell into a bathtub.
“I floated,” he gasps.
“You did.”
“I hated it.”
“I know.”
“I want to go home.”
“We’re not going home. You floated for almost two seconds. We need to shoot for five.” I fix his glasses, straightening them on his face with both hands. He blinks at me through water-spotted lenses, his hazel eyes wide and scared. But underneath all of it, there’s determination.
That’s the thing about Ryan. He’s terrified of everything, but he does it anyway.
Secretly, I think it’s because he has me standing next to him while he does.
I wish I could tell him that I will never leave him.
That no matter how far apart we may end up one day, I’ll still be right there, championing him.
Reveling in his successes. Picking up the pieces when his dad inevitably disappoints him.
But I can’t, because that would make things weird and awkward. He’s skittish. I don’t know what I’d do if he ran off because of me.
“I want to try again,” Ryan says, pulling me out of my thoughts.
This time, he lasts six seconds before the windmilling starts. Third try, fifteen seconds. On the fourth attempt, a kid does a belly flop in the deep end, and the resulting tidal wave sends Ryan into such a violent startle that he grabs my head and nearly drowns me.
“Ryan!”—glub—“Let go”—glub—“of my”—glub—“head!”
“Sorry! Sorry!”
He lets go, and I surface, coughing. Chlorine burns the inside of my nostrils. I wipe water from my eyes. “You almost drowned the person teaching you not to drown. There’s irony in there somewhere.”
Despite everything, Ryan’s mouth quirks. “You’re still alive.”
“Barely. My ear is full of pool water, and I think you scratched my scalp.”
“Your hair is very short. There’s not much to grip.”
“And yet, you managed to do just that.”
The lifeguard—a bored-looking teenager with zinc oxide smeared across his nose—leans down from his chair. “You guys okay?”
“Fine!” I flash him a thumbs-up. “Just teaching my friend how to swim.”
He glances at Ryan, who is standing stock-still with water dripping from his chin and his glasses at a fifteen-degree angle. “Maybe try the kiddie pool?” he suggests.
Ryan’s face turns the color of a fire engine. I steer him away before he can die of embarrassment. “Ignore him. We’re staying right here. You’re doing fine.”
“He told us to go to the kiddie pool, Oliver. The kiddie pool. With the toddlers and the mushroom fountain.”
“He’s sixteen and paid minimum wage. His opinion doesn’t count.”
We take a break. I buy us two Bomb Pops from the snack bar—the red, white, and blue ones that stain your tongue and drip down your wrist if you don’t eat them fast enough. We sit on the edge of the pool with our feet dangling in the water. Ryan eats his, catching every drip with a napkin.
“You know,” I say, biting off the blue tip of mine, “my mom says everyone learns at their own pace. I promise, by the end of summer, you will be doing laps in this pool.”
He scoffs. “I highly doubt that.”
“Don’t be so sure. I’m an excellent teacher.”
“And I’m an excellent student, but that still doesn’t mean it’s going to happen.”
“It will. You trust me, right?”
Ryan glances up at me. His eyes study me, and for some silly reason, I force myself not to move, not to blink, not even breathe.
“I do,” he says right before I pass out from lack of oxygen.
“Then finish your ice cream. We’ve got a lot of lessons to get through before the sun goes down.”
The fact that he listens to me warms my heart in a way that the sun could never.