24
I fall asleep expecting to wake in McCormick’s arms, snuggled under the piney boughs of the casuarina tree. I imagine the warmth of his chest, his solid heartbeat, and the golden afternoon light filtering through the pine needles as he tells me his story.
Instead I stumble as I land back on the island, tripping over myself on a dark, cold-sanded beach. I catch myself and shake off the disorientation.
My skin is cold and clammy, the air is humid and tropical-wet, and a heavy, thundering weight presses down on me. The beach is pitch-dark. Indigo-black clouds sweep across the sky and hide the crescent moon. Down the sand, the battery-powered light of a half-dozen torches slices the sky. The thin streams of light slice up then down, then out across the black water. Dark figures scan the beach, searching for something—or someone.
They’re shouting—a name—but the roar of the waves drowns their voices. The ocean is choppy and agitated and a wave smacks the sand and then rolls over my calves, slapping me with salty water. I stumble again and someone reaches out and steadies me.
“Are you all right?”
“Ye—”
I stop.
It’s Robert. He grips my forearm, keeping me upright as the wave is yanked back toward the ocean. The salty sea air punches at me as I peer up at him. His fingers are tight and he wraps his arm around my waist, pulling me out of the surf.
Behind us, past the dark smudge of forest and the dark sky, the beach cottages stand dark and empty. A single light burns on a porch. It’s the yellow glow of a hurricane lamp. Essie stands in the light, Sean in her arms. She’s looking this way.
“There he is,” Robert says, his voice tight. He’s shrouded in the night, his expression indiscernible. His copper-colored hair is almost inky black in the darkness.
I follow the line of his gaze and squint out over the black sea. The torches bounce off the water and the matte black of the waves sucks in the light. Even so, I catch a glimmer of something. There’s movement in the water. About fifty meters out there’s the flash of metal glinting in the light of a torch. It’s a watch. Someone is out there, swimming in the dark.
“What . . .?”
“He’s gone after her,” Robert says.
When I stiffen Robert spreads his hand over my back. He pulls me against him. “Don’t worry. He’ll find her. If she’s there, he’ll bring her out.”
And that’s when the entire scene that I’ve landed in snaps together. I can hear the people shouting now—“Amy! Amy!”—and I can see they’re searching the waves.
Now I see there’s a boat on the water too. A twenty-foot outboard motor fishing boat. It’s bobbing on the waves, moving slowly with a pale light shining over the depths.
They’re searching . . . for Amy?
“No,” I say, stepping into the sinking sand and the dark, cool water. It grips at me and my feet slide in the murky sand. My bare feet nick on the sharp broken shells. I make it to my thighs, the water foaming around me, before Robert yanks me back.
“What the hell are you doing?” He shakes my arm. “You can’t swim. What are you going to do? Make it so McCormick has to save you both?”
“Let go of me.” I yank my arm, freeing myself from his grip.
“Becca!” Robert tugs me up the sand, away from the roaring water.
I search the waves, trying to catch another glimpse of McCormick. I remember his fear from the other day, the white lines on his face, the urgency in his voice when he pulled me out of the depths and shouted, “You know there are riptides.”
And now he’s out there again, in the dark, searching for his daughter.
If people die in dreams, do they come back? If Amy dies tonight, will she be here the next time I dream? If McCormick drowns, will I come back tomorrow and find myself in his arms?
I catch a glimmer of him again, a flash of muted moonlight glinting off his skin. He slices through the water, moving through the waves with powerful strokes.
I see what he’s doing now. He’s combing the water, searching in a grid. Ten feet forward, turn, ten feet back. Again. He’s meticulous. Solid. Yet the threat of the riptide and of Amy, lost, makes a battery-acid fear rise in me.
It reminds me of the day I took Mila to the Parc des Bastions at the center of Geneva. It was spring, the sun was finally shining warmly, the grass was green, and flowers were stretching drowsy heads toward the blue sky.
Mila was four. She wanted to run, to play chess in the park, to see the monuments. I looked down for one moment. I was searching for a bottle of water in my purse, and when I looked up Mila was gone.
The terror of that moment, of frantically scanning the trees, the empty benches, the families in the grass, and not finding my daughter? It strangled me in a tight, mindless grip. For five desperate minutes I lived in the terror of losing my daughter.
And then she skipped out from behind the wide trunk of a tall chestnut tree. She was smiling widely. There was a caterpillar in her dirt-coated hands. “Mummy, isn’t it pretty?” The swelling of relief was immediate and immense. I can still taste both the terror and the relief.
Right now I see that same desperation in McCormick’s relentless search of the night-black waves. There’s a desperate fear in the driven way he pushes through the water.
“What happened?”
Robert glances over at me and then back to McCormick. “Why’d he go in? Essie told us Amy said she was going for a swim. That was an hour ago. You know Aaron. If Amy drowns it’ll kill him.”
I stare at Robert then. The way he said that—it wasn’t the way someone would state a fact. It was more . . . bitter. Surprising in its bitterness.
Robert grabs for my hand. I jerk my fingers away. “What do you mean? What are you talking about?”
He glances at me. His mouth twists in the dark and the light of a torch slices over us. There. Gone. For a moment I can see his eyes. He’s watching McCormick with a strange mix of emotion—admiration, bitterness, love, hate.
The hair raises on my arms and I shake my head. “I’m going in to help?—”
I start to lift my dress over my head. I’m not an expert, but I can swim. And I can’t be hurt. I know if I drown here I’ll just wake up in my soft, cozy bed.
Amy though?
McCormick?
I don’t know what happens if they don’t survive.
Robert grabs my wrist and spins me back around. “Becca. No. You aren’t thinking.”
“He needs help!”
“He needs you to stay on the beach. Safe. He needs all of us to stay on the beach. Safe. You know this better than most.”
I shake my head and try to pull free of his grip. His hand shackles my wrist.
“I want to help him.”
“Aldon has the boat out. We’re searching the beach?—”
“But what if he gets caught in the riptide too? What if?—?”
Robert lets out an incredulous laugh, and it echoes over the hiss and roar of the waves. I stop fighting his grip and watch the shadows play over his face.
He shakes his head then and drops my wrist. “You know as well as I do, others may die, but not McCormick.”
“I don’t know what you’re talking about.”
“He killed his best friends, didn’t he? And now he might have killed your daughter.”
Lightning-quick, without thinking, I reach out and slap Robert. The crack of my hand is like a gunshot.
Robert blinks at me then sets his hand to his cheek. When he touches the bright red imprint of my hand he winces. “You know it’s true.”
“You hate him.” I’m incredulous at the realization.
He shakes his head. “He’s my best friend. I love him like a brother.”
“You have a terrible way of showing it.”
He holds out his hands as if to say, “We’re in this together, you and me.”
“I need a torch,” I say.
Robert sighs then takes me to a cottage with a line of flashlights on the steps. I grab one, flick it on, and then start my search of the beach.
For two hours I pace the wet sand, running the light through the churning surf beating against the shore. At times I think I see a person rolling in the waves, but it turns into driftwood or seaweed or the glimmer of the moon on the water.
I pass others searching, Jordi and Junie, the crossing guard, Maranda and Dee. As the minutes pass and hope seeps away like water evaporating in the sand, I avoid the worried looks of every person I pass.
Instead I call out, “Amy! Amy!” until my voice is raw and my throat aching. The misty salt stings my eyes, and my feet are raw from the sharp coral rocks and the broken shells.
The night cools in increments, until at midnight I begin to shiver.
It’s been two hours.
For one hundred and twenty minutes I’ve searched for Amy. Every few seconds I’ve been tugged to turn my eyes to the water. To find McCormick and make certain he’s still swimming. I’ll catch him—a flash of his watch, the light of his arm—a movement that lets me know he’s okay.
He hasn’t stopped searching, swimming. And so I keep my eyes on the water, and I keep my eyes on him.
But finally, at midnight, with the moon buried behind a black cloud, McCormick turns toward shore. The boat veers our way too, its light aimed toward the beach.
We all gather in a semicircle, two dozen people waiting to see if McCormick’s found her or if he’s giving up.
I can’t imagine him giving up.
Which means . . .
I hold my breath, my lungs burning as he stands in the shallows. He’s a dark shadow rising from the ocean. The water sluices off him, catching the dull moonlight.
He’s in Speedos, his muscles bunching, his shoulders tight as he climbs from the ocean. He’s wide, powerful, the tattoos covering him blending into the night. I search his face. His jaw is tight, his expression devoid of any emotion.
He doesn’t have Amy.
It’s just him climbing from the water.
I’m filled with relief, but also fear.
“I couldn’t find her,” he says, looking me in the eye but speaking to everyone. There’s an apology in his voice. Frustration. Self-castigation.
I take a step forward and he shakes his head.
“I need two minutes, then I’m going back out.” He looks through the group, then stops at a short, gray-haired man. “Erol, are you up for a night dive?”
When he asks that the collective mood shifts. Like a cold winter wind shifting through a barren forest, it grasps the last autumn leaf and tugs it free from the branch.
“If you think . . .” Erol trails off, looking down at the sand.
“Just in case,” McCormick says. He clenches his hands and looks away, burying his expression in shadow.
He means just in case Amy has drowned and she’ll be found underwater, by the diver.
“All right,” Erol says. “I’ll go out with Aldon on the boat.”
“Thank you.”
Across the group Robert watches me, a look of sympathy clouding his features. I shake my head at him, refusing to believe Amy’s gone, and when I do, McCormick catches our exchange.
I turn to him, stepping forward and putting my hand to his arm. His skin is cool, wet, and his muscles are tight.
I want to tell him it will be okay, that he’ll find her, but the words won’t come.
So he looks down at me and catches my expression as if he knows what I want to say without me having to say it at all.
Finally, I find my voice. “It will be all right.”
A cloud passes through his eyes as if he’s seen this before and it wasn’t all right. As if he already knows how this ends.
“I need a minute,” he says, “then I’m going back in.”
My chest clenches. How long can he swim without endangering himself?
But at the determined look on his face, I can only nod and take my hand from his arm.
I fold my fingers into my palm, wishing I could hold him for a moment. Hug him. Give him a bolt of energy to keep him swimming for as long as he needs.
Instead I can only stand there and watch, impotent, as he turns toward the cottages.
And then?—
“Dad?”
His head jerks up. His shoulders rise.
A swell of relief rides over me. She’s here. She’s alive.
“Why’s everyone at the beach?” Amy asks, blinking sleepily at her dad.
“Amy!” Maranda cries.
“Thank goodness,” Junie says, clasping a protective hand across her belly.
Amy’s in jean shorts and a bikini top, her hair messy, a book in her hand. She stands there blinking in confusion at the gathering of islanders.
McCormick makes a raw noise and then he’s in front of her, crushing her in a tight hug.
“What?” she protests. “Eww. Why are you so wet? Were you swimming? Why?”
He merely holds her, his arms wrapped tightly around her, his shoulders shaking.
After a moment Amy realizes this wasn’t a nighttime swim party—it was something more.
“I thought I lost you,” McCormick whispers, his voice ragged. “I thought I lost you.” He drops his head to rest on hers. Then he takes her shoulders, and says, “Dammit, you know not to swim by yourself! You know not to swim on this beach! Where were you?”
Amy stares up at her dad, stunned at the emotions. “I was . . . I didn’t swim. I changed my mind. I fell asleep reading in the hammock.”
McCormick lets out a half-laugh, half-sob, and then he’s hugging his daughter again. “You’ll be the death of me,” he says, “You’ll kill me some day. I swear.”
“Dad.” She shoves at him. “I’m okay. It’s okay.” And then, when he doesn’t let her go, she hugs him back. “I’m okay, Dad.”
His shoulders relax then and he takes a step back, his gaze sweeping over her. I understand. He just spent adrenaline-fueled hours chopping through the waves searching for his daughter. He didn’t know if she was alive or dead. It’s hard to adjust to the reality that she’s been fine all along.
I imagine his heart is pounding, his ears are ringing, and the world feels a bit unreal to him right now.
Amy holds up her book. “I’m sorry, Dad. If you want to blame someone, blame it on Descartes.”
“What?” McCormick says, shaking his head. Water drips down his neck, trailing over his back.
“Descartes. ‘Let whoever can do so deceive me, he will never bring it about that I am nothing, so long as I continue to think I am something.’” Amy points to her book.
McCormick stares at her blankly. So she lifts the thick book and tries again.
“‘If you would be a real seeker after truth, it is necessary that at least once in your life you doubt, as far as possible, all things.’”
The fear has flown out of me and I’m left with a strange, giddy sensation. I want to laugh, and it bubbles inside me and catches in my throat.
I step forward then, crossing the cold sand, and pull Amy into a quick hug. “You’re very loved.”
At that, everyone on the beach gathers to give Amy a hug or a pat or a teasing scold for scaring the ever-loving daylights out of them all. After fifteen minutes, everyone has drifted back to their homes.
Thirty minutes later we’ve collected Sean from Essie and put him to bed. Amy’s asleep with her book tucked under her pillow.
And I’m alone with McCormick.