Chapter 13 #3
She couldn’t argue with that. They began to move through the water. At first, she kept her elbows bent, but as he pulled and turned in large figure eights, her arms relaxed.
“Now,” he said, “blow bubbles in the water.”
“I’m not a baby,” she said, but as she spoke, water slipped into her mouth, and she sputtered and coughed, losing her grip on one hand, and she pulled at him in panic.
“I can’t touch. I can’t touch!” Her head slipped under, and she grabbed at anything, everything sloshing.
Her elbow collided with bone before sure arms grabbed her waist and knees and she was hauled to Cyril’s chest.
She still scrambled for purchase, clawing her way up and as far out of the water as she could. He lifted her halfway out, and then he was dumping her onto the pebbled shore. He collapsed next to her, holding his hand over his eye.
“I know this is going to be difficult for you,” he grumbled as he waited for her to sputter herself out, “but you’re going to have to do as I say.”
She rolled onto her stomach and buried her face in her folded arms, heaving a last few coughs. The sun-warmed air played with the cool drops on her arms and neck. She shuddered. Defeat never settled well with her. “I’m too afraid,” she muttered.
“You have reason to be.”
She lifted her head and looked over at him. He lay on his back, gingerly touching the outer corner of his eye, where it had met with her elbow.
“How do I not be afraid?” she asked. Surely, Cyril Burke would know. He never backed down from anything. Though, she’d never tell him that. “I’m a coward.”
He rolled onto his side and propped his dark, shining head on his wrist. “If you were a coward, we wouldn’t be anywhere near this lake, dripping wet because you are fighting like a demon to learn how to swim.
I wouldn’t have this swollen eye, and you wouldn’t have a belly full of lake water and perhaps a minnow or two.
You, Violent Violin, are the least cowardly person I have ever met, and I have George for a brother. ”
She let his words settle on her. To her horror, her chin began to tremble.
Her brow crumpled, and she fought it. “I … I wish I’d learned how to swim …
before.” Her attempt to breathe hurt. “If I’d known how, Daniel wouldn’t have—he wouldn’t have—” Quickly, she turned her face into her arms again, unable to fight the tears.
Her stomach burned. Her heart burned. The sobs came as quietly as she could render them.
She was mortified that Cyril witnessed her failure on top of everything else.
A warm hand pressed her shoulder. “Come now, Violet. You can’t know that.”
She scrambled to her knees, grabbing fistfuls of pebbles.
“I do. If I hadn’t challenged him, if I hadn’t been trying to show him how deep I could go—I didn’t see the drop-off.
And he ran. He jumped off the dock and he didn’t swim well, but he tried to save me and he pushed me and pushed me until I could reach the dock and when I turned around”—she was gasping for air, her voice a high squeak she didn’t recognize—“when I turned around, he wasn’t there.
I couldn’t see him. And he wasn’t there anymore …
” The world became a blur around her, and she wrapped her arms around her middle, the pebbles slipping through her hands.
A sun-warmed towel was wrapped around her shoulders, and she knew Cyril sat near her, but she wasn’t sure how long she stayed like that, crying over her brother, who would never swim with her again. Who would never do so many things … again.
A little while later she blinked with the realization that she no longer cried. Though puffy, her eyes had dried. Her breathing had settled, and her back rested against solid warmth. The solid warmth shifted.
“I was thinking,” Cyril said from behind her. They were back-to-back, sitting on the lakeshore. She’d never sat that way with anyone. He’d let her lean against him for how long?
“What about?” she asked, her voice a bit croaky.
“About Daniel. I was wondering, if he were watching from the heavens, if he’d want you to learn how to swim.”
She blinked up at the sky, summer blue with a scatter of puffy white clouds.
“I think he would,” he said. “I would want that for Ruby.”
She looked over the lake, to the dock. Then back up to the sky. Was he up there somewhere? Did he want her to conquer her fear? Did he want her to have that power in the water? “I think he would too,” she said.
“All right, then.” Cyril unfolded himself from the ground. Her back immediately cooled. He extended his hand to her. “Ready to try again?”
She took his hand, and he pulled her up. “I think so. But don’t let go of me,” she added a bit desperately.
He tipped his head, darting her a speaking glance. “You must trust me. Your contest isn’t with me this time, Violet. It’s with the water. You’ve asked me to help you conquer it. Think about that.”
She sighed heavily, wiping at the itch of dried tears on her face. “I suppose that makes us allies.”
“Yes. Allies.” He narrowed his eyes at her. “But just this once.”
She returned the expression but had difficulty hiding a smile.