Positively Beautiful (26 page)

“You'll do what you have to do,” he says.

But what if I can't?

“It's going to be all right.” He leans toward me, the sleeping bag falling away from his bare chest, and puts his arm around me. Even though he's done it many times in the past
days, somehow this time it's different. We both feel it, and I stop crying, staring into his eyes that are eerily luminescent in the flash of lightning. I wonder what he would do if I rubbed my hands over his chest, because suddenly I want to touch him so badly it hurts.

I lean toward him, and I'm breathing fast and shallow. I want it to happen, I want to kiss him and I wonder if he's feeling the heat like I am, if he's thinking about kissing me. I feel loose and warm, like frozen honey beginning to thaw and sweeten.

He leans forward to meet me, then … presses his lips against my forehead. He does that for a while, and I close my eyes, tears slipping down my cheeks.

“Good night,” he whispers finally and pulls away.

He lies back down, but I don't think he sleeps most of the night.

I know because I don't either.

Though the rain still pours outside, the tent has lightened. Dawn has come creeping, muffled in thick, fluffy clouds.

I look over and see Jason's eyes are open and he's looking at me.

“Are you ready?” he says. “To go home?”

Without answering, I get out of the tent and go to the cove. I take off all my clothes and float in the rain-puckered water. The water feels warm, and the raindrops are cold on my skin. I try to find that place of silence and peace of the last couple of days, but it isn't there anymore. I am a jumble of emotions—anger, confusion, pain, terror—all raging through my head, and I cannot turn it off.

Jason comes to the beach and looks down at my pile of clothes on the sand. He sighs, raindrops caught in the fine hairs of his unshaven face.

“Erin, what are you doing?”

“Swimming. Want to come in?” I know he knows I'm naked. The water caresses me, a silky bronze veil concealing little. My skin feels hypersensitive and I'm aware of the velvety mud between my toes, the tiny flick of a baitfish's tail as it rushes past my calf, the delicious touch of water everywhere.

“Erin …”

I don't know why I'm doing it. Not really. Anger thrums through me, pounding through my veins, souring my mouth. I'm mad at him, I'm mad at myself, I'm mad at
everything
.

“The water's
wonderful
.” I move my arms so the water sweeps against my skin, sending shivers from head to foot. I've never felt so aware of myself before. And that's what I want, isn't it? I want to know what it feels like to be a woman before I don't have any of the parts anymore. “Why don't you come in?”

He is looking at me, and his gaze is a heavy, satiny weight touching every part of me, and then he looks deliberately over my shoulder.

“Erin. Stop it. Put your clothes on. We need to go. It's time to go.”

“Jason …”

“Erin, why are you doing this? What are you afraid of?”

He turns and strides up the path without waiting for me to answer.

I sit in the water with the cold rain falling on my head.

I'm crying as I get dressed. I feel so stupid, and once again, it's all my fault. Did I really think he would come in? Why do I keep throwing myself at guys who don't want me?

What are you afraid of?

I walk slowly, the tears falling. I'm going the opposite direction of camp, on a path I've never been on.

Behind me, I hear Jason call, “Erin!”

It sounds like he's following me.

I walk faster.

“Erin!”

I start running. I crash through bushes and scrape myself on sharp palm fronds, and fall to my knees in the leaves, and then get up and run some more. Ahead of me, I see glimpses of water, and I make toward that and suddenly I burst out of the scratchy embrace of the bushes onto the beach. A heaving expanse of water stretches in front of me, steely waves smashing onto the shore. Birds startle for the sky.

I can no longer hear Jason, and I sit down on a smooth, water-silvered log. The rain is still falling, but I'm shielded by overhanging trees.

I look around. There's not a boat or house to be seen. It feels like no one's alive but me.

What are you afraid of?

I wipe my face with my sleeve, because it's not just rain and spray on my face but tears as well. I want to stay on my little island
forever
, and not deal with anything but whether I'm going to catch fish for dinner. But I told Mom a couple of days and it's been six, and now Jason says it's time to go home and
I'm not ready
.

Oh, Mom, I miss you so much. I don't know if I can survive without you, and God, it hurts, it hurts, and I want to see you and tell you I'm sorry, and I love you so much but it hurts, hurtshurts-hurts. I can't bear the thought of you leaving me so I guess I left you first …

A flutter of baitfish throw themselves out of the water as the rain pitter-patters, making dimples on the skin of the water.

What are you afraid of?

A seagull calls and the mangroves rustle in the wind.

What. Are. You. Afraid. Of?

And then I know, and it's like someone punches me in the stomach.

I'm afraid of the dark. I am afraid of getting cancer. I am afraid I will decide to cut off my breasts. I'm afraid I will decide not to cut off my breasts. I'm afraid Trina will never talk to me again. I am afraid Jason will never like me the way I'm beginning to like him.

I am afraid my mother will die.

But above all?

Above all that?

I am afraid of what Mom dying will do to me.

I changed so much after my dad died. I was a fearless kid before, and then everything got so scary. Like a turtle, I pulled into my shell so that nothing could hurt me.

So what would happen if my mom died?

I'd be a pile of Jell-O on the floor, shuddering and quaking, until I eventually dissolved into a puddle of
nothing. There would be nothing left of me.

Nothing.

I hold myself as I sob because there's nothing I can do about any of it. People die. People lose themselves.

It happens all the time.

And I can't stop it.

I can't stop it.

I cry for a long time, and when the tears stop, I sit up. I feel empty, hollowed out. All the messy stuff is gone and all that is left is determination.

I know what I need to do.

When I get back to the cove, Jason is pacing. His eyes are dark with anger and worry.

“Where did you go?”

I was gone longer than I realized.

“I'm sorry,” I say.
Will I be saying I'm sorry for the rest of my life for the stupid things I do?

Jason stares at me, his face hard and set, and for a moment I'm almost frightened of him. He looks grown-up, like a man, someone I've never met. Then he pulls me into a hug. I clutch him back tightly, feeling the hard muscles under the warm skin of his back, smelling the sweat and salt and wildness on him, and I close my eyes. Trying to remember it. This might be the last time. I don't know what's going to happen now.

“It's over,” I say when he lets go of me. “Take me home. I'm ready to go home.”

“Are you sure?” Jason studies me with his turbulent sea-colored eyes and he is so glorious, so full of life.

“Yes.” I start to cry because it is the end or the beginning, I don't know which, but it's sad and scary and I'm still not sure I can do it.

It is near dark by the time we get to Jason's house. It sits on a secluded canal, blue with white trim, with a little deck on top overlooking the waving sea of mangroves.

Jason helps me up on the dock and a woman—tall, with a short nest of curly hair and startling blue-green eyes—comes out of the house and hurries toward us.

“Just in time for dinner,” she says. “I was worried about you, Jason.” She looks at him, relief and love plain on her face, and then turns her gaze on me.

“Mom, I want you to meet Erin,” Jason says, almost shyly. “She's been staying out on my island the past few days.”

Jason's mother studies me in silence for a moment. Her eyes, so amazingly like her son's, drink me in. She smiles, open and luminous. “It's nice to meet you, Erin. I have a feeling we have a lot to talk about. Let's get you into a shower and dry clothes.”

And without any questions, she takes my hand and leads me toward the house.

“Do you think,” I say, “do you think I can call my mother?”

Mom cries the entire time I am on the phone with her. She keeps telling me she loves me, she loves me,
God, she loves me and she has been so worried
and then I cry too.

After I shower, Mrs. Levinson—Miriam—sits me and Jason down and we tell her the entire story. When Miriam asks why Jason didn't tell her I was on the island, Jason says simply, “You would have just worried and she needed to be there.”

And that was that.

Dinner is a jumble of conversations, happy,
a family
, and I miss Mom so badly I want to jump in a car and drive to her. But Mom says she'll come for me tomorrow and says to
wait right there, please don't go anywhere.

Jason and his mom look alike, tall and big and somehow untamable, while Jason's dad is thin, with dark hair and eyes and a deliberate manner. He does not talk often but when he does the whole family shuts up and listens.

A skinny, dark-haired girl wanders in when we are finishing. She is carrying a violin case and studying a music score as she walks, and when she looks up, she blinks at me in surprise.

“Ashley,” Miriam says, “this is Jason's friend Erin. She's visiting from Georgia.”

This is the real Ashley.

Ashley throws a look at her brother and walks over and offers me her hand. “It's nice to meet you,” she says quietly.

Ashley gets a plate and sits down and their family is complete. We continue to talk, but I am fascinated with Ashley. Where Jason is bold and bright, Ashley is self-contained and serene, like a jewelry box with all the gems hidden away. You get the feeling maybe she only shares the treasure of herself with the people she trusts.

We eat and talk, and for a little while I'm able to forget everything that is waiting for me.