Existing (9 page)

“Evans!” yells Coach. “What the hell are you doing? Get into the water!”

“Sorry Coach,” I yell back. I dive into the water and start to pound up and down the length of the pool.

As I’m swimming
, I think about Rose. I couldn’t sleep last night because I was thinking about her and I haven’t stopped thinking about her today, especially after I saw her face this morning. A thought hits me so hard that my stroke falters for a few seconds. If she’s lied about being hit before, then that means that it’s someone who has come to Cannon Beach with her.

When I touch the side after my tenth length and
wipe the water out of my eyes, I turn to find that I’m the second one to arrive back. I stare disbelievingly at Roisin, who turns around and grins at me. So she finds it funny that she’s beaten me, does she?

Coach Johnson walks
up behind her and puts his hands on his hips. “Very impressive,” he says. “Were you on the team at your old school?”

“No,” she
says, wiping her face.

He nods. “Come on out and
get yourself ready for the race-off.”

She
nods and bobs under the lane separators before climbing up the steps. I can’t stop myself from staring at her bum as she walks towards the benches.

“Mr Evans,” Coach says, clicking his tongue at me. “What the hell happened there,
son?”

I shrug my shoulders and lift myself out of the wat
er. “I don’t know.”

“A girl beat you,” he says.

Talk about stating the obvious. “I know.”

“Go a
nd sit down and we’ll do a race-off,” he says.

I nod and walk over towards the benches.

“Did you pull up or something?” I ask, sitting down next to Roisin.

Our silky smooth arms keep
brushing against each other and where her skin touches mine, it feels like its burning. I turn and all that I can see is an angry purple bruise. It’s a shame that her pretty face is marked by something that’s so ugly. I notice her trying not to smile at me.

“Pull up?” she asks, blinking at me.

I nod. “Yeah, did you get cramp or something and stop?”

“No,” she says. “I didn’t pull up.”

“Did you do the ten?”

“Yes,” she half laughs
. “Don’t you believe me?”

I stare into her deep brown eyes and smile at her.
“I believe you.”

“I don’t
friggin’ believe it,” Charlotte says as she sits down on Roisin’s other side. “You’re quick.”

Rose grins. “Thanks. I used to be really good at swimming. It’s probably the only sport I can actually do.”

And cycling, I think.

“Are you going to the beach party on Friday?”
Charlotte asks her.

I turn away
and stare at the other swimmers, but don’t stop listening to them. I can’t believe I’m actually bothered about whether or not she’ll be at the party. What’s happening to me? What is she doing to me?

“No,” she says. “I don’t know anything about a party.”

Charlotte laughs. “Well, you know about it now. Are you going, Cabe?”

I
turn to face them again. “What?” I ask, hoping I’m doing a better job of pretending than I feel like I’m doing.

“The party on Friday,” repeats Charlotte. “Are you going?”

I nod. “Yeah.”

“Cabe’s going,” Charlotte tells Rose.

Rose shakes her head. Something in her eyes closes down and they instantly dull. “I don’t go to parties.”

I shift uncomfortably on the benches, hoping t
hat neither of them asks why I don’t go to parties. Maybe I shouldn’t have answered them so quickly. I could have just made an excuse up for the party on Friday. I didn’t need to flat-out tell them that I don’t do parties at all. Charlotte eyes me warily, but thankfully doesn’t push the matter any further. Cabe glances quickly at Charlotte, shrugs, and then continues watching the other students finish their swims.

The rest of the class
is now sitting around us. We all fall silent as we watch Coach walk to stand in front of us. I watch his eyes scanning over the students that are seated on the benches. “Okay,” he says, looking at his clipboard. “Everyone gather into the five lanes except for Cabe, Charlotte, Daniel, Thomas, and Roisin.” I look up, wondering why we’ve been left out. “Everyone spread across the five lanes. I want four lengths each. The winners of each can stand to the left and will re-race until we narrow it down to our ten.”

I glance quickly at Ch
arlotte who grins at me. We sit and watch the other students pounding up and down the pool in hopes of a place on the school team. Some of them are very good, but some don’t even manage to do the four lengths before stopping to take a breath.

When the five of us finally get called to swim
, we are freezing cold and the muscles in our arms and legs are stiff. I end up in the middle lane with Charlotte and Daniel next to me. Cabe is on the outside lane and grins at me when my eyes fall on him. I shake my head and try to fight the smile that seems to want to stretch across my face every time he looks at me.

“He wants you.”

I blink at Charlotte. “What?”

“Cabe,” she grins, “I think he’s digging you.”

“Digging me?” I repeat at her.

“Yeah,” she says
, nodding. “You know, I think he likes you. I think you might be the one to take Cabe Evans down.”

I laugh as the whistle blows and quickly dive into the pool. I swim as hard as I’ve ever swam before. I love swimming. It’s a time to clear my mind and think about everything else
, other than what people think of me. I think about Hallie and what she did to me last night and the anger I feel toward her surges through me, forcing my legs and arms to move quicker than they ever have before.

When my hand touches down against the cool tiled wall
, I hear the whistle blow. As I finally move my hair from off my face and surface from the water, I see Cabe touch down second at the far end of the pool. He looks immediately toward me and rolls his eyes playfully when he sees that I’ve beaten him. The other three join us within seconds of each other.

“Well, well,”
Coach says, looking at his stop watch. “It looks like Cabe has finally been beaten after a four-year winning streak. Congratulations, Roisin, you’ve made the school team.”

Charlotte whoops and cheers at the side of me and the rest of the class
claps as well. I feel my cheeks burn scorching hot in the cool water and keep my head facing forward.

“Happy b
irthday,” she whispers so no one else can hear.

I shove the last forkful of peas and carrots into my mouth and push my empty plate away from me.

“Were you hungry?” my Father asks.

I nod. “I had
swimming today and it always makes me hungry.”

He smiles. “It used to do that to me too. How did
it go today?”

I nod. “Good actually, I made the school swim team.”

He stops eating and stares at me. “That’s fantastic, Rose. Well done.”

“Thanks,” I say
, looking at him and him only.

He continues to stare at me for a while before smiling and carrying on eating his steak. “
Ava says you fell yesterday.”

I can feel the burn of Hallie’s gaze at the side of my head and
turn to her and say, “Yeah, I fell in the kitchen. Tripped over the broom.”

My
Dad places his silverware onto his plate and taps his belly. “That was delicious and you’ve always been clumsy, Roisin. Make sure you’re more careful in the future.”

I finally tear my gaze away from the frown on Hallie’s face and smile at my Dad.
“Will do. Actually, Dad, can I ask you something?”

He looks up and blinks at me. “Fire away.”

“Can I go to a party on Friday night, please?”

He
wipes his mouth with a napkin and smiles. “You’ve made friends already?”

I resist the urge I have to tell him to stop sounding so surprised and nod. “Charlotte has invited me to a party at a beach house. There are a few other girls going too.”

He glances at Hallie and shrugs. “I see no reason why not, as long as you’re in by midnight.”

“Sure.”

I can’t help but smirk when I see Hallie’s furious face.

“Have you had a ni
ce birthday, Rose?” he asks.

I glance up quickly at him and nod. It hasn’t exactly been nice walking around school all day with a bruise on my face
, but I guess I wasn’t stuck here with Hallie all day which is a bonus on any day.

“
If I don’t have to work on Saturday, we’ll do something nice. Just the two of us.”

Hallie’s head snaps up but I refuse to meet her eyes.

“That would be nice, yeah.”

He nods. “Yes, I think we’ll have a father-daughter day. Do some shopping or something.”

My phone buzzes in my pocket. When I pull it out, I see Ashley’s name on the front. I tap the ‘read’ button.

Don’t think I didn’t see that bruise on your face today. Hope you’re okay and having a nice birthday evening. As
h
x

I sigh and hit the delete button.

“Who was that?”

I put my phone away and smile at my Dad. “It was one of my friends from school. They were just wishing me a happy birthday.”

“Charlotte?”

I shake my head. “No, it was Ashley.”

He nods. “That was nice of her.”

I’m so glad that Ashley has a unisex name that I have to fight off a smile. Instead, I nod. “Yeah, it was.”

My Father decides to put
Ava to bed, leaving me alone with Hallie in the kitchen.

“I’ll clean up,” I say in the hope that she leaves the room.

She snorts. “Damn right you will.”

I put the salt and pepper back into its holder and keep my back to her. She’s so venomous with her words that sometimes they hurt more than the burns or the shoves in the shoulder, or any other physical pain she has caused me.

I can’t really remember when all of this first started. All I know is that it feels like it’s been happening forever and it’s slowly getting worse.

Before I started school, Hallie didn’t look after me every day. Most days of the week a nanny would come in, especially when I was a baby. After my third birthday, I think my Dad must have put his foot down and the nanny would only come every other day. Hallie was supposed to take responsibility for me for the rest of the days.

I have a vivid memory of using a wax crayon to draw on
the walls. I was only three and didn’t know any better but I remember Hallie storming into the room with a face like thunder, snatching the crayon from me and throwing it across the room. I remember watching my blue crayon skid across the floor as she gripped my shoulders tight and screamed in my face that she wasn’t my Mother and that she thanked God every day that I wasn’t hers. I remember watching her furiously scrub at the wall while muttering something about me being too ugly to be her child and that the whole world would be able to tell by just looking at the two of us together. After that episode, whenever I did anything I imagine normal children would just get a scolding for, I would get a reaction from her as if I’d ruined her life. I would be laid across her knee while she belted my little backside with the flat palm of her hand. I remember my Father coming home late one night from work and walking into the bathroom when I was in the bath. I remember watching his face when his eyes fell onto the finger prints that were slashed in violent red across my skin. I remember him questioning me and I remember saying one word and one word only: “Hallie.” After that, there was lots of shouting, swearing, and doors slamming. I didn’t see Hallie for four days after that and when she returned, she didn’t scold me as much as she used to. That didn’t last long.

I guess I should have told my Father everything that had ever happened to me the night I was first admitted to
the hospital because of Hallie. I was seven years old. I had been walking down the stairs and Hallie had decided to walk up them at the same time. She obviously hadn’t seen the blanket I was dragging down the stairs and had tripped over it, landing flat on her face. A carpet burn ran down the ridge of her nose for days afterward, but my broken arm caused by her thrashing out and pushing me down the stairs in anger had lasted for six weeks. She’d never been sorry, but she had made sure that I promised to tell everyone it was an accident and that she had nothing to do with it. She told me that my Father would be mad at me if he knew I’d tripped her up. I’d nodded and lied to the doctors just as she’d asked. I was only seven and didn’t really know any better, and I certainly didn’t want to make Hallie cross again.