In Too Deep (2 page)

“Oh, please.
In Touch
is way worse.”

“You didn’t tell us,” Gracia said.

I shrugged. “Maybe I didn’t want you to make it a bigger deal than it is.”

“Maybe you’re worried you’re going to be a disaster,” Mimi said.

Gracia shot her a look. “Not helpful, Mimi. The real question”—she rested the prongs of her fork on the edge of her plate and leaned forward—“is, what are you wearing?”

“What do you mean, what am I wearing? My suit.”

“Not the sensible one-piece,” Gracia said.

Mimi shook her head. “The lesson-giving suit?”

A familiar sense of exasperation crept up my spine. My friends looked at me with the twinkle of challenge in their eyes, as though I were a native they couldn’t wait to civilize.

“But I
am
giving a lesson,” I said weakly.

Gracia’s twang took on the lilt of a patient schoolteacher. “That doesn’t mean you have to act like it. Look at Mimi here. Hard-nosed, driven…but does she dress like she’s on the ethics committee?”

Mimi turned and posed with one hand behind her head and the other on her hip. Her tight white T-shirt rose enough to show the three inches of midriff she could easily cover up if a teacher wandered by in search of dress code violations.

“Rhetorical question,” Gracia said. “The point is that you’ve already established yourself as the dorky girl who likes the ocean.” She reached over and unpinned the blue-and-green Marine Park Conservancy Fund button from my collar. “Which means you don’t need to wear this, or hit anybody up for donations, or talk about sunken treasure. Mix it up a little bit, why don’t you.”

“And get a new suit,” Mimi said. “Seriously.”

A hand clamped on my shoulder. Gracia’s eyes widened, and my button clattered to the table.

Mimi tugged down the bottom of her shirt. “Hi, Mr. Fleet,” she said, all melodious.

“Young ladies,” my dad said as he sat next to me.

“Bye, Mr. Fleet.” Gracia patted me on the leg and spun away. Mimi hopped up. Then they were gone, and my dad waved after them. If he was aware that he’d caused their sudden departure, he wasn’t letting on.

“What’s with the bird’s nest up there?” I said, motioning to his hair. “You’ve gone full ‘scatterbrained professor’ on us.”

“It gives me gravitas, don’t you think?” He skimmed his fingers over the uncombed brown mane and adjusted his striped yellow tie. “I ran into Mr. Alvarez on the way over. He said your report was solid. A bit lacking in—”

“Primary sources, I know.”

The worst thing about being a faculty brat—aside from the wonderful lunchroom encounters with my dad—was the complete lack of privacy. A normal kid could get away with lying to her parents about what was going on at school, but my dad had essentially taken to streaming the events of my school day in real time.

“Have you eaten yet?” Dad rapped his knuckles on the table and stood. “Come on, I heard the baba ghanoush is organic.”

When I was little, we would take a metal detector to the beach and spend hours walking through the sand. Sometimes we’d find a watch or a set of keys. Once, we found a silver bracelet, which I gave my mom for her birthday. On the days we struck out, Dad would bury something for me, but I had to create a search grid before he’d let me look for it. Blaming your parents for how you turned out is a cheap way to handle things, but really, my whole treasure obsession is all my dad’s fault.

T
he bitter scent of chlorine was thick in the air even though I’d propped the side door open with an empty oxygen tank. We stood next to the pool in the back of my mom’s dive shop with an array of diving equipment at our feet. The grumble of the pool’s filter pump wasn’t nearly loud enough to cover the sound of my heartbeat in my ears.

There was no reason for Josh to be shirtless just yet—I still had on shorts and a tank top over my lesson suit—but it was probably a reflex.
Grr, me see pool. Me take
shirt off.
And I guess he’d been working out, because he kept glancing down at his arms and his chest, probably hoping I’d follow his gaze. Which, of course, I did.

“Let’s review a couple things first,” I said as I sat on a folding metal chair.

Josh pulled his chair three feet from me. He collapsed into it. He stretched out his legs and crossed his ankles and leaned back. “I bet your dad is totally freaking out, huh? Teacher’s kid busted for cheating.”

“What are you talking about?”

“Oh, right, of course,” he said, waving at me with both hands. “It’s like in those movies, where the convicts are sitting in the prison yard, swearing that they’re all innocent—”

“Seriously. What are you talking about?”

“The trip to Mexico? Good Deeds and whatever. Alvarez making us all do his stupid volunteer stuff because he says we cheated?”

I scrambled to make sense of what he was saying. Josh smiled at me like I was in on it, so what was I supposed to do—admit that I’d signed up for the trip because I
wanted
to go?

“Yeah,” I finally said. “My dad’s totally freaking out. You want to get started?”

“Okay, fine.” Josh cracked open his
PADI Open Water
Diver Manual
and hunched over it, his fingers tracing the words of a random page. “Nitrogen narcosis. Ooh, sounds bad.”

My mom’s voice percolated in from the adjacent retail room, a conversation with a customer about dive knives. “How about something with a four-inch blade? You’re a sport diver, not a Navy SEAL.”

The PADI manual landed on my lap, and I flinched. “Wake up, Annie. It’s time to get a-certifyin’.”

A high-pitched buzz sounded when the door opened and the customer left.

“I want you to walk me through the equipment here,” I said. If there was one thing I could focus on, it was this. “Step number one?”

It’s not that difficult. The tank is strapped to the buoyancy compensator, or BC, which is pretty much like an inflatable vest that you use to control your buoyancy depending on your depth. The regulator is what you breathe from, and it connects to the tank, along with other hoses for the BC, the pressure gauge, and the secondary air source known as the octopus.

“When you put the regulator on the tank,” I said, “you have to make sure the O-ring is flush with the valve.”

“Ooh.” Josh bounced his eyebrows. “You said
O-ring
.”

“That’s sexual harassment,” I said. I wanted to throw him into the pool, but then, of course, he would have glistened.

My phone rang, and I groped at it like it was a lifeline.

“You’re not alone with him, are you?” Gracia twanged at me.

“Mmm-hmm.”

“Shut up,” she squealed. “Are you guys gonna go in the pool? Gonna get-ah wet-ah?”

“Okay, then. Sounds good.” I covered the mouthpiece and whispered to Josh, “It’s my dad.”

Gracia lowered her voice. “Seriously, though, is he hitting on you? Are you hitting on him? You have to talk to me, here. How’s it going?”

“We should be fine as long as he doesn’t drown,” I said, loud enough for Josh to hear. “Okay, gotta go.”

“Annie—”

I hung up and tossed the phone into my backpack. “Sorry about that. Let’s get back to it, okay?”

Josh reached for the regulator and laid it in his lap. He gave me one of those sincere looks, as though the narrowness of his squint would prove how interested he was.

Don’t say anything stupid,
I reminded myself.
Let him
fill the space. Let him bring the conversation to you. Wait.

He said, “You really like treasure hunting, huh?”

“It’s awesome,” I said. More of a yelp, really, as if I’d sat on a thumbtack. I tried to recover with a laugh, but that just made things worse. I looked away. “Yeah. It’s cool.”

The front door buzzed right on cue, like I was a losing contestant on some game show.
Annie, for two hundred
dollars, please try
not
to make an ass out of yourself in
front of Josh Rebstock
.… BZZZZZZ!
Wrong answer,
thanks for playing!

I cleared my throat. “What’s this called?” I said, holding up the octopus.

“You’re sure I have to know all this stuff?”

“That depends. If your regulator hose malfunctions at eighty feet, maybe you might want to reach for your backup. Or you could just die. I guess that’s up to you.”

“You’re more of a smart-ass than you are at school,” he said. “I like that.”

Oh, boy.

My mom poked her head into the small room. “Annie, can I borrow you for a second?”

I sighed for her benefit. Then I held up Josh’s regulator and pointed to a nearby tank. “When I get back, I want to see this put on correctly. No leaks.”

“Yes ma’am,” he said with a smile. “And don’t forget about the O-ring, right?”

I shook my head and laughed in spite of myself.

“It’s going okay?” my mom said as we entered the retail area. Wetsuits and BCs hung from circular stands in the center, while masks, fins, and snorkels lined the entire wall to the right.

“Maybe you should finish up in there.” I didn’t think I could trust myself with him.

Mom gave me one of those annoying motherly pats on the back as we reached the customer. “This gentleman and I were having a discussion about fins.”

“Your mother tells me she’s a traditionalist.” The man’s skin had the tanned and pockmarked look of an old leather couch. He was all muscle and bulk, and his massive shoulders slumped forward. “But she says you’re a fan of the hybrid fins.”

“Do you use a typewriter instead of a computer?” I said.

The customer flashed me a bewildered smile. “I’m sorry?”

“Do you ski with leather boots? Play golf with wooden woods? Shy away from Gore-Tex?”

“I’m afraid I don’t see where you’re going—”

“The hybrid fin is the best of both worlds. You get the power of the paddle fin with the comfort and maneuverability of the split fin. Deliberately avoiding technologically superior equipment isn’t being a traditionalist; it’s just dumb.”

Mom clamped a hand down on my shoulder. The way things were going with the shop, we couldn’t afford to lose even a tiny sale like this one, and we were far enough in that I knew she couldn’t just bounce me from the conversation.

“Unless, of course,” she said, “you’ll be doing a lot of current diving, in which case the paddle fins might be better suited—”

“Come on,” I said while still looking at Mr. Pockmarks. “Big guy like him? I bet he could power through—”

“Jesus, oops!” Josh’s voice carried from the pool room. “Which way do I turn this?”

“Righty tighty, lefty loosey!” I yelled over my shoulder. “Sorry,” I said to the customer. “He’s just learning.”

“No prob—”

“I did it!” Josh yelled. There was a loud crash, and then, “Turdballs!”

I suppressed a smile. “Language!”

“Sorry!”

My mom glanced at me, and her eyebrows shot skyward. She nodded toward the pool, all the while showing us how white her teeth were.

“I should probably get back in there.”

Mr. Pockmarks gave me a slight bow as I stepped away. “Thanks for your help.”

“Yes, Annie,” my mom said. “Thank you so much.”

Josh was sitting on the edge of the pool, dangling his feet in the water and breathing air from the tank at his side. He removed the regulator from his mouth and smiled.

“Guess whose O-rings aren’t leaking?”

“It’s a miracle,” I said after a quick check, just to be sure. “So, are you ready to go under?”

“Ready as I’ll ever be.”

I rolled my eyes. “I hope not, for your sake.”

He took a deep breath from the mouthpiece, holding it in and letting his cheeks puff out. “This is high-quality O-two,” he squeaked. He breathed out and doubled over, coughing.

“Easy, there. Compressed air makes your throat dry,” I said.

He got up to lean against the wall for support while he hacked violently, and he had tears in his eyes when he finally looked up at me. “Do we get wetsuits?”

“It’s just twelve feet, all right? It’s for you to get comfortable, to get a sense of how the water feels around you. We’ll hang out at the bottom for a few minutes and come back up.”

He strapped on his weight belt, and I lifted his tank so that he could put his arms through the BC. He snapped the buckle around his waist and shrugged the vest until he seemed satisfied. Then he turned around and reached for my tank.

I slapped his wrist away. “Nobody touches my gear but me.”

“That’s what
he
said. Come on, Annie, you can’t just lob them up there like that.”

I could feel his eyes on me as I kicked off my shorts and pulled my tank top over my head. My ideal swim date with Josh would have included a midnight hot tub and a new bikini, not this over-chlorinated cinder-block room and my old black, boxy, lesson-giving one-piece. My friends were right: the suit was definitely function over form. Plus, the fluorescent lighting made my freckles practically leap off my skin.

“You should wear your hair pulled back more often,” Josh said.

My hand instinctively went to the back of my head, where I’d wrapped a quick rubber band around hair that was just a shade too light to be legitimately brunette.

“Seriously. Maybe you could come by my mom’s set sometime. Her stylist might be able to take a look?”

It seemed as though he’d just asked me out on a date, and to a movie set, no less. My bosom should have swelled, right? He looked pleased with himself, apparently unaware that telling a girl she needed to see a stylist might, you know, give her the impression that he thought she needed to see a stylist.

I lifted my vest by the shoulder straps, propped the tank on my thigh, and stuck my right arm underneath the strap as I spun quickly to my left. One more nimble motion, and the BC was on.

The door buzzed again. Josh stared at me. “You know what I think?” he said, those undeniably fantastic green eyes of his magnified by the mask’s plastic lens. “I think this whole I-can-do-it-myself thing you’ve got going is just an act.”

“Enough small talk, Aquaman,” I said, positioning him near the edge.

I showed him the proper way to enter the water—one big step off the edge with a hand over my face so the mask and regulator stayed in place—and then I watched him do it. We gave each other the “okay” sign, then emptied the air from our BCs and began to descend. Beginners tend to have trouble with the first ten feet, filling their lungs with gulps of air, so I’d put an extra ten pounds on Josh’s weight belt. He sank like a stone, and I joined him at the bottom.

We sat cross-legged, and my ears squeaked as the pressure equalized. Our tanks rested against the concrete, angling our upper bodies slightly toward each other. I pointed to the pressure gauge to show him how much air he had left. Thank god my dork-tastic smile was covered by the gear.

We’d been down for two minutes when Josh pulled out his regulator and pointed to his lips, where he tried to make smoke rings with his air bubbles.

I shook my head and gestured that he should put the freaking mouthpiece back in right now, but he just grinned at me like a moron. Little bubbles escaped from the edges of his mouth and danced along his cheeks as they rose to the surface.

And that’s when Josh coughed again.

He let go of the regulator as he flailed forward, and it writhed like a snake in the water, free-flowing a torrent of air bubbles that momentarily obscured his face. I motioned for him to take it easy, to calm down and put the regulator back in, but I could tell that full-blown panic had already gripped him. He opened his mouth as if to cough once more, and his legs shot out.

I vaulted toward him and tried to help him to the surface, only to find that the weight belt and equipment had made him too heavy for me to get any leverage. I reached for the belt’s clasp, but Josh flailed and an open palm caught me on the cheek and knocked me to the side. I tried to jam the regulator back into his mouth, but by that time he was thrashing and terrified, and he pushed me back again.

I took a deep breath and ditched my weight belt and BC in two quick movements. A dull thud echoed as my tank hit the bottom. I ducked under Josh’s whirling arms, swam around behind him, and clutched at the buckle of his weight belt. Panic was surging through me, but I inflated his BC and pushed off the bottom of the pool, kicking straight up.

We broke the surface, and I gasped for air. I slid his mask off, letting it drop to the bottom of the pool. Josh wasn’t breathing and his eyes were closed. He was dead weight.

I tore off my mask and threw it against the wall. I undid the clips on his BC as I gave him two rescue breaths before I kicked frantically for the edge.

“Mom! Call nine-one-one!”

I reached the edge and pushed Josh’s BC away; then I climbed out, keeping one arm under his. You hear the stories about mothers lifting cars off their babies, and that’s pretty much the only way to explain how I got him out. The fear of being on the cover of the
Enquirer
gave me superhuman strength, and I pulled Josh onto the wet concrete.

“Mom!”

Think!
I’d been certified in CPR since I was eight, but this was the first time I’d ever had to use it. I tilted his head back to get his airway clear. I put my ear to his mouth and listened for breathing, praying that I’d see his chest rise.

Out of the corner of my eye, I saw my mom come running, but she stopped in the doorway. “Annie!”

“Nine-one-one! Nine-one-one!”

She disappeared again, and Josh wasn’t moving and his face was turning pale. I put my lips on his and breathed twice, then moved to his chest and pumped down with my arms locked. Thirty times, to get the circulation going, and then back up to his mouth. A rhythm, a cycle to keep my mind off of what was actually happening.