Still Waters (9 page)

They were silent. Hannah gazed out the window again. Beside her, Colin drove smoothly, efficiently. They passed overgrown pastures lined with decaying rail fences. Here and there, a skinny cow stood morosely over a feed trough. Smudges of dark trees divided the fields, which should have been waving with six-foot corn at this time of year. But most appeared to have never been planted and were choked with waist-high weeds.

Farmhouses drooped beside their fields in the deepening twilight. A huge mansion, like a decaying wedding cake, stood on a little rise with an equally grand barn in the back. But glassless windows gaped like blinded eyes. Loose clapboards hung from the walls and lay strewn on the ground where they’d fallen.

There was something missing. But she couldn’t quite figure it out. Then she got it. “Colin, you know what’s weird?”

Colin jerked a little, as if awakening from a daydream, and glanced over. “Hmm, what?”

“No other cars. No one outside. No one. We’ve been driving
straight on this one road, and we haven’t seen a single person or car since we left the road to Pine House …” She looked at the odometer. “Seven miles ago.”

Colin’s brow creased. “There’ve been cars.”

“No, Colin, there hasn’t. Not even one other car.” It was like they were the only people left on earth. Which was stupid of course. The place was just really depressing.

Just then another truck appeared, coming toward them. An early-model black Ford, the kind Hannah’s grandfather used to drive. Colin pointed triumphantly. “There, see? I told you there were other cars.”

They both watched the Ford approaching. The paint was dull and the bumper cracked. The truck loomed in their windshield, then whooshed by, a stone-faced man in a feed cap at the wheel.

Hannah settled back in her seat. The sight of the other driver should have made her feel better, but somehow, she wasn’t comforted. She stared out the window at a scummy little pond, then at a group of crows picking a raccoon carcass on the shoulder. There was nothing ahead of them but more open country. She shifted around. “Shouldn’t we be there by now?”

Colin glanced at the odometer and lifted his eyebrows. “Thirteen miles. I didn’t realize we’d gone so far.”

Hannah reached in the back for the old map. “You said it looked like just a couple of miles from the house.” She traced the line Colin had pointed out and tried to mark it using her thumb.

Colin shrugged. “Maybe it’s not drawn to scale. It’s just homemade.”

Hannah folded her hands over her stomach, which gave a loud gurgle. “Well, I’m hungry, it’s dark, and we’re really far away from food. And the highway exit is forty miles the opposite direction too. That means we’re forty miles from French fries. It’s time for emergency measures.” She leaned forward and snapped open the glove compartment, riffling around among oil-change receipts and yellowing parking tickets. “Ah!” She held up a wrinkled box triumphantly.

Colin glanced over. “Stale Mike and Ikes?”

“Hell, yes.” Hannah excavated a few cracked red candies from the box and, leaning over, popped them in Colin’s mouth.

“Mmm.” He worked his jaw with some difficulty. “Chewy.”

Hannah grinned at him. “Yeah. I like them best with dust.” She rubbed a green one against her shirt and ate it.

Colin braked abruptly in the middle of the road and Hannah sat up. “What are you doing?”

He spun the wheel and turned around, backing up and then threw the truck into drive. He accelerated back toward Pine House. “This is way too much hassle. I propose we go back to the house, eat our expired baked beans, take these inside”—he held up the Mike and Ikes—“to finish in bed.” He grinned at Hannah, bathing her in the full force of his high-wattage smile.

She bit her lip as a delicious shiver ran from her neck to her fingertips. “That sounds like a great idea.” She squeezed his knee under the dashboard and watched the road thrumming by ahead of them.

Hannah woke by degrees the next morning. First the gray light filtering in through her eyelids. Then the sense of warmth encasing her from head to toe, and the awareness of Colin cradling her from behind, one arm draped around her middle. The room around them was silent—the one small window shrouded with the flat early morning fog. Hannah could feel the layers of silence pressing in on her from each room in the house, then the silence in the woods around them and in the countryside out beyond that.

She kept very still, relishing the rise and fall of her boyfriend’s slow, regular breathing against her back, then shifted carefully to face Colin. He lay peacefully on his side, eyes closed, golden stubble glinting on his cheeks and chin. She stared at his high, sunburned cheekbones and the light sprinkling of freckles on his nose for a long moment before whispering, “Colin.”

“Hrrm?” he mumbled without moving.

“Colin, are you awake?” she whispered a little louder.

He wrapped his arm around her neck and pulled her into his chest. “Hmm. Shh. Han …” His voice trailed off.

Hannah willed herself to go back to sleep. But she was wide-awake now, and her feet were hot and sweaty, like they always were when she stayed in bed too long. So after a minute, she slowly disentangled herself from his embrace and slid out from under the covers. Colin turned on his other side, mumbling something indistinct, and hugged the pillow as Hannah padded from the room.

The big living room seemed to regard her with serene calm, bathed in a pearly diffuse light. Hannah put her hand on a checked curtain and peered through the glass, trying to see the lake. The fog hung like a white shroud though, allowing only a view of the rough, sandy beach, with the rowboat sitting on one side.

In the kitchen the remains of their baked bean dinner from the night before still lay spread on the table. Hannah swept the dishes into the sink. No unloading the dishwasher here. No packing lunches. No grocery shopping.

As if on cue, her cell rang, the noise bone-jarring in the silence. Hannah looked around for it wildly and spotted it lying by her place at the table. She grabbed it up before it could ring again and hurried onto the porch.

Outside, the damp air was rich with the odor of lake mud and rotting reeds. Hannah flicked open the phone without looking at the screen. “Hello?”

“Hi, honey.” Mom’s voice came from the other end.

Hannah’s heart stuttered. She glanced around quickly, as if expecting to see her mother standing at the edge of the gravel drive. “Hi, Mom.” She sank down slowly on the edge of the splintery porch step. The hole she’d almost fallen through yesterday stared back at her.

“How’s work going?” Mom asked. “We’ve been missing you here. David …” Her voice crackled and faded out, then in again. “Han? Han?”

Hannah glanced at the screen. One bar. “Shoot, hold on, Mom,” she almost shouted into the receiver. She got up and walked down onto the overgrown lawn, holding the phone in the air, watching the screen. Really it was amazing there was any cell reception out here at all. One bar, then two, and then none. She stood at the side of the house near a falling-off gutter. “Mom? Mom?”

“What, honey?” Her mother sounded like she was shouting through a bucket. “I’m having trouble—” A burst of static interrupted her words. Hannah held the phone away from her ear, wincing.

“Mom!” she shouted. “Listen, the reception’s bad. But I’m fine, everything’s fine.”

Another burst of static. She could hear her mother faintly saying something. Then the line went dead.

Hannah set the phone down on the edge of the porch, then leaned back against the cold, damp metal of the gutter. Weeds wet with dew brushed her ankles, leaving behind a trail of tiny green seeds. She tried to ignore the twist of emptiness in her
middle, picturing David, waking up this morning and looking in her room, seeing the bed empty. She thought of his mouth, turned down in disappointment, and his sad little eyes.

She exhaled, forcing herself to focus on the lake in front of her. The water was visible now as a glassy, flat sheet, hung with a curtain of fog that stopped a few feet above the surface of the water, as if someone had rubbed an eraser through the landscape. Hannah squinted, trying to estimate how far the opposite shore was.
A mile? A half mile?
Far enough that the pine trees were visible only as an indistinct mass. In the eastern sky, the sun was a silver disk, steadily burning through the moisture.

Her skin felt coated with sweat and grime from yesterday and she had yet to take a shower. The water would be so cool and refreshing. On impulse, she slipped around to the back of the house. Here, the little beach lay spread out—the rough yellow sand damp from the night and strewn with dark branches and stones. In the water on either side, the reeds clustered, whispering together. As Hannah watched, a loon rose from the water. It called plaintively before diving under again.

She glanced back at the sleeping house. No movement at the windows. The back door was tightly shut. Quickly, she skimmed her T-shirt over her head and slid her gym shorts down to her ankles. She ran toward the water, feeling extremely exposed, and was sure that Colin had come to the back door. He was probably standing there, laughing at the sight of her running in her underwear. But when she plunged in and turned around, the back porch was still empty.

The cold dark water enveloped her skin like silk. Under her toes, mud squished. A reed brushed her calf, and she thought fleetingly of water snakes.
Don’t be such a wimp
. It was colder than she expected, but she forced herself to wade deeper into the water as the chill worked its way into her bones. When she was up to her chest, she swam a little back and forth, churning her arms and kicking vigorously, trying to warm up. After a minute, the water didn’t feel quite as cold. Hannah flipped over on her back. It felt very adventurous, being out here alone. The trees on the shore loomed over her field of vision like giant towering sentinels.

The screen door slapped behind her, and Hannah turned to see Colin standing on the porch, his hair sticking up. He wore nothing but his boxers and for a minute, Hannah could hardly breathe at the sight of his broad, golden chest and thick arms. She waved one arm in the air and paddled close enough to stand. “Come on in!”

He didn’t move, so Hannah called again. “Colin! The water’s great!”

“Awesome,” he said, but his voice had an automatic quality as he stared past her at the water, his arms crossed on his chest.

Hannah swiped some of the wet hair out of her face. “What are you waiting for? Scared?” She laughed.

Colin laughed too, a bit hollowly. “Very funny. I’m just working up to it.” He took a couple deep breaths, and then swung his arm back and forth a few times before walking slowly into the water. He seemed to relax as the water reached his chest. “Damn, it’s cold.”

He swam awkwardly in a circle, while Hannah floated on her back again, staring up at the white sky. The sun was burning stronger through the clouds. Now the fog hung above the water in thin wisps. Spirit vapors. That’s what her grandmother used to call it. She glanced over. Colin looked like a disembodied head floating on the surface of the water. His hair was pasted to his forehead. “Come here,” he said, swimming over. He lifted her easily in his arms as she wrapped her legs around his waist and her arms around his neck.

This close, she could see the individual water droplets that sparkled like diamonds on his tanned, wet face. “Mmm, you’re so warm,” she said, squeezing closer to him. Maybe she should tell him now. Right now. This could be the moment. She pressed herself closer to him, looked right into his broad, open face. He gazed back encouragingly. Then she dropped her eyes. It was like he was looking right through her skull. She knew he was thinking about it. And he knew she was thinking about it.

Colin released her, and she clung to him weightlessly, her legs still twined around his waist. He smoothed the wet hair off her forehead with both hands. “Love you.” His voice was so low she had to lean forward to hear it.

Hannah hesitated. Colin sensed it immediately and twisted away from her. Just like in the bedroom yesterday. Her legs released his waist, and he swam a few feet, his back to her. She could tell by the set of his shoulders that he was upset. Her stomach felt sick. Again! What was the matter with her?
Relax, for God’s sakes! Just say it!

She swam up to him and held on to his broad shoulders from behind. The skin felt slick and slippery, like a seal’s. “Colin … listen …” She pulled on his shoulders until he turned around. “I’m sorry.” She hugged him, and after a minute, he hugged her back. Hannah tried a smile. “Can we just have a good time? I really, really want to remember this. Our last time together before you leave.”

“That’s a little dramatic, don’t you think?” His voice was light, but she could hear the hurt still lingering underneath. He swam away from her toward the center of the lake, doing a serious crawl with proper breathing.

Hannah swallowed. Okay, no problem. She’d dealt with his moods before. She’d get him, she thought. Smiling to herself and taking several deep breaths, she ducked her head under the water and opened her eyes.

Before her floated a murky green world, with dark reeds waving at the bottom and the sunlight filtering through the thick water. Ahead, she could see Colin’s body moving through the water, his legs kicking steadily.

She swam toward him and when she was close, dove a little deeper, then reached up and grabbed one of his ankles, pulling as hard as she could.

His ankle was all hard bone and sinew under her fingers. His leg kicked wildly, and she just barely managed to hang on. The force of the kicking swung her back and forth as if she were a shark clamped onto his leg. Her lungs were aching. She released his foot and kicked swiftly toward the surface of the water.

Hannah burst through the surface, raking her hair out of her eyes and already grinning. But she recoiled at the sick look on Colin’s face. His skin was almost gray. Then, as she watched, the gray was slowly replaced by a flush.

“Colin, are you okay?” She reached out to touch him. “I’m sorry. I was just playing around.”