Swim to Me (25 page)

They spent the morning listening to music and exchanging stories about their pasts. Armando told the group that his parents were from Cuba and how every time he mentioned that he'd like to visit Cuba, his mother would look as if she might cry. She'd wave her hands in front of her face and say: “This is not for discussion. We are never going back there.” Molly asked if any of them had ever been to a foreign country. Sharlene, of all people, looked up from the
floor and said, “I was in Windsor, Ontario, once but I don't guess that counts.”

Scary Sheila said that when she was about twelve, her family had gone for a week to St. Martin but they had to come home early when her father became infected by a rare bacterium called shigella. And Delores said that if she could pick anywhere in the world to go, she'd go to France. “My mother used to say she had a little French in her,” she said. “That was only because she liked liver and, according to her, the French like liver.”

Before she knew it, she had told them everything: about her mother and the fashion magazine; about Westie and about his babysitter who had just died; and about her father who had disappeared more than two years ago—although she couldn't bring herself to bring up the latest news about the circus. “I'm not who you thought I was in the beginning,” she said, watching for their reactions. “But I am now. I really am.”

“Christ, do you think any of us are who we said we were?” said Scary Sheila. “You don't really think I'll ever go back to the University of Florida, do you? First of all, they wouldn't let me back in even if I wanted to go. They told my parents I had a drinking problem. That was an understatement,” she rolled her eyes.

“You want to hear about drinking problems, my old man was soused before he went to work every morning,” said Helen. “Sometimes he'd be so desperate, he'd drink mouthwash.”

“Okay, while we're telling true confessions, I've got one,” said Blonde Sheila. “Right before I came down here, I caught my mother in bed with a neighbor from down the street. He was a nineteen-year-old hippie.”

And then Lester spoke up. “When I told my father that I'd been hired as a merman here, he slapped me across the face and called me a queer. But I came here anyway.”

Molly shot Adrienne a look. “And you thought you had troubles,” she said, referring to the pyrotechnic baton-twirling travesty on the football fields of Zephyrhills High.

It was as if they were a big family, sitting out a rainy day together, telling their secrets. And, for that afternoon at least, they were all in the same boat: kids who had seen grown-up troubles.

L
ATER THAT AFTERNOON,
Armando looked at his watch. “We'd better get back to the station,” he said to Delores. “Sommers is going to think we drowned. Again.”

“Shouldn't you change before we go?” she asked.

Armando had forgotten he was still wearing Thelma's shirt and sweatpants. “Oh God, I wonder if I still have any clothes,” he said. “I guess I could wear one of the mermaid outfits.”

“That'll never work. You're too skinny.”

Armando flexed his muscles and in a tough guy voice answered: “Oh yeah. Well, there's more to me than meets the eye.”

Delores laughed. He was anything but a tough guy. She liked that about him.

“C'mon Mr. Muhammad Ali, let's go find you some clothes.”

They walked across the lawn to Thelma's office. Thelma was sitting in her chair, her back to them, her Keds propped up on the windowsill.

“Knock knock,” said Delores.

Thelma spun in her chair. She had the slack-faced expression of someone lost in thought.

“I'll bet I know why you're here,” she said, pulling Armando's freshly washed khakis and sweatshirt from a drawer. It wasn't enough that she was matchmaker and secretary. Now she had to be laundrywoman as well. Thelma assumed that this effort, like so many of her others, would go unnoticed and unappreciated. But
when she handed the clothes to him and said, “Here you go, young man, you'll be needing these,” Armando bent down and kissed the top of her head. “You are an angel,” he said. “An angel from heaven.”

It had been years, maybe a lifetime, since anyone had kissed the top of Thelma's head. An “angel”? Her laugh sounded unsettled. “That's not the word most people would use to describe me.”

“Then most people don't know you,” he said.

Thelma blinked and looked at Armando as if he'd just spoken in a foreign language. She couldn't decide if he was really that nice or just an artful ass-kisser.

Armando ran off to change his clothes. “Nice young man,” said Thelma, nodding as if she were agreeing with herself.

In the van back to the station, Armando and Delores turned on the radio just as Roberta Flack started singing her new hit, “Killing Me Softly.” When she got to the part about strumming my pain with his fingers, Armando cocked his ear toward the radio. “Kind of X-rated, those lyrics, don't you think?” he asked. Delores put her hand on his leg and kept it there until they got to WGUP. That's the kind of day it was.

I
F
A
LAN
S
OMMERS
had been moved or shaken by the events of the night before, he certainly had made a speedy recovery. Lately he had taken to wearing a gold chain around his neck; on this afternoon, he'd also left his shirt unbuttoned a notch or two lower than usual and he reeked of aftershave. “Hey, dollface,” he said when he spotted Delores. “How goes it in the lifesaving business? The press has been hounding me all day. Wooh, all this publicity. We are on the map. On the globe. In the stratosphere!” He turned to Armando: “Get a good night's sleep, buddy?” He winked. “I'll bet you did.” Then, just like that, the jocularity went out of his voice.
“People,” he shouted to the crew on the floor, “listen up. We've got forty-five minutes to go. I want tonight's show to be flawless. This isn't local television anymore. The entire world will be watching.”

At around that same time, Roy walked over to the Giant Café. Hanratty was already there, seated at the counter with a cup of tea and a grilled-cheese sandwich. “Well, Mr. Walker, a rare privilege it is to be in your company twice in a day,” said Hanratty, dabbing the corners of his mouth with a napkin. “Please, join me.”

Roy sat on the stool beside him. “I'm going to see her at noon tomorrow,” he whispered, sounding like a man who was being watched. “I thought maybe you'd like to come with me.”

Hanratty was shrewd enough to know that Roy had no way of getting to Weeki Wachee without him. “How kind of you,” he said. “Perhaps I can give you a lift.”

“Yeah, that would be nice. Thank you.”

Rex came over and took Roy's order: key-lime pie and a glass of milk.

As if in a movie, the three men looked at their watches at the same time, then stared up at the TV set.

“It'll be tough to compete with last night's act,” said Rex. They all nodded, watching the camera zoom in on a grave Chuck Varne. As if he'd been eavesdropping, Chuck opened the broadcast with these words: “Last evening, we witnessed an extraordinary act of courage by a member of our own WGUP news team. Sent out to cover the damage caused by Hurricane Claudia, weathergirl Delores Taurus was standing oceanside at Belleair Beach when she spotted a little boy being dragged out into the roiling ocean. Without hesitation, Ms. Taurus threw down her mike and swam after the helpless child, all the while fighting against the forces of nature. Tonight, we will show you the footage of those frightening and treacherous moments that, fortunately for everyone, culminated in a victory at sea.”

Again, they watched Delores's rescue and even though they all knew how it would end, Hanratty and Roy put down their food, and Rex blew a whoosh of relief through his cheeks when Delores and the boy finally landed on shore.

“Ladies and gentlemen,” said Varne, “this is unprecedented television: the live drama of a miracle unfolding before your very eyes—for some of us, the very reason we got into this business in the first place.” Moved by his own words, Varne had to clear his throat before he continued. “And tonight, we have an exclusive interview with Lee Alexander, the father of the young boy whom Delores Taurus rescued from the clutches of Hurricane Claudia. Back with you in sixty seconds.”

When Chuck returned, there was a rail-thin blond man seated beside him. Lee Alexander had a short crew cut and a large Adam's apple that jumped up and down each time he swallowed. The camera crawled in on the man's face as Chuck continued: “Watching Delores Taurus swim out to rescue his six-year-old son Danny, Lee Alexander cut a silhouette of agony and desperation.” Chuck paused as they showed a film clip of Lee Alexander standing on the beach watching the rescue. Indeed, his arms were folded in front of him and he was hunched over as if he were trying to keep his insides from coming out. Chuck continued: “Thanks to the valiant efforts of our own Delores Taurus, little Danny is safe at home tonight watching his dad on live television. Lee Alexander, welcome.”

Alexander stared into the camera and swallowed hard. “Welcome,” he said.

Everyone on the set worried that this would be tough going—everyone except Chuck, who had become an expert at putting words into other people's mouths.

“Mr. Alexander, it must have been harrowing to watch your boy being dragged out to sea. I can't imagine the feeling of helplessness and utter desolation that you must have felt. Can you tell us what it was like?”

Lee Alexander's mouth was dry as paper and his tongue stuck to the roof of his mouth. “It felt as if the world was ending” (swallow). “Like my life was over. My family and I are so grateful. Really, that's all I can say.”

Tears welled up in his eyes. His mouth twitched as he tried not to cry. The camera sucked it all up. Chuck, once again overwhelmed by the raw emotion of live television, wiped a tear from his eye. “Mr. Alexander,” he said, in a cracking voice, “all of us at WGUP and in the greater Tampa area share in your happiness. God bless you and little Danny and the rest of the Alexander family.”

Lee Alexander, with his bouncy Adam's apple, nodded to Chuck in a way that made clear that his ordeal had finally ended.

By now, it was six fifteen, time for another commercial break. “When we come back,” said Chuck, his voice restored to normal, “we will bring you an update on Hurricane Claudia, and then the current weather from our resident heroine, Delores Taurus.”

Roy and Hanratty sat up a little straighter. Rex, not knowing that Roy had told Hanratty about Delores, pretended that nothing unusual was happening.

After the commercial break, Delores appeared on-screen. “Tomorrow morning the clouds will clear and, by noon, we should have eighty-three degrees and full sunshine—good news for Roy Walker over at the circus in Venice.”

No one at the Giant Café looked at anyone. Roy gripped the counter with both hands and thought that, if he were here alone, he would jump up and down and raise his fist triumphantly in the
air. But since he wasn't, he sat quietly and scraped the last of the graham-cracker crust off of his plate. Rex caught Roy's eye and winked at him. And when the weather report was finished, Hanratty pronounced Delores Taurus “the real thing” before sinking his teeth into the rest of his grilled-cheese sandwich.

Roy awoke earlier than usual the next morning. Normally, he'd walk around his bed fifteen times, do his sit-ups and push-ups, then throw on his clothes, feed the animals and clean their cages, then come back to his room and shower. He always dressed by rote, wearing the same thing almost every day: a pair of khaki shorts, a white T-shirt, brown leather sandals. By now, he looked the way he looked, and staring in mirrors held no interest for him. But on this morning, after he returned from his chores and did his exercise routine, he took his time showering, then making sure to rinse the soap out of his hair.

The cold water set his mind racing. Delores had turned into a beauty. He'd never seen it coming. How would he talk to her? What would they say? Should he tell her about his affinity for the animals? Try to explain how trapped he had felt and why he had left? Apologize? He'd best be careful. She was clearly savvy—he hadn't seen that coming either—and he didn't want to risk sounding corny in any way. He wanted her to know that he was comfortable in his life; happy, even.

He stepped out of the shower and wrapped a towel around his waist. The mirror on the metal bathroom cabinet was about the size of a plate, just big enough for him to give his face the once over. He stuck out his tongue, stretched his lips, and studied his teeth and
gums. He'd completely forgotten about the gap between his front teeth, the same way people with freckles never remember they're there. He ran his tongue over the space and let it linger for a while. He bent his head toward the mirror and studied his hairline. Had his forehead always been this big, or was his hair just receding? The rest of his hair fell like shingles around his neck; maybe he'd put it into a ponytail. Nah, he'd look too much like a hippie. Now he wished he'd allowed Carmen to cut his hair, as she had offered to do so many times, instead of cutting it himself. He caught the reflection of his eyes. How could he have not noticed that they were small and worm-colored and had puffy bags underneath them?

My eyes,
thought Roy,
they tell the story more than any other part of me.
His tendency was not to look people in the eye, something that, in hindsight, probably made him look shifty and uncertain. Hanratty. There was a man whose eyes locked with yours. They commanded attention and made him seem firm and powerful. Roy would keep that in mind. He ran his hands across his stomach. No flab. That was the one thing he did have going for him: his physique. He didn't have an extra pound on him, and, between his exercise and all the physical work he did, he was as strong as ever. Working in the sun all day had also turned his skin the luscious golden brown of peanut butter.