Drowning

Diving-Chapter 9

Chapter 9

Diving

Carson finds me a crumpled up mess at the base of the old slide. He was on his way to Nate's when he must have spotted me, head in hands, elbows on knees, and tears staining my cheeks.

“Tessy?” He makes his way up the green grassy hill to the slide where I'm crying. “Are you...are you crying?” he hesitates to touch me for a second and just looks at me, hair all a mess in my face, mascara coating my cheeks like paint on a wall.

“I'm fine.” I struggle to pull myself up from the rusted metal and lie through my teeth. I'm not okay. Not at all. There's a hole in my chest the size of Nate's fist. Right next to the one from my father.

“For some reason I have a hard time believing that..”

Neither of us says anything, knowing hes right but also realizing that I'm not about to tell him the real problem. The wind sends wisps of my blonde hair around to reach my face where they stick to the salt trails. Even with Carson sitting in the grass next to me I feel completely and utterly alone, deserted, and abandoned. It's strangely familiar to the feeling that hit me after mom told us about dad.

Carson finally breaks the silence. “So should I call Nate or...” immediately I shake my head no. “Oh. Oh wow. Okay.” He stutters obviously not expecting me to be so vigorously disagreeing with his question that I'm usually desperate for someone to ask. “Well I was headed over there but I think he can deal with a night without me.”

“I just—We just..got in an argument.” I don’t know why I feel the need to explain myself, I know Carson won't judge me no matter what.

“Tessy,” he starts, “If you want to talk about it just let me know and we'll talk about it. If not then don't feel obligated to tell me. It doesn't matter whether or not I know what happened I'm still gonna try my best to make you feel better.” I'm quiet in response to this as I allow his words to sink in.

For some reason I have the strongest urge to tell him everything. Half of me knows its only logical, once someone has so much bottled up inside of them then eventually they're going to want to tell. But the other half is screaming, crying, terrified, because Mom always told me that only the weakest people have to complain. If I tell Cars, am I weak? I can't be weak. Dad is weak. I can't be like him.

There's a still silence as the wind blows a swing back and forth in the distance, the rust makes a creaking noise but the sound only seems as though it belongs. It's just background to the eerie quiet taking over my life.

Carson breaks into a random smile. He says nothing but stands from the green grass, reaching a hand out to pull me up. “Do you have any other plans for tonight?” he asks. Wearily I shake my head. “Awesome. We're going bowling.”

Twenty minutes later, I'm slipping my feet into neon pink bowling shoes and taking in the scent of fried food and feet. It's gross yet comforting at the same time. Carson tosses me a bottle of hand sanitizer and wipes down the mini table in front of us with a wet wipe. He's a germ freak.

After convincing me to bowl with him he brought me to one of the tourist trap rest-stops filled with souvenirs and cheap gas station food to clean up a little. I was stunned by my reflection in the dingy mirror, hollow eyes and permanently pink cheeks stared back at me until I found a way to fix my appearance. He then proceeded to convince me on our way through town that Eli definitely needed to bowl with us. He told me that he was just home alone doing nothing on this Friday night and that just wasn't acceptable. I'm pretty sure somehow he realized my crush on Eli.

So here the three of us are. In the depths of the winter tourist season, at the most visited place in town on a Friday night. A little girl screams at the station beside us, learning she's lost, a couple feeds each other onion rings a few tables back. Carson wrinkles his nose at them.