Float

Original Edition: Chapter Twenty-Two

My eyes locked on the little white scar above his left eyebrow.

"What happened?" I asked, my voice quiet but not soft. I knew Blake Hamilton well enough to know he'd hate it if I suddenly started treating him like some kind of wounded baby animal.

"My mom was a competitive swimmer," Blake said, his eyes still locked on that window. "She almost made it to the Olympics back in her twenties, actually. But then she met my dad, and she sort of gave it all up to settle down and raise a family. She kept swimming, though. She was still really good at it. She just didn't compete."

There was a knot forming in my stomach.

"When I was about, uh, twelve or thirteen, Hurricane Dean went through the Caribbean. We all thought it'd completely missed Florida, so there wasn't any reason to worry about it. My mom went out swimming one morning, like she usually did, and, uh..."

I was going to throw up.

Blake seemed to have trouble starting another sentence. He looked down at the ground for a minute and shook his head.

"We—my dad and I—heard about all the residual rip currents that afternoon on television. Hurricane Dean didn't even brush us, and we'd thought maybe the gulf would get some weird tides, but we had no idea... God, there was this horrible moment when we just both looked at each other and went, mom's usually back by now."

I'd started shaking, but I didn't dare move.

"Dad called the coast guard right away. But I couldn't just sit there and wait to hear if mom was alive or not, so I sprinted to the harbor and I just jumped in Mr. Fletcher's boat—you know, Lena and Jesse's dad, he had this dinky little sailboat—and I took it out to sea."

He shrugged then.

"That's where this came from?" I asked hesitantly, reaching up to brush my fingertip along the little white scar on his forehead. Blake shivered under my touch, and I realized my hands must've been cold.

"It was so fucking stupid," Blake said, squeezing his eyes closed and letting out a single huff of bitter laughter. "I thought I could just sail out there and I'd find mom and everything would be okay. I didn't even make it out of the harbor; currents pulled me right into a wall of rocks along the shore. Mr. Fletcher's boat flipped and I ended up pancaked."

Blake shook his head again.

"So fucking stupid," he breathed.

"It wasn't stupid," I insisted, "it was brave."

Blake winced at my words.

He turned, so his back was to the hospital building where he'd no doubt received a couple of stitches, and eyed the mural. It was obvious he didn't want to talk about his mom anymore, by the slump of his shoulders and the weary look on his face. So I turned towards the mural, my shoulder brushing against his, and decided to change the subject.

"It's amazing, isn't it?" I prompted.

Blake nodded wordlessly.

"I mean, I knew Rachel was a pretty good artist, but I had no idea she was this good. Then again, I've only ever seen her doodle some stuff on napkins. Not exactly her best work, I guess."

My captive audience nodded again.

For what felt like the millionth time since I'd arrived in Holden, I felt that ridiculous urge to keep talking.

"You know, I really wish I'd inherited some of these artistic genes my family supposedly has. I can't draw for shit. Sometimes I think Rachel must've made a deal with Satan to get her talent, because my dad is like the least creative person I've ever met. I mean, I guess neurosurgeons don't exactly have the freedom to get creative when they're operating, because that'd probably result in a whole lot of lawsuits—"