“What if people end up in the sea?” Kat asks. “How come heaven isn’t in the ocean? It’s as pretty as the sky.” She leans down, scoops up a sand crab, and lets him roam all over her palm, searching for an escape.
“I don’t know where heaven is. Maybe it’s not in the sky or on Earth,” I tell her. I spot a spiral shell in the clear tide pool and grab it, shake the sand off underwater and toss it in my pocket. “But I think wherever your mom is, she’s probably watching us.”
I don’t know if it’s true, but Kat always goes out of her way to make me feel like I belong, so I want to return the favor and let her know I’m on her side. I take the spiral shell back out and give it to her. I already have enough in my collection anyway. She smiles at me, and her earnest blue eyes match the color of the Montauk sky.
“Race you to the jetty?” Kat challenges.
“You two dumb shits are not supposed to be in the water!”
We both hear Henry despite the wind, and Kat’s grip on my hand tightens.
Henry is Kat’s older brother by three years, but it might as well be by a million. He acts like he’s the man of the house and bosses us both around like he’s our parent.
“We’re not swimming!” Kat retorts and begins to pull me down the beach.
Henry grabs our bag and dumps it out on the sand. After grabbing a cookie for himself and stuffing it grotesquely in his face, he dumps the rest out, ruining our picnic.
“Punk,” I say under my breath.
Kat sticks her tongue out at him.
A hint of rage crosses Henry’s usually blank and bored expression, and he runs at us full-speed, tearing through the water. Kat tries to make me run, too, but I stand my ground. I’ve seen bigger bullies than Henry Shaw on the playgrounds where I grew up.
“You better run, you dumb little trash,” he taunts.
I take a deep breath before he crashes into me full force and knocks me down into the shallow waves.
Kat screams. “He can’t swim!” I hear her cry right before he pushes my head underwater.
I open my eyes into the salty sting and see his poker face distorted above me. I try to talk, but salt water rushes into my mouth. It’s true, despite my many visits to the beach at Wainscott Hollow, I still don’t know how to swim.
Then Katelyn is on top of Henry, trying to pry him off me. She scratches his face and wraps her skinny arms around his neck. My lungs ache as I hold my breath until I can’t anymore. The saltwater feels like razor blades as it rushes into my lungs. Panic bubbles up in my throat, and I freeze, wondering if this is what it felt like when Mrs. Shaw went under. My mind flashes to my mother and the scream she’ll let loose when Kat tells her I was lost to the angry sea, too.
The water churns above me as Kat and Henry scuffle, and when I think I can’t take the pain any longer, suddenly, the weight is gone, and I see the bright sun lighting up the water over my face. I crawl to standing and suck air into my ragged lungs, shaking off the water and regaining my bearing. Henry shoves Kat to the sand by the shore and takes off, running back toward the Shaw estate, Wainscott Hollow.
“Kat, you okay?” I shout as I make my way to her. She’s on all fours in the sand, and her dress is soaked.
“I hate him!” she cries when I reach her.
I help her up and give her a hug, trying not to look at her tears or notice how her nose runs into my shoulder.
From the moment we arrived, I could tell Henry was going to be a problem. He’s got a mean streak as wide as this beach and seems hell-bent on proving himself to everyone who crosses him. At first, I guessed he was angry because his mom died until Kat told me that Henry’s always been mean and didn’t even get along with his mom. A bad seed maybe, someone who never had an ounce of good inside him, like some of the pushers in my old neighborhood my mother warned me to steer clear of.
Kat reaches out and touches my temple, and I wince in pain. When she pulls away her hand, it’s got blood on it from where Henry smashed my face into the shells and sand.
“You’re bleeding.”
“No biggie,” I say. I shrug to show her I can handle the pain.
“Let’s go home. I can put some stuff on it,” Kat tells me.
We hold hands and walk in the surf until we get to the path through the dunes. I look back over my shoulder and squint at the sea before we begin the climb back to Wainscott Hollows. In every sense, this life of mine is an improvement over what we had before. I’ve traded fire escapes for real balconies overlooking the sea, crowded train platforms for wide open beaches, and noisy city kids for the bravest explorer in Katelyn Shaw.
Better in all ways, except for her wicked brother, who seems to hate us all.
* * *
From one dayto the next, my mom is gone.
