Sea Read online

  xoxo, Mom (and Daddy)

  I swallowed back tears. The postcard arrived three years ago on my twelfth birthday in a mix of other cards and junk mail. A week after Dad came home from Thailand without her.

  I never even told my dad I got it, because it was ours.

  The last secret I shared with my mom.

  Carefully, I tucked the card back into my old journal and splashed cold water on my face. I stared at myself in the mirror, the counter cool marble on my palms.

  The glass was clear. But three years later, I still didn’t look like me.

  SPIDER

  My bedroom felt dusky in that walking-out-of-a-matinee-movie way when the pinging started.

  Ting bing.

  I got up off my bed and moved aside my window curtain.

  Spider?

  I blinked to make sure my eyes weren’t teasing.

  With his free hand, the one not wrapped around his surfboard, he waved up to me, his sandy blond hair still wet from the sea. I cracked open my window and a cool foggy breeze rushed in.

  “Are you throwing rocks at my window?” I asked.

  “Shells. Guilty as charged. I heard you locked yourself in your bedroom.”

  “Really? Who told you that?”

  “Bev told me you called her, freaking out. I figured it wasn’t a good time for me to knock on your door, but I figured you might let me harass you from down here.” He grinned confidently. Everyone was always happy to see Spider, and he knew it.

  I couldn’t help but smile back. It was good to see him.

  When his head cocked to the side, his eyes weren’t joking anymore. “So I found something of yours the other day. And since it’s your birthday I figured it was the perfect time to give it to you.”

  He remembered my birthday? I hadn’t talked with Spider one-on-one in forever. Whenever I saw him, it was in passing at his and Bev’s house or at the beach surrounded by his posse of surf rats and girl groupies. He barely even looked at me at school when we walked by each other in the halls, and now he showed up at my house all nonchalant, remembering my birthday?

  “Really? What is it?” I asked.

  He scrunched his eyebrows, teasing. “Not telling. You have to come over and find out. It’s in my closet, waiting for you.”

  I felt my face flush imagining being in Spider’s house not because it was Bev who had invited me. About being in Spider’s room alone with him after all this time.

  I had to think of something to say.

  Tugging on the back of my hair, I asked the obvious. “You were surfing?”

  His eyes lit up. “The waves were shoulder high,” he said. “Must be a storm coming in. You should have been there.”

  I should have been there? Yeah, right.

  Speaking of giant waves. “So Bev told you about my birthday ‘surprise.’”

  Spider nodded. I nibbled on the rough skin next to my index finger and startled myself when I blurted out, “You know I don’t fly.”

  “I know,” he said without missing a beat. Of course he knew. He was there when it all happened: Sienna doesn’t fly anymore. Sienna doesn’t surf anymore. Sienna doesn’t do anything anymore. Sienna just doesn’t.

  “But if things were ... different, it would be kind of cool helping the tsunami survivors and all that,” he said encouragingly.

  Then I grew suspicious. “Hey, did my dad ask you to try and talk me into going with him?”

  Spider frowned. “No. Why would you think that?”

  “I don’t know. It’s just ... I’m kinda surprised to see you.”

  Spider bobbed back and forth from one bare foot to the other on the sidewalk, the same sidewalk we used to skate race when we were kids. Once white and smooth, the concrete was now chipped and cracked, bits of scraggly grass growing between the spaces.

  “Look,” he called up, scratching his salty hair, “I better jam. Just wanted to stop by and wish you a happy birthday. Come over when you’ve bailed yourself out of your self-imposed isolation cell,” he joked.

  “Okay,” I said.

  He looked up at me for a second like he might want to say something else. But then he just shrugged. “See ya,” he said, with a little wave over his shoulder.

  “Spider?”

  “Yeah?”

  I wanted to ask if he was here because he wanted to be friends again and if so, why after all this time? But that sounded lame, so no words came.

  He cupped his ear like a conch shell. “I can’t hear you, Sea,” he yelled up.

  I winced at the sound of my old nickname.

  “What’d I say?”

  He must have noticed my expression. I wondered how to explain it. That we weren’t little kids anymore, that instead of being the skinny hyper kid I used to know, Spider was one of the hottest guys on the cove, his body filling out his chin-to-toe wet suit in all the right places, his lean surfer body six feet tall.

  He was Mr. Cool and I just ... wasn’t anymore. I wasn’t Sea anymore. And I got over him a long time ago.

  “It’s Sienna now,” I corrected him.

  He blinked. “Oh, right.” He sounded disappointed. “I forgot.”

  Shrugging, I tore my eyes away from Spider’s, stared past him, down the long street of our neighborhood, toward the peek of silver-blue ocean.

  If there were ever a tsunami here, it would hit Spider’s house first.

  I imagined the tall windows shattering into razors of glass. Spider, Bev and their perfect tennis-playing parents running from the giant wave as the water thrashed over their expensive furniture, flooding their polished wooden floors and overflowing their granite countertops.

  Spider wouldn’t be so happy-go-lucky after that happened.

  Cringing, I looked back at his uncomfortable face and felt horrible. What was wrong with me?

  “See ya, then, Sienna,” he called up from below.

  “See ya,” I echoed back.

  A half smile crept up his mouth before he turned to go. Why wouldn’t it? It wasn’t like he could hear my awful thoughts. Spider had that easy way about him that people who have never had anything bad happen to them seem to possess.

  Lucky him. Lucky Spider.

  I took another deep breath of salty air, let it tingle down my throat. Even after all the grief it had given me, the ocean still smelled good.

  I watched Spider walk away until he disappeared up his driveway ten houses down, leaving nothing but watery-gray footprints on the sidewalk.

  TSUNAMI

  Dad was reading a thick book about child soldiers when I peeked into the den. The African boy on the cover was staring straight ahead, his eyes angry but empty somehow. He looked about ten years old and was bare-chested, pointing a gun toward a broad blue sky; the gun was obviously not a toy. A dim fluorescent light bent over Dad’s book, illuminating the unsettled look on his face.

  Dad’s office smelled like stale coffee and lavender; lavender from Oma’s garden, dried and hanging on the wall. The scent still reminded me of Mom, and I wondered why Dad kept it in here, when it seemed like most of the time he didn’t want to be reminded, or talk about her, anyway. About what happened.

  “Oma said you wanted to talk,” I said, standing in the doorway.

  My birthday was several days ago and we’d pretty much been avoiding each other since.

  Worked for me, but apparently it wasn’t working for Dad.

  Jazz music blasted from two old speakers on opposite ends of the mahogany desk where Dad sat. When I was little, he used to spin me around and around in that worn black office chair. Now I didn’t come in here much; we all have our corners in this house. This den was Dad’s.

  “Hey, kiddo. I need to talk to you about the trip.”

  My insides twisted into a sticky web. “That looks like light reading,” I said, trying to stall him.

  “The book isn’t light reading; that’s the point,” he said defensively, his face half shadowed in the light. “These ugly things are really happening in the
world, and if I can, I’m going to do something to help. If I can’t help stop it, I’ll do something to help heal the wounds. That’s what Team Hope was ... is ... all about.”

  “Team Hope? That’s what you’re calling your group now?”

  “Yes. We changed it ... in honor of your mom.”

  I didn’t know what to say. His international work was the reason she was gone.

  My stomach clenched as I connected the dots.

  That was what my birthday morning was all about: Dad? Check. Tom? Check. And ... they needed a third person now.

  Vera.

  It was obvious who Vera was replacing.

  My stomach seized. “Whatever.” I spit out the word, spun around to flee.

  “Sienna, stop.”

  “What!” I snapped. The circles under his eyes were darker than usual, but this time I didn’t feel bad. I was tired too. We were all tired.

  He moved toward me, setting his hand on my shoulder in his robo-Dad way. But I shrugged it off.

  “Listen, I know you’re still mad about your birthday and I want to apologize. I thought if I surprised you with the ticket, you might not be as adverse to coming along-okay, that’s a lie.” He chuckled a little, making me want to scream. “I knew you’d say no and I really wanted you to say yes.”

  I didn’t answer. He was supposed to know better than to act like this. He was supposed to be an expert! My eyes stung with frustration.

  “I’m sorry, honey. Being a dad of a teenage girl doesn’t come with instructions,” he said.

  Neither does being a daughter of a widowed psychiatrist, I wanted to retort, but instead I said the worst thing I could think of. “How could you even think of bringing her in place of Mom?” My words cracked like a whip. As soon as they were out, I wanted to suck them back in. Wanted to take back the whole stupid week. The whole last three years.

  Dad just stared at me.

  He scratched his beard, avoiding my eyes. “That’s not ... ,” he started to say but let his words trail off. “Wait. Just wait.”

  As I stood in the doorway fuming, Dad reached under his desk and held up a DVD. “I have a proposition for you.”

  The cover of the box was a faded photograph of three little girls standing in front of a massive gray wave. “What’s that?”

  “A documentary shot at the orphanage we’ll be volunteering at. Look, I know you’re angry, but I want this trip to be your choice. I’m not going to force you to go. Watch this DVD and decide for yourself.”

  I didn’t trust him a bit. “What’s the catch?”

  Dad’s face relaxed. “No catch. I’m sincerely sorry for how I acted.” He raked his fingers through his thinning hair. “How this all seems. I’ve been a mess, and I can’t apologize enough. You’re fifteen years old now, so I might as well be honest with you.” He sighed. “I hate my practice. I hate listening to spoiled women whine about their rich husbands spending too much time on the golf course. I can’t even bring myself to fix the stairs, Sienna. I’m sure you’ve noticed.”

  I grunted in agreement.

  “See? The house is a wreck. It’s falling apart. And as dear as she is, your grandmother drives me crazy. I’m just ... I’m just lost.” He sighed again. “Do you know what I mean?”

  I nodded. I knew exactly what he meant.

  His voice picked up, as if energized by my understanding. “I need to feel useful again, kiddo. I need to help people with real problems who actually need my help. This trip is something I have to do. And I really want you to come along. If you would just think about it? Please?”

  When I squinted, the broken pieces of Dad’s face blurred and he looked like the dad who taught me to surf, to ride my bike. He looked like the man I used to believe could fix anything.

  “Okay, Dad,” I said.

  THE BACKPACK

  Spider’s room still smelled like crusty salt water and cheese puffs. But now there was a musky scent, some cologne mixed in, that made it even nicer to hang out in.

  Surf posters still covered the walls like ocean-themed wallpaper, and I could barely see the floor, it was so covered in crap. Maybe that’s why we used to get along so well—we both enjoyed lounging around in our own chaos.

  A surf movie was on his flat-screen TV, but I was paying more attention to the fact that we were sitting next to each other on his bed. “Want some more?” Spider asked, dangling a half-empty bag of chips in front of me.

  “No, thanks.”

  Spider shrugged and continued to munch.

  So.

  When are you going to show me the thing you found for me?

  Like he could read my mind, he rolled up the empty bag, shot it easily into the basketball hoop beside his door and watched it swoosh into the trash can underneath.

  “Nice shot,” I said.

  “Some things never change,” he said ironically. “Did you decide about Indo yet?” he asked, facing me.

  I could have told him about the DVD.

  How I watched half of it before with Bev in her room. That I didn’t finish it. Not because I didn’t want to, but because I couldn’t. It was too scary hearing the kids’ stories mixed in with news camera footage: the massive wave rushing through villages, destroying everything in its wake. The screams as the people ran and swam and struggled for safety. How one little girl, with a white flower in her hair, hid from the camera’s questions the whole time. She wouldn’t speak at all, like she was hiding from her own story. The whole time I watched, I couldn’t stop thinking: Maybe she’d speak to me.

  “Can we talk about something else?” I asked Spider. I didn’t want to admit I was actually considering going. That even though Bev and Oma both thought it was a terrible idea, I might do this.

  I might really go.

  I noticed the summer freckles sprinkled across his nose when he asked, “Come on, you don’t want to go to Indo even a little bit? Because I remember, we used to ... Well, you used to always say you wanted to travel with your parents one day.”

  I narrowed my eyes. “Do you swear my dad isn’t bribing you to persuade me to go? I mean, I know Bev would never succumb to that kind of pressure, but you,” I said with a grin, “are an entirely different story.”

  “Swear.” He held up his pinky—our old ritual. “And I take offense at the suggestion,” he said, but he was grinning too.

  I stared at his tanned hand.

  Did he want me to twist mine into his? I didn’t dare reach out and touch him. From the corner of my eye I watched him pause for a beat before folding his hand back into a fist and reaching over the side of the bed.

  “What’s that?” I asked.

  He set a kid-size backpack on my lap. “Remember when we were eight, your parents were leaving for Vietnam and we thought we’d stow away in your dad’s Jeep? Well, I found yours.”

  “No way!” I held up the Scooby-Doo pack. Sea was written on top in bright pink cursive. “I can’t believe you still have this!”

  “They almost missed their plane when they found us hiding in the back. Your dad was so pissed, but your mom just laughed ... ,” he said, and then stopped when his words stuck to the air like flypaper. I tried to swallow them away, but my throat was a desert.

  I carefully unzipped the top. The inside was still stuffed with the little kid clothes I’d packed all those years ago.

  “I think this is a sign, Sea,” Spider said, his voice low, cautious. “This time you really get to go.”

  Was it a sign?

  I didn’t believe much in signs, not anymore. But this was pretty coincidental. I stared at the bag but didn’t dare look at Spider, who was leaning so close I could feel his breath on my cheek.

  I leaned back, staring at the backpack while I talked. “If I decide to go, I have to get a ton of shots. They have serious diseases over there, you know,” I mumbled.

  “We’ll just have to put you in a bubble when you get back so you don’t contaminate us with your cooties.” I felt him leaning closer.

&n
bsp; “Would you visit me in the bubble?”

  “Of course,” Spider said. “I’d bring you Popsicles and cheesy celebrity magazines.”

  “In that case, it might be worth going. I think a bubble house life would appeal to me.”

  Then Spider started tickling me. I feigned protest, hugging the backpack to my chest. “Spider, stop!”

  Then we kind of rolled around laughing.

  It felt good to laugh. Strange. Like I didn’t recognize the sound of my own laughter.

  Spider started tickling me again and I laughed some more until suddenly Spider’s face was too close. He stopped laughing. His eyes looked different.

  Something clicked. He was right. The little girl on the documentary. The backpack. Him.

  I jumped up. “I need to go, Spider. You’re right!”

  “You mean go home? What’s wrong?” Spider stood up from the bed, concerned.

  “I’m fine,” I said. “I just need to tell my dad I’m going.”

  He held on to my shoulders and I froze.

  Was he trying to kiss me?

  No. That couldn’t happen.

  “So you’re going to go?” he asked, puzzled. “And you decided that just now?”

  I kept the backpack firmly between us. “Yeah,” I said. It was the truth.

  Ducking out of his arms, I headed for the door so he couldn’t see the confusion on my face. “I think ... I think it’s the right thing to do.”

  Even if I wanted him to, I couldn’t let Spider kiss me.

  I remembered the last time as clear as if it were yesterday. His curious eyes and his cherry soda lips.

  And then the horrible thing that happened after.

  I wasn’t sure about a lot of things, but I was sure about this.

  I would never be brave enough to try again.

  I ran out of Spider’s house the same way I had that terrible day.

  Maybe an ocean between us wouldn’t be such a bad thing.

  SHARKS

  “So you’re really going tonight?” Bev asked.