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“I’ve never been called Becca.”
His eyes scrunch down and he has that helpless look again—the one he wore when the woman was yelling at him about the crib.
Wait, that’s it. “The crib. How did you order it?”
“Um. Through Kyle. On the mail plane?”
Why is that a question?
“Is there any other way to get word to the outside world? Any way at all?”
“No.” He extends his “no” as if he’s not sure why I’m asking. He looks back at the beads behind him. “Find it, baby?”
“It’s down on the bottom shelf,” she calls, out of breath. “I can’t bend down to reach it! My belly keeps getting in the way!”
Jordi gives me a quick glance, seeming relieved to have an excuse to end our conversation. “Right back.”
I nod.
He hurries into the back.
I wait for a moment. Then I drop the phone back in its case and run out the front door, the beads knocking aside.
The full sun, the heat, and the sound of the ocean hit me again.
It’s hard to breathe in the heat. You can see the waves of it rising from the road and the sand, making squiggly lines in the air.
My chest is tight. My heart flings itself around my chest like a grasshopper stuck in a glass jar desperately trying to find its way out. I’m dizzy.
I think I’m going to pass out.
So instead of giving in to the hand-swiping black lines in front of my eyes and pushing myself toward oblivion, I sprint to the beach. My feet hit the wet sand, sinking into the cool, foam-soaked, powdery surface.
I drag in quick, frantic breaths, and then the cool waves snap around my feet. The shells and coral rocks picked up by the waves knock against my legs. I plunge further into the water, letting the waves yank me deeper. I stand then in the sinking sand, the waves up to my knees, the white dress floating on top of the water like a cloud.
I let the cool water flow over me, tugging the panic out of me. As I stand in the crashing waves, unsteady in the shifting sand and swirling water, my chest opens. My breath comes easier. I drop my fingers in the water, drag my hands through the current, and stare out at the unending blue.
Where am I?
Why did they call me Becca?
Why did the old women think they knew me?
Why did the girl call me Mom?
And the man, Aaron, he shouted Becca too.
I stand there, my mind whirling as fast as the eddies swirling around me.
I hold still and quiet, not turning, when the man comes, wades into the water, and stands next to me. The water laps at the bottom of his shorts.
He stands less than a foot away. He’s taller this close, his shoulders broader, the magnetic feel of him so strong he’s impossible to ignore.
He stands quietly next to me, not speaking. His isn’t a gentle quiet though—it’s more like the sound of the waves on the beach, restful or tempestuous depending on your perspective.
He holds a glass bottle in his hand, a Coca-Cola. Condensation drips down the lip and coalesces in round beads on the gleaming glass. He stares at the horizon, at where the world seems to drop off into nothing.
“Junie said you needed this,” he says finally, holding the bottle toward me. “You all right?”
