Her question was so innocent, the inflicted hurt so unintentional, that I knew I shouldn’t be angry. But I was—suddenly angry at the reminder of why I hated the water and hadn’t wanted to come out in the first place. Angry that the memory outshone anything I’d just seen.
She continued to stare up at me, her eyes hidden behind her blue sunglasses, and I struggled to find a calm voice. “It was an accident. When I was twelve. But that was a long time ago.”
I felt Gibbes’s eyes on me but I didn’t look up, instead pretending to focus on unbuckling my life jacket, and then helping the children with theirs as Gibbes and Loralee left to retrieve the picnic basket from the kitchen.
When Loralee first spread the red and white checked tablecloth on top of the deck so near the water, I almost asked for my life jacket back, but when nobody else seemed concerned I remained silent. I wondered to myself whether alligators could jump, but kept that thought to myself, too.
We all helped Loralee remove the plastic-wrapped and Tupperware-covered items from the basket, setting them on the cloth. I was busy taking off lids and wrappings when Loralee bumped into me. We were on our knees, so I wasn’t taken off balance, but I instinctively reached out to steady her. Her face was pale under her makeup and her skin clammy.
“Are you all right?” I asked, realizing that I was the only thing preventing Loralee from toppling into the water.
Gibbes moved quickly to her side, his fingers finding her pulse. We were silent for a moment as he counted. “I think she needs to get out of the sun. I’m going to bring her inside where it’s cooler and get her some water before I make her lie down on the sofa for a bit.” He turned to Owen. “She’ll be fine,” he said, and I felt absurdly grateful that he’d thought to reassure Loralee’s son.
She could barely walk, and by the time they’d reached the end of the dock, Gibbes was carrying her, lifting her as if she weighed no more than a pillow. Her long, manicured fingers rested on his shoulder, and I quickly looked back at the picnic spread, although it took a while for the image to go away.
We were busy loading our plates with food when Gibbes returned.
“How is she?” I asked, glad to hear my voice sounded neutral.
“She’ll be fine. Her meds cause her to be dehydrated, which makes her overheat easily. She drank a tall glass of water and she’s already feeling much better. I set the clock on the stove to wake her up in an hour.”
“Good,” I said, watching him closely, wondering why he was avoiding eye contact.
He sat down next to me on the blanket and rubbed his hands together. “So, who wants some watermelon?”
“I do, I do!” the kids shouted in unison, their hands and faces smeared with mayonnaise from their sandwiches, half-moons of yellow on their upper lips from the lemonade.
I reached into the basket, surprised to find it empty.
“What are you looking for?” Gibbes asked.
“Knives and forks. How else are we supposed to eat the watermelon?”
The children began laughing and I saw that Gibbes was trying very hard not to. “Have you never eaten watermelon before, or had a contest for who could spit a seed the farthest?”
I thought for a moment, then shook my head. “I know we had watermelons in the grocery store, but I can’t say I’ve ever actually eaten it. And the watermelon I remember wasn’t anywhere near as red as that. But I can say with certainty that I’ve never spit any seed out of my mouth, intentionally or not.”
I was being silly, almost flirtatious, yet I didn’t stop to think about why. I felt the sun on my skin; I was in the middle of a salt marsh where nobody seemed to care that I was wearing an old lady’s floppy hat and three coats of sunscreen, or that I was wearing a pair of shorts for the first time in a very long while.
Gibbes seemed to pick up on my mood. As if he were a surgeon exhibiting a precise technique to medical students, he carefully unwrapped a wedge of watermelon. Holding it up like a prize, he then leaned forward and bit right into the middle of it. Watermelon juice seeped from the fruit, past the rind, and onto his hand and wrist.
“Pardon me, Merritt, but this is a necessity when eating watermelon.” He bunched his lips together and without further warning ejected a seed from his mouth. I watched with guarded fascination as it carried out over the water, landing at a good distance.
“Nice one, Dr. Heyward,” Owen said, high-fiving the doctor. Holding his hand up, Gibbes then lightly patted Maris’s palm with splayed fingers.
“What a talent,” I said, hoping I wouldn’t also be asked to perform.
“Why, thank you, ma’am. I was the watermelon-seed-spitting champion at the Water Festival three years in a row when I was a boy.”
“That being on your résumé is probably what got you into med school. What happened the fourth year? Got too old and lost some teeth?”