“Maybe you will. One day.”
She shrugs, utterly indifferent all of a sudden. “Yeah, whatever.” She slides off the concrete lip of the pool, dropping into three feet of water, spring suit still on. Slowly, I begin unbuttoning my Polo men’s shirt, the one I’m using as a poolside cover-up. I’m deliberate and slow, slipping each button through the hole, hoping she’ll turn and see. See what I look like in a one-piece; that even this much material can’t hide all my scars. It’s why I invited her—without really explaining my plan to Michael, without telling him how it was I thought I might get through to her today.
The starched men’s shirt falls open, slipping off my shoulders, and at that instant Andrea turns in the water to stare up at me.
And she sees. She definitely sees, and I see the way she nearly gawks at the long scar peeking out of the top of my suit. I know that it looks like I had open-heart surgery or something dramatic like that. Then, aware that she’s staring, she drops her head.
“You can look,” I encourage, popping into the pool like a heavy stone beside her. The water splashes a bit, circling us both in radiating waves, and she bends low until her ponytail floats on the surface.
She blows bubbles, then stops. “Rebecca, can I ask you something?”
“Of course.” I bend my knees until I’m looking right at her, eye-level, meeting those clear blue eyes with all the reassurance I can muster. “Fire away.”
Her auburn eyebrows draw together tight, freckled nose wrinkling. “What happened to you? How come you have all those scars?”
I can only wonder how to translate such a raw act of irrational violence into terms that an eight-year-old can process. I’m wrestling with that when what has to be my mother’s euphemistic gene kicks in, and I hear myself say, “I had an accident.”
“What kind of accident?” Andrea’s small mouth purses into a hard, desperate line, and sudden blotches of color stain her face.
“Sweetie, it wasn’t like what happened to you.”
Her face falls. “Oh.”
“But I do understand,” I hasten to explain, brushing a damp lock of red hair off her cheek. She jerks away, swimming toward the steps fast, and I nearly beg, “Andrea, please listen. You can talk to me, sweetheart.”
She shakes her head, climbing the steps. “You just said. It wasn’t the same kind of accident.”
“Andrea, I almost died.” Now this gets her complete, earnest attention, and slowly she pirouettes on the steps until she’s facing me. “I spent an entire month in the hospital. Getting better.”
She runs her tongue over her upper lip, just watching me, and I can tell she’s making quick mental calculations. Deciding if she can trust me with her own secrets or not. “How?” she asks, clutching the metal railing as if her life depends on it.
“How did I almost die?”
“No, no,” she says hurriedly. “How come you didn’t?”
And this is the answer I’ve contemplated for three years running. All I know is to give the best one I’ve come up with in all that time. “Because I wasn’t supposed to die yet.”
She nods knowingly, and I understand that she’s considered these same thoughts on her own time. “But what if somebody else died, and they weren’t supposed to either?”
“Like your daddy?” I supply tentatively, afraid I’ll send her scurrying away for good just when we’re making serious progress. I swim closer, until I’m at the foot of the steps.
“Did Michael make you do this? You know, talk to me and all,” she explains with a tired sigh. “’Cause you don’t have to.”
“Andrea, sweetheart, I’m not doing this because of Michael. All I’m trying to say is that I understand.”
Tears brim within her eyes, and she whispers, “Nobody else does.”
“Well, I do.”
She nods, saying in a small voice, “I think maybe I’m the one who should’ve died.”
“Oh, sweetie, no. No, that’s not true.” She plops onto the top step, planting her chin in the palm of her hand thoughtfully, avoiding me, but I press her. “What even makes you think that?”
“Want to see my scar?” she murmurs, looking up at me with doleful eyes. From Michael, I know this is the touchstone, the scar that she won’t show anyone; what I say next is critical to her knowing she can confide in me.