“Bad how?”
“I don’t know, but they’re reckless people. They do a ton of drugs, sleep with each other’s boyfriends, leech off people, piss people off. It’s off the rails. Bound to explode eventually. Just saying, be careful. Honestly, if I were you, I would think long and hard about rooming with them next year. But now I’ve had my say and I’ll shut up. Those waves are calling to me. Want to go in?”
Drew hauled himself to his feet and held out a hand to her. They ran together down to the edge of the water and waded into the crashing waves. The water was surprisingly cool and refreshing against Jenny’s skin. They swam out to where it was calmer, treading water, as a school of tiny silver fish swam by, tickling them. The water was so clear that she could see straight down to the pink polish on her toes. She looked back toward the crowded beach, and followed the line of the road up the mountainside. Far above, the mirage of Kate’s house glittered white against the green hills. The sight of it gave her a fierce twinge of foreboding.
When Samuel came to pick them up at sundown, Kate, Aubrey, and Lucas were in the car with him.
Kate leaned out the open back window. “We’re going to a pig roast, get in,” she said, smiling exuberantly. A strand of her long blond hair caught the wind.
“We’re in wet swimsuits,” Jenny said.
“It’s fine, you’ll need a bathing suit anyway. The restaurant’s next to this magical bay that glows in the dark. It’s bioluminescent, from these microorganisms that live in the water. You have to see it before you leave.”
Kate’s excitement was contagious. She pushed open the door and scooted over, and against her better judgment, Jenny climbed in.
“C’mon, Drew, you too,” Kate said. “I’ll sit in Aubrey’s lap.” She climbed on top of Aubrey, who put her arms around Kate’s waist and rested her chin on her shoulder. Everybody had magically made up. Well, maybe not everybody. Lucas sat in the front seat next to Samuel. He turned around and gave Kate a disgusted glance. Jenny tried to catch his eye, but he wouldn’t return her gaze.
Samuel dropped them in a crowded parking lot and they walked down the steps to an open-air restaurant by the water. The place had a concrete floor, a thatched roof, and a steel-drum band playing Caribbean music. They snagged a picnic table with a view of the bay and ordered a round of rum punches. Needless to say, nobody asked for ID.
The water of the bay was calm and muddy, and quite unbeautiful compared to the crystalline waves at the beach.
“Where’s the glow?” Jenny asked.
“When it gets dark, we go out on a boat,” Kate said. “You’ll see.”
A guy with dreadlocks and gold teeth turned a pig on a spit over a grill made from a giant oil drum. His long goatee was adorned with beads and a ribbon in the colors of the Jamaican flag. Every once in a while he would get up and croon a ballad, accompanied by the steel-drum band. Now he sang “I Bid You Good Night,” the plaintive lyrics set off perfectly by his high, sweet voice. “Lay down, dear brother, lay down and take your rest…”
“I love this song,” Kate said.
“It’s a funeral song, you know,” Jenny said.
Jenny had vowed not to drink so she would be able to manage the 5 A.M. wake-up call and long flight home the next day. But time dragged as they waited for the sun to go down and the pork to be ready, and her resolution fell by the wayside. Lucas had taken the seat beside her, and when he ordered another, so did she. It had been many months since they last talked. With two rum punches easing the way, they found themselves in deep conversation, reminiscing about high school, their Belle River friends. The conversation turned eventually to what they were doing now, and how each of them found Carlisle. Lucas was anxious and depressed. He told her about his hockey injury and how it had effectively ended his athletic career, something she hadn’t known. He seemed lost without hockey in his life.
“I’m so sorry,” she said, leaning toward him, squeezing his hand. “Kate never mentioned it.”
By the time the waitress brought them heaping plates of roast pork, rice, and beans, Jenny’s head was spinning from all that rum on an empty stomach. She’d eaten nothing all day but an ice cream at the beach and a couple of slices of mango for breakfast. Lucas’s face, his rich brown eyes, anchored her to the surface of the planet and prevented her from flying off into space. They talked and talked as if no time had passed, and her chest ached with how much she missed him. She looked out at the water, and the sky was dark. She’d been so wrapped up in Lucas that she forgot to watch the sunset.
“The boat’s leaving. Let’s go,” Kate said.
Jenny stood up reluctantly. They were the last five people to board, and had to take separate seats, wherever they could find empty ones, on the ledge that ran around the perimeter of the boat. Jenny ended up sitting beside the crooner from the restaurant, who also served as the captain of the tour boat. His name was Chesley, and he kept up a running patter of jokes and information as he steered the creaky old ferry out into the bay. Once they were under way, he turned off the lights on the ferry and told them to look back at their wake, which glowed yellowy green in the black water.
“Now lean down and drag your hands in it,” Chesley instructed. They all did that, and oohed and aahed at the sparkling trails they left. Jenny pulled her hand in from the warm water and stared at it, awestruck. It sparkled momentarily, bright as a disco ball, then faded and died.
The lights of the restaurant receded into the distance. A few minutes later, they came alongside a sandbar, and Chesley dropped anchor.
“Now we swim,” he said. “You got fifteen minutes, then I blow the horn. Get back to the boat within five minutes or I drive away and leave you to the sharks.” He laughed uproariously at his own joke. “Just kidding, they take my license for sure if the sharks get you.”
People stood up and began diving one by one into the water. They would hit with a splash, sending rings of glowing color radiating outward. Jenny peeled off her cover-up and swung her legs over the side of the boat, dropping down easily into the water. It was warmer than the ocean, and shallow enough to stand comfortably, the bottom made of fine silt that squished between her toes. There was no moon tonight. The sky and the water merged together into blackness. But wherever people moved, a luminous brilliance flared and then disappeared, like a candle being snuffed out. The invisible creatures clung to Jenny’s skin, outlining her limbs in electric radiance. She turned and Lucas was beside her, recognizable from his glowing outline in the blackness. They were alone behind the boat, the splashes and giggles of the others audible from around the corner.