Her mother began typing. The “…” bubbled up. As always, it seemed to promise something profound.
I know you are, Zo. I get it & don’t blame you. I’ve been a wreck—so worried about you getting hurt that I haven’t been able to eat/breathe/operate heavy machinery. I’m at the hot springs. Come and let me hug you?
Maybe. Not sure. Let me see if I can get un-pissed.
Please-please-please?
OK, OK, I will—just so you don’t start sending me emojis. OX (as you wd say).
Thank you. And do NOT make fun of the ox! :)
Piping Hot Springs was a run-down old place nestled in a hillside above Flathead Valley. It boasted two pools. (Literally: there was a sagging banner out front that read, We Have Two Pools!) Both were outdoors and fed by rejuvenating, mineral-enriched waters that shot up through the earth. One was an ordinary-looking swimming pool kept at 84 degrees. The other, a giant, kidney-shaped concrete-bottomed lake, was always precisely 104 degrees. Zoe’s mom was a conscientious manager, but the owners lived out of state and were always on the verge of selling the business and didn’t want to sink any more money into it. So every season Piping Hot Springs looked a little grubbier, a little more desperate. The green fiberglass slides were rickety and rusted. The colored pennants decorating the walls were faded. The enormous ’70s-style digital clocks were all malfunctioning so that, rather than telling the time, they seemed to be making announcements in Chinese.
These days, the rich tourists all went to spas where they got microfiber bathrobes and shiny wire baskets with lotions and loofahs. The more adventurous tourists drove up to Canada, where hot, swirling pockets of water appeared, as if by magic, in the middle of freezing rivers. Piping Hot Springs mostly attracted elderly couples who sat against the wall of the big pool with their arms draped sweetly over each other’s shoulders. There were also some European tourists and some drunk twentysomethings who thought the place was hysterical. Zoe would have been embarrassed about Piping Hot Springs except that she’d never seen anyone leave without looking blissed-out and dreamy and pink. The waters worked.
It was early evening by the time Dallas had his wrist wrapped at an urgent-care place on the highway and then dropped Zoe off at the hot springs. Zoe caught her reflection in the door on the way in: she looked like hell. Beneath X’s overcoat, her clothes were wrinkled and torn. Thanks to the caving helmet, her hair looked like roadkill.
Her mom sat perched behind the front desk, folding towels and watching for her. She stood up the minute Zoe stepped inside. They inched toward each other shyly, like a couple that’s forgotten how to dance.
Zoe let herself be hugged but made a point of not hugging back. Her mother ignored the awkwardness.
“Oh my god, that coat,” she said. “Is that X’s?”
“Yeah,” said Zoe. “It heals you. The minute you put it on, it starts, like, erasing your bruises and mending your bones.”
“Seriously?” said her mother, her eyes wide.
“No, it’s just a coat,” said Zoe. “It’s superwarm, though.”
Her mom laughed and swatted her on the shoulder.
“Look, I need to apologize to you,” she said. “Come fold some towels with me, and let me try?”
They sat with a basket from the dryer between them. Zoe remembered folding towels with Bert after he’d become senile. He’d been obsessed with how warm and fluffy they were, how clean they smelled. She had to stop him from shoving his face into them.
“So,” her mother said now, “do you want the short, medium, or long apology?”
“Start with the short one,” said Zoe.
“I love you, and I’m sorry,” said her mother.
“Not feeling it,” said Zoe. She smoothed a towel with her hand. It crackled with electricity. “Try the medium one.”
“I love you, and I’m sorry—and I was wrong to tell the police to leave your dad’s body in the cave,” her mother said.
“Why did you?” said Zoe. “I don’t get it.”
Her mother sighed.
“I’m just going to blurt it out, like you would, okay?” she said. “I think maybe your dad killed himself, Zo.”
Zoe said nothing.
“He was really unhappy toward the end,” her mother continued. “He felt like a failure. He hated who he was. And he thought I’d stopped loving him, which … It kills me that he thought that.” She paused. “I’m only telling you all this because you’ve asked me so many times, and I think you can handle it.”
“I can,” said Zoe. “Don’t stop.”
“Look, I don’t know anything about caving, but it seems like he was too smart to die in some freak accident,” her mother said. “So I thought maybe he killed himself, and I didn’t …” She paused again, and pressed her hands against her eyes. “I didn’t want the cops to go in there and prove I was right.”