Cole nodded. “I went for a swim after getting water from it this morning. It’s deep and clean, and I think it’s spring-fed.” He set the lantern on a rock.
The older elephants didn’t hesitate. Flossie, Petunia, and Pepper flattened a stand of cattails and waded in, their trunks swishing back and forth in the pond. Dirt and dust floated off their backs, coating the water with a thin, brown film. JoJo put in his front feet, but hesitated. The adult elephants went in deeper and deeper, until the water was nearly up to their eyes, their humped backs like small, mountainous islands. Flossie and Petunia ducked beneath the surface, the ends of their trunks sticking out of the pond. Pepper lifted her trunk, blew a brown shower over her head and back, then snorted at JoJo, as if telling him to come on in. JoJo moved toward her and when the water touched his belly, he bent his knees, dove in, and surfaced a few feet away, his trunk spraying in the air.
Lilly and Cole laughed, delighted by the spectacle. Then they grew quiet and watched the magnificent beasts in the pond, splashing and swimming and rolling. The elephants’ joy was as palpable as the humidity in the night air, and Lilly felt like one of the luckiest people on earth. She was with her best friend, witnessing these glorious creatures act like the wild animals they were born to be. After everything she’d been through, she never dreamt it was possible to feel this happy. Even though it wasn’t her choice to join the circus and she despised her job, she wouldn’t give up this moment for anything in the world.
Cole took off his shoes and started unbuttoning his shirt.
“What are you doing?” Lilly said.
“Going swimming.”
“You’re crazy,” she said.
He smiled and pulled off his shirt. “Well, I’m hot too.” When he started unbuckling his belt, she looked away, went over to a flat-topped boulder, and sat down. She plucked a tall stalk of timothy from the grass and concentrated on pulling off the blades. Despite the fact that she had seen numerous men—freaks, clowns, and performers alike—in various stages of undress, the thought of seeing Cole in his undershorts unsettled her.
The other sideshow women always joked that with Lilly’s perfect features and Cole’s fair complexion and muscular physique, the two of them would make beautiful, angel-haired babies. Lilly shushed them and said she didn’t think of Cole that way. He was her best friend and that was it. Except it wasn’t entirely true. She wasn’t sure when her feelings for him had started to change or when she stopped ignoring them, she only knew they had. And she wasn’t sure what to do. They had been best friends for nearly six years, but he wasn’t in love with her. She was a fifteen-year-old albino who worked in the sideshow, and at eighteen, Cole was the lead performer in the elephant show. He could be with anyone he wanted. The trapeze artist, Natasha, was his age, and so was Chloe the tightrope walker. They were beautiful girls with perfect figures, smooth, rosy skin, and shiny hair, who wore fancy costumes covered with feathers and glittering jewels. She had seen them watching Cole out of the corner of their eyes, sizing him up and down and whispering behind their hands, wondering why he spent so much time with a freak and paid so little attention to them. She wondered too.
“You coming in?” he said.
She glanced at him and laughed. “No.”
The lantern light reflected off his bare chest and muscular shoulders, and heat rose in her cheeks. She wanted to watch the elephants, but went back to picking apart the timothy instead.
“Come on,” he said. “Don’t be a chicken. It’s hotter than Hades tonight.”
She looked up at him again. “I’m not chicken, I just . . . I don’t have my swimsuit with me.”
He raised one eyebrow. “Since when do you own a swimsuit?”
She grinned. He knew perfectly well she didn’t own a swimsuit. Then, before she knew what was happening, he rushed over, scooped her into his arms, and headed for the water. She screeched, then put a hand over her mouth. What if someone heard?
“Put me down!” she said as loud as she dared. She pushed against his bare shoulders, trying to get him to release her. But he was too strong.
“I’ll put you down,” he said, laughing. “Right in the water!”
“Okay, stop!” she said. “I’ll go in. Just let me take off my sandals.”
He set her on the bank and straightened. “That dress will weigh you down and wrap around your legs. Better take that off too.”
She took off her sandals and tossed them up on the bank, toward the rock where she’d been sitting. On one hand, she wanted to cool off and play in the pond with Cole and the elephants. She wasn’t afraid of the water. On the other hand, she had never been swimming in her life and wasn’t crazy about the idea of being in her underwear in front of Cole. She had changed her clothes in front of men and women alike getting ready for the sideshow. But this was different.
An image of them naked together flashed in her mind, and a strange sensation fluttered in her abdomen. She turned away and undid the thin belt around her waist, then pulled her dress over her head, thankful she had worn her long-legged panties. She stood for a minute, her dress bunched in her hands over her brassiere, then took a deep breath and turned to face Cole, her heartbeat thudding in her ears.
To her surprise, he was gone. He was already running into the pond, his long legs cutting through the water. She let out her breath and watched him dive in, disappear, and surface a few yards away. JoJo moved toward him, his mouth open in what looked like a smile. Cole swam over and climbed on JoJo’s back. His tanned skin looked even darker now that it was wet. Lilly looked down at her arms. They were white sticks, like the limbs of a skeleton. She fumbled with her dress and hurried to put it back on.
“What are you doing?” Cole said. “I thought you were coming in. Come on, it feels great!” He slipped off JoJo’s back and swam toward shore.
“I don’t know how to swim,” she said.
“That’s all right,” he said. “I’ll teach you.” He rose out of the water and took her hand. She hesitated, then dropped her dress in the grass and followed him into the pond. The water was cold. She drew in a sharp breath and scrunched her shoulders. Pebbles and mud squished between her toes. He led her in farther, laughing. “Don’t worry, you’ll get used to it.”
When she was in up to her waist, he told her to lie across his arms and paddle with her hands while kicking her legs. She leaned forward, but when her stomach and chest touched the water, her breath caught and she straightened. It felt like ice on her hot skin. Cole smiled and waited patiently. After a minute, she gathered the courage to lean across his arms again, and this time the pond didn’t feel as cold. He held her up and she kicked and paddled, doing her best to follow his instructions.
“You’re doing great,” he said.
Then her face accidentally went under and she swallowed a mouthful of water. She put her feet on the bottom and stood, coughing and wiping her face.