“Wow, the tree life is still so present for you.” Her laugh warbles in my ears. “It’s also why you can be a bit . . . immovable.”
I frown. Immovable? Does that mean boring? She touches the tip of my nose like I’m a small child. “The best part is that before you were a tree, you were a sea captain. And before that, an otter.”
“Why is that the best part?”
“Because it’s still in there!” she exclaims. Her fist knocks on my chest. “All of it. First you were an otter, the most playful creature in the world. And then you were born as a human boy for the first time, and you became a sea captain because the water called to you from your otter days. But it’s all still in there, Jonah. The tree stuff is more recent, but there’s an otter in there dying to make a Slip ’N Slide in your backyard and spend the whole day doing nothing else.”
Wow, that’s a lot of weird information. “Okay. When do you think I was a sea captain?”
She shrugs. “It’s hard to say specifically. Turn of the twentieth century or a little before, I think.”
“Maybe I sailed to New York City, where you were performing as a ballerina.”
Her air intake is sharp, almost a gasp, followed by a brilliant smile. “Yes! Maybe you watched me dance.”
To demonstrate, she backs away from me and lifts to her tiptoes. She moves her arms in graceful lines, then drops her limbs back to the ground, smiling. “I took lessons for a few years because I missed my former ballerina life so much that I needed to relive it a little.”
I play along, smiling. “Yeah. I’m sure I’ve seen you do that before.”
She steps toward me, delighted, and bubbling over with energy. “Maybe you came backstage after you saw me dance. Maybe I took you underground to my favorite Prohibition spots, and we drank bathtub gin together. Then maybe we got stupid drunk to jazz music and stumbled back out onto the cobblestone streets to my apartment and made love the whole night, sweaty because there was no air-conditioning back then. I bet if we smelled juniper, we’d remember pieces of that night; don’t you think so?”
Now, what in the hell do I say to that? Did she say make love? I’m not sure which is more confusing: that she’d use that phrase like someone’s mom or that she just casually suggested maybe we were doing it in another life? There can be only one response. “Maybe.”
“Well, I should get going,” she says. “Are you busy tomorrow morning? I’m off work.”
“Not busy. Just home with the other three.”
“Good. I’ll bring supplies.”
“For what?”
“A Slip ’N Slide.” She flashes me that strawberry smile. “God, Jonah, keep up.”
CHAPTER FIVE
Vivi
I don’t know if you’ve ever sprawled out in a wide-open field and stared up at the blue sky and felt the planet humming all around you, but that’s what my days feel like here. The world moves a few paces slower—so slowly that my movement feels like zipping, like crackling energy through the streets.
When I met Jonah Daniels yesterday, there was a magical shift in the trajectory of my summer. He’s the ring to my Frodo, the wardrobe to my Lucy Pevensie. His presence in my life sets me on my journey, and I can feel it, a vital mission pulsing in my bones. Here is a boy who needs me. That’s why I bought supplies at the hardware store and headed over to his house: because I knew he’d be surprised that I meant what I said.
They’re already in the backyard, each little kid squealing with joy as Jonah points the hose at them.
“Vivi!” Leah calls. “Hi!”
It doesn’t take us long to set up the tarp on a slight downslope in their lush backyard. We blow up a baby pool at the end and fill it with water. Jonah checks underneath the Slip ’N Slide for rocks—of course he does—and calls out, “All good!”
The world smells like cut grass and beach air and hose water, and my stomach tightens with excitement.
“Who’s first?” I ask, popping open a mega-size bottle of dish soap to line the plastic runway for maximum slippage and slideage. I look magnificent, if I do say so myself, in my wide-brimmed sun hat and the leopard-print leotard that I’m using as a bathing suit. The leotard is super formfitting, so I don’t have to wear any underthings, and it has long sleeves to cover my scar. Isaac brings out a retro radio and sets it to the oldies station, and I shake my leopard-print hips around in pure glee.
Silas dives onto the plastic runway—what a ham—and crashes into the baby pool at the end.
“Bravo!” I yell from the top.
Bekah holds up four fingers on each hand. “The judges give it an eight out of ten.”
“Go ’head, Leah,” Isaac says. It seems like he’s being a considerate big brother, but I think he’s a little nervous to try it himself.