Delta Girls (31 page)

“I only saw a little,” he said. “My dad had to show me something.”

“What?” I couldn’t imagine anything else worth seeing when a whale was leaping in your backyard.

Ben grabbed my hand—this time with intention, with a firm, sure grip—and I grabbed Quinn’s. He ferried us into his truck and drove us to the cold-storage house. When he rolled the door open, the smell of ice hit me like tear gas.

“The pipes burst,” he said. “Lucky we already shipped out most of the pears. Only lost a few boxes.”

The concrete floor of the wooden building was covered with a rime of ice. It glittered in the shaft of sunlight that came through the open door, wet and slick.

“We keep this room at thirty degrees,” he said. “The pears don’t freeze because of all the sugar. But water sure does.”

I felt light-headed as I stepped through the doorway. The ice gently sucked the tread of my work boot, but with my next step, I slid a few inches and felt a giddy zing up my spine. The air was cool and sweet; I inhaled deeply as I took another sliding step, then another, until I was slipping all over the small warehouse, the wood beams bent over me protectively, like a rib cage. Ten years. How could I have been off the ice for ten years?

“Come here, Quinn.” My eyes stung; I told myself it was from the cold, from the wind I created by rushing around.

Quinn tentatively stepped onto the ice. She had never seen snow, had seen ice only in glasses.

“Don’t worry.” I held out my hand, and Quinn walked toward me in tentative steps. “Just let yourself move with the ice.” Maybe we could go up to the mountains that winter, rent a cabin somewhere near a good sledding hill. Maybe an outdoor rink, one that wouldn’t be too crowded. Maybe I could pick up a pair of skates—not rentals with their floppy ankles and dull blades. Something with a spongy tongue, sharp edges. My work boots felt way too clumsy with their thick rubber soles.

Quinn and I stumbled and slid across the surface, Quinn shrieking, face lit up, whenever she lost her balance. Ben grinned, leaning against the doorway.

“Why don’t you join us?” I called to him.

“Maybe in a little,” he said.

“Hold both my hands,” I told Quinn. “Keep your arms nice and tight.”

I bent my knees, then hoisted her all the way up over my head, her legs stretched out behind her in the air.

Quinn shouted, “Mom! Put me down!” but I started to spin—nothing too fast, just a slow rotation, step by step, until Quinn started to wobble, legs flailing, and I set her back onto the ground.

“Jesus, you’re strong,” said Ben.

“I told you—it’s picking pears.” I shook out my aching wrists. Quinn was a lot heavier than a bag of pears; I hadn’t lifted her that high since she was a toddler.

Quinn lost her footing and crashed onto the melting ice, reddening her palms. Ben ventured out to help her and fell, too, drenching his entire side, sending his khaki baseball cap flying.

“Cold, huh?” Quinn laughed.

“Soaked to the bone.” He crossed his arms in front of his chest to keep warm. “We better go change before we catch pneumonia or something.”

“I think I still have some stuff at the house,” said Quinn.

“You start on ahead,” I said. “I’ll close everything up.”

Ben and Quinn slipped a couple of times as they struggled to get upright, then helped each other over to the door with stiff, careful steps, their clothes splotched dark from the cold water.

I waved as they walked away. So lovely to see Quinn comfortable with Ben. So lovely to be able to look at Ben from behind. So lovely to have the ice all to myself as they walked toward the farmhouse.

The ice was not great. It was slushy in places. But it was ice and I was on it, and I wanted to see what I could do in my clunky boots. I tried a simple scratch spin, not too fast, my free leg crossing, sliding down the front of the other, my hands pulled together in front of my heart. It felt good and not good all at once; my body was happy to be spinning again, but I found myself distressingly dizzy. I put my hands on my knees until I caught my bearings again. I thought of all the pears that had been in that cold-storage building over the years, “sleeping” as Mr. Vieira called them, holding still inside their green skins before they were allowed to come out and ripen. Maybe the spins were sleeping inside my muscles all these years, shoved into cold storage, waiting to be unpacked. Maybe the jumps were there, too. I stood and inhaled deeply.

There wasn’t much stroking room, wasn’t much decent ice, but I took a few sliding steps and tried the easiest jump—a waltz
jump, just half a rotation. The landing wasn’t the same as on skates—I landed planted rather than sliding backwards, but it felt wonderful to be up in the air. I tried a single jump—a loop: back outside edge, full rotation in the air, back outside edge again, not that my boots had edges. But that felt good, as well. Then an axel, one and a half rotations, taking off forward, landing backwards, a waltz jump and a loop combined in the air. A little wobbly on landing, but the form felt right as I corkscrewed through the room, the wooden slats of the walls spinning with me. A double was the next obvious move—a double lutz, like a double loop, but starting with a toe pick. I slipped a bit on takeoff and the landing was a little squirrelly, but not bad. I was contemplating whether I should attempt a double axel, when I saw someone out of the corner of my eye. Ben, standing in the doorway.

“You sure know what you’re doing,” he said.

“I used to,” I said, heart pounding.

“Left my hat.” He bent to pick it up; the bill was partly melded to the ice and took some tugging.

His eyes suddenly seemed closed off. Quinn appeared behind him, eating a green pear she had swiped from one of the remaining boxes.

“You shouldn’t eat too many of those,” I said, “you’ll get a stomachache.”

I held my breath and waited for Ben to say something to Quinn like “Did you know your mom could do tricks like that?” or “Do you know who your mom is?” but he just said, “I’ve eaten hundreds of green pears. I’m still alive.”

W
HEN NATHAN WENT INTO THE BATHROOM, KAREN RAN
downstairs to the lobby. It was full of skaters, coaches, all looking stricken, looking for answers. Reporters were busy corralling the most famous skaters they could find; Karen walked sideways, head down, trying to avoid the cameras. She needed to get outside, get some fresh air.

Isabelle was standing by the doorway. She and her cousin had made it to Nationals for the first time; Karen was happy for her, but kind of sad, too—Isabelle seemed more serious this year. Her emails had focused on her diet and training regimen lately, her body mass index, her costume design. Karen hoped Isabelle would still take time to visit the Liberty Bell and whatever other fun touristy things she could find in Philadelphia. Things Karen knew she herself would never see, unless she was driving or jogging past them.

“Karen!” Isabelle yelled. Karen had been excited to see Isabelle, but not like this.

“I need to get out of here.” Karen felt sick. Isabelle ushered her outside, and Karen threw up on the sidewalk.

“Your trademark move!” Isabelle laughed nervously before she said, “Isn’t it awful what’s happened? Poor Lance—poor Cindy!”

“I need to get out of here,” Karen said again.

“You need to see a doctor?” Isabelle asked.

Karen nodded, looking back to make sure Nathan hadn’t followed her.

“Do you need a ride?” Isabelle asked.

“You have a car?” Karen perked up.

“My mom’s …”

“Can I borrow it?” asked Karen.

“Are you sure you’re up to driving?” Isabelle asked. “God, I hope you don’t have the same thing as Lance.” She took a step back from Karen.

“I’ll be fine,” Karen said, but thought,
No I won’t. Nothing will ever be fine again. Ever
.

“It’s the blue Pontiac with the polar bears in the back window.” Isabelle tossed over a set of keys with an Epcot Center key chain. Karen ran off to the parking lot without saying thanks, without saying good-bye, without thinking anything but
Get out, get out, get out
.

W
HEN ABCDE ASKED IF I WANTED TO GO OUT TO DINNER
with her in Isleton, I jumped at the chance. It would be a relief to get away from the orchard for a while, to get away from Ben’s unspoken questions, to get in the car and drive. Maybe we should have followed Jorge and the other guys up to Oregon. Maybe it still wasn’t too late to join them.

Abcde had heard about a restaurant and hotel called Rogelio’s that featured American, Chinese, Italian, and Mexican food all on one menu. It looked like a Wild West saloon on the outside—I was worried it might not be a good place for kids when we pulled up to it—but the inside was full of cozy tables and fake flowers and big families sitting down to plates of chile relleno and fettuccine Alfredo and sweet and sour pork. We couldn’t even tell people were playing blackjack and poker on the other side of the back wall.

Quinn slid into the aqua-colored booth next to Abcde. They were wearing the necklaces they had made—Abcde’s had her name spelled out in alphabet beads; Quinn’s spelled
INNQU
, her
name in alphabetical order. She told me she was going to use it as her pen name when she herself became a famous abecedarian poet.

Our server, an older Asian woman, set down bowls of chips and salsa and handed us large menus.

“At least they don’t serve whale,” said Abcde, thumbing through the pages. “They serve just about everything else here.” She ordered the spinach and mushroom enchiladas—so did Quinn, who wanted to become a vegetarian, just like her new idol. I was going to order the veal scaloppine, but Abcde and Quinn gave me such withering looks, I changed my order to pasta primavera al pesto.

“Nice alliteration,” said Abcde. “We approve.” Quinn nodded. Since when had they become “we”? I felt continents away even though I was just across the table. I wanted to say something, but then I thought about how Abcde’s boys truly were continents away, out of her reach even when they were close by, and I held my tongue.

“You plan on keeping in touch with Danny?” Abcde said after we got our meals. I was kind of glad to see spinach stuck in her teeth. I hoped my own teeth weren’t slathered with green from the pesto.

“Fallen-fruit guy?” I shook my head.

“He’s cute,” she said.

“If you like them hairy and smelly.”

“Oh, I do.” Abcde grinned wickedly. “I do.”

“My mom’s in love with Ben,” Quinn said, digging into her little cup of pinto beans.

“Quinn!”

“You were holding his hand,” she said matter-of-factly.

“You were, were you?” Abcde’s eyes sparkled as she leaned forward. “Tell me. Everything.”

“That’s all there is to tell,” I said, blushing.

“Your mom,” Abcde said to Quinn. “She’s full of secrets, isn’t she?”

I swallowed my sip of water the wrong way.

“She’s going to marry him,” Quinn said with her mouth full.

“Quinn, I held his hand once,” I said, coughing. “That doesn’t mean I’m going to marry him.”

“And then we can stay at the orchard for ever and ever.” Quinn held up her hand for a high five, but Abcde wrapped her arms around her instead, and Quinn, to my surprise, started to cry.

She was still crying when the woman brought us our fortune cookies. Mine said,
Now is the time to try something new
. I didn’t show it to Quinn—she had been on the “try something new” tour all her life. I knew she was ready to stay put.