The Children (30 page)

“Look at the other Sun Valley video,” I said. “Not the one with Laurel, the other one.”

“You know what?” Sally said. “I have to go, I'm not talking to you about these videos. Please stop watching them.”

“Just watch it when you get home.”

“No,” Sally said. “Lottie, delete them. You're making yourself sick.”

When we hung up, I watched the video one more time, and now it was so clear, so obvious. Spin had deliberately tried to capture his shadow. He had chosen that exact time to do that run, had angled the camera just so. The other video had shown what it was like to ski from his perspective; the camera was angled out at the scenery. In this video, Spin wanted to see himself. He wanted to see what he looked like. Maybe he wanted to see what the big deal was, what it was that everybody—our family, his friends, Everett (especially Everett)—thought was so great.

*   *   *

I try not to think of the specifics of that afternoon very often. I had to recount them for the police and the attorneys too many times, and now I try to avoid thinking about the actual incident. But I do think of that drive Spin took to Holden Academy to get his notebooks and his meters that day. He would have gone down Maple Hill Road and past Harwich Center, another quarter mile, then turned left through the main gates of the Holden campus. He would have driven past the playing fields where he had run around every summer since he was five—first at soccer camp, later lacrosse camp, and then preseason football. He would have parked in front of the field house named for his great-grandfather and walked past the headmaster's house, where my grandfather lived for twenty-five years. All the men, all the coaches, all the knowledge that Sally and I imagined we had been missing, they had all been there at Holden. The education that we felt had been denied us—this had been Spin's birthright. Somehow, in our minds, he was carried aloft into a bright homeland of community and belonging when he moved into his dorm there. Acceptance, enlightenment, knowledge—it would all have been ours there, too. At least that's what we once believed.

I was up in the attic when Everett and Spin pulled away in the little skiff. They pushed it from the beach and then hopped inside. Everett lowered the engine and gave a quick tug to the pull cord and they motored off. I watched them glide across the still water until they were around Whitman's Point. There they disappeared from view.

There's a tree there at the end of Whitman's Point. It's a sugar maple, hundreds of years old. In the winter, her rough branches reach out above the ice like ancient, pleading arms. In the summer, she regains her youthful beauty, her full green skirt rustling and swaying over the lake's edge. When I was little, I loved paddling our old canoe into her shade on hot afternoons. I loved to drift there. When I pressed my ear to the floor of the canoe and closed my eyes, I could hear the clacking of crayfish as they scuttled beneath me. At least I thought I could. If I held my breath and listened hard enough, I thought I could hear the minnows play.

Everett was going to tell him about the night with Laurel and just allude to the fact that there were other secrets she was keeping from him. We thought there might be some way that Spin could get the marriage annulled if he moved quickly enough. We were sure that Spin would believe Everett. Everett had nothing to gain by telling Spin. He knew what he was guaranteed to lose—Spin's friendship, forever. It was worth it to Everett, to save Spin from Laurel.

They were out for so long. An hour went by. I took an old pair of binoculars from the top of the fireplace mantel in our living room and went out on the porch to see where they were. Two kayakers came close to our dock. In the distance, a motorboat pulled a skier. I heard Laurel walking down the front stairs. I snuck through the kitchen and up the back stairs. A few moments later, she drove away in the Jeep, as she did every day. Driving off to the side of the town where there's cell service. She said she needed contact with the “real world.”

Finally, I heard the dogs barking down by the lake. I looked out the window. Everett was still at the tiller, steering toward shore. Spin was laughing and calling to the dogs. Snacks raced to the end of our dock and soared through the air into the water. It was his thing; we all loved it when he did that. He swam out to the boat and then swam alongside it as Everett pulled up to the dock. What had happened? Spin was so jolly. Had Everett told him? Was Spin possibly relieved? That thought actually occurred to me at the time. Perhaps Everett had laid it all out for Spin and he was happy to know the truth.

Spin jumped onto the dock and tied up the skiff. He grabbed his meter and his notebook and waited while Everett made some kind of adjustment to the engine. They walked back along the dock together, and when they came to the end, I could hear Spin say, “Thanks, man. Hey, you wanna head over to the tavern later? You, Laurel, and me? Get a burger and a beer?”

Everett had been facing his house when Spin said that, but then he turned and said something that I couldn't hear.

That was a big deal with the police later. They insisted that I should have been able to hear what Everett said. I had heard what Spin said, about going to the tavern, so, according to the police, I should have been able to hear what Everett said. I couldn't. He said it quietly. And he was looking down.

I think Spin must have had trouble hearing him, too, because he walked over to where Everett was standing.

Everett was still looking down. I couldn't hear what he was saying, but my heart raced when I saw Spin's posture change. He had been standing there barefoot on the lawn, leaning over and patting the dogs, and then suddenly he stood ramrod straight. The clipboard and meter were tossed on the ground and he just rushed Everett.

By the time I got to the beach, they were sort of entangled in a wrestler's hold. Spin was punching Everett's sides with his fist. I was screaming at both of them to stop. The dogs were snarling and biting at them, and finally Everett managed to trip Spin. Spin fell back, he landed on his side, and his head bumped the corner of the dock hard. I've never heard a sound like it. The dogs sniffed at him. Everett leaned over and said, “Spin? Buddy?”

I heard him say that. I was almost next to him then and I was calling Spin's name, too.

Spin was just lying there blinking. Everett leaned over.

“Spin, you okay?” Everett asked.

Spin closed his eyes. After a moment, he opened them and propped himself up on his elbow. He reached around and felt the back of his head.

“Fuck, man,” he said to Everett, who was now kneeling next to him. Then Spin said, “My fucking head.”

He started to sit up, but Everett put his hand on his shoulder and said, “Don't try to stand. Don't get up too fast. Let me see your head.”

“I'm okay,” Spin said. He sat up slowly and squinted at Everett.

“I'm sorry, man,” Everett said. He was teary now; I was, too. “I'm really sorry,” he said.

“Your head's bleeding, Spin,” I said. “Let me look at it.”

Spin bowed his head down and we saw that there was a steady trickle of blood coming from the back of his scalp. Everett whipped off his T-shirt, wadded it up, and then pressed it against Spin's head. I sat next to Spin and held the shirt. Everett knelt in front of us, looking into Spin's eyes.

“Spin, I'm just … sorry, man.”

“It was an accident,” Spin said. He was wincing, but he also managed to smile. “Stop making such a big deal of it.”

“It's not bleeding much,” I said to Everett. “Head wounds usually bleed a lot. It's barely bleeding.”

After a minute or two, the bleeding had almost stopped, and we asked Spin if he wanted to go inside, but he was distracted. We thought he was trying to process what Everett had just told him. Spin seemed content just to sit there and stare out at the lake, so we sat there with him for a few moments.

“You should wash that cut,” Everett said finally.

“Yeah,” Spin said.

“Do you want to come in my house? I think maybe it's best,” Everett said.

“No, I want to see Laurel when she gets back. We're going to the tavern tonight. Wanna come?” Spin asked.

I remember feeling in that instant that my heart had stopped.

Everett said shakily, “Spin … do you remember what just happened?”

“Yeah, I hit my head.”

“Do you remember what we were talking about?”

“Yeah, the lake survey,” Spin said. He looked quizzically at the blood on his fingertips from when he had touched the back of his head.

“Go call an ambulance,” Everett said. There was a terrified urgency in his voice, but also, I sensed that he felt relieved. I felt it, too. Spin must have had a concussion. He seemed to have forgotten what Everett had told him.

I jumped up, but Everett grabbed my wrist and whispered, “I'm not telling him again.”

“No, no, I know,” I said, bursting into tears. I can't begin to describe my relief. Telling Spin had been a mistake. We were being given another chance! We couldn't bear to have Spin hate us; nothing was worth that. I ran to the house to call the ambulance.

When I came out, Everett and Spin were sitting side by side, staring out at the lake. I sat next to Spin.

“Do you want to go in the house?” I asked. “Let's go inside, Spin. Let's clean up that cut.”

“Okay, in a minute. Let me just sit,” he said. He rested his head on my shoulder.

We just sat there, the three of us. A motorboat sped across the lake. Its wake formed huge furrows that spiraled outward and then rolled up onto our beach. I pushed my feet forward to meet the cool froth of the little waves.

“Love this hour, right?” Spin said.

“This hour?” I asked.

“It's so shiny,” he said, and it was true; it was that time in the afternoon when the sun glints off the lake and you see everything through a sort of silvery filter.

“It's the slying now,” said Spin. “It's the slinge.”

I pulled away and looked at his face.

“Spin?” Everett said. “Buddy?”

“Yeah?”

“Are you okay?”

He just smiled.

“Yeah.”

“Let's go inside,” I said. I took his hand and stood, but he just sat there gazing out at the water.

“Come on, let's go,” I said.

“Wait for Dad,” Spin said. “Less wait for Whit.”

“Whit?” I said, my heart racing. “Come on, Spinny. Let's go inside.”

“Juss Whit,” he said. “Whit for Whit.”

“Spin,” I cried. “Can you stand?”

“Is small,” Spin said. His words were slurred. He walked between us now, his legs moving in small shuffling steps. “Iss a small song, sweet, swing it again.”

“What song?” I cried. I let go of him for a minute so I could open Everett's door, and he cried out, “No, come back, Lottie.”

“I'm right here,” I said, and as we moved him across the threshold, he said, “Was that song?”

“Where the fuck is the ambulance?” Everett said. “Where is it?”

*   *   *

It was a subdural hematoma. When people talked about it later, people here in town, they always referred to the famous actress who died after the skiing accident. One minute she was joking with the paramedics, the next minute she was dead.

Spin didn't joke with the paramedics. He died before they arrived. Everett and I sat him down on the sofa, and he just closed his eyes. We kept telling him to wake up. I kept pushing him, calling his name. I knew he shouldn't be allowed to go to sleep. He never opened his eyes again. The cut that we had seen on the back of his head was nothing. There was another lesion, on the inside. His brain had crashed against the back of his skull when his head bumped against the dock. It was bleeding, but the skull was intact. There was no place for the blood to go. Maybe if we lived closer to a hospital, he would have made it. Maybe if we had gotten him to a hospital sooner, they would have been able to drill a little hole in his skull and relieve the pressure.

Everett went in the ambulance with Spin. Laurel arrived home while they were gone. I saw her walk into our house. Well, it wasn't our house anymore. I guess it never was ours, really.

“Hello?” Laurel called out, I could hear her from Ev's. She must have been standing in the front hall. All the windows were open. I could hear her from where I crouched next to the window in Everett's kitchen. I was huddled there with Riley and Snacks. I led them into Everett's room and closed the door. It was dark in there; he had his shades pulled down. Laurel knocked once on Everett's front door, then walked in.

“Hello?” she called.

When I heard her footsteps approaching the bedroom, I backed up into his cluttered little closet and closed the door. I smelled Everett there. I would have been happy to stay there forever, to be honest. I could smell his skin and it reminded me of hundreds of days in the sun. I could smell his musky, familiar sweat, his hair, his breath. I felt him all around me. His presence reassured me. Spin would be fine. Ev was with him.

When Laurel came into his room, she didn't open the closet door. I heard the dogs' excited feet on the old wood floor as they skittered up to her. I heard her say to them quietly, “Fuck off.” Then I heard her leave.

 

TWENTY-SEVEN

Joan and I stayed in the house through the fall and winter. The estate was all tied up in probate and we were allowed to stay on until it was settled. Spin, of course, had no will. What twenty-six-year-old has a will? Perry and the trustees tried to get his marriage to Laurel annulled, but it was impossible. You should have seen her cry at his memorial service. Her lawyer was the husband of Everett's old girlfriend, Lisa. That's how small the world is up here. He had his arm around her as she sobbed during the church service. He had his arm around her in a photo I saw online recently. They were at a fund-raising gala for Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center. She's been all over the Internet lately: She's about to star in a reality show about New York “society” women. She's the “hot widow,” according to one of the promos I watched.