Tides (6 page)

“Fine with me,” said Mara, grinning at him, feeling the rush of water underneath them as she rowed.

“I guess the whole ‘friends’ concept is out the window, then.”

“Is that you talking?”

Noah made a horrified face and clapped his hands over his mouth. He looked so different when he joked, his eyes crinkled at the edges and sparkling. His eyes, she saw, were green.

It took only moments to cross Gosport Harbor and the tiny stretch of ocean between Star Island and White. Mara looked over her shoulder and pulled the rowboat up to the shore. Noah jumped out—did he have
any
care for his shoes?—and, wading through the shallows and foam, he pulled the boat onto the gravel with Mara still aboard.

The sound of the hull scraping against the bottom made her cringe. “I’ve got it,” she called, and jumped out, pushing the boat from behind until it rested several paces in from the tide line.

She looked up from her efforts to see Noah recovering from a backwards fall. He had still been pulling the boat when her pushing it had overtaken him.

“You’re strong,” he said.

“And you’re still talking. You’ll want to look to that. Now, what’s for dinner?”

Mara laughed, and Noah did too. She caught her hand reaching out to take his as they walked inland and pulled it back, mentally smacking herself. What was she doing? Talking so casually with this boy, enjoying his company,
joking.
It wasn’t that Noah was particularly interesting, she told herself. People had always fascinated her—otherwise she wouldn’t have spent so much time on land this spring and summer. That, she decided, must be the reason—simple curiosity. That was all.

Noah opened the door to the old weather-beaten keeper’s cottage, but he didn’t go through. Instead, he stood back behind it, clutching the doorknob.

When she stopped to wait her turn, he gave her that look again. “Ladies first,” he said.

Mara walked inside, giving Noah one of his own withering looks as she went. She heard him chuckle as he walked in behind her and shut the door.

Inside, the cottage smelled earthy but fresh. Almost everything was made of wood in various stages of wind-worn, gray age. The only color came from ugly green countertops and a pink sofa that slumped next to the stairs.

A woman sat at the table, her back to the door, but Mara recognized her immediately. The invisible link between them hummed and sang with Mara’s sudden panic. She tried to quiet her mind, but the moment she’d walked inside, it was already too late.

The Elder turned, her face taut with disbelief. Mara met Maebh’s eyes and braced herself for the storm.

eight

I
CAN’T
believe—to think I trusted you to stay—” Maebh’s chair tipped and clattered to the floor as she stood. She crossed the room in a few wide steps and grabbed Mara by the arm. “How many times have I told you?” she demanded. “Goddess, Mara, I need you safe. I need to know you’re safe, always.”

The look on Mara’s face passed through shock to horror and shame in a moment, then pulled into anger as fierce as Maebh’s. She met the older woman’s eyes. “How can you say that to me?” she said. “What are you doing here? I know this place. I can—” She stopped herself, her nostrils flaring. Noah could have sworn she was about to say she recognized the cottage’s smell. “You can’t tell me I’m not safe, Maebh, when it’s so clear you’ve been here before.”

“And your brother? Does he know?” Maebh was shouting now. “And the young—” She stopped and glanced toward Noah. He thought she’d liked him well enough when they met, but the look she gave him now made him feel like a kidnapper. He stared down at the floor, his whole body tense.

“Come with me,” Maebh hissed. She tightened her hold on Mara and dragged her outside. Noah could hear her shouting again after the door slammed shut, and Mara shouting back, just as angry.

Gemm and Lo sat at the table, their mouths slightly open.

Noah stood speechless for a moment, blinking in surprise. “So I guess they know each other,” he said.

He sank down onto the couch and leaned his head back. He officially gave up on making any friends this summer.

“Um,” said Lo. “What was that all about?”

Their grandmother sighed. “Just family troubles. In fact, I’m surprised it didn’t happen sooner.” She shook her head. “But—I think Maebh would rather I didn’t talk about it.”

“Oh.” Lo looked no more satisfied than Noah felt.

Gemm stood and started clearing the table. It looked as if they had just been finishing dinner when Noah and Mara walked in.

“Sorry I’m late, Gemm,” said Noah, standing up to help with the dishes. If he arrived this late for dinner at his parents’ house, his mother would sulk at him for days.

“Don’t worry about it, honey,” Gemm said. She started humming to herself as she soaped up the plates.

Noah waited for a passive-aggressive remark to follow, but Gemm really seemed okay with it. He dried the dishes as she washed, then sat down with a plate of spaghetti.

He ate his first bite in peaceful silence, and then realized that Lo was staring at him. No—she was staring at his dinner, wearing such an intense expression of longing that Noah had to look at it again himself, to reconsider how good it looked. But it was just regular spaghetti with Bolognese sauce and a sprinkling of Parmesan. It did smell good, but it was nothing fancy.

“Want some?” he asked.

“No,” Lo said, and looked away.

“I can’t believe you’re still full from lunchtime,” said Gemm. “When I was your age, I ate like a horse.”

Lo shifted in her seat.

Noah shook his head slightly at Gemm. She raised her eyebrows and then shrugged.

Lo was staring at Noah’s food again. He was holding his fork, a bite of pasta in midswirl. He didn’t want to move.

Lo made an ugly sound, half groan and half cough. “I’m better now, remember?” she said, standing up. “I went to the doctor, I went to therapy, and I got better. Watch me.” She yanked Noah’s fork out of his hand and took a big slurping bite. “Would I do that if I were still sick?” she asked. She grabbed her stomach and jiggled her hand up and down. “Christ, would I look like
this?
” Tears started in her brown eyes.

Noah looked down at his plate, once again trapped by his inability to say the right thing. He knew she wasn’t better. He knew it. Still, he was glad that at least she looked healthy now, not like the wasted skeleton she’d been two years ago. He remembered the note he’d found on her calendar:
October 20th, ninety pounds.
Her thirteenth birthday and her goal weight.

He’d had to tell their parents. They put Lo in therapy, and Mom watched her closely to make sure she ate. They had dinner as a family every night. But when Dad’s health insurance stopped covering the therapy, they pulled her out.

And yes, Lo had been eating. Sometimes only celery, sometimes whole batches of cookies, but at least she ate. Noah was happy to see medium- and large-size tags on her clothes when it was his turn to do the laundry, and he pretended he didn’t notice when she started cutting the tags off. He made up excuses for her when he heard her get sick in the bathroom. But now, seeing how angry she was, how much she hated her perfectly normal body, he couldn’t pretend.

“I’ve heard you,” he said, standing up. “You make yourself throw up. You think you’re so smart, like it’s this big secret, but it’s not.” He glanced at Gemm, who was holding out her hand as if she wanted to touch Lo’s shoulder. “I thought maybe if we both came here this summer, you’d stop. If Mom and Dad weren’t around. I guess I was wrong.”

Lo’s lips pulled together. “You think this is all about Mom and Dad?” she whispered.

“No, I—” Part of him knew that nothing he could say would be the right thing, but he couldn’t stop. “You keep hurting yourself!” he yelled, unable to quiet his voice. “Can’t you see that’s all you’re doing?”

Lo snorted and turned away from him, tucked her chin down, and stared at the floor.

“Lo, honey.” Gemm walked into the space between them. “I’m sure Noah just wants you to be healthy.” She let her hand rest, finally, on Lo’s shoulder. Lo shuddered but didn’t move away.

Noah reached out his hand toward hers and she flinched and bolted for the stairs.

“Just leave me alone,” she said, pausing halfway up. “I thought at least here—” She ran the rest of the way upstairs and slammed the bedroom door shut.

Noah closed his eyes and rubbed his temples. He couldn’t believe how angry he was—angrier than he should have been, angry at Lo for being sick and immature and unable to understand that she was just fine the way she was. Angry at his parents for their constant criticism. Angry at himself for being angry.

Then Gemm put her arm around him. She was tall enough that he could lean against her, and he let her support him for a moment. She patted his back and pulled away enough to look at him.

“I didn’t know. I’m sorry I caused an argument, truly.” She sat down on the ragged couch. “Your parents don’t tell me much about you. I wish I’d known.”

She looked over at the framed advertisements on the wall. “I’ve read about these things,” she murmured, “and I knew a girl or two who did that. Made themselves sick. But such thinness wasn’t important in my day.” She chuckled, her face tired and sad.

Noah looked at her photos, and it was true. The women in the old advertisements had soft cheeks, curved waists, flaring hips. None of them would have made it into the modern fashion magazines his mother and Lo kept around the house.

Noah remembered the feel of Mara’s torso between his hands, strong but soft, slippery with water. He had to remind himself of her hostility, her teasing, her bizarre encounter with Maebh. No, he told himself, he was not interested. He’d be perfectly happy if he didn’t see Mara again for the rest of the summer—or ever.

What was wrong with him? He should be worrying about Lo. For the second time that evening, Noah pushed the memory of Mara’s body from his mind.

He heard the couch springs creak, and he turned to see Gemm walking toward the stairs.

“I’ll see if I can talk to her,” she said. She smiled at Noah and lowered her voice. “Maybe you should stay down here for a while?”

“Right,” he said. “I’m not tired yet, anyway. Take your time.” He hoped Gemm would get through to Lo. God knew he never could.

Noah settled onto the couch. He heard Gemm opening the door to his and Lo’s room, and the faint sound of Lo crying. He tried not to listen in on them. He drummed his hands against the cushions, unable to sit still.

The wind knocked urgently against the windows and doors. Noah remembered a rocky cliff by the lighthouse that stood on the far end of Gemm’s island. The waves sprang up and shattered on the gray rocks, with the lighthouse standing, weather-beaten and stoic, above everything. When he’d seen it from the ferry yesterday, he’d thought it was beautiful, but he hadn’t had time to visit it up close since he’d arrived.

He creaked the door open, nearly tripping on the uneven jamb.

The air outside was cool, and the wind roughed up his hair. The darkness erased the island’s boundaries, breathing infinite space around it. Noah stepped carefully, knowing the island must be smaller than it seemed.

There was a small path between the cottage and the lighthouse, lined on either side with stubs of driftwood. Gemm had said there used to be a whole covered corridor linking the lighthouse to the keeper’s cottage. But years ago a storm had blown it all away, and now there was just this path. Crabgrass grew on it, crunching under his feet. There was seaweed, too, strung in dry bands at the tide lines.

The darkness deepened. The lighthouse was the only shape Noah could make out, illuminated by its own swirling beam. As long as he faced away from it, the whole world was contained in one rotating flash, one circle of light. Everything else was simple, immeasurable darkness.

He moved off the path and edged toward the shore, guided by the sound of the waves. The water rejected the light and glinted it back to him. Moonlight turned the beach gravel to rough pearls under a thin, retracting blanket of sea foam. He sat down.

Noah reminded himself why he’d decided to come here. A summer without his parents—that would be good for him, and even better for Lo, or so he’d thought. He’d known his parents wouldn’t let her go away unless he went with her, so he’d been glad to give her this chance. He’d wanted to get to know Gemm better, too. And the internship had sounded so perfect, he would have done anything to take it, even if he hadn’t wanted to help Lo get away.

Those had all seemed like good reasons then. But sitting here now, on a cold, damp rock on the edge of a still-colder and damper ocean, on a tiny island miles off the coast of his lifelong home . . . he wasn’t sure why he’d come. Things weren’t working out as he’d hoped.

He pulled off a sandal and dipped his foot in the waves. Water bubbled around his toes.

A motorboat by Gemm’s dock clinked against its mooring. He focused on the sound, and the rhythm of his own breath, trying to forget about tomorrow. It was good, he decided, sitting out here in the dark. There was something satisfying about being so alone, with no one asking anything of him.

Then he squinted at the motorboat and frowned. When he’d seen it that afternoon, he’d assumed it was Maebh’s. But of course, if he’d stopped to think, he would have remembered that Gemm had two boats and that this one was the
Minke.
And now Maebh was gone—Mara, too—and the boat remained.

The selkie story whispered back to Noah from Gemm’s cottage. He looked over his shoulder. All the lights were out but the one he’d left on in the kitchen. The lighthouse beam flashed over the house and left it behind in an even, wide sweep over the night ocean.

He imagined Mara out there, floating on a dark wave, watching him from the purplish water. He knew from firsthand experience that she had legs, but in his vision she had a long mermaid tail instead, smooth and gray like a dolphin’s, undulating in the deep. She smiled, but her teeth were too sharp, too carnivorous, and shiny with venom. Venom he wanted to taste.