Even with the shirt on, she felt naked. It was the painted plank seat, wet and slick against her buttocks.
“Okay,” she said. “You can open your eyes.” Charlie nodded.
“You didn’t peek, did you?”
“No.” He fidgeted a bit. “You asked me not to.”
“Well, good. Thanks for the shirt. It feels good. I was freezing. Are you cold without it?”
“No. I’m not wet.”
“How long have you been out here?”
He shrugged a bare shoulder. “Not real long.”
“Does your mother know?”
“She was sleeping.”
“What if she wakes up and finds you gone?”
“Well, I guess she’ll whale on me pretty good when I get back.”
“But you came anyway.”
“I didn’t… I just got in the boat and ended up here. I didn’t mean to. It just sort of happened.”
“I’m glad.”
“You weren’t supposed to know.”
“Take me someplace, Charlie.”
He rubbed his mouth with the back of his hand. “I oughta take you back to your pier.”
“You won’t, will you?”
Shaking his head, he raised the oars over the sides and lowered them into the water. He held one oar motionless under the surface and stroked with the other until the bow swung around to the opposite direction, then rowed northward. The boat swept along, oarlocks squawking, blades making quiet slurps as they came out. They left straight trails of droplets on the surface until they dipped in again. They stroked back smoothly, silently.
Leigh watched Charlie. He sat with his back arched, legs stretched out, his bare heels planted against the ribs along the inside of the hull. Leaning forward with his arms stiff, he slipped the paddles in. Then he eased back, drawing them through the water, coming forward again as they broke the surface, letting the boat glide as he brought the oar handles toward his belly in a graceful circular motion before extending his arms again and bending far forward to start over.
“You’re very good at this,” Leigh said.
“Thank you.”
She stretched out her legs until her feet met Charlie’s. He kept rowing. He didn’t try to move his feet away.
“It’s beautiful out here at night,” she said. “So peaceful. Have you always lived here?”
“Yeah.”
“It must be nice.”
“Sure. It’s okay.”
“Do you have any brothers or sisters?”
“No.”
“Neither do I.”
“I had a twin, but it was born dead.”
“I’m sorry.”
“Well, it don’t bother me. I never knew it, so it weren’t like a loved one going toes up on you.” He rowed a few strokes in silence. “Would’ve been queer, having a brother around that looked the same as me.”
“I know some twins. They pretend to be each other. They’ve put over some good ones.”
“It’s in the lake.”
“What?” Leigh asked, uncertain what Charlie meant.
“My old man, he took it out on the lake and tossed it in with an anchor. Guess it’s still down there.”
Leigh frowned, trying to make sense of what Charlie had said. Suddenly, she realized that “it” was his stillborn twin. Charlie’s father had weighted the body with an anchor and left it in the lake.
She’d been swimming in the lake…
There wouldn’t be much of it left by now, she told herself. That was what, eighteen years ago?
A dead baby down there.
Its bones, anyway.
The lake’s dark water with its silver-moon trail didn’t look quite as tranquil and beautiful as it had a few minutes ago.
“Funny to think about it down there,” Charlie said.
Hilarious.
“You know how sometimes a fish’ll jump and you look real quick but you don’t see it? There’s just the ripples moving around? Well, when I was a kid and that used to happen, I’d think it was ‘it’ coming up.”
“Jesus,” Leigh muttered.
“Didn’t scare me. I just kept looking quick, hoping I’d get a peek at it. I was mostly curious, is all. One time, I jumped in.” He shook his head. Leigh saw the white of his teeth. Was he smiling? “Had it in mind I might dive down and grab the body, get a good look at it.”
Leigh didn’t want to hear any more. “How far’s the high school?” she asked.
“Oh, twenty miles.”
“How do you get there? Do they have a bus?”
“I never gone.”
“You never went to school?” She wasn’t very surprised.
“What do I need school for? Mom teaches me all I need to know.”
“Your mom’s a teacher?
“She was, a long time ago.”
“Well, you’d meet people.”
“Don’t have much use for ’em.”
“You’d meet girls.”
“You gonna start on me about girls again?”
“Not if you don’t want me to.”
“Well, I don’t see no point. You’re a girl. You’re here. What’s the point talking about girls I don’t even know?”
“None, I guess.”
“I never seen one, anyhow, as pretty as you.”
“Oh, I bet you have.”
“Nope. And I see plenty of ’em, too, going around the lakes hawking the baskets. None of ’em are as nice, either. Mostly, they act funny like they’re scared of me.”
“Why would they be scared?”
For a few moments, he didn’t answer. He drew back, the oars and leaned forward again. “ ’Cause I’m not the same as them, I guess. Is that why? You’re scared of me, too, so I guess you must know how come.”
“I am not.”
“Sure. Only difference is, you don’t let it stop you.”
“If I were afraid of you, I wouldn’t be out here in your boat in the middle of the night.”
“That so?”
“Yes, that’s so. I’m no idiot.”
“You’re scared, but you’re not scared off. Maybe you got a streak of daredevil in you.”
“I’ve sure got a streak of something, Charlie. And you’re the one who gave it to me.” She drew in her feet. “Move over,” she said. Staying low, she made her way to the center seat, raised the oar handle out of her way, and sat down beside him. “Let’s make this baby fly,” she said, and started to row.
Leigh matched his movements, leaning forward as he did, dipping in her paddle and drawing it back, feeling her body against his—his arm and hip and leg.
He sped up, and so did she.
The boat skimmed along, faster and faster toward its destination known only to Charlie.
FIFTEEN
With a shush of hull against sand, the boat skidded to a stop. Leigh and Charlie swung their oars in, resting them on the stern seat.
“Well,” Charlie said, “here we are.”
Leigh nodded, a little breathless from the rowing.
“You like it?”
“Just fine,” she said. Except for its opening not much wider than their boat, the inlet was surrounded by high trees. It looked totally isolated. It was a far better place than Leigh had hoped for. She smiled at Charlie. “In fact, it’s terrific.” Peering over her shoulder, she saw that they had landed on a dim stretch of sand. “It’s even got a beach,” she whispered.
“That’s ’cause it used to have a house. Still does, only no one lives there.” He got up from his seat and stepped to the bow. There, he lifted the anchor and flung it. The concrete block hit the sand with a quiet thud.
“I’ll be right with you,” Leigh said, still in a whisper. This place made her whisper. She went to the stern. Bending over, she felt the shirttail slide up, felt the soft breeze on her buttocks, wondered if Charlie was watching.