"A flyer," Beth said. Perhaps because they were all thinking about Tristan, Beth had used the word for a swimmer who did the butterfly.
Ivy tried to brush off the insect. Its wings fluttered, but it surprised her by staying put.
"It's mistaken you for a flower," Will said, smiling, his eyes full of light.
"Maybe," Ivy replied, anxious to get away from him and Beth. Pushing off from the side of the pool, she began to swim.
She did lap after lap, and when she was finally tired, she swam to the middle of the pool and flipped over to float.
"It's such a great feeling. Ivy. Do you know what it's like to float on a lake, a circle of trees around you, a big blue bowl of sky above you? You're lying on top of the water, sun sparkling at the tips of your fingers and toes."
The memory of Tristan's voice was so strong it was as if she heard it now. It seemed impossible that the big blue bowl of sky stayed up; it should have shattered like the car windshield the night of the accident, but there it was.
She remembered lying back in the water, feeling his arm beneath her as he taught her to float. "Easy now, don't fight it," he'd said.
She didn't fight it. She closed her eyes and imagined being in the center of a lake. When she had opened her eyes, he was looking down on her, his face like the sun, warming her.
"I'm floating," Ivy had whispered, and whispered it now.
"You're floating."
"Floating." They had read it off each other's lips, and for a moment now she felt as if he were bending over her still—"Floating" — their lips close, so close…
"Give 'em back!"
Ivy pulled her head up quickly, and her feet sank straight down beneath her. She quickly wiped the water out of her eyes.
The door of the pool house had been flung open, and Gregory was racing across the lawn, carrying a small piece of dark clothing in his hands. Odd globs of white, foamy stuff flew from his hair. Eric came streaking after him, one hand clutching Beth's hat — his only bit of cover — and the other wielding a long kitchen knife. "You're dead meat, Gregory."
"Come get them." Gregory egged him on, holding up Eric's trunks. "Come on. Give it your best shot."
"I'm going to—" "Sure, sure," Gregory baited.
Eric suddenly stopped running. "I'll get you, Gregory," he warned. "When you least expect it."
Lacey sat back in the cafe chair, smiling at Tristan and looking very pleased with herself. Apparently she had forgiven him for dragging her away from the pool house free-for-all at Eric's party. Now she hooked her thumbs together and flapped her hands, rippling her fingers like wings. "You have to admit, landing that butterfly on Ivy was a nice touch."
Tristan eyed her shimmering fingers and long nails, and responded with something between a grimace and a smile. When he had first met Lacey Lovitt, he had thought the purple nails and the odd magenta rinse on her dark, spiked hair were a result of her hanging around in this world for two years — a long period of time for their kind of angel. But actually it was the way she liked her nails and hair to look, the way she had colored them after her last Hollywood film and before her plane went down.
"The butterfly was nice," he began, "but—" "You're wondering how I did it," she interrupted. "I guess I'll have to teach you about using force fields." She eyed the dessert tray as it went by — not that she, or he, could actually eat. "But—" Tristan said again. "You're wondering how I knew about the butterfly," she said. "I told you, I read all about Stonehill High's hero, the great swimmer, Tristan Carruthers, in the local paper. I knew the butterfly was your stroke. I knew it would make Ivy think of you."
"What I was wondering was this: Couldn't you have left die pies alone?"
Her eyes slid over to the dessert tray again. "Don't even think about it," he said. There were only a handful of customers sitting at the town's outdoor cafe at four-thirty in the afternoon, but he knew Lacey could create chaos with very little. Two pies and some whipped cream — that's all it had taken earlier at Eric's. "I mean, isn't that kind of stunt a little old, Lacey? It was old when the Three Stooges did it."
"Oh, lighten up. Dumps," she replied. "Everyone at the party enjoyed it. Okay, okay," she said, "some people enjoyed it, and a few, like Suzanne, got fussy about their hair. But I had a good time."
Tristan shook his head. Lacey had been lightning-quick, moving around die pool house, invisibly picking fights. She had obviously enjoyed yanking at Gregory's swimming trunks whenever Eric was dose by.
"Now I know why you never complete your mission," Tristan said.
"Well, excu-u-use me! Please remind me of dial next time you beg me to come widi you and help you reach Ivy." She stood up abruptly and stomped out of die cafe. Tristan was used со her dramatics and followed her slowly onto Main Street.
"You've got nerve, Tristan, criticizing my little bit of fun. Where were you when Ivy started making faces like a goldfish down in die deep end of the pool? Who took care of Eric?"
"You did," he said, "and you know where I was."
"All tangled up inside of Will." Tristan nodded. The truth was embarrassing. He and Lacey moved silently down die brick sidewalk, passing a row of shops with bright striped awnings. Windows full of antiques and dried-flower arrangements, art books and decorator wallpaper showed off die taste of die wealthy Connecticut town. Tristan still walked as if he were alive and solid, moving out of the way of shoppers.
Lacey went straight through them.
"I must be doing something wrong," Tristan said at last. "One moment I'm inside Will, so much a part of him that when he looks at Ivy, I do, too. It's like he feels what I feel for her. Then all of a sudden he pulls back."
Lacey had stopped to look in the window of a dress shop.
"I must be pushing too hard," Tristan continued. "I need Will to speak for me. But I think he's discovered me prowling around in his mind, and now he's afraid of me."
"Or maybe," said Lacey, "he's afraid of her."
"Of Ivy?"
"Of his feelings for her."
"My feelings for her!" Tristan said quickly.
Lacey turned to look at him, her head cocked. Tristan feigned a sudden interest in an ugly black sequined dress hanging in the window. He couldn't see a reflection of Lacey's face in the glass, any more than he could see his own. Just a shimmer of gold and wisps of soft color shone against the window; he guessed that it was what a believer would see when looking at them.
"Why?" Lacey asked. "I want to know why you assume that you're the only guy in the world in love with—" Tristan cut in. "I entered Will, and since he's a good radio, he started to feel my feelings and think my thoughts. That's how it works, right?"
"Didn't it ever occur to you that the reason it was so easy for an amateur like you to enter Will was because he was already feeling your feelings and thinking your thoughts, at least when it comes to Ivy?"
It had. but Tristan had done his best to squelch the idea.
"I got inside Beth's mind, too," he reminded her.
The first time Lacey had seen Beth, she had told Tristan that Ivy's friend would be a natural "radio," someone who could transmit messages from a different side of life. Just as Tristan had coaxed Will into drawing angels in an effort to comfort Ivy, he had gotten Beth to do some automatic writing, though it was so jumbled that no one had been able to make sense of it.
"You got inside, but it was tougher for you," Lacey pointed out. "You bumbled a lot, remember? And besides, Beth also loves Ivy."
She turned back to the window. "A killer dress," she said, then walked on. "What I really want to know is what everyone sees in this chick."
"It was nice of you to save a chick you think so little of," Tristan remarked dryly.