Now that he had called to mind the name and the face of this woman, who was once a part of his life, he remembered her with increasing clarity. She was a salesgirl at a department store in the city, he remembered, she always had Dentyne chewing gum in her mouth, and she was not married. He remembered that even as a little boy he had thought that his aunt Debbie was extraordinarily pretty, and affectionate, as well. His father, he remembered suddenly, with a distinct clutching sensation in his belly, had liked Debbie, too.
A feeling came over Victor like a dark cloud, and he stood up without looking at Shelby. “I’m going in the water,” he said, and marched towards and into the waves that suddenly seemed to crash and hiss like a thousand red hot demons falling from heaven into the boiling cauldrons of hell.
Victor was unprepared for the chill of the water that met him; he stood for a long time at the very edge of the Atlantic Ocean while the shallowest of waves lapped about his ankles. The cries of seagulls just overhead seemed to accentuate the unearthliness of the moment as he hesitated, shivering, his arms wrapped around himself like a straightjacket. There were children in the distance, playing with abandon in water that looked as if it must be a hundred feet deep, but of course it could not be that much deeper than where he stood, even though it was so much further out. Victor eventually trudged forward, marveling at how quickly the cold sting of the salt water gave way to a pleasant coolness. Still, he hesitated to immerse himself totally. The murky greenish salt water had nothing in common with the clear, chlorinated pools he was used to; he could see nothing beneath the surface of the water except vague shadows. As he moved forward, however, the waves met him with greater force, until at last one swept him off his feet and laid him down; he fell back into the shallow water and emerged spluttering, completely wet from top to toe, with the curious sensation of having been, despite himself, utterly liberated. He turned and looked back toward Shelby, and for a moment he felt frantic, for he could not see her, with his salt stung eyes, amongst the dozens of reclining bodies on the beach. But then he spotted her, bent over a book that held her skirt to the ground between her upraised knees, it looked as if she was scribbling something in it. He turned back to the ocean and half hopped, half dove forward, and once again immersed himself in the cool, murky, and strangely invigorating waters. For what felt like hours he flung himself against and under and into the incoming waves, each of which seemed to carry its own individuality and its own particular reason for preventing him from moving too far out. When he had enough and finally made his way out of the water, trudging diagonally across the increasingly loose and burning sands to where Shelby sat hunched over on the green bed sheet, still scribbling, Victor had never felt so physically spent, and yet so very much alive. Shelby closed the clothbound notebook she had been scribbling or drawing something in, and squinted and smiled up at Victor as his shadow draped over her. “Did you have fun?”
“Yeah.”
“Are you hungry?”
“Yeah.”
Shelby reached into her straw bag and pulled out, in foil wrapped increments, their lunch. Victor wolfed down his own roast beef sandwich and was left to observe with what delicacy his cousin consumed hers, like a thoughtful bird over a hunk of bread, half of her sandwich, in fact, she threw to the gulls, who descended upon it with cries of joy. After the two humans had eaten and Shelby had gathered their trash into one compact ball of foil, Shelby suggested that they start the long walk back home to make sure they were ready for work on time. The walk back was indeed long; it seemed much longer than the walk from home, and by the time they arrived Victor felt as if his entire body was covered with an uncomfortable slime of sweat and salt. He lingered in the shower, fearing that the excessive use of water would be irritating to his grandmother, but he relished the strange sting of the water on his skin, which from exposure to the sun felt tight and raw and new, and not yet painful.
That evening at the restaurant was much as it had been the night before, except for the fact that this night, Victor had help gathering the bus pans in the form of Oliver, the Salvadoran prep cook, whose bright black eyes and snaggled teeth and short, strong body exuded an air of boundless energy and willingness to please. As none of the biker types that worked in the kitchen said much to Victor, he was grateful for Oliver’s company and conversation, limited though it was by the barrier of language and by Oliver’s predominant interests; he seemed to have conceived a passion for the blonde waitress named Kelli. “She is…” he said, nudging Victor, then rolled his brown eyes in a manner that somehow seemed incredibly lascivious.
Victor grinned and blushed, at the same time wondering at himself as he did so, for hadn’t every other guy in the treatment center acted like this, hadn’t most of the conversation between the residents there been about the physical attributes of the few females they saw every day? Why, outside of that place, did talk of sex seem so treacherous to him?
Oliver did not wait for any response, but slapped Victor on the back, giggling. “I make you… Nervous? I’m sorry. You saved? You go to church?”
“No,” said Victor. “No church.”
“No?” Oliver, for a brief moment, looked puzzled, but his agreeable smile did not falter. “I don’t go to church here. But I am saved. I think, though, it’s okay to say I like her…” and he placed his hands against his heart. “I don’t bother her. She don’t even know I like her. She don’t like me. She has a boyfriend, anyway.”
Victor shook his head and rinsed down a rack of dishes. He had no idea how old Oliver was, but in spite of his uninhibitedness he seemed not a little wise.
“Maybe you right,” Oliver said after a moment, even though Victor had said nothing. “Maybe it’s not good, to look too much, maybe it’s a sin. Pero, I get lonesome, it’s hard not to look. Maybe I need to go to church, get saved again, yeah?”
“I don’t think that would help,” said Victor.
“No?” Oliver, still smiling, looked at Victor as if he really believed that Victor could advise him.
“I don’t know,” shrugged Victor, “maybe.”
The next day was Saturday, the day that Uncle Buzz was scheduled to move to the rehabilitation facility in Beaufort, just over a bridge and a few miles away. After nearly a week of sleeping in the living room, Victor had gotten used to it, and the prospect of another move, into Uncle Buzz’s room, seemed at once welcome and jarring. Victor wasn’t sure what exactly was wrong with Uncle Buzz, but whatever it was, Victor had never seen him wear anything except pajama bottoms and that same wine colored bathrobe. Uncle Buzz did very little besides sleep and watch television, and as his only form of nutrition was his supplemental milkshakes, he gave the impression that he never ate, but only drank; there always seemed to be a can in his hand. He did not seem to be suffering much, but he did not seem to be enjoying much either, he was like a shy ghost drifting through the house.
It was just before noon when a medical transport van arrived to take Uncle Buzz to his rehab. Why that van, which looked exactly like an ambulance was required, Victor didn’t know, but evidently he was the only one surprised by its arrival in the driveway, as his grandmother, who was in the kitchen on the telephone with one of her many sisters and sisters-in-law came out into the living room, opened the front door, and said “Here they come...” as if they were not already there. “Honey,” She called over her shoulder to Victor, “run tell Shelby. They’re here to take her daddy over to the rehab.”
Victor looked out at the huge vehicle, conspicuous even without its siren as it grumbled in the driveway. The driver and several other uniformed men climbed out and made their way to the front door as the grandmother opened it wide and waved them forward. “We’re