Our eyes locked, mine and hers, and it nearly took my breath away.

* * *

In that look, we each seemed to say: Here you are, at last.

chapter twenty-one

June 20, 2019

I woke up to the smell of coffee and bacon.

I’d been dreaming that Lexie came to my room and stood in the corner, dripping and smelling like the pool. We were telling each other riddles. My riddles were old schoolyard things: What has four legs and a body but can’t walk? A table!

Lexie’s were nonsense: What has gills and pink polka dots? The Brooklyn Bridge!

But her final riddle stayed with me as I sat up. Who is cold and dark and smells like rotten eggs?

And there she was, watching me from the painting propped up on the dresser, gazing at her reflection, her own version of Narcissus.

I glanced into the corner of the room, where she’d stood in my dream. Pig was curled up on the floor there, chin resting on his front paws, yellow eyes watching me.

I got out of bed and made my way down to the kitchen. My head felt thick and heavy, my thinking clouded as I pushed myself to come up with a logical explanation for what happened with the flashlight. Did I actually see it fall? I was distracted, frightened, so maybe I didn’t notice that the light hadn’t actually fallen into the water. Maybe, I told myself, it had been there on the edge of the pool the whole time. That must have been it.

But the blinking light I saw in the water, did I imagine that?

And the splashing?

“Morning, Jax,” my father called. He was standing in front of the stove, flipping bacon on the big cast-iron griddle my grandmother had used to make us pancakes: plain for me, chocolate chip for Lexie. Another large pan full of home fries sizzled next to it.

“Hope you’re hungry,” my father said. He grabbed two eggs. “Over easy, right?”

Lexie liked her eggs over easy, not me. “Scrambled hard,” I said. It wasn’t even nine in the morning. The Ted I knew rarely rose before noon. And I doubted he’d ever cooked me breakfast in my life. “I didn’t know you could cook,” I said.

“Ha!” he said jovially. “Well, then you’re in for a treat. Should we wake Diane up?”

“No way,” I said, pouring myself a much-needed mug of coffee. “Let’s let her sleep. You’re up early.”

“I had the most amazing dreams,” he said. He looked wistful, little-boyish. I sat at the kitchen table and noticed a sketchbook, an assortment of drawing pencils, an eraser, and a sharpener.

“I found your sister’s art supplies up in the attic and helped myself,” he said, following my gaze.

“The attic? When were you up there?” Growing up, it was off-limits to Lexie and me. When my mother and Aunt Diane were girls, their grandmother lived in the attic. Her brass bed was still up there, covered in a sheet like she might still be sleeping beneath it. The few times I’d been up there it scared me. I’d heard stories from Mom and Aunt Diane about their poor old grandma who’d gone senile and kept her teeth in a jar next to the bed. I was afraid of encountering either her or her teeth up there in the dark.

“I thought… I thought I heard something up there. I went up to check it out—must have been a mouse. Anyway, your sister had turned part of the attic into a studio. I started sketching some images from last night’s dreams,” my father said. “I’ve gotta tell you, it feels good to be working again. I haven’t done any real, honest-to-God authentic artwork in a long time. I started to think maybe the old creativity well was dried up—wrung dry from painting crappy Key West landscapes for tourists. But this may be the best work I’ve done in years.” Eggs hit the pan with a sizzle, and he stirred them with a spatula.

I reached for the sketchbook. I’d loved his drawings and paintings when I was a girl: He worked in broad strokes and used vivid patches of color. His heroes were the German Expressionists: Klee, Kandinsky, Marc.

“Uh-uh,” he scolded, wielding his egg-covered spatula. “I’m not ready to show you yet.”

“Okay,” I said, pulling my hand back. “Were any of Lexie’s paintings up there?”

“A few sketches and the beginning of a couple paintings; I had no idea she had such an eye.” He dumped the eggs, some bacon, and home fries onto two plates and came to sit down with me.

“What were your dreams about?” I asked.

“I’ll tell you all about it when I show you the drawings. Until then, mum’s the word.”

Mum’s the word, Jax. Don’t tell a soul.

“Ted, what do you know about Rita’s imaginary friend?”

“Martha? Nothing much. Just stories your mother told. Rita said she lived in the pool, but she came out sometimes. Rita used to make your grandmother set an extra plate for her at the dinner table. Then, when she didn’t eat it, Rita would carry the plate out and leave it by the pool.”

“And Martha was a little girl, right?”

He nodded. “That’s what Rita said. A little girl almost her age.”

I nodded, remembering the drawings I’d seen of Martha, the little girl with pale blond hair in a blue dress, like the one inside the box of that old game, Snakes and Ladders.

“Why the sudden interest in Martha?” my father asked.

“Martha?” Diane said, coming into the kitchen and heading straight for the coffeepot. “Who’s Martha?” She was wearing old running shorts and a T-shirt of Lexie’s. Her hair was a mess, and the dark circles under her eyes were like purple bruises.

“Rita’s imaginary friend,” my father said. “Jax was just asking about her. But you’re really the better person to ask.”

Diane poured herself a cup of coffee and looked at me. “There’s nothing to tell. Rita had a very active imagination. She was younger than Linda and me, and when we lost patience and wouldn’t play with her, she invented her own playmate.”

“Did you ever think,” I began, “that she might be real?”

My aunt frowned at me. “A real girl who lived at the bottom of the swimming pool, who no one but Rita could see?” She chuffed out a laugh. “Um, no, that possibility never crossed my mind.” She took a sip of coffee, rubbed her bloodshot eyes.

“How did you sleep?” Ted asked.