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Show the pool, skimming leaves from the surface, testing the level of chlorine. Scott and I have pulled large rubber inner tubes into the pool and he and I are taking turns jumping from the deck, falling through the center of the tubes, trying not to touch the rubber sides. Sometimes I misjudge and feel the burn of the rubber as I brush against it, red welts appearing along my legs and belly. We dare each other to add more tires, heightening the pile and the challenge, prepared to spend an afternoon where our feet never touch the ground. The phone rings and my mother goes up to the house to answer it. Later, I will learn it is Mrs. DeBobes calling to gossip or unwind, happy to have another Navy wife to talk to whose husband leaves and returns every day in darkness. Though my mother does not say it, as the oldest I am in charge of watching my brothers. But I do not stop jumping wildly from the redwood deck even for a moment, never stop to locate my youngest brother, to pull him from the edge, make sure he does not follow me in my quest for the perfect dive. My mother remains in the house for some time, wrapping the extra-long telephone cord around her body as she talks, every now and then trying to find an angle through the picture window to the pool. I pull myself out of the water and onto the deck for one more jump. Scott, treading water, lines the tires up for me so I can clear the sides. Our pile has grown taller than either of us, wobbling in the air, threatening to topple before long. I am standing on the deck, water running from my hair, down my legs, and into a puddle on the wooden floor. Then I notice Bryan, face up on the bottom of the pool, as if napping in his crib or waiting for my father to pick him up. I see his shimmering body, his white diapersagainst the plastic blue liner of the pool, his blonde hair waving like a water nymph. He seems at 69 |