Freddie wasn’t in school today. I try not to keep tabs on him, but I’m thankful for his absence. It’s been two weeks since Fat Tuesday, and every day at school has been torturous. For once, I don’t feel like I want to contort myself into a ball and hide away in my locker.
Everyone moves past me at lightning speeds to vacate the school in time for spring break, but I take my time getting to the bike rack. All that’s waiting for me this spring break is more work and a few trips to the baby store with Hattie.
“Ramona!” calls a voice behind me. “Ramona!”
I backtrack to find the source and don’t have to go far. “Oh, hey,” I say. “Allyster, right?”
“You remembered.” His voice is neither surprised nor bitter, but factual. His hair is gelled into a hard spiky shell, and today he is wearing long denim shorts and a black T-shirt that says: The Dark Side Made Me Do It. “So listen,” he says. “You missed the deadline for senior page first drafts. I need some pictures of you and whatever you want your page to say.”
“Here’s the deal: someone bought me that page as, like, a gift, and I’m not really interested, ya know? So take the money as a donation and we can call it good. Cool?”
His face is unmoving. “What? Like, you think it’s uncool or something?” He pulls his backpack straps tight against his shoulders like a pair of suspenders. “I guess you can tell your grandkids you were too cool when they ask why you don’t have a senior page in your yearbook, right? You can do what you want,” he says in exasperation. “I mean, we were really striving for a hundred percent participation this year, but I’m not going to chase you all over town trying to get this from you. You have until the end of April to get it to me, but you’ve already missed the proofreading window, so it better be clean.”
“Thanks,” I tell him. “If I decide to go for it, I’ll be in touch.”
“Whatever,” he says. “Have a good spring break.”
After my paper route on Monday morning, my limbs are aching. Not because I’m sore, but my muscles miss the swimming. My arms and legs want nothing more than to spend an hour in the pool, slicing through water.
I lie in bed for a little while as Hattie snores on the other side of the wall. Watching the clock, I think back to when I would go swimming with Agnes and Freddie. If they even decided to go today, they should be gone by now.
Springing out of my bed, I tear through my room searching for my swimsuit and goggles. I check my wallet for the guest pass Agnes gave me and hope she hasn’t removed me from her YMCA account as swiftly as I’ve removed myself from their lives.
What little winter we had has melted away, and on the bike ride to the pool, I even begin to break a sweat. It’s a reminder that summer is coming and I’ve once again survived another winter. Except that this summer is different.
There are no hiccups when I hand over my guest pass, but just in case, I find myself jogging to the locker rooms. As I’m headed down the hallway to the pool, the permanently damp carpet squishes against my toes.
“I was wondering where you’d gone off to,” says Prudence Whitmire the moment I round the corner.
I gasp and freeze. “You caught me off guard.”
Unlike every other time I’ve seen her, she’s soaking wet and panting. She’s not shy about adjusting the back of her swimsuit and letting the material snap against her dimpled rear. I can’t help but smile, even though the mere sight of her makes me anxious about the future.
“Just been busy,” I add. I should tell her that I appreciate her offer, but I can’t take her up on it.
She tsks. “I bet you’ve softened up. Lost all that great momentum you’d been building.”
I shrug. “I do this for fun.”
She shakes her head. “Well, the way I see it, how you move in the pool is more fierce than fun.”
I force myself not to smile, but inside I’m glowing. “It was good seeing you,” I say, cutting our interaction short.
I search for an empty lap lane and end up with the one closest to the water aerobics class. The pool is so much busier at this time of day, and spring break is definitely not helping. Extra lifeguards occupy all the chairs that are normally empty, and there’s even one monitoring the constantly replenishing line of kids waiting for the diving board.
After using my bathing suit to clean out my goggles and pulling my hair into a braid, I position myself on the blocks. I stretch back deep like a cat with my fingers clinging to the front of the block before diving in.
The chlorinated water washes over me as I propel my body forward like a machine. If it wouldn’t cause my lungs to fill with water, I would sigh.
I can have this. I can still have good things.
I let myself have fun and switch strokes as I please, not bothering to focus too much on form. Only speed. When I finally resurface, Prudence is sitting on my diving block in a matching red Windbreaker suit with Coach Pru embroidered above her heart. Her fingers are clenched around a stopwatch, and she jots down a time on a piece of scratch paper.
“You on spring break?” she asks.
“Yes, ma’am.” My arms are crossed over the lip of the pool and my heart is thudding in my chest.
“This is a pool buoy. Keep it in your gym bag and bring it to the pool to train with next time.” She reaches down between her legs and throws a small foam float into the water. “Meet me here tomorrow morning. Same time. We’ll run a few drills. You got athletic shoes? Bring those too.”
I open my mouth to protest—mainly ’cause I’m in the habit of fighting back—but she stops me when she adds, “Just for fun.”
That night after work, Hattie is waiting for me on the porch with bright eyes and flushed cheeks.
“Hey, what’s going on?”
“Come sit down,” she says.
“What’d you do?” I ask, knowing better than to not be suspicious.
“I went on a date.”
“Okay?”
“It was someone from the website. Remember?”
“How could I forget?” I ask.
“Well, when they picked me up, it turned out—it was Tyler. Actually, the profile belonged to this guy we went to high school with, Chad, but when he figured out who I was, he started asking around, because he’d heard me and Tyler were having a baby. And well, when Tyler heard . . .”
“Oh God,” I moan. “You can’t be serious.”
“He’s different, Ramona. He really is. He got a job at that video game store on Lamar, and he says that there might be a management position opening up soon. And he just wants what’s best for me and the baby.”
“Well,” I say defiantly, “he should know that’s not him.”
“Don’t be like that,” she says. “Come on. I know Tyler isn’t perfect, okay? And I know we’re not smart and all like you and Freddie and Ruthie, but I gotta give my baby girl every chance at a real family.”
“You have a family.” I press my hand to her belly. It’s one of the few times I’ve actually touched it. “She has a family.”
Hattie reaches up and gathers my hair before pulling it over my shoulder. “I know that. Of course I know that. But what if she could have it all? What if she could have a great grandpa and a badass aunt and a sort of flaky grandma and a mom and a dad?” She pulls my hand back to her belly. “Her little foot has been kicking out all day.”
I wait for a moment, but nothing.
Suddenly, I yelp. There’s a ripple of movement under my sister’s shirt. “Holy shit!”
My sister laughs. “I lie around all day and wait for her to kick. She’s stingy with her love. Just like her auntie Ramona.”
“I’m not stingy,” I retort.
“You’re like a cat,” says Hattie. “Territorial, too.” She pulls herself up, using the railing. “You coming in?”
“Not yet. Just give me a few minutes.”
She leaves me there on the porch, and I wonder what the logistics of all this means. Is Tyler moving back in? Will they get an apartment? But most of all I wonder what all this means for me. I should feel free, shouldn’t I? Hattie has made her choice.
Part of me feels a little sad. Replaced, even. I imagine what life would look like if I stayed here in this trailer with Dad. I can’t think of him alone. I’m scared that somehow he might wilt away without Hattie or me here. But if I stay, I might just wilt away, too.