The Fires Beneath the Sea ebook - Lydia Millet (primary phonics .txt) 📗

The three of them were in the garage digging up camping gear from previous years, when the family had made road trips out West to hike in the red-rock country of Utah and near the Grand Canyon. Cara remembered her mother laughing as the wind tossed one of their picnics into the air—running, as she held Cara’s hand, through a high alpine meadow where there were purple lupines.…

This summer, of course, there’d been no road trips.

“From up on the bluffs we’ll definitely have a view of the water,” she pressed. “A better view. We can see way further out from up there. So if the glow’s all the way out at the shipwreck, say?—and doesn’t come up to the waterline, we’ll still be able to spot it. And there’ll be less chance anyone will catch us.”

Human or otherwise, she thought.

Max was rolling up sleeping bags and pads and stowing them in the back of the car. He thought they should take those along in case their friends got bored and wanted to crash; the four-person tent had a clear-mesh door flap, so the others could just lie down while Cara or Max kept a lookout.

“You’re probably right,” he said. “Plus, if we hit paydirt, and we have to call Zee to bring the boat out, we get better cell coverage up there, too.”

“’Course the downside,” said Jax, “is you’ll have more mosquitoes.”

“Note to self: pack bug juice,” said Max.

The garage was dusty, with cobwebs clinging to the boxes of battery-powered lanterns and lightweight cooking equipment. Cara brushed them off and wiped her hands on her jeans.

“So, here’s how we’ll do it,” said Max. “I’ll drive over early and pitch the tent, OK? I’ll leave the bags and pads in there, flashlights and lantern, drinks, insect repellent”—he looked down at the pile of gear, nodding as he took stock of what they’d need—“and some snacks. Also extra batteries for the lantern, cause we wouldn’t want to run out of light. After I set it all up, I come back and we all have dinner with Lolly and act like normal kids.”

“Act like,” said Cara.

“Then, as soon as Lolly goes home, you and Hayley take off on the bikes. Me and the guys’ll come relieve you at one in the morning, in the car. We’ll do the rest of the night shift. It’s no problem. Keat wants to play poker with nickels. But we all gotta sync up our watches. And charge our phones.”

“I’ll man the home base,” said Jax. “Even if I can’t go with you, I can still stay up and help. You’re not giving me a curfew now, are you Max?”

“No curfew, little dude.”

“So you can text me any questions. And report back hourly, just to check in.”

“Especially if it’s raining,” said Cara. “Because if it rains….”

“Exactly. Is this thing waterproof?” asked Jax, and lifted a corner of their family’s old red tent.

“Used to be,” said Max. “Not so sure anymore. But it’s not like we’re camping out for days on end or anything.”

“I mean, because of him,” said Jax. “Night and rain. Those are his favorite things.”

“His?” asked Max.

“Pouring man,” said Jax.

“The man who walks in water,” Cara said with a nod.

“As opposed to on water,” added Jax.

“Wait. On water, as in Jesus?” asked Max.

“In water,” said Jax.

“He sure isn’t Jesus,” said Cara. “Way too creepy.”

Jax shook his head. “And no beard.”

But a slow, steady drizzle began after Max drove off to pitch the tent, telling Lolly he had to pick up his paycheck at the restaurant.

“Great,” whispered Cara to Jax, helping to set the table. “Rain, like you forecasted.”

“I still wish I was going with you,” said Jax.

“Going where, dear?” asked Lolly, bustling in with a basket of bread.

“To-to-to …,” he stammered.

“To school with me in the fall,” broke in Cara, grabbing at straws. “See, they were going to skip him ahead some grades, but Mom and Dad said he was ‘developmentally inappropriate’ for my grade. He’s kind of disappointed.”

“Oh, dear,” said Lolly and patted Jax’s head as though he were Rufus. “Don’t be in such a hurry to grow up. It’s more fun being a kid.”

“Yeah, right,” said Jax.

After she went back into the kitchen they stood staring over the table at the windows beyond, a stack of place mats and napkins in front of them. Cara could see through the trees in their backyard to the rain falling over the bay, freshwater joining the salt ocean in a million minuscule pinpricks on the surface. Soon you wouldn’t be able to see out there at all; already dusk was coming on, and with all the dark clouds overhead it seemed even later.

The branches of the pines dipped and swayed, and beyond them the gray of water and sky seemed to combine without a line between them, into a vague mist.

“Is that what they really said?” he asked after a minute. “I’m not mature enough?”

Cara looked at his hurt face and was surprised, then felt a pang of shame that she hadn’t thought of his feelings.

“I was just making it up, mostly,” she said.

This was one of those times she needed him to keep his promise—his promise not to ping her.

“I mean,” she said, scratching a bite on her arm to give the impression she wasn’t focused on fibbing, “they did think you should be with kids your own age, though. They said you’d have no fun if you were with thirteen-year-olds. That it would be too weird.”

“But I get along with you,” he said. “You’re thirteen.”

“Come on, Jax,” she said gently. “That’s different. You know what I mean.”

He shrugged defensively and turned back to the window.

“I don’t know,” she said hesitantly. She didn’t want to make him as nervous as she was about tonight, but she felt so unsure.… They had no idea what they were doing, after all. It was a giant shot in the dark. They were trusting that all this meant