Endless Summer

There was also the small detail that Adam was like that and I was not.

Suddenly I found myself shooting farther and faster beyond the boat than I’d expected. We were turning at the bridge, just under the words AOAN LOVES LOKI. I pulled up and took control of the run.

What had I been thinking? Had I seriously been considering throwing a jump and pretending to be hurt just to get a boy? What kind of boy did you catch with a ploy like that?

And furthermore, what kind of person was Adam to give me the idea?

I decided right then that I was not going to pretend to get hurt and throw this show for Sean or anybody. Furthermore, I would skip the party tomorrow night, because there would be no one there I wanted to see, except Tammy. Well, okay, maybe I wouldn’t skip the party, because who could skip a party next door? But I wouldn’t enjoy it. Or I would hang out with Tammy, ignoring the boys. And furthermore, sometime between now and then, maybe tonight since I obviously would not have a boy to go out with, I would ask McGillicuddy to drive me to town. I would buy the latest Kelly Clarkson album as a birthday present from me to me. I would fight and fight and fight to play it in the boat the next time we went wakeboarding. I was sick to death of Nickelback.

Something dark in the water flashed past the corner of my eye. I turned and saw an enormous log tumbling gently in the water. Just then the pull on the rope changed, and I remembered McGillicuddy was veering to the right to avoid the log. I veered to the right with him as I headed for the pontoon boat to ride the rails.

Only I was coming up too fast on the backside of the pontoon boat. I glanced over at the boys and motioned to Adam to slow down. I’d screwed this trick already.

Adam was motioning to me, an exaggerated wave away from the pontoon boat. And he was mouthing something. Your other right. I realized what I’d done then and dropped the rope. The side of the pontoon boat emblazoned VADER’S MARINA zoomed toward me, smack.

This probably would have been a lot easier if I’d gotten amnesia or at least felt a little woozy from the impact, but I didn’t. I knew exactly what was happening as I slipped wakeboard-first under the pontoon boat and slowed to a stop. e buoyant wakeboard on my feet and the life vest hugging my chest stuck me like magnets to the slippery underside of the boat.

My head—I had cracked my head open when I hit the boat, and the pain was almost unbearable, but I had nowhere to put it. Blood curled around me, backlit by sunbeams streaming through the water at the edges of the boat. I needed to get out from under. I was ru

I tried to kick myself over to the edge—but my feet were still stuck in the wakeboard bindings. Bending over to untie them was the only way out. I would run out of air before then. I could hardly think of anything except ru

I reached one hand as far toward the edge of the boat as I could, hoping I could pull hard with every bit of life I had left and slip out from under, dragging the wakeboard with me. My hand sank into a firm, gelatinous mass. Without looking, I knew it was bryozoa. I had died and gone to hell. is was how my mother must have felt. e water had always been my friend. The water had betrayed me.

en they came for me. ey were under the pontoon boat with me, blurry and green like ghosts in the water. One boy shoved down on the wakeboard. e other boy put a strong arm across my chest and pushed off from the bottom of the boat with his feet. He took me lower in the water—wrong direction, hello, I could hardly suppress the urge to breathe in water instead of air. I struggled. He let me go. The wakeboard and the life vest propelled me to the surface, clear of the boat.

I popped into the air, gasping. Sean put his arms around me again and held my head above the water so I could breathe. e thought crossed my mind of rejecting a boy’s help and resisting the damsel-in-distress role, but really it was a little thought that had no effect on letting Sean help me breathe. e more I breathed, the harder my head throbbed, so I also had a little thought that MTV would never invite me to dance on stage during one of their Spring Break specials now that I looked like the Elephant Man.

And a little thought that I had been wrong about Sean. Mom had sent me a sign. She’d sent Sean to save my life. Maybe he was worth a faked injury, after all.

Of course, there was also McGillicuddy down at my feet, and the fact that the motorboat had been only twenty yards away from me when I went down, so maybe it wasn’t Mom’s doing. God, my head hurt like a mother.

McGillicuddy got me loose from the wakeboard. Sean held me up to Cameron in the boat, who grabbed me under the arms and lifted me in. Immediately Sean climbed the ladder and came to me. He pulled me out of the life vest, then eased me down and cradled my head in his lap.

Just like in my dream, he looked down at me with eyes lighter than the deep blue sky behind him. e sunlight turned his hair and shoulders and broad chest gold as he pressed both hands to my head.

Unlike in my dream, he dripped water and tears on my face, stinging my eyes. e blood didn’t help either. Oozing from under Sean’s hand, it crawled like mosquitoes on my skin. I felt pretty.

“Calm down,” McGillicuddy said. “Calm down. For God’s sake, would you calm down?”

“I’m fine,” I said between heaving coughs. “At least I can move my toes, so I won’t have to ride the short bus.”

“I meant Adam.”

I stared past the pain in my head, upward at Adam’s chin. Adam held me, not Sean. I hadn’t recognized him upside down, without the skull and crossbones.

“Sean,” Cameron called. “We’ve got her. Let’s go.”

e engine started, and the boat lurched into high speed. Down in Adam’s lap, below the sides of the boat, the motor sounded muffled, more a buzz than a roar.

Without Nickelback blaring, for once.

“Let me see,” McGillicuddy said, bending next to Adam.

I cringed and closed my eyes and tried to go to a different place, away from the pain, as they fumbled on my forehead. Poked at my forehead. I came back from that different place and said, “DON’T TOUCH IT.”

“It’s going to need stitches,” McGillicuddy said. “They might have to shave your hair a little. But if they do, I’ll shave mine too. So will Adam. Right, Adam?”

“It’s a wonder you weren’t killed,” Adam cried. “It’s a wonder you didn’t at least put your eye out.” McGillicuddy said, “Adam, would you calm down?”

I squeezed my eyes more tightly shut.

“I can’t believe you actually did it,” Adam said. “I can’t believe you’re that stupid.”

“I didn’t,” I mouthed. That’s all I could do. Sean and Adam had been my whole life for the last couple of weeks, but it was surprising how little I cared about them when I suddenly had a throbbing headache the size of the lake. Even if I’d wanted to, I didn’t have the strength to fight. Adam wouldn’t have believed me, anyway.

At first, all five Vaders plus McGillicuddy crowded into the emergency room with me. e nurses kicked everyone out except Mrs. Vader. ey must have mistaken her for someone motherly and soothing. She barked at people and insisted on seeing their credentials before she’d let them touch me. en Cameron came back and said Adam had taken a swing at Sean and gotten them all kicked out of the waiting room. So Mrs. Vader herded them all home where they could beat the hell out of each other in peace.

She sent McGillicuddy in to sit with me.

I didn’t have a concussion, and they didn’t shave my head or anything traumatic like that. After the first prick of anesthetic, my head didn’t even hurt much. Which was a good thing, because McGillicuddy went to buy himself some Pop-Tarts out of the snack machine. I lay there by myself on the hospital bed and stared at the water-stained ceiling while the doc stitched me up, scolded me, and left to find me some pain pills for when the anesthetic wore off. I felt very sorry for myself and very alone until Dad showed up, with Frances.