never ever break up with you as long as I live.”
19
A nnie was an experienced sailor—and she wasn’t alone. Five of us had gone out on the boat. Friends of Annie’s I’d come to like, including Sarah, from the night I fell in love at first sound.
It really wasn’t raining that hard. It was a relatively warm day, but the deck was icicle slick. We were a little more than a mile off the coast of Santa Cruz, in Craft Kindle.
Annie went aft. She was tying down a rope when we got hit with a swell. I wasn’t even watching, but I heard her call out my name. When I moved around to the front, we got hit with another wave. I caught her eye, just as she went overboard. At the exact moment, it didn’t seem like a big deal. The waves weren’t that high. It’s not that we were calm, far from it; we just weren’t completely panicked. I grabbed a life preserver and headed to the side, but when I looked over, there was no Annie. I called out. I saw nothing, heard nothing. I dove in.
The waves were ugly but manageable. Where could she have gone? Had she hit her head on the side and gone under? I did circles around the boat—as deep as I could swim. I held tight to a rope I’d been thrown, to keep me from drowning myself.
I almost lost my own life. I swam myself ragged. I had to be pulled from the water, anguished and inconsolable.
We’d dropped the anchor, of course, then an inflatable boat, and spent hours searching, the Coast Guard by our side. Her father hired a veritable army. They searched the water for days.
They found nothing.
20
I was still lost in the past when Officer Sampson delivered me to the San Francisco Police Department, filled out some paperwork, and set me down on a bench to wait for Lieutenant Aravelo. I tried to avoid eye contact with the passing cops, consumed with the idea that they knew what I’d done to Aravelo’s brother and would relish an obnoxious comment or leer.
What could I hope to get out of this situation? Aravelo would doubtless be in full grill mode. He wasn’t likely to tell
me
a damn thing. Not intentionally. Could he be convinced to trade information?
While waiting, I checked my voice-mail messages. There were two. My editor, Kevin, had called. “Wondering how the story is going,” he said. “Call when you have a sec to chat.” He hung up without saying good-bye. Typical. The other message was from Samantha, who wanted to remind me to visit her the following day for acupuncture. “I sense you need intensive work on your gallbladder meridian.”
Anxious for distraction, I scrolled down the stored numbers file on my phone. I discovered one number I hadn’t called in years. I wondered if it was even still valid. Louise Elpers, licensed marriage and family counselor. In my phone book, she showed up as “braindoc.” I’d talked to her for a few sessions after Annie’s death, and she helped me with the basic approach to processing grief. I remember her saying that I was glorifying Annie, that it was perfectly normal, and that, as she put it, knowing that didn’t help a goddamn bit.
I did manage one reality check in the week just after Annie died. I’d gone to Costco, bought beef jerky in the industrial size, a four-pound bag of peanuts, and a case of Dr Pepper. I just didn’t want to feel obliged to stop. I drove for nine hours due east, away from the ocean. I landed in Litham, somewhere in Nevada, population 814. There was a gas station beside a diner. They were connected, or co-owned, as denoted by the sign, “Gas-n-Steak.”
Two teenagers, a boy and a girl, were flirting, wrestling in a light romantic way. The boy went to his waistband, pulled out a bright green water pistol, aimed, and fired. The girl covered her eyes and squealed with delight. She charged toward the boy and wrapped her arms around him. Started kissing his face. I began to sob, and I didn’t stop even when the gas station attendant asked me to move the car away from the full-service island.
A
19
A nnie was an experienced sailor—and she wasn’t alone. Five of us had gone out on the boat. Friends of Annie’s I’d come to like, including Sarah, from the night I fell in love at first sound.
It really wasn’t raining that hard. It was a relatively warm day, but the deck was icicle slick. We were a little more than a mile off the coast of Santa Cruz, in Craft Kindle.
Annie went aft. She was tying down a rope when we got hit with a swell. I wasn’t even watching, but I heard her call out my name. When I moved around to the front, we got hit with another wave. I caught her eye, just as she went overboard. At the exact moment, it didn’t seem like a big deal. The waves weren’t that high. It’s not that we were calm, far from it; we just weren’t completely panicked. I grabbed a life preserver and headed to the side, but when I looked over, there was no Annie. I called out. I saw nothing, heard nothing. I dove in.
The waves were ugly but manageable. Where could she have gone? Had she hit her head on the side and gone under? I did circles around the boat—as deep as I could swim. I held tight to a rope I’d been thrown, to keep me from drowning myself.
I almost lost my own life. I swam myself ragged. I had to be pulled from the water, anguished and inconsolable.
We’d dropped the anchor, of course, then an inflatable boat, and spent hours searching, the Coast Guard by our side. Her father hired a veritable army. They searched the water for days.
They found nothing.
20
I was still lost in the past when Officer Sampson delivered me to the San Francisco Police Department, filled out some paperwork, and set me down on a bench to wait for Lieutenant Aravelo. I tried to avoid eye contact with the passing cops, consumed with the idea that they knew what I’d done to Aravelo’s brother and would relish an obnoxious comment or leer.
What could I hope to get out of this situation? Aravelo would doubtless be in full grill mode. He wasn’t likely to tell
me
a damn thing. Not intentionally. Could he be convinced to trade information?
While waiting, I checked my voice-mail messages. There were two. My editor, Kevin, had called. “Wondering how the story is going,” he said. “Call when you have a sec to chat.” He hung up without saying good-bye. Typical. The other message was from Samantha, who wanted to remind me to visit her the following day for acupuncture. “I sense you need intensive work on your gallbladder meridian.”
Anxious for distraction, I scrolled down the stored numbers file on my phone. I discovered one number I hadn’t called in years. I wondered if it was even still valid. Louise Elpers, licensed marriage and family counselor. In my phone book, she showed up as “braindoc.” I’d talked to her for a few sessions after Annie’s death, and she helped me with the basic approach to processing grief. I remember her saying that I was glorifying Annie, that it was perfectly normal, and that, as she put it, knowing that didn’t help a goddamn bit.
I did manage one reality check in the week just after Annie died. I’d gone to Costco, bought beef jerky in the industrial size, a four-pound bag of peanuts, and a case of Dr Pepper. I just didn’t want to feel obliged to stop. I drove for nine hours due east, away from the ocean. I landed in Litham, somewhere in Nevada, population 814. There was a gas station beside a diner. They were connected, or co-owned, as denoted by the sign, “Gas-n-Steak.”
Two teenagers, a boy and a girl, were flirting, wrestling in a light romantic way. The boy went to his waistband, pulled out a bright green water pistol, aimed, and fired. The girl covered her eyes and squealed with delight. She charged toward the boy and wrapped her arms around him. Started kissing his face. I began to sob, and I didn’t stop even when the gas station attendant asked me to move the car away from the full-service island.
A
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