Pieces of You(8)
“Tina’s always lying,” I say as I shut the door and make my way into the kitchen to check on the things Tina, Cora’s caregiver, never checks on; the things Claire taught me to check on when we first met. “Do you have anyone coming to look at the apartment this week?”
The apartment below me has only been empty for three weeks, but I’m going to have to sneak some extra funds into my rent check if Cora doesn’t find a new tenant soon. I can’t let her go broke just because Claire went back to school. After all, even though I’m pretty miserable over it, I am the one who encouraged her to go. I have to accept responsibility for the emptiness of Claire’s old apartment, and the void it’s left in Cora’s bank account as the landlady of this building. Of course, paying double the rent will cut into my savings, but I can do it for a few months—for Cora and Claire.
Everything is in order in the kitchen, but when I enter the living room Cora is already leaning back in the recliner with her eyes closed. For a moment I fear the worst.
“Cora?”
She waves me off. “Go home, honey. I’m not up for any fun and games today. All I can handle right now is a long senior citizen siesta. Tina will be here soon. Go do your water tricks.”
“You sure? I can hang out if you need some company. My class doesn’t start for ninety minutes.”
“Get out of here before I sick Bigfoot on you.”
Cora’s been more tired than usual lately. Tina says it’s normal for someone her age to have bouts of lethargy. I don’t like to think of Cora as any age, but I suppose there are certain truths one has to come to terms with when you reach the age of eighty-six. I haven’t told Claire. As far as she knows, Cora’s as spunky as ever. She doesn’t need anything else to worry about.
I make it to Shell Island an hour before class so I immediately jog out across the sand, surfboard under my arm, to get a feel for the surf. The water is choppy—it’s hurricane season—but I paddle out and chill on my board for a while as I watch the waves break on the shore.
The water ebbs beneath me and I think of Claire’s crazy meditation habit. It’s not much different from my need to surf. I can’t function if I’ve gone too long without immersing myself in the water, without feeling the power of the water pushing me. Surfing is a healthy addiction, like meditating.
Today I quit smoking. For good.
I leave everything in the water today. I should save something for my students, but they’re such beginners I don’t need much energy to teach them how to stand on a board in the sand. I start a new group of students today, even though I won’t be around next week to continue. Jason will pick up where I leave off. The first day is always the easiest.
I shake the ocean out of my hair as I come out of the water. A couple of girls in bikinis are standing next to Jason, my boss and the lead surf instructor at the academy. The girls smile and the shorter one whispers something in the other one’s ear as they watch me approach.
“What’s up, bro?” I say to Jason with a nod of my head.
Jason is thirty and still single so I’m used to the young female students fawning over both of us, but I’m not in the mood for it today.
“I thought you weren’t coming in today,” Jason says. “I already asked Nayla to take this class. She’s on her way.”
“I’ll text her to tell her I’m here.”
“This is Nadia and Brittany. They’re sisters and they’re part of the new class. We’re just waiting for Fred and Priscilla, the couple that came in last week.”
“Cool,” I reply without looking at the girls.
A long, awkward fifteen minutes pass before we decide that Fred and Priscilla are too late. We’ll have to start without them.
The first ten minutes of the lesson are always spent introducing the academy and myself and talking about what we’re going to be doing for our first lesson. When I’m done with my spiel both girls raise their hand like they’re in a fucking classroom. They can’t be much older than eighteen, if they’re even that old.
“You don’t have to raise your hands.”
The taller one, Nadia, speaks first. “We already took surf lessons in Carolina Beach last summer. Can we skip the stuff in the sand?”
Jason has already left us to go teach an intermediate class further down the beach. He doesn’t like me to skip the basics, even when a student insists, but I’m not exactly opposed to skipping the positioning and pop-up section of the lesson. I always have to put my hands on someone’s arms or legs to get them positioned correctly and I don’t feel comfortable touching these girls without Jason around.