The Other Side of Blue(16)

At the far end of the beach, just around the curve where Mother can no longer see us, even with binoculars, I stop. I turn around. Sure enough, Kammi’s following me, and I wait for her to catch up.





Chapter Eight


WHEN KAMMI reaches me, she says, “I want to paint that boat.” The wind flips her cover-up across her thighs. Her straw hat threatens to fly away, and she forces it down on her head.

I know the boat she means. I ignore her.

“This is just the shade of blue,” she says, holding up a watercolor pencil in her fist, not giving up.

“No, it isn’t.” Her pencil is delft blue. The blue of the boat is more vibrant, richer in tone. More like ultramarine. The name even sounds like it should mean the ultimate or the perfect sea, but it doesn’t. To medieval Italians, oltramarino meant “from beyond the seas.” Maybe that’s more accurate. A blue not of this world.

“Come on, it’s farther.” I start to walk again.

“How much farther?”

“The next beach over. Not far.” We cut across inland through scrub and cacti. Lizard tracks weave through the hot sand. I like the way the heat feels, the way it sinks over my head, anchoring me to the ground. Kammi falls behind, the art supply bag over her shoulder. At least she’s given up on the leather shoes and opted for plastic beach slides.

Down a long hill, the path opens up to another beach, a tucked-away cove. Too shallow for most boats, Boca Roja invites only swimmers who walk from the road at the top of the hill, or people who come from the grand houses, like the one we rent, along the shore. At dawn and dusk, the light here is almost reddish. I’m not sure why, whether it’s the slant of the sun or some base color under the sand that comes out only at the ends of day. The full sun bleaches everything out.

We’re the only beachgoers today. I pick a spot and start pounding stakes into the sand, the mallet making a hollow sound as it strikes.

“It is too the right color.” Kammi doesn’t give up. She plops down on her bottom on a red beach towel like a two-year-old child would. “It’s just this shade.”

“The light in the boathouse is no good.” The mallet strikes until the wood sinks into the sand, and I fight to put up the tent. The loose fabric flaps in the wind like a flock of silk saris, the kind Mrs. Bindas’s servants hang on the line by their beach. The saris catch the breeze and dry in under an hour. Not enough time to fade, she said once to Mother when they stood talking at the farm market. Mrs. Bindas held an armful of mangoes and Mother a clutch of watercolor pencils she’d brought to match the colors in the market.

“They smell so fresh, like the sea,” Mrs. Bindas said about the saris.

But the sea doesn’t always smell fresh—sometimes it reeks of marine life stranded ashore by low tide, and it tastes like tears.

The salt air burns my eyes.

“But if we open the doors—”

“No.” I wrap my hands around the cloth, squeeze. “Grab that end, will you?” Be useful, that’s what I want to say. Why I don’t, I’m not sure. Most of this past year I’ve said anything that popped into my head.

Kammi fights to hold on to a corner of the cloth, and I wrestle it into place. Now we have a four-foot square of shade between us to share.

While Kammi pulls out her art supplies, arranging the Caran d’Ache watercolor pencils, the kind Mother would buy, around the blanket like a color wheel, I stare at the sea. She opens the water bottle and pours some into a small cup. She settles herself, flips over a fresh sheet of drawing paper, and pauses. I sense her close her eyes, centering herself. Mother does that, too, like she would a yoga pose, a breathing exercise to push away distractions.

In the distance, a fishing boat, probably heading from Venezuela to the floating market at Otrobanda, chugs along. The wavelike shape of the prow reminds me again of the boat in the boathouse. Kammi’s too busy settling herself to see it, to notice it’s like the other one, the one I won’t let her draw.

“Since my dad’s been gone,” Kammi begins. She doesn’t mention the divorce. She says “gone,” almost as if it were a passive act. Something done to him, to her. She takes a deep breath. “Ever since then, it’s just been Mom and me. Mom says she won’t marry anyone else. She won’t even date. I sort of thought ... well, I sort of thought that meant he might come back, you know?” She looks at me from under the hat and tears start to well in her eyes.

I thought my dad would come back, too. Even after they found his body trapped in the netting. Even after the boat was hauled onto the sand and into the boathouse. I thought he’d just swim out of the sea and laugh at me for worrying. Water and sand would stream down his face and body, making unexpected sand castles at his feet.