“You’re gonna fall,” I warned as she broke into a segment of Michael Jackson’s “Thriller” choreography, the part everyone knows with the zombie arms and the side toe taps. The ledge was not wide enough for dancing, but Georgia apparently didn’t agree. I yanked my shirt over my head, set it on our towels, and stared down at the black, glass-smooth surface, waiting for further instruction. I wasn’t jumping in first.
Georgia pulled off her T-shirt and tossed her shorts to the side, baring everything but the little that was covered by a baby blue bikini, and I forgot about the water or the fact that there was probably a creature living beneath the surface who liked dark meat. Georgia could save me. I would gladly let Georgia save me if she wore that suit. Her body was long and lean, with surprising curves and swells where a girl should curve and swell. But the best part was the way she seemed unconcerned and unbothered by it all, as if she was absolutely fine with the way her body looked and had no need to strut or pose or seek my approval.
She reached for my hand, and I jerked away, not wanting her to pull me in before I was good and ready.
“We’ll go together. The first jump is always the best. The water feels amazing, you’ll see.” I didn’t yield, and she kept her hand out-stretched, waiting.
“Come on, Moses. I’ll let you lead,” she said, her voice bouncing silkily off the metal walls, the sound more alluring than any singer on any mic in any nightclub across the country. Suddenly, I needed to get in the water or I was going to embarrass myself in my thin shorts. I grabbed her hand and without warning, plunged us both into the inky depths. Georgia’s squeal was muffled as the water covered my head, and I released her hand so I could fight my way to the surface.
We both came up sputtering, me from fear, Georgia from laughter, and it didn’t take me long until I had abandoned the fear and was laughing with her. She spurred me on, splashing and talking and playing in the flickering shadows that danced on the walls. We swam for a long time, unconcerned with the lateness of the hour, unafraid of discovery, strangely at ease with one another.
It wasn’t until I braced my arms on the ledge, my legs kicking out behind me in the water, resting momentarily, that I noticed the light bouncing off the water gave the wall in front of me an iridescent sheen. I reached my hand out to touch it, tracing the watery reflection with my finger, wondering how I could recreate the sheen with paint. Georgia moved to my side, holding onto the ledge, watching my finger as it painted invisible lines.
“When you paint . . . do you know what you’re going to paint before you start . . . or do you just let your heart take over?” she asked softly. It was a good question—a sweet question—and her sweetness unlocked something in me that I kept guarded most of the time. Still, I chose my words carefully, not wanting her to know everything about me, not wanting to ruin the moment with ugly truths, yet not wanting to lie and ruin the memory when the moment had passed.
“There are so many things that I see . . . that I don’t want to see. Images that come into my mind that I would rather not think about. Hallucinations, visions, or maybe just an overly vivid imagination. My brain might be cracked, but it’s not just my brain. The sky is cracked too, and I can sometimes see what’s on the other side.”
I sneaked a look at Georgia, wondering if I’d scared her with that last confession. But she didn’t look scared. She looked intrigued, fascinated. Beautiful. So I kept talking, encouraged.
“When I was younger I was scared a lot. When I would visit Gi, she would try to tell me stories to calm me down. Bible stories. She even told me about a baby named Moses. A baby found in a basket just like me. That’s how I got my name, you know.”
Georgia nodded. She knew. Everybody did.
“Gigi would tell me the stories to fill my head with better things. But it wasn’t until she started showing me artwork that things started to change. She had a book with religious art in it. Someone had donated it to the church and Gi brought it home so that nobody at church would see all those paintings of naked white people and get offended. She colored all the naked parts in with a black Sharpie.”
Georgia laughed, and I felt the air lodge in my throat. Her laugh was throaty and soft, and it made my heart swell like a balloon in my chest, fuller and fuller until I had to sneak breaths around its increased size.
“So you liked the pictures?” Georgia prodded after I stayed frozen and silent too long.
“Yes.”Georgia laughed again.
“Not the naked people.” I felt ridiculous and actually felt my face get hot. “I liked the beauty. The color. The anguish.”
“The anguish?” Georgia’s voice rose in question.
“It was an anguish that had nothing to do with me. An anguish everyone could see. Not just me. And I wasn’t expected to make it all go away.”
Georgia’s gaze touched on my face like a whisper and drifted away almost immediately, drawn to my tracing fingers.
“Have you ever seen the face of the Pieta?” I wanted her eyes on me again and I got what I wanted.
“What’s the Pieta?” she asked.
“It’s a sculpture by Michelangelo. A sculpture of Mary holding Jesus. Her son. After he died,” I paused, wondering why I was telling her this. I seriously doubted she cared. But I found myself continuing anyway.
“Her face, Mary’s face . . . it’s so beautiful. So peaceful. I don’t like the rest of the sculpture as much. But Mary’s face is exquisite. When I can’t take the stuff in my head, I think about her face. And I fill my mind with other things too. I think about the color and light of a Manet, the details of a Vermeer—Vermeer includes the tiniest things in his paintings, little cracks in the walls, a stain on a collar, a single nail, and there is such beauty in those little things, in the perfect ordinariness of them. I think about those things and I push out the images I can’t control, the things I don’t want to see, but am forced to see . . . all the time.” I stopped talking. I was almost panting. My mouth felt strange, numb, like I’d surpassed my daily word limit, and my lips and tongue were weak from overuse. I didn’t remember the last time I’d talked so much all at once.