The Invisible Circus - Jennifer Egan [125]
Back in their room Wolf dove into sleep almost instantly, his shirt still on. But no sooner had Phoebe closed her eyes than she felt again the drift and pull of memory.
The final night of their father’s final trip to Mirasol. For the first time all vacation she and Barry and Faith had stayed on the beach into twilight, lying on their backs in the sand watching the first pale stars blink awake.
When their father loomed over them, they scrambled to their feet. “Forget it,” he said, waving away their apologies. “I felt like getting outside.” He seemed more tired than usual, heavy-headed the way he used to get when he drank. “Maybe I’ll go for a swim,” he said. “How about a swim, Faith?”
There was a startled pause. “I don’t know,” Faith said. “Maybe not, Dad.”
They stood together in the cooling sand. Their father wore his bathing trunks, an old T-shirt pulled over them. “I can’t leave this place without swimming once,” he said.
“Let’s go tomorrow,” Faith suggested, “before we leave.”
“Nah. Tomorrow I won’t have the energy.”
Faith glanced at Barry. Their father threw back his head. “It’s gorgeous out here,” he said. “Christ, look at that sky. I want to swim under that sky.” And to Phoebe’s joy he seemed his old self again, full of vigor and impatience. He lifted the T-shirt over his head and tossed it into the sand. Though he’d lost weight, he was still well-built, a different species entirely from the soft, overripe fathers of Phoebe’s friends. The patch of dark hair on his chest made the crude shape of a heart. He was more than a father—he was a man, with strong legs and a mustache, a hard flat stomach they’d once taken glee in walloping with all their might, for it never seemed to hurt him. Though their father had once looked imposing, now he was tough and slight, distilled to his very essence.
“Come on.” He held out a hand to Faith. “Please, babe,” he said in a tight voice. “Come in with me.”
It was a strange moment, for although they stood in a cluster, their father spoke only to Faith. Phoebe had a brief, hallucinatory sense that she herself was not actually there, was witnessing a private moment between her father and sister.
A hacking cough shuddered up from deep within him, painful to hear. “Come on,” he said, to Faith. “Do this for me.”
Faith started to cry.
Their father smiled, a ghost of mischief in his face. “What’s the matter, you scared?” he cajoled her gently. Faith wiped her eyes, not answering. “That’s okay,” their father said. “I’m scared, too.”
He took Faith’s head in his hands and kissed the top of it. Phoebe wondered if her father had felt the hot bruise under her sister’s hair. Then he pulled Faith against him, clasping her head to his bare chest as if it were a precious box someone else were trying to wrest from his grasp. Phoebe felt Barry go still beside her. Faith was sobbing now, her eyes closed. Their father’s chest moved quickly, shallowly, as he breathed. Finally he let Faith go and began walking toward the water, feebly, like an old man. There was something terrible in the sight of their slender white father approaching that dark sea.
“Faith, go,” Barry whispered fiercely. “Go!”
Faith started as if jerked awake. Without a word she left them and followed their father, who had reached the water’s edge and was standing there as if waiting, knowing she would come. They went in together, bit by bit. Little waves were coming in; their father had to brace himself against their faint impact. Faith took his hand. Phoebe strained to see them in the fading light. She felt a pressure inside herself, as if something there were in danger of breaking. When the water reached her father’s chest, Phoebe said, “I’m going in, too, Bear.”
Barry made no reply. Phoebe ran to the sea. The water was warm, silky over her feet. Faith and her father floated close together; Phoebe saw only their heads. She went