The Invisible Circus - Jennifer Egan [126]
Reluctantly she turned from the water and walked back up the beach. Her brother was hunched on the towel. Phoebe sat beside him, and they watched the tiny pair of heads move slowly through the water. Then it was too dark to see them. Barry made a choking sound, and only then did Phoebe realize he was crying. “Bear,” she said. She caught the wet gleam of his cheeks and was about to ask what was wrong when she, too, began to cry, deep gasping sobs she neither understood nor could quell. Alone on this beach there seemed no hope for Barry and herself.
“Let’s go back,” Barry said. Phoebe nodded, turning to the water, thinking she’d call to her father and Faith and say they were leaving, but it was dark and her eyes were too messed up from crying to see anything.
“Phoebe, they don’t care,” Barry said. “Don’t you get it? Let’s just go.”
They stood. Barry left their towel in the sand and took Phoebe’s hand. Walking, she began to shiver, as if her tears were making her cold. They climbed to the boardwalk, then to the street lined with small square houses, each a different color. By the time they reached their grandparents’ house, they had stopped crying. What had happened on the beach felt strange, distant. Inside the house their mother was setting the table for dinner, her hair falling from a pin. “Is everything okay?” she asked.
“Everything’s fine,” Barry said.
From an upstairs window Phoebe watched for her father and sister’s return. It wasn’t long. They moved slowly through the bleached street light, wet hair gleaming. The sight was ghostly, dreamlike. They seemed to hold a secret knowledge between them. Phoebe assumed this must have to do with the swim they’d taken, that if only she’d followed them in, she would be included. She was six years old. Suddenly Phoebe was mad at Barry for dragging her from the beach, mad at everyone for keeping her here, against her will, in the plain bright house. I should have gone in, she thought.
twenty-one
A carved sign pointed the way to Corniglia.
Phoebe and Wolf walked single-file along a narrow path high above the sea. Phoebe went first. The mood between them was resigned, workmanlike. Every word they’d uttered the night before seemed ludicrous now.
The path rounded a point, then doubled back inland to circle a bay wedged in the mountain’s lap. Rocky promontories reached into the sea on both sides of it. The land was staggered for cultivation, lifting from the ocean like a vast flight of undulating steps, each one carpeted with grape vines growing on silvery wires. Phoebe walked gingerly, fearful of swerving off the path and onto the vines.
As the morning mist burned off, the heat became intense. Phoebe and Wolf skirted the bay and headed seaward along the second rocky point. Phoebe’s heart began to stammer in her chest. They would turn the corner and there would be Corniglia. But the turn revealed only another bay, larger this time, followed by another promontory. “Damn,” Phoebe said, breathing shakily.
Under a sheen of sweat Wolf was pale. “Are you all right?” she asked.
“Altitude,” Wolf said with a faint laugh. Phoebe didn’t get it. “We’re at sea level,” he explained.
They began their journey around the second bay. The ribbons of vineyard gave off a rusty smell. Phoebe wanted to go faster but the path was narrow; she had to keep watching her feet. As they neared the hub of the next point, a rush of dizzy blood filled her head. Here it comes, she thought, expectation nearly stifling her breath. But again she was disappointed—another bay, another long arc inland.
“Jesus,” Wolf said. He leaned against