Page 9 of Breathing Under Water

He pushes off the wall, straightening to his full height. At five foot ten, he’s only four inches taller than me, but he somehow gives off taller vibes. It used to disarm me. Now it just makes him feel further away.

“Now? Here?” Phil asks. The panic on his face is unmistakable. “Can’t we table it and just try to enjoy the wedding together?”

My annoyance skyrockets. In the few days since Leo wasasked to prom, I have tried, repeatedly, to get Phil to go over websites with me, to acknowledge that Leo needs one-on-one training from a professional. Yet Phil has managed to avoid spending a moment with me through any of it. Only now, when he’s stuck at an event where most of the guests are strangers, does he deign to be with me. Well, fine. He can use me as his entertainment, but only if he’ll finally let me make my case.

“You’re stuck here either way. You can pass the time working through issues that matter in your life, or”—I tip my chin toward two ladies in pastel skirt suits just outside the doors of the little barn—“you could get to know Dean’s great-aunts in the Kentucky Derby hats.”

“I’m not doing this here,” he says, marching off toward a cater-waiter who’s holding a tray of Bloody Marys.

I should have known. He’s always maintained that arguing in public, even quietly, is not “the Becker way.” I watch for a moment as he moves toward the parents of the other groom and introduces himself. A charming smile fills his face as he congratulates them and then waves me over to meet them. And just like that, we go back to pretending.

6

McKenna

May 2023

The smell of Hamburger Helper greets me as I step through the front door. My heart stutters when I find my grandmother in the kitchen, standing at the stove where she’s jiggling a frying pan back and forth across a burner. It’s a motion I’ve seen her do a thousand times before, but these days I worry about her in front of an open flame. She’s dressed in a gauzy floral blouse and a pair of what she would call “smart” black trousers. And luckily, she seems to have everything under control.

“McKenna, finally,” she says when she sees me, a hint of exasperation in her voice as if I’m late. Her face is fully made-up, with aggressive layers of rouge and eyeshadow. At age seventy-five she’s still slender and tall, and she looks good, ready to head out for a night on the town. Minus the three rollers still set in her copper-colored hair.

I glance at the ancient wall clock above her head. It’s only four p.m., so I’m early, not late. Normally I don’t get back until after five, but the club closed early for a wedding. I guess my schedule is just one more thing my grandma’s having difficulty keeping straight lately.

“Hi, Glory.” I close the distance between us and lean in to kiss her cheek. The rosewood and jasmine scents of her perfume are hard to miss. It’s the same Nina Ricci perfume she’s worn for special occasions since I was a little girl. “Do you have plans tonight?” I ask cautiously, picking up the spoon she rested on the counter.

“Oh, yes.” She looks up at the clock too. “I have to hurry.”

I snag a taste of the beef and tomato sauce simmering in the pan before she swats at my arm and says, “You’ll spoil your appetite.”

It’s the same thing she always says when I start snacking while she’s cooking, but now the normalcy of it feels heartbreaking. Seeing her like her regular self only highlights how off her behavior’s been the last several months. Even so, if we’re both acting normal now, I’m here for that, so I roll my eyes before handing her back the spoon. “You know my appetite is endless, Glory. This morning’s practice burned through so many calories, I could eat an elephant and not feel full.” Still trying to act casual, I ask, “So, um, where are you going tonight?”

“Ronald’s coming to get me in an hour, and I’ve got to finish my hair. I just wanted to leave dinner for you first.” She opens a cabinet and takes out a painted casserole dish.

Ronald was her high school sweetheart, long before she met my grandpa, Fred. She’s told me stories over the years about how her parents never liked Ronald, and she always wondered if they might have gone the distance under different circumstances. How nice it would be if they actually got to explore that after all this time.

The only problem is that Ronald’s been dead for at least two decades.

“Oh, right,” I say as my mind races. The internet suggests that when an older person is confused like this, it can sometimes be kinder, and even more productive, to lie. “Therapeutic fibbing” is what they call it.

“I forgot to tell you,” I start cautiously. “Ronald left a message last night saying he needed to reschedule.” I’d like to avoid watching her sit by the window in the front room all night, waiting for a car that will never show up. “But why don’t you and I do something together instead? We can eat dinner on the deck and then play Scrabble.”

Glory looks at me in confusion, holding the wooden spoon up in midair.

“Reschedule?”

“He said he’d call you later in the week once he has a better sense of when he’s free.”

“Oh,” she says, the disappointment in her voice palpable. “If he can’t make it”—she looks at me feebly—“all right then.”

As I watch her walk back to her room to change out of her fancy clothes, I can’t deny what’s happening any longer. For at least a year she’s been having these blips. It started with small things, like calling me by my mom’s name or forgetting to take her blood pressure medication. When the mistakes got bigger, like the time she left the house in summer clothes on a snowy December day, I told myself that it wasn’t a big deal, that all older people get senile. I made sure to visit her more often last semester, helping however I could, keeping track of appointments or finding things for her around the house. I’d been sure that if I kept at it, we’d get everything figured out while I was home over the summer.

Clearly, I was wrong. I’m ashamed that with all the nursingtraining I’ve had, I somehow let things drag on this way. I guess I just haven’t been able to face the idea of Glory changing, ceasing to be herself, not when she’s the only person left in my life who is truly mine.

I’m about to follow her into her bedroom when my phone buzzes. It’s Lark again. A bunch of the girls are watchingPitch Perfecttonight, and she wants me to join them. I don’t have the energy to be the upbeat team buddy she’s looking for though, and I don’t want to leave Glory.

Heading to my room, I flop onto the floral comforter, kicking off my flip-flops and letting my eyes rove over the walls.

The room is still decorated the way I left it when I finished high school, with posters of Harry Styles and One Direction taped to the walls. There are Polaroids of some high school friends on the corkboard above the desk, and a bigger picture tacked to the center of the board showing Mom and me. My grandfather took the picture when I won Metropolitan Swimming’s big meet for ten-and-unders. I’m in my wet swimsuit, goggles still on my head, and Mom’s got her arm around me as she gives the camera her big toothy smile.