No Such Person Read Free Page A

friend under and hold him under for a long time.
    It’s a perfect murder. He’ll claim he was stupid and unthinking and he’s ever so sorry. And it will go down as a tragic accident.
    When she looks back, the water skier is gone.
    Miranda prays that he has dived; that he is swimming faster than the fastest fish; that he will pop up safely out of the channel.
    But almost certainly he has not dived.
    The river is full of currents; it flows down to the sea no matter which direction the tide is going, and with the tide coming in, those two forces roil and whirl. The displacement of all that water by the barge creates a third force, against which his body is as fragile as a leaf. No matter how big a breath he takes, the air will not last long enough. He will be held on the muddy bottom as if by an alligator. Or chopped by the massive propellers of the tug like cabbage in a blender.
    Miranda runs down the cliff stairs to join Lander on the dock. “Lanny, he did it on purpose. I saw him. He slowed down on purpose so his friend would fall in the water and be killed.”
    Lander hates being called Lanny. “That’s ridiculous!” she snaps. “Of course he didn’t do that. And how could you tell anyway? That’s a horrible thing to say. The poor man is thoughtless and inexperienced and now he’s going to find himself responsible for a death—but it’s an accident, Rimmie!”
    Miranda hates being called Rimmie. “Lander, I saw his hand on the throttle. I saw him let the tow rope go slack.”
    Her sister fixes her with a glare so hostile that Miranda flinches. “This is not a video, Rimmie. This is not television. This is some poor young man drowning and the poor friend who will carry his bad judgment with him forever. Don’t make it worse with some vicious exaggeration.”
    The barge and tug pass by.
    Miranda’s father is getting into their Zodiac. He will try to find the body. Miranda’s mother has come down the stairs to join Miranda and Lander. Incredibly, she is holding a mug of coffee that she has prepared for the boy in the boat. “He’ll be in shock,” she says. “Signal him, Lander. I’ve called nine-one-one, they’re on the way, but water rescues are slow.”
    Lander yells at the
Paid at Last.
The driver nods and slowly approaches the Allerdon dock. Miranda finds this as shocking as the murder. The driver should be searching the water, along with the pleasure boats that have cut their engines and are hoping to spot the skier. High up on the tug and barge, the crew stands in horror, looking down, helpless to do a thing. And yet the driver of the boat just tootles up to the nearest dock.
    Miranda says, “Where are Henry and Hayden?”
    “I sent them home,” says her mother. “I don’t want them to see what will happen next.”
    What will happen next is they will find a damaged dead body. Miranda doesn’t want to see it either. She wants the swimmer to pop up smiling. “Mom,” she says, and she finds breathing hard, as if she too were underwater, “Mom, the driver of that powerboat—he—”
    Lander interrupts. “Rimmie. Don’t lie. Don’t exaggerate. Don’t, don’t,
don’t
repeat that nonsense. Do you want to ruin a second life?”
    There is some basis to this ferocity. Miranda in childhood always doubled or tripled any event. If she stubbed her toe, she described a broken ankle and a hospital visit. If her mother slammed on the brakes while driving, Miranda cried out that her ribs were broken and her seat belt torn away. When she returned from playdates, she talked about a sight-seeing helicopter flight instead of her failure to make a helicopter out of a Lego kit.
    She hasn’t exaggerated (her parents’ word) or lied (Lander’s) in years, but in Lander’s mind, the little sister hasn’t grown up and hasn’t grown better.
    The Coast Guard will come, because it’s a water accident. The ambulance will come, because there will be a body. The state police will come. And what will I do?