The Wave by Kristen Crusoe (smallest ebook reader txt) 📕

The bathroom looked out onto the wide, sloping yard that ran down to the river. Apple trees, plum, and cherry dotted the landscape, leafless and barren. A large fir, with many branches, old and nicked by time and storm, stood, shaking and swaying in the wind. A rope swing danced from one of its lower limbs. They would swing out over the river, dropping into its waters, clear and freezing cold, even in summer. Devon’s laughter and screams of make-believe fear rang out. She took a deep breath, exhaled longer, as the yoga therapist had taught her. Again, and again until she felt calmed. The medical bag was clutched in her hand. Setting it down on the counter, next to the double sinks, she began setting the dressings and other apparatus on a clean towel. The nurse had instructed her to stand in the shower and let the warm water loosen the bandages around her chest, then gently ease them off. Clair had asked what would she do if the drains pulled out. The nurse had said that wouldn’t happen. They were sewn in and were secure. Taped up, with plugs for draining, the nurse had assured her nothing bad could happen. OK then, she thought. Here I go.

The water flowed down her face, her back. She was unsure if she should turn and let the water run down her front, right over the dressings, but soon realized she would have to do that. Slowly, she turned cautiously to the right, each new area of skin being cleansed and massaged by the water jets, bringing her back to herself, to the woman she was before any of this happened. Like a baptism, she thought. I was lost, then found, lost again, and now, maybe found again. Everything that I was is gone. These very breasts I nursed my son from, gone. Soon, my hair will be gone. Broken down, shattered, turned to rust. And then, cells replaced; all new and resurrected. If I live. While I live, she reframed.

Standing with her face up to the water flow, feeling its warmth begin to loosen the tape, the weight of the bandages pulling on her skin, she raised both arms up, pushing wet hair out of her eyes. Tightness burned, under her arms and down towards both wrists. She had been told it was important to reach her arms up, several times a day, to prevent lymphatic fluid buildup. Keep your fluids flowing, the nurse had said, moving her arms in circles around her head. Clair had said she looked like a crazy banshee, and they had both laughed. Still, she understood the concept. Like a garden hose, any blockage in the system would clog up the flow, and we don’t want that, do we, Clair? She smiled at the memory.

The dressings were getting looser now. She gently tugged at the corner of one. To her surprise, it came off in one piece, dangling by a few strands of sticky tape to the bottom of her ribcage. Her breath caught. She held it while she pulled the last of the tape, releasing the dressing altogether. The site of her slashed chest made her slip down the shower stall to her haunches, the water pounding on her head. As though by design, the dressing on the other side slipped away, hanging by a few threads of tape, lying on her belly where she slumped, faint and tremulous.

‘Adam,’ she called, her voice weak. ‘Adam,’ stronger.

He rushed in, seeing through the glass shower door. ‘Oh Clair, darling, what have you done?’

He stepped through, gathering her in his arms.

‘These drains,’ she cried. ‘I have to drain all this fluid.’

‘It’s OK, Clair, I’ll help. Here, let me see.’

He began to open the plug on one of the drains, and Clair cried out, ‘Oh God, not here. We’ll have this bloody mess all over us.’

‘Well shit,’ he said. ‘I have it open, now what?’

They began laughing, he holding onto the plug, stopping the drain with his thumb. Clair looking at him, soaking wet in his clothes, hair streaming into his face and eyes, looking so much out of his depth she laughed harder. He figured out how to close the plug and yet, they remained. He holding her, stroking her back, as their laughter turned to tears.

‘I am so sorry, Clair,’ he said. ‘So very sorry.’

‘I am too, Adam. That day, I was angry. Seeing you, hearing you. Why, why so many women?’

‘Clair, I was never with another woman, not like that, not since we married. I flirted sure, hoping to get a reaction from you. But sex, love? Never. From the first moment I saw you, I loved you. All I ever wanted was for you to love me too. Then Devon came, and all you seemed to care about or notice was him. I knew it was because he had special needs, I loved him, Clair, so much. But you never would let me in. You wouldn’t let me share the love or the pain.’

They huddled there, not talking, until the water cooled. Clair shivered.

‘Here, let me help,’ he said, lifting her up. They stepped out into the bathroom, warm from a small space heater. Adam gently wrapped her in a towel. He led her to the side of the bed, setting pillows against the headboard so she could lie back. He covered her with a soft fleece blanket.

‘I did see him, Adam. That day I drowned. He was there, with the selkies.’

‘I believe you, Clair. Now rest, let me cook for you.’

‘You cook?’ she chided.

‘Just you wait and see,’ he said, pulling off his wet clothes.

She watched as his pale; angular body came into view. He had lost weight, she noticed. His broad chest looked sunken. His waist, slender, sloped down to narrow hips, tight buttocks. His back was turned to her. As his arms reached up to pull off his fleece sweater, muscles rippled along his spine. It was