Page 23 of SEAL’S Baby Surprise (Lanes #2)

AUSTIN

The morning after the carnival, I find Lee curled up in my big chair outside. She is hugging her knees and looking out to sea. She looks up at me with those amazing blue eyes of hers. They look damp and a little red, as if she’s been crying.

“Let’s not send Julia to school today,” she says. “Let’s have a family day. Does she know how to paddle-board?”

As it happened, I had been teaching my daughter paddle-boarding and water safety. “Some,” I say cautiously. I don’t want Lee to think that Julia could do it on her own.

“Maybe that little nook just below the island?” she says.

“Sure,” I say. “There’s no reason Julia needs to go to school every day. It’s just been a good routine for both of us. If we have her with us, we won’t have much time for each other.”

“That’s all right,” Lee says. “She’s a good kid, and she deserves some quality time.”

I’d kind of thought we’d given her plenty of quality time at the Farmer’s Market Fair and Carnival, but more attention of a different sort probably won’t hurt. “I’ll see what we’ve got that can be packed for lunch,” I say. “It might be peanut butter and jelly.”

“I don’t mind PB&J,” she says, even though I’ve noticed she isn’t all that fond of it. I rummage through the food locker and discover that I have some tins of potted meat and a can of spam.

We’d brought home fresh bread, a bag of purple plums, some cheese, and several small jars of jelly. I pack it all carefully in the flotation cooler, along with a can of dog food and some kibble, and water for all of us.

By the time Julia is up, I have us packed and the two inflatable boards blown up. I strap everything on a fat-wheeled little cart that I will leave with the lifeguard on duty.

It’s not likely that anyone would walk away with it, but it would be inconvenient if we didn’t have it for the trip back up the hill with all our gear.

Julia is a little disappointed not to go play with her friends, but the prospect of paddleboarding all day more than makes up for missing time with Betty and Bobby.

As soon as we are out on the water, Lee seems to relax. She lets Julia show her the right way to sit on an inflatable board and shift the paddle from one side to the other to keep from going in circles.

I know that Lee already knows this — it was one of the things we’d been practicing. But apparently it amuses her to let Julia be the teacher.

We paddle around the end of a small promontory to a secluded beach where l’d liked to spend mornings when I’d come to the oceanfront alone. The water is shallow all along the edge. I have the idea that while Julia and Lee entertain each other, I might be able to get a little work done.

I’d been neglecting my accounts lately, and I know that if I don’t take care of some things, I will soon be so far behind, I’ll never catch up.

While most of my financial wizardry is at a stage where it could take care of itself for as long as three months at a time without intervention, I have some accounts where some financial shuffling needs to take place.

Just as I had hoped, we beach the boards above tide level so they won’t drift away. Lee becomes the perfect age mate/companion for Julia, a chameleon behavior that I marvel at because I can’t do it, and the two of them set about building not only a sandcastle, but an entire village.

I am able to get my work done while sitting under a beach umbrella, keeping one eye on them. Ark digs himself a hole in the sand where he will remain cool without being actually wet.

Consequently, we are all extremely pleased with ourselves when we settle down to have our lunch in the shade of the umbrella.

It is after lunch that things begin to fall apart.

To start with, Julia has been used to taking a short nap in the afternoon, but both she and Lee are too excited for such a sedentary activity. Consequently, they talk me into all three of us paddling out away from shore.

I let Lee take point, with Julia in between us. In my imagination, we are a family party. I could get used to this, I think. Lee is an absolute natural as a parent.

As I watch, Lee is laughing back over her shoulder at something Julia has just said. Julia gets excited and starts waving her paddle around in the air.

Her paddleboard is the chunky kind intended for kids.

It is super hard to turn them over, and even then, the kid should be tethered to the board with an ankle strap.

Julia leans way to the left on her board.

It tips, dumping my daughter into the ocean.

And that is when I realize she is not wearing her ankle tether!

Before I can shuck my own tether and jump in, Ark launches himself off the front of my board, ducks into the light waves, and emerges with Julia’s flotation device clenched in his teeth.

My mind goes straight to guilt-tripping all the adults involved, but I keep it together enough to pull my daughter onto my board. “Lee!” I bellow. “Lee, get back here!”

Then I realize, she has already turned about and is struggling to paddle back to us. Unfortunately, in her unskilled panic, she has set her board to spinning instead of heading back. I’d heard the expression, “heart leaped into my throat,” but I’d never felt it.

At that moment, it seems to me that every motion in my chest stops. I have Julia safe, but I don’t dare leave her on my rigid board to go after Lee. I feel as if my heart is in my throat, and I am being ripped in two!

Fortunately, Ark is under no such constraint. With Julia in my care, he immediately swims out to Lee. “Lay down on the board and let him tow you!” I yell.

Lee looks toward me, panic on her face. Then she sees Ark coming to her, and she follows my shouted direction. All the air whooshes out of my lungs as she lies flat on the board, holding onto Ark’s flotation harness.

“What about the other board?” Lee asks, as soon as Ark has her near me.

“Forget it,” I say, holding Julia close to me. “I can get another. Let’s get the two of you to shore.”

In a few minutes, we are all on dry land. Lee quickly and competently pulls the boards up out of the water.

“I’m okay, Daddy, I’m okay,” Julia says over and over. “Don’t squeeze so tight.”

I let out a gasp that is somewhere between a laugh and a sob. “Sorry Judy-Rudy. I thought for a minute I’d lost both of you.”

“Ark’s a hero,” Julia announces. “Put me down, Daddy, so I can hug him.”

I set Julia on the sand, and she immediately goes to Ark and hugs him around the neck.

“I’m sorry,” Lee is sobbing, “I’m so, so sorry. I didn’t think to check. It’s my fault.”

I had been thinking just that, but then I realize that I was just as culpable. I hadn’t checked on either Julia or Lee to make sure their ankle tethers were properly attached.

“No, no,” I say. “I’m the one with experience. I should have checked both of you. Did you fasten yours?”

Shame-faced, Lee shakes her head. “I don’t like to be tied to things,” she says. “I made swim champion twice when I was in high school.”

“But no one swims well if they are hit on the head,” I say gently.

“I know that,” Lee says irritably. “But it scares me to be tied to a board or a boat. What if it sinks? What if it gets swept out to sea like Julia’s board?”

We both look out into the water. Julia’s board is bobbing serenely along, and slowly drifting back toward shore.

“It’s coming back!” Julia exclaims. “My paddleboard likes me! Are we going to have to go home because I fell in?” Her face has a look on it that bodes ill if the answer is yes.

Ark, tired of being hugged in a near death grip, showers all of us with wet sand and plunges back into the water. Before I can think to stop him, he paddles out to the floating board and begins towing it back.

“Maybe we could go somewhere with a wading pool?” Lee suggests timidly. “I think I’ve had enough water for today, but Julia is still excited about it.”

Such a good solution! Why had I not thought of that? “There’s the family Y on the other side of the village,” I say. “I can tow us all back, and we can be there almost before you know it. What do you think, Julia?”

“It will be okay,” she says grandly, as if conferring a great favor upon all of us.

I fasten the two inflatables to my rigid board. Ark and Lee ride on the bigger of the two inflatable boards, and I keep Julia with me. We load the picnic things onto Julia’s little board.

None of us say much as we stow the paddleboards at the van, then walk on over to the Y. There, we run into the one snag of the day.

The receptionist looks at the four of us. “You can’t take the dog in,” she says. “Especially since he’s filthy.”

“He’s my ESA,” I say. “We can spray him off if you’ve got a shower area. I’m very much in need of him right now. My daughter fell off her paddleboard, but she is not ready to stop having water fun.”

“I could. . .” Lee starts to say.

I shake my head, pulling a folded piece of paper from my wallet. I’m a little ashamed of myself, because Ark is much more Julia’s ESA these days than he is mine.

But I’m not going to leave him outside in the heat while we have fun. And I’m not ready to take my eye off either Julia or Lee after our near disaster.

I hand the paper to the receptionist. “Oh,” she says. Then, “Oh! Thank you for your service. But…please hose him off in the men’s shower area, and don’t let him in the pool.”

I smile thinly at the woman. “If someone is drowning, I won’t be able to stop him. But I think Ark has had enough recreational swimming for today. Our plan is to let Julia, my daughter, play in the wading pool while the rest of us relax in the air conditioning.”

The receptionist laughs a little nervously. “I guess that will be all right.”

In a few minutes, Ark, Lee, and I are hanging out in the chairs provided for parents who have kids in the shallow pool.

“I didn’t mean . . .” Lee starts to say.

“I’m sorry,” I start.

Then we both laugh. “She’s safe,” I say.

“In fact, I think you might have been in more danger than she was. Ark got her out of the water almost as soon as she fell in. But I’ll be honest. I don’t think I could ever forgive myself if something happened to her.

There were two of us, so I wasn’t paying as close attention as I should have. ”

“I swim really well,” Lee says. “I was okay, really, I was. Can Julia swim?”

“Take a look,” I say, nodding to where my daughter is happily dog paddling in three feet of water.

“She’s learning, but I don’t think she’s up to swimming where it’s deep just yet.

Lee, I’ve been stupid and selfish today.

I left you to entertain her all morning, and then I didn’t double check either of you.

I’m so angry with myself. . .” And I am, too, I realize.

The panic I had felt floods over me again.

Ark sits up and lays his chin on my knee. He looks up at me with his big, brown eyes, his brows drawn together in a little crease.

“I’m okay, big guy,” I say. “They’re okay, so I’m okay.”

Hesitantly, Lee puts an arm around me. I draw her in, and we watch Julia play. Both of us are quiet, locked in our own heads with our thoughts.