Of Poseidon

her from biting him.
    After a long silence, Rachel says, “A house? A car? What will you be doing in Jersey? Sounds pretty deep. Everything okay?”
    He tries to put distance between him and his sister before he whispers, “I … I might be going to school there for a little while.”
    Silence. He checks the screen to make sure the signal is good. “Hello?” he whispers.
    “I’m here, babe. You just, uh, surprised me, that’s all.” She clears her throat. “So umm … what kind of school? High school? College?”
    He shakes his head into the phone. “I don’t know yet. I don’t exactly know how old she is—”
    “ She? You’re buying a house and a car to impress a girl ? Oh, swoooon!”
    “No, it’s not like that. Not exactly. Will you stop squealing, please?”
    “Oh, no, no, no, I will not stop squealing. I’m going with you. This sort of thing is my specialty.”
    “Absolutely not,” he says, running a hand through his hair. Rayna grabs his arm and mouths, “Get off the phone now .” He shoos her away and is met with a growl.
    “Oh, please, Galen,” Rachel says, her voice syrupy sweet. “You’ve got to let me come. And besides, you’re gonna need a mother if you want to register for school. And you don’t know a thing about shopping for clothes. You need me, sweet pea.”
    He grits his teeth, partly because Rayna is twisting his arm to the point of snapping and partly because Rachel is right—he doesn’t have a clue what he’s doing. He flings off his sister and kicks sand on her for good measure before he walks farther down the beach.
    “Fine,” he says. “You can come.”
    Rachel squeals and then claps her hands. “Where are you? I’ll come get you.” Galen notes that she no longer sounds tired.
    “Uh, Dr. Milligan said Destin.”
    “Okay. Where’s Destin?”
    “He said Destin and he said Florida.”
    “Okay, gotcha. Lemme see.…” He hears clicking in the background. “Okay, it looks like I’ll have to fly, but I can be there by tomorrow. Is Rayna coming, too?”
    “Not in a million years.”
    The phone is snatched from his grasp. Rayna sprints away with it, yelling as she runs. “You bet I’m coming! And bring me some of those lemon-cookie things again, will you, Rachel? And some of that shiny stuff to put on my lips when they get too dry…”
    Galen massages his temple with fingertips, contemplating what he’s about to do.
    And he considers kidnapping Emma instead.

5
    DAWN BREAKS unwelcome and hazy against the bay windows of the living room. I groan and pull the quilt over my head, but not before I see the stoic face of the grandfather clock in the corner. I picked the living room to sleep in because it’s the only room in the house with just one clock. All night I allowed myself to admire the driftwood clock, so long as I didn’t look at the face. The last time I failed was two a.m. Now it is six a.m. Which means, for the first time since Chloe died, I have slept for four consecutive hours.
    It also means the first day of my senior year will be starting in two. I am not ready for this.
    I throw off the covers and sit up. The bay window shows me that it is not light, not dark, but gray outside. It looks cold, but I know it isn’t. The wind whispers through the dune grass just off our back porch, making it look like a gathering of hula dancers. I wonder what the sea looks like this morning. For the first time since Chloe died, I decide to check.
    I open the sliding glass door to a warm August breeze. A quick jump off the last step of the back porch and my bare feet sink in the cool sand. The beach is private, and I wrap my arms around myself, taking the path between the two huge dunes in front of our house. Past them is a miniature hill just big enough to block my view of the ocean from the living room. Had I slept in my room last night, I could already be soaking in the sunrise from my third-floor balcony.
    But my room is full of all things Chloe. There is nothing on my shelves, on my desk, or in my closet that doesn’t have something to do with her. Awards, pictures, makeup, clothes, shoes, stuffed animals. Even my bedding—a quilted collage of pictures from our childhood we made together for a school project. If I took everything out of my room connected to Chloe, my room would be pretty empty.
    The same as I feel inside.
    I stop a few feet from the wet sand and plop down, drawing my knees to my chest. Morning tide makes a great companion when you