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“Near Fatal Drowning Accident,” the headline read. And the story was full of the same blather. The twelve-year-old girl’s name was Rebecca Morison. Three years ago — not an August day, but a July day in 2000 — Rebecca had gone for a swim off some secluded plot of beach and nearly drowned. It took paramedics four minutes to get her breath going again. There didn’t appear to be any brain damage, and Rebecca got to her feet within minutes of being resuscitated. She was, however, still taken to the hospital for further checkups, checkups that found nothing wrong. “It was a near miss,” the last line read, “but thankfully, little Rebecca will be just fine.”
Where was that secluded spot? The article didn’t say. But I would have been willing to bet on a particular place.
I read and reread the article. Just one of your run-of-the-mill close call stories. Nothing out of the ordinary; but then, they really didn’t know what they were looking for, did they?
I took a scrap of paper from my purse and jotted down the name, Rebecca Morison, and her parent’s names, Michelle and Jack Morison.
“Cindy?” I called. She was practically standing right next to me anyway.
“You’re ready for the big fish?”
The big fish — how lovely. Still, I played along. “Yes. Let’s reel her in.” And I smiled apologetically, though I was smiling to myself more than to anyone else this time.
Cindy came over, took out the old microfilm, and put in the even older one. “Watch,” she said, “I’ve got this down to an art.” And she pushed the forward button. The screen illuminated a blur of black and white text and pictures. They whirred by for what seemed like minutes. “…Twenty-five-one-thousand, twenty-six-one-thousand.” Cindy released the button, and the blur became bold. She hadn’t hit it right on, but close. Very close, indeed. “Oh shoot. Missed it by a hair.” And she centered the headline.
“Thanks,” I said.
And Librarian Cindy was gone again.
“Beachwood Bay Mourns the Loss of Two Children.” The article dated back to August 13, 1942. Centered below the headline were two pictures. The one on the right was John. The one on the left, Elizabeth. The boy had short-cropped and dark hair, had eyes that matched. And he wore a smile that seemed shifty, even in the photograph. Elizabeth had hair down to her shoulders, hair not too curly and not too straight. Her eyes were perky and bright. And the toothy smile she sported, seemed, well…genuine.
“Two of our very own were lost to the ocean yesterday, August the 12th,” the article began. “We will never forget them. Jonathan Shlizback and Elizabeth Henderson, both twelve years old, went for a swim early last evening. The storm caught them unprepared. The near-hurricane force winds and torrential rain made a calm Atlantic into a perilous proposition. Their bodies were found a little after 10 p.m. by the parents of both children, who were concerned upon their not coming home. They were found on an isolated part of beach.”
The size of the storm the article mentioned was a bit exaggerated. There were no near-hurricane-force winds, for all I can remember. Did it rain hard? Yes. Was it a strong and guttural storm? Yes. But hurricane force? No, I didn’t think so. It was just the town’s coping mechanism, I think: an explanation for the inexplicable.
Still, kids can get themselves into trouble with or without a sudden-onset storm.
The article went on and on about what great kids they had been, about how they would be missed. There were interviews with teachers and friends. Tentative funeral plans were mentioned that the whole town might be able to attend. As for how much John was missed, I can’t say. But I recognized Elizabeth. I knew her from school.
Elizabeth always sat in the back of the classroom. I never shared any classes with her, because she was a year older than me, but I remember because any time that I was going to the restroom or to the nurse’s office or for an early release, there she was. I would glance into the rooms as I passed and see her in one of them, always chewing on the eraser of her pencil and staring nowhere. Sometimes right at me as I walked by. It gives me the creeps to think about all that now. It gives me goosebumps, the way her eyes once regarded me. Never abnormal but not quite normal, either.
My daughter has a sign hanging in her house, and whenever she dishes out some punishment that my grandchildren don’t agree with, she points to it. A loon is painted on its wooden flank, a loon with red-rimmed eyes and an open beak. At the top of the sign, in golden lettering: “The Loony Bin.” Beneath the loon, “Abnormality is the Normality at this Locality.”
Whenever I see that sign I think of her. I think of Elizabeth. In a way, their eyes were similar. The loon’s red-ringed eyes are forever frozen on the wood. Elizabeth’s pink-ringed, drowned eyes are the splinters that wedge themselves into my sanity. They are the eyes that regard me in my nightmares.
I may have seen Elizabeth in school, but I didn’t talk to her there. I didn’t actually communicate with her until I was twelve years old — August 12, 1943, the day Richie died.
About Tony Dvorak
