Halfway Home by Paul Monette Page A

says, making a mental note for later. He stands, retrieves his toolbox, and we head out of the Chinese garden.
    Because I have slept the day away, the sun is already winking at the horizon. As we tramp down the slope from the sycamore grove, I say, "Come down to the beach with me, will you? In case I have another heart attack."
    "Well, I gotta wash," he replies, holding up his bare arm, slick with muck from the fish pool. Then he laughs. "Hell, I can wash in the ocean."
    We make for the beach stairs. Gray leaves his toolbox under a cactus, and we head down, me first. Behind me Gray asks, "You think he came because you're sick?"
    I feel a startled relief that the subject hasn't been dropped. "No, he didn't know that till Mona told him. I don't know why. The Irish get sloppy sentimental sometimes." We're clopping down the stairs at a fair clip. It's easier to talk about this in motion, my back turned. "I didn't really let him talk," I admit, sheepish for me. "I think he wanted to."
    "Well, next time," Gray declares briskly.
    "Oh no, there won't be any next time. That's all she wrote."
    We've reached the bottom, coming off the steps onto the smooth and trackless sand. The tide is inching out, about ten feet away. Gray shucks his Top-siders and rolls his khaki pants to the knee. Without preamble he struts into the shallows, bending down and splashing water up his arms. You can practically see the gooseflesh.
    "How cold is it?"
    "Nippy," says Gray, cupping his hands and splashing his face. "Foo used to say there's an iceberg off the point."
    He turns with a grin, happily wet, then his eyes go wide. For I am already half-undressed, my sweat shirt on the sand, shinnying out of my jeans. I drop my eyes as I drop my shorts, for Gray has never seen me naked. As I trot toward him I can see he wants to tell me not to, but holds his tongue. I'm hollering at the cold when it's still just at my ankles. I take a long stride past him and dive headfirst.
    It's unbelievably arctic, a thousand knives. I roar up and out like a whale breaching, my arms flailing the surface. A numbness locks the joints of my bad knee. But I'm not planning to swim anyway, not a stroke. I totter to my feet, fighting the surge of the undertow. I turn and face Gray, about hip deep, and slap my hands over my head like a seal, whooping. Gray still frowns with concern, but he's glad, too. I head in, scrambling through sand that sinks and shifts. I'm chattering with the cold, I can't wait to get out, but I'm delirious from the shock. The sand gets firmer, and I feel like I'm dancing. Panting and roaring with pleasure, I drop to my knees on firm ground.
    "I would've brought a towel," Gray says fretfully, but with no reproach.
    I can't believe how upside down I feel, reeling still from the zero cold, every inch of my skin slapped. A pang of victory rises in me like a shout, though I am jerked by shivers. The sensation is very specific: it's the first time my body has not been crawling in months. I'm washed clean. I sit back on my haunches, hair stiff, eyes stinging, and Gray is already holding out my clothes.
    "Now don't get chilled," he admonishes me.
    I clamber to my feet, shaking off like a dog. I don't feel shy being naked now. My nuts have seized just like Brian's did, and yet I feel the most insistent cockiness. It's the first time I've done anything in so long—I'm practically a man again. I hunch and let Gray pull my sweat shirt on me, feel him rubbing my shoulders and arms, bringing the blood back up. In that moment he seems like my coach, and I stand in the sunset, simple as a jock. I grab my pants but don't put them on, tucking them with my Reeboks under my arm. I start up the stairs, butt-naked and laughing. Fastidious Gray stops to bat the sand from his feet and put on his shoes clean.
    Of course the eighty steps do what they always do—put me in my place. Twenty steps up and I'm wheezing, favoring the banister. Yet I'm remarkably undaunted. I set my pace and