Although not the quarry I remembered from days long past, there were directions to it in the house. We put on our swim suits under our clothes and drove to the road marked on the little map. Like so many places to swim in the country, you know it's there because suddenly there are cars parked by the side of the road. Geoff and I parked
our car, and walked down the red dirt path, deep into the woods. We
could hear voices pitched high with the pleasure of summer, carrying
across the water. The woods opened up, and we could see the water. We eased ourselves into its silky coolness. For a while we just played in the water together,
enjoying the its softness, looking at the water lilies,
basking in this moment of being in the woods, in the water, far away from the hard, heat-baked streets of our apartment in
East Harlem.
There was a group of adolescent boys swinging from a rope
attached to a big tree on the hillside. They'd climb up to a platform,
grab the rope, swing out over the water and drop in. "I'm going to try
that," Geoff said. "I dunno, honey," I said. Those boys were lithe
fearless teenagers, loud and silly. Somehow I was worried about Geoff
trying to do what they were doing. But Geoff was just a big boy, too,
really, and wanted to do what the other boys were doing.
He
climbed up to the platform as I watched. The boys were polite, and
made room for him. Geoff was tall, taller than any of the others. As
he grabbed the rope, one of the boys said to him "Bend your knees up,"
but he didn't hear. Instead of swinging out over the water, somehow he
banged his legs and feet all the way down the cliffside before the drop-off. The boys
laughed but were wincing too as they watched him drop into the water.
I was terrified, and swam to him. He was in so much pain that he
couldn't speak. "Just stay here with me," he managed to say. We sat
in the water for a long time. I tried to figure out if I needed to go
for help. I couldn't imagine him walking back up the path to the car.
"Just let me sit here for a while," he whispered. I had visions of
somehow having him choppered out of the woods, like in the movies.
"Let
me sit and not speak," he whispered again. I waited, agonizingly, my
pleasure in the woods and the lily pads and the dragonflies and the
dappled water all vanished at this point. Finally he said that he was
ready to try walking up the path. Slowly, slowly we limped up the
rocky hillside. Well, I wasn't limping but it felt like I was.
Finally
we reached the car. Geoff said he could drive -- a good thing, since
I'm not much of a driver. I said we needed to go to a hospital, to an
emergency room, and get him checked out. Geoff said no, and insisted
on stopping at the store so we could buy fresh corn and ice-cream for
dinner.
