The Edgewater

He selected a chocolate from the crystal bowl. The exterior was frosted with divots. The bowl reminded him of a snapping turtle that caught his line by mistake two summers ago on the pond. He hoped he snagged a walleye…but it felt bulkier, like an old tire. His heart beat faster as he reeled in the line. When the rough uneven half moon emerged from the water, he felt a pang of grief for the turtle. The hook penetrated the left side of her cheek. Somehow he believed it was a girl.

She froze as he reversed the hook, pushing it back and counter clockwise, to release. The turtle locked eyes with the boy during the entire removal of the hardware embedded in her flesh. She was eerily still. It was unnerving how a creature could suffer such indescribable pain without flinching. When he released her, she paddled deep down into the blue-black water, and did not look back. He imagined her swimming to a secret world where turtles lived. He hoped she would stay there and be safe.

Isaac’s father was a diamond dealer. Every Friday for as long as he could remember, he tagged along to the seventh floor of the Edgewater Hotel in Madison, Wisconsin. When he felt anxious, he liked to count the wood panels in the herringbone flooring. He found it comforting that the speed of his stride made it more difficult to number each plank. The lines blurred between light and dark, smoothing out the entire design and making it all more alike than not. When his father was inside with his wares, he ran through the halls as fast as he could. At top speed, he could not decipher any difference in the flooring at all. It became a blur of warm amber. He imagined it to be like velvet under his feet. It was as though if he stopped running and knelt down, the great earthy haze would envelop him completely.

“Grace!!!! You get back here, right now!!!” a booming voice echoed down the hall. He saw a wisp of a girl, mid-twirl. Her navy pea coat, like a bell, as she danced past. His breath caught in his throat. He sprinted back to room 716 as fast as he could. His father was packing up his briefcase and glanced up when Isaac blew into the room. The left side of his mouth was so subtly upturned. Only Isaac knew, that was the signal that his father made a sale. It would be a peaceful night at home, but he couldn’t shake from his mind’s eye--the girl in the blue pea coat and the expression on her face--like joy interrupted. He felt very cold on the drive home despite the heat blaring from the radiator.

Every winter dozens of ice skaters came to the pond. Isaac loved to sneak down to the restaurant adjacent to the lobby of the hotel. He pressed his face against the cold glass watching the skaters from the massive bay windows. There was an order and a dance to the activity around him that made him feel like a star in a galaxy of billions of stars. He could hear sugar cubes splashing into cups of coffee and tiny silver spoons clinking. Waiters in black ties with crisp white linens swooshed back and forth. Old men told of their pride and their woes. Young women wiped the mouths and fingers of their small children trying to escape the table.

All the while, the skaters glided like swans across the ice, orbiting one another in a world of their own. Even from the hotel window high up overlooking the pond, Isaac could see hundreds of thin lines carved into the ice, left behind by each skater. Each one left their mark etched into the ice, the way a diamond cutter offers their own unique signature. He longed to be a part of a world like that; to make a mark, to experience freedom, to be able to fly. A hand touched his shoulder, shaking him out of the trance. It was time to go home. He couldn’t read his father’s face if he made a sale or not, but he relaxed into the drive back in spite of it as he imagined the dancers on the ice. He could close his eyes and draw circles around himself over and over until he was at the center of his own design. He felt safe and maybe for now, that was enough.