Free Fallout by Nikki Tate

Chapter Two
    â€œPut your hands together for Tara Manson!”
    I step into the spotlight. The audience is out there, though I can’t see them.
    This moment is mine. I can say anything in my poems.
    Have you ever faced fear
    and jumped
    into churning waters
    So deep there is no bottom?
    I have. At the waterslides.
    There’s always a chuckle after I say that line. Maybe I look too heavy to be a waterslide type. Whatever. It’s my job to deliver the poem. The audience hears what they want to hear.
    I change my voice so I sound like I’m in a commercial.
    Splash Kingdom!
    Your fun in the sun
    place to plunge
    in and away from
    what really matters.
    Then I go back to my normal voice.
    So what
    if the phone ringing
    in your beach bag
    needs to be answered.
    Here, I point at the audience.
    No. You don’t get it.
    Not like a hey, hi, how’s it going?
    Â Â Â Â  see you later, whatever
    kind of call
    but a message you need to get now
    not tomorrow
    not some other time
    but right this second or
    someone will die.
    Then I start again, softly.
    When fun calls
    it’s wrong to ignore
    sun and sweat
    skin on skin
    his lips on mine
    my lips drinking him in
    this wild ride down
    slippery when wet
    curves ahead.
    Fun is all good, right?
    Here’s where I speed up and get louder.
    THIS is all that matters
    because we only live once
    and all that living
    is churned and pushed into
    one glorious afternoon at the
    Â Â Â  waterslides.
    You hear what I’m saying?
    How can they hear what I’m saying? I can speak fast and loud, but they can’t really know what it was like that day last summer. One year ago—today. The whole, long, sun-baked day David and I played, splashed, laughed…while Hannah was—
    The sound of fingers clicking moves through the audience. They think I’ve lost my place. This is their way of telling me to keep going.
    Plunge feet first
    Down Big Mountain
    Time Tunnel
    Jumbo Splash
    Race and giggle
    catch each other
    and sprint to the snack stand
    hot dogs and plastic cheese.
    I ignore the ringing phone, for once.
    Turn my back on her, for once.
    Snap it shut. Click it off, for once.
    Toss it under a damp towel
    and forget
    that outside this moment
    in my heat-soaked day
    a tragedy unfolds
    one phone call away.
    The applause washes over me. I dip in a modest bow.
    Rick, the host, shakes my hand. “Careful going down the steps,” he says. “Judges, let’s see your scores for Miss Tara…”
    He calls them out. The low score is a 7.1 and the high an 8.9. That should be enough to get me through to the second round of the poetry slam.
    When I touch my fingertip to my cheek, it’s wet. When I touch my fingertip to my tongue, I taste salt.

Chapter Three
    Outside the Koffie Klub it’s muggy. I’m still not used to this humid Ontario summer weather. On the west coast it cools off at night. Not here in Camden.
    Mom and Dad both called while I was at the poetry slam. Their numbers glow from my cell phone.
    I know why they called. It’s the first anniversary, and I should have checked in. But it will be awful to talk to them. We will have to remember what we don’t want to remember. What we can’t forget. It’s not like we haven’t been warned. The counselor also told us that it’s normal to imagine the worst when we don’t hear from a surviving family member. Surviving. Barely.
    I flip through the list of missed calls again. David’s number isn’t there. He’s probably thinking about the same thing I am—that day at the waterslides. Like me, he’s probably replaying that moment in the day when I could have stopped her—and didn’t. He was there. He knows. The knowledge binds us together even though he’s in Vancouver and I’m here.
    People shuffle in and out of the Koffie Klub. Sweat leaks from my pits. My bra strap has glued itself to my back. I can’t go too far,