"You're doing it, baby!" Dad shouted. "You're swimming!"
I staggered out of the water and sat on the calcified rocks, my chest
heaving. Dad came out of the water, too, and tried to hug me, but I
wouldn't have anything to do with him, or with Mom, who'd been
floating on her back as if nothing were happening, or with Brian and
Lori, who gathered around and were congratulating me. Dad kept telling
me that he loved me, that he never would have let me drown, but you
can't cling to the side your whole life, that one lesson every parent needs
to teach a child is. "If you don't want to sink, you better figure out how to
swim." What other reason, he asked, would possibly make him do this?
Once I got my breath back, I figured he must be right. There was no
other way to explain it.
"BAD NEWS," LORI SAID one day when I got home from exploring.
"Dad lost his job."
Dad had kept this job for nearly six months—longer than any other. I
figured we were through with Battle Mountain and that within a few
days, we'd be on the move again.
"I wonder where we'll live next," I said.
Lori shook her head. "We're staying here," she said. Dad insisted he
hadn't exactly lost his job. He had arranged to have himself fired because
he wanted to spend more time looking for gold. He had all sorts of plans
to make money, she added, inventions he was working on, odd jobs he
had lined up. But for the time being, things might get a little tight around
the house. "We all have to help out," Lori said.
I thought of what I could do to contribute, besides collecting bottles and