Oscar has stolen an eight-by-ten photo of his brother’s wife and keeps it with him in his house. The picture hails from Darla’s honeymoon to Jamaica, where Darla poses underneath a waterfall near a beach, clad in a forest green bikini, her arms splayed in the air in joyous celebration. The bikini, perhaps a tad too small for Darla, could not have withstood the water pressure for long, Oscar imagines. Soon after the photo is snapped, the top had to have been ripped from Darla’s breasts by the powerful streams gushing from above. Oscar also imagines Darla not caring, arching her back to allow the jets better access to her front parts. Darla soon peels off her bottoms, tosses them ashore with seductive nonchalance. Here Oscar is the photographer, is rugged and tan with blond dreadlocks. Oscar imagines Darla begging him to join her for a dip, teasing and prodding until he relents. Recently, however, the picture of Darla in her bikini in the waterfall in Jamaica has been telling this to Oscar. The photo speaks out loud, calling for him to remove his clothes and dive into the cove, to join her for all the pleasantries her world has to offer.
* * *
Oscar’s brother Bruno used to stand behind Darla in the waterfall, shirtless with a shark tooth necklace that mimics his jagged smile. Oscar has removed Bruno’s image with an X-Acto knife, the perfect outline of Bruno shadowing Darla, a hole Oscar cannot explain when she inquires. Photo Darla does not know Bruno, doesn’t remember the wedding, nor Real Darla’s entire life. She understands only this waterfall, her superfluous bikini, her lust for Oscar. It’s drafty back there, Photo Darla says, referring to the Bruno hole. Windy today, Oscar says, and fakes a shiver, pretending to feel the breeze, too.
* * *
When Oscar is home and alone, he props the photo of Darla next to him on his couch. Oscar watches TV with Photo Darla, eats dinner, tells her about work, lunch, the commute home. Darla remains single-minded: Water’s great, she’ll say as he eats. Come in and work up that appetite. As she persists, Oscar imagines her quiet, pictures her swimming laps, posits her a fan of his favorite shows, a patient and attentive viewer. Darla counters by removing her bikini top, by jiggling her breasts, splashing at him with the warm, two-dimensional water. The more Oscar resists, the more provocative her taunts become. Why fight it? Darla says, blowing him a kiss. Why indeed, Oscar wonders.
* * *
Each weekend, Oscar hosts Bruno and Darla for dinner, football, and board games. Before they arrive, Oscar wraps the protesting photo in pillows, puts her inside the couch bed in the basement, turns up the TV. He works to keep the couple upstairs, which isn’t hard, nothing in the basement but dust. Discovering Photo Darla would devastate the real Darla, Oscar knows, as Real Darla is nothing like Photo Darla. While the two share appearance, one experience, and one item of clothing, Real Darla did not remove her bikini, did not invite the photographer to join her for a dip, has never shown a smidgeon of attraction toward Oscar. Real Darla bakes for church raffles, counsels teens on abstinence, loves big, handsome Bruno without waver. Darla once caught Oscar staring down her sweater as she reached across the Monopoly board to move her thimble. Every week since, she has arrived at Oscar’s in loose-fitting, full-collared tops. Bruno is a lucky man, Oscar knows, but wonders if Real Darla, in the privacy of their bedroom, ever takes on Photo Darla’s randiness. He’ll never know, he concedes, and concentrates on not looking at Real Darla when she visits his home. Photo Darla’s constant, desperate screams from the basement give him enough to worry about.
* * *
Oscar announces to coworkers he’s met someone. For years, these friends have shown concern, tried and failed to fix him up, called him “lonely” in front of and behind his back. Oscar has been attracted to several of these ladies, has thrown out feelers, finding nothing reciprocal, not in that way. Like with Real Darla, Oscar appears kid brotherly, the loveable sap, the sweet guy who can fix their computer and scrape ice from their windshields. Women entrust him with secrets, ask mysterious advice, confide details Oscar never imagined; he can’t remember how many times a beautiful woman has borrowed a quarter for the tampon dispenser. These same women appear ecstatic he has found a mate. They offer tips for keeping her happy, keeping her his. Flowers prove popular. Foot rubs, too. Betty from accounting suggests nightly cunnilingus. Everyone wants details. Where’d you meet her? When can we meet her? What’s her name? Without thinking, Oscar announces, Darla. Isn’t that your sister-in-law’s name? Trina from H.R. asks. I know, what a coincidence, Oscar answers. Two days later, he announces that he and Darla have split, that she wasn’t the one for him after all.
* * *
Bruno, drunk one Christmas, argues with Darla at Oscar’s house. They fight about invitations, about fonts. It is less than two months before their wedding, before Jamaica, the waterfall, the photo. Bruno declares the wedding off. Darla cries, tells Bruno she loves him, that she’s sorry, that she can be less stubborn. Marry Oscar, Bruno says. Let him put up with this bullshit.
* * *
Oscar returns home one evening to find Photo Darla’s arm reaching through the Bruno void. It is a three-dimensional, flesh-and-blood arm, and the more Photo Darla stretches, the more she becomes real. When the photo sees him in the room, she waves her real arm, beckoning him to jump in for a dip. Get back in there, Oscar yells, not ready for this level of commitment. Throughout the evening, Photo Darla tests her limits. She sneaks pokes at Oscar, pulls his arm hair, tugs his pinky. She splashes him, too, the water wet and authentic. During the late news, Oscar notices the bikini top missing. Photo Darla says it floated away, but Oscar later finds it between the couch cushions, wrings it out, stuffs it back onto the shore. Just before bed, Photo Darla pokes her head through the gap, breathing her first real air. Wonderful, she says, but notes how Caribbean air, glossy and artificial, is more pure. Then stay in there, Oscar says. He sees he’s hurt her feelings. Have a pretzel rod, Oscar offers, but Photo Darla remains quiet the rest of the night.
* * *
Oscar knew the real Darla before Bruno ever met her. Oscar began seeing a psychiatrist when the boys’ mother died, and this psychiatrist was Darla’s father. Just after Oscar started his sessions, Darla came home from college for the summer, worked the desk for her dad, answered phones, typed his notes. Oscar came once a week, giving them time to learn each other’s names, for Oscar to anticipate his visits, for him to call with questions he knew the answer to, just to hear Darla’s voice. When Bruno needed a psych consult for a job with the state, he asked Oscar about Darla’s father. A week later, Oscar met Bruno out for a drink, and at Bruno’s table sat Darla, the cute psychiatrist’s daughter who took his insurance info, who he thought about all week, who knew he wet his bed till he was eight, that he cried when he drove alone, that he’d never had a girlfriend for longer than a week. During her engagement, Darla will say that Oscar introduced her to Bruno, sometimes call him a matchmaker. Bruno corrects her every time. Maybe if I was marrying your dad, Bruno says.
* * *
Photo Darla, banned from leaving the lagoon, takes to pulling things into the photo. At first she is limited to what she can fit, what she can reach from wherever Oscar has laid her down. Oscar looks down one morning to see her picking her teeth with a paperclip. Later she plays with change, some pennies, a nickel, and a dime, dropping them in the water so she can dive and pick them up. One day Photo Darla has his Visa, driver’s license, and Blockbuster card and won’t give them back. As barter, Oscar puts other things into the picture, objects meant to keep her occupied. He folds in magazine articles, which get too wet to read. He hands her food, which she’s not interested in. He puts through more coins, a pair of nose plugs, a whole box of Q-tips, one by one, then some dice. He manages a pair of sunglasses, which she appreciates, hangs over the side of her bikini bottom. What else you can shove through this hole? Photo Darla says.
