Straight No Chaser

Yuzu

"Invalid Entry"  first so you can laugh, as i intend to, at how badly i'm about to fuck things up.

*****

It's starting to seem like this bath may never end. "Ready for a nap, honey?" asks Shannon hopefully, peeling the saturated curls away Kailani's delighted face. "I think that's enough splish-splash for today."

"Splish-splash," echoes Kai, onomatopoetically executing the same with her hands and feet.

Determined, Shannon lifts her out of the water, ignoring her squirms. Naptime. Not just for Kai; maybe for herself, as well. She's starting to feel it: slower, heavier, more easily fatigued. Glad theirs is a manageable kid, not so difficult to corral. True to form, Kailani doesn't fuss about the end of bathtime, just falls limp in Shannon's arms, understandably exhausted.

She dries them both off and dresses herself in white, Kailani in yellow. One of her better colors.

The little girl's eyes are already shut by the time Shannon lays her on her blanket, one tiny thumb hovering near her pursed mouth. "Sleep tight, honey," whispers Shannon, dropping a kiss on one cheek.

She straightens up and yawns. Stumbles outside and looks for Aaron.

*****

after accidentally deleting the entirety of my british literature paper, due tomorrow, i've since recovered something like three quarters of what i lost. be proud of me. i waited for a milestone before i got stuck on this frivolity.

*****

God, am I going to die?

Even in the absence of an oxygen source, he finds himself laughing. It's a ridiculous question. Of course you are. His own answer, not God's.

Stimulus overload equals stimulus vacuum. The tide is bouncing him, pressing him into himself, pounding his knees to his nose, his elbows to his heels. He is a human Barbie-doll in the presale durability testing phase. A pair of jeans, sandblasted.

But God, I have babies--

And in this stimulus vacuum, he is suddenly lucid enough to remember a random factoid about riptides: that their foremost danger is not in the possibility of drowning, but in the probability of banging one's head against the rocks beneath; of being knocked unconscious and then drowning. He's still conscious now, he thinks.

One I haven't even met yet, I just want--

The noise is deafening, and so, silence. He chooses to hear silence. He waits for the next phase: for the burst of clarity that might save his life, or the rush of peace that might let him relinquish it.

God, I forget what to do--

*****

tomorrow is hell day. hell hell hell, from sunup to sundown.

well. ten till seven.

*****

She sees a foot. Then a hand.

He's--

He isn't fooling. He wouldn't. He doesn't swim over here, not on the north beach, not since that fucking piglet--

He must be fooling. He's certainly flailing; only a few yards from the shore but acting like he's in over his head, throwing up the occasional extremity, momentary white flags among the churning waves. Someone else, maybe. (Her heart lifts.) A rescuer? (And falls again.) A fellow shipwrecked? Someone having a hell of a time finishing out those last few yards to shore, someone (obviously) without the experience they've garnered these three-odd years--

No. His coloring, his sunburnt arm, his left foot with the giant red gash where Kailani mauled him with one of her sticks. It's him, and what the fuck is he doing? Drowning?

Idiot. She squints to be sure, sure this isn't just her exhausted mind playing tricks on her, entertaining wild hallucinations to drive her mad at naptime. He wouldn't drown, they've got a daughter and someone else on the way, and he wouldn't drown because who the hell does he expect to save him?

--And yet, he is. She's up on the precipice, too high to jackknife into the ocean that's about to swallow him up.

She sprints down to the base of the island, to the shelter; peeks in on her sleeping daughter. Kai is stirring, configured differently than she was just minutes ago. Not fully asleep; still in the uncertain stages of her nap. She could wake up. They never leave her alone when she's like this; she could wake up and--

"FUCK," utters Shannon with uncharacteristic violence. The noise wakes Kai (an almost hysterical irony; all his creative doublespeak only to profane her this way, instead); she sits up and reaches.

"Yes," says Shannon decisively. "You're coming. Come."

*****

i'd like to think that i'd be equally heroic, in this situation. but. i'm watching my roommate flail academically, literally setting herself up to fail every class she's taking, and doing nothing. but in my defense, she's an adult, and it's none of my business.

i've also had the feeling, on occasion, of watching marcus drown. and felt completely helpless.

*****

He is remembering something important--

Never fight against the--

An underwater sandbar connects with his left temple. Knocks him out cold.

*****

i am almost too tired for this. almost.

*****

With Kai strapped to her back, and the tiniest bit of extra weight out front, Shannon's center of gravity is hopelessly, hopelessly off. Running for the waves, she feels like an Olympian; belabored and burdened but with no interest in a silver medal.

Now that the sun's gone down, the water is freezing. Kai is screaming, naturally horrified. They've never played this game, and frankly, she can't find it to be much fun. Night-black water slaps them both in the face and the screams dissolve into tears like thunderclouds into raindrops; Lord only knows how betrayed she must feel.

Shannon breaks through the waxing tide with no small amount of difficulty, calling on very old geometry lessons--

The angle, the angle is good, the tide is pushing her this way, and he's this way--

"Mommy!" accuses Kailani, gripping Shannon's sides with angry fists. They're both crying, now.

Aaron is not moving. Not voluntarily, at least. The tide is still wracking his limbs, but in a stilted, jerky way; he's an underwater marionette on unforgiving strings.

What to do, when she reaches him? Grab for an elbow and pull? But he's heavier than she is; she'll get sucked in, they'll get sucked in, she and Kai and this nameless--

Never fight against the tide.

It hits her, as does a wave. Sends her tumbling, the latter, while the former reverberates in her unhappy mind, a telepathic gift from God knows where. Miss Cleo, maybe; maybe they're in the Caribbean. Aaron would be so sorry to miss this, her clairvoyant moment.

She's inches away, and she feels--not a pull, but the hint of one, at her calves. She tips backward, submerging her daughter--

Balances on one arm, shoves Aaron roughly with the opposite foot.

And again.

With, never against.

From one of those beach trips, years ago. Her dad probably expected it'd save her little life, six years old and ignorant. Not his twentysomething son-in-law.

With. She pushes. He floats, with.

She raises up as high as she can, reaches behind to unstop Kailani's nose. "Blow," she commands." Twin trickles fall into her waiting hand.

She swims back to shore.

*****

whew!

*****

Aaron washes up seconds later, still fully unconscious. She puffs and pumps, puffs and pumps, repeatedly and still with the baby strapped to her back, again and again and again till he chokes up what seems a gallon of seawater.

"I'm okay," he croaks immediately. Forces an absolutely idiotic smile without ever opening his eyes.

"Go to hell," she rasps, and collapses beside him.

*****

whew.

*****

It takes some trying, but Kailani finally wiggles free. Deeply unhappy, and cold, and possibly a little hungry, but so primarily confused as to ignore all that other.

She looks around, first at the two sleeping adults, and then at the alluring waves. Swim, she thinks.

*****

thank god no one ever asks me to write action sequences.

and also, i so should have let you drown.

i definitely need to go to bed.

*****

No, she thinks, just after. The waves are scary, they are Bad, and above all else she is tired. She drops to her knees and burrows beneath her parents' overlapping arms; between them, falls instantly asleep.

*****

entry title comes courtesy of mia, once again.