Drowning Instinct(48)
Author: Ilsa J. Bick

Although sometimes his hand would brush my arm and a little shock would zing through my chest. Our eyes might meet, and then heat would crawl up my neck and warm my thighs, and I would have to look away. More often than not, we both drove away when our work at school was done or practice was over, so everyone would see us go in separate cars. We‘d meet up again: for dinner, coffee—

And other things.

In his car. In mine. Huddled under blankets in darkened fields, where we explored ways of keeping one another warm: when he showed me what he liked, and how.

We ran on the weekends, too. And, yeah, a couple times, we couldn‘t wait until we made it to the cabin. That‘s not to say that we didn‘t spend a lot of time in our hideaway.

That was ours: a private, magical space where we could talk and fill volumes.

e

I remember one afternoon—a Saturday after we‘d . . . well, you know. We were wrapped in a comforter on that window seat in his study: my back snugged against his chest, his arms hugging me close. No rain this time, but the day was gray and the woods so filled with mist, we might as well have been on our own little island. There was music, something as gauzy and soft as that fog.

―I love it when it‘s so still,‖ he said. I remember that his fingers brushed and stroked my br**sts, back and forth. Nothing grabby. Just a gentle touch you‘d almost swear wasn‘t there but which sent tiny electric shocks dancing over my skin and stabbing through my thighs. ―It always reminds me of diving, the way you hover between the water below and the world above.‖

―I wish we didn‘t have to leave.‖ My hands were hooked on his arms the way they‘d been that first afternoon when I told him everything. ―It feels like we‘re floating.

Everything‘s so calm.‖

―Mmm-hmm.‖ He pressed his lips to the top of my head. ―I‘d forgotten what this was like, feeling really at peace and not just putting on a show for family, my father, my . .

.‖ He paused. ―You remember when I said you can look at a guy in the water and not know he‘s in trouble? That he‘s drowning? I saw it happen once.‖

―You saw someone die?‖

―Mmm-hmm. There was this one guy, pretty experienced, and his dive buddy was this newbie-kid who‘d sucked down his air pretty fast. So the kid surfaced and this guy kept on by himself, which might not have been a problem if he‘d stayed close or partnered up again, but he didn‘t. So we‘re all back aboard and thirty minutes become forty and then forty-five and the dive master is starting to freak. Then, all of a sudden, the captain spotted the guy maybe a half mile away. Without binoculars, you could barely see him, but he was upright and floating. We all started waving, but he didn‘t wave back, and then the dive master was screaming that we had to get there fast. I thought he‘d gone crazy. I mean, the guy seemed fine: not shouting or splashing or anything. Only by the time they got the boat turned around and over there? He was gone. That‘s why the dive master was so frantic. He understood the guy had about twenty seconds left.‖

―But he was on the surface,‖ I said. ―How could he not breathe? Why didn‘t he scream if he was in trouble?‖

―Because you‘re thinking of the movies, and that‘s not what happens in real life,‖ he said. ―They call it the drowning instinct. It‘s when drowning doesn‘t look like drowning. In real life, if the water‘s very cold, a person can‘t help but gasp. It‘s reflex. The thing is as soon as water hits your lungs, your throat closes off, even if the water‘s warm. Your body‘s trying to protect itself, and the reality is that a lot more people suffocate than truly drown.

Regardless, to people on land, especially when you‘re really close to the end, you don‘t look like you‘re in trouble. You don‘t scream, but that‘s because you can‘t, and you don‘t wave your arms either or expend a lot of energy flailing. You‘re just there. So people don‘t notice that you‘re dying.‖ He was silent for a moment. ―That‘s me. I think I‘ve been drowning all this time and doing it so quietly, even I didn‘t know it.‖

That sadness was there again. For some reason, I thought back to those pictures of Mrs. Anderson: happy and beautiful as a princess on her wedding day; then pregnant but scarred. I wondered what had happened in the middle; if maybe she‘d been drowning and Mitch hadn‘t known that either. Maybe they both had.

Despite how Mitch made me feel, I never quite forgot what Danielle said about him and broken people. You can‘t spend a million hours in therapy and not have it rub off a little. So was Mitch always trying to help because he hadn‘t been able to do the same first for himself and then for his wife? I could see where the shock of what happened to her—the pain and guilt— would . . . well, rip and then scar a person on the inside. Look at my parents. Look at Matt.

My therapist once said that everything I did was a repetition: a way of trying to make what was wrong with our whole family come out differently and right. So why should Mitch be any different? Maybe he couldn‘t help himself. He might not understand what he was repeating, or that he was even doing it. Adults don‘t know everything, Bob.

I only understand this now, of course: sitting here, still freezing cold, in this awful emergency room. Listening to the quiet.

Back then and at that moment, warm and safe in his arms, all I wanted was to help.

But I didn‘t know what to say. I had this urge to tell Mitch that I would save him—that he could grab on to me—but that felt dumb. Mitch had so much already. What could I do or give that he couldn‘t find somewhere else?

―But I‘m here and now you do know that you‘ve been drowning.‖ I sat up and when I turned to face him, the blanket slid from my shoulders and down my back. The scars were still there, on my stomach and thighs. They would never go away. I wouldn‘t be me if they did. ―So you don‘t have to do that anymore, Mitch. You don‘t have to drown.‖

For once, I did the right thing. Something unclenched in him; I could see the strain and tension drain from his body. His eyes drifted over my face and then to my br**sts, my belly, those scars, and then he was reaching for me—and then there was no need to say anything.

Except for the moment when he guided my hand to where he wanted: when I gasped and he sighed and said my name, and then we were drowning in each other.

f

It was all so shockingly easy, as long as we were careful. I know you don‘t want to hear that, Bob. You want to hear that we felt guilty or lived in constant fear of discovery.