Below the pond’s scummy surface, hairy milfoil swayed to the rhythm of unheard music.
I turned to the woman beside me, the wind sweeping her sun-lambent hair across her face.
How would she look down below?
Squeezing her hand, I felt a swell of gratitude that I’d probably never know.
Tim Boiteau is a Writers of the Future winner and author of The Nilwere (Grendel Press, 2024).
The sea is a living thing: shifting, expanding, slipping, withdrawing.
In the depths below I watch him sway, caught up in the kelp. It’s wrapped around his wrists and weaves through his hair.
When I swim past him I can see my silver body reflected in his flat, murky eyes.
Nanna is an Icelandic freelance journalist and writer with her nose to the grindstone. It hurts; please, someone send medical help.
“‘Let’s go to the beach,’ you said! ‘Let’s go for a walk on the sand with baby Timmy,’ you said! ‘Let’s dress like giant crabs and pretend to kidnap him and take him to a magical underwater utopia full of laughter and song,’ you said! ‘He’ll enjoy it,’ you said…”