Drinking Seawater II

By the time my partner returned from his reef exploring, I was beside myself with sadness. He looked at the tears streaming down my face with a shade of disbelief and a heavy dose of confusion. He asked, "Are you OK??" I couldn't even muster the energy to answer; I shook my head, morosely. Too embarrassed to look him in the eye, I kept my gaze downwards and focused intently on the yellow fibers of the salt-stained raft. He said, "Are you ready to swim back?" An inexplicable shudder ran through my body when I pictured myself entering the deep blue sea, and a fresh batch of tears poured from my eyes. At this time, I looked him dead in the eye, pleading as loudly as I could: "Please don't make me. I can't. I can't. Can't you swim back and tell the guy with the boat to come and get me?"

My partner was trying to be sensitive, but I was bordering on ludicrous now. He shook his head, closed his eyes - perhaps looking at me would have made him burst out laughing - and said, "No, come on, you can do it." We proceeded to spend the next five or ten minutes in a battle of wills, which he eventually won despite the fact that I had to attempt to get into the water three times. Each time, I would get thigh-deep in ocean water, become overwhelmed by the fear, and scramble back onto the raft, howling. The last time, he grabbed me by the ankles and dragged me into the water, so I had no choice but to swim. But I refused to look back down, and good thing too. He told me later that there was a giant barracuda swimming right under us, with a huge scar running down its back where it had been attacked by something. His fervent prayers to Providence, begging Him to keep my head above water, were answered. And my life was spared...for the meantime.

The tide was coming in, and the water was getting rougher. Remember the horrific flippers? Well, this was not a good time to have them on our feet. I'm panicky and out of shape. My partner was out of shape and this was making him panic, but at least he kept it a secret lest I freak out and die. You see, he had told me that I could hold his hand the whole way back as well, so I had to see him as a rock, a point of stability in this cold, wet, deep world of waves. Alas, our lack of cardio activity was about to bite us in the ass. Halfway to the first rest station we'd stopped at previously, I felt my lungs giving up. All this time, I had been breathing through my mouth, which is surprisingly exhausting. Suddenly, I couldn't breathe anymore. And because the flippers weren't really doing anything to propel me forward, my legs were tired as well. I tried to float, but I was too scared to concentrate and anyway, the sun was directly in my eyes, which I couldn't take. I knew then that this is how I was going to die, and I absolutely could not believe it. In my distress, I contemplated climbing on my partner's back, having flashbacks of a time when I was four years old and riding on my eleven-year-old sister's back in a pool. Of course, then I weighed about an eighth of what I weigh now, but I was too frantic to reason. I placed a heavy hand on my partner's shoulder in preparation for my leap onto his back, and pushed him underwater. He came up sputtering and angry. Bless his heart, he was still being very kind to me, so he didn't give me the slap I deserved. All he said was, "STOP THAT!"

I didn't even apologize, asshole that I am. I just kept saying, "I can't swim anymore, I can't swim anymore," over and over. He was trying to save himself from drowning, given that he was also exhausted, but the poor guy had to keep reassuring me that I would be fine. Soon he stopped to float and encouraged me to do the same, but every time I noticed him standing still in the water, I would just try to clamber up to his head, falsely assuming that he was standing on the ocean bed. And every time I tried to do this, he dipped a foot underwater. After my third attempt to kill him, he pushed me away - which was very wise - so I decided that it was time to get Hitler's attention. Forget what he said, he was gonna come get me! The frontal lobes of my brain were still running on fear, however, so while one arm was waving for rescue, the other arm was still attempting to grab my partner's shoulder - and effectively drown him. Repeatedly, he would rise up from under the water, see me waving for help, and slap my hand down, saying "Stop doing that!" Because he knew what I refused to comprehend: we were not too far away from the shallow water, I would soon be able to stand on my own, and it would absolutely mortifying, breathtakingly embarrassing for Hitler to bring his boat to where we were. But I could not be stopped. I kept waving, kept getting my hand smacked down, and I was too out of breath to even yell at him what my brain was screaming at me: I'M DROWNING AND I AM GOING TO DIE IN THIS OCEAN IF THAT MAN DOESN'T COME AND GET ME!!!

Eventually, however, I realized that I have been swimming since I was three and that I didn't have to rely solely on the flippers to propel myself through the water. So I gave my arms a break from waving and used them to swim to the shallow water, where I began to walk as soon as I could. I stomped to the beach, swearing and cursing the Bahama reef, the flippers, the fish, the snorkeling gear - everything. When we got close to Hitler, he said jovially, "So how did you enjoy your trip?" I shrieked, "I was drowning and you didn't even notice!" He looked at me, puzzled, and said, "Well, then, you should have waved." I was weak. To avert what would have probably ended in an argument, I just said, "You're right. I forgot," and walked off to rinse the salt out of my hair.

Snorkeling. Bah!