Erin Matsuba

8°27’ 15.61”S 128°46’09.68 W THE SWIM HOME

THE FREEZING WAVES OF THE OCEAN sap out any heat in my small cabin bunk below the hulking ship. Huddled under the covers of my single bed and threadbare sheets, I carefully fold my papers back on their well-worn crease line. It’s too cold to concentrate. I’m shivering to the beat of the bass coming from the other room. Jesse. Long strands of dark hair, sweeping eyelids, and grey eyes that used to spark into silver when he smiles, that’s Jesse. And if you listen closely, you can hear shouts and exclamations from Nolan in other warlocks or wizards online. In the next room lies Alexis, the daughter of the tycoon funding this whole project. Fake golden curls and blue contacts plastered in eyes, just a touch too far apart, she wears more make-up than clothing. I am only here because I’m not old enough to be left home alone for two weeks. My mom is the leading marine biologist for this project, just like my grandmother and great grandmother were before her. There are still six days left in this frozen prison, and too much has already fallen out of our hands and into the unforgiving ocean waters below.

Jesse, Nolan, Alexis and I all sit at the “kids’ table” together for each meal. Every day Jesse grins and laughs at anything remotely humorous. Then, Nolan makes sarcastic remarks at Alexis’s tales about other countries the rest of us will never visit. We all think the same thing: maybe if we talk loud enough over each other no one will have time to notice the empty chair to my right. After dinner, at night cowering under my blankets I unwind the notes. I focus intensely and I try to remember how it felt to be a decent person.

“Roses are red, violets are blue, the things I felt I wish you knew.”

Roses are red, violets are blue, I’m falling for you, are you falling too?”

“Roses are red, violets are blue, if you want to meet me, come to the deck at 2.” million pieces. They shattered like a hammer thrown at a perfect glass wall, like the most braced myself for the impact of it connecting to my face. But he simply unclenched his aren’t red, violets aren’t blue, now I’ll swim home. But I don’t blame you.”

When I close my eyes I can remember it all so clearly. I was wearing a red shirt that made my shoulders look good, jeans that accentuated my hips and a overpowering fragrance called “Tropical Love.” I imagined what would happen in just a few moments time. My secret admirer would step out of the shadows of expect was Alexis arm in arm with my mom, crossing the barren deck at exactly 2:01, the same time he stepped out of the darkness. What I couldn’t expect was his face full of love and longing. What I shouldn’t have to expect was my mother’s face rearranged to make an emotion not quite anger and not quite dismay, and Alexis’s nasal laughter.

“Alex! Alexander James Tascar, you don’t take one step closer to that blasphemous devil incarnate!” My mother exclaimed while taking a step back, like homosexuality itself was contagious.

“Alex is straighter than a ruler. Why did you even try?” Alexis’ words are like a dagger, I could clearly hear my heart thumping above the laughter and shrieks. My hands were clammy as I told him the saddest excuse of a reason I could muster.

“It’s not you, it’s me.” But I murmured it, and he had to ask me to repeat myself. The for what the sugar coating couldn’t hide: rejection.

They found his body a few hours later. They said he was still alive, but there was too paper. The other possibility.

“Roses are red, violets are blue, I’m so glad that you were falling too.” They said it wasn’t my fault, and even in his note he said it wasn’t. They told me that his off of the face of this world. I saw the effect of my words. I had to watch his father cry when they unveiled his water-sodden body and know that it was my fault his son was gone forever. The worst part is knowing that maybe I could have been happy with him. Maybe we could have beaten the odds and made it through life’s twisted obstacle course together. Opening my eyes I wish I could change it all. I wish I could repress these memories, but no, remembering them is to remember him. And forgetting about him is more than I deserve. Our paths just crossed too early for me. And now the images of his eyes watering, his vulnerable expression, and his body that trembled with anticipation haunt my thoughts. The lines of his cheesy poetry march up and around every corner of my mind. We were a love not ready for each other. He was an endless void of water, persuasively whispering “dive in, dive in!” But in the end I was caught up in the undertow and it was him who stayed submerged.