LULLING

by

Margetty Coe

A wave broke and she turned her back and crouched down, waiting. Tumbling water reached her, churning her hair and shivering along her skin. She leaned into it, let her arms and legs lift and loosen in the surge. Then the flow eased, releasing her. She sank back slowly, heels digging into sand as the wave sucked out and streamed to deeper water.

She turned to face the waves again and curled herself. The wash licked at her chin, her toes brushed the bottom. Between them, her body -- a formless, unfamiliar weight, carried on the current's push-pull. A new set glided forward, two small swells and then a larger one; she must watch and be ready for the big wave to break.

Even in shallow water she felt brave to let herself be tangled by the surf. And then she thought, This isn't real fear -- not like capsizing in a storm, or seeing a child caught in a riptide -- but a taste of it. A hint.

When she was small a wave had grabbed her and dragged her under. Water rushing all around her. No air. No breath. For a long time afterward she feared the ocean, as if it were a living creature, hungry, reaching for her, its toothless fish-mouth gaping beneath the quivering surface. She was afraid to go in above her knees. After a time she recovered herself, by watching other children, listening to their teasing, feeling ashamed, till finally she shut her eyes, splashed in, and found her way again.

Now the big wave began to break before she could move to meet it. She dove into its rolling flank and right away bumped the sand. She fought to keep below the tumult until the current ebbed. Then she looked up, drifting, to see a chaos of foamy streaks and ripples with pale lights flickering through.

Tired of wrestling with the waves, she ducked below the surf again to swim towards calmer water. With every stroke she stretched, cut through the surface, pushed swiftly forward. In the gentle swells beyond the break she stopped to rest. She floated, gazing up into an endless, empty sky.

For a moment there was nothing. The muffled beating of her heart. Drops sliding off her skin. Her thoughts a mist. And then a salt breeze off the open sea reached her, stirred the mist and shaped it into words: Do I want it? she asked herself.

On land she had shifted back and forth, from wanting to not wanting, each a cliff from which she must jump down to hard ground, and no climbing up again.

On land her worries had dug ruts behind her brow. But here beyond the breakers every moment brought new riffles, and froth blew off at once on the breeze. Out here the question floated over her, a bubble, a puzzle whose key might drift in on a wave.

A swell rose smoothly at her feet, lifted and rocked her the length of her body. She thought of all the swells that rolled across the ocean -- all the way across. She tilted her head to look toward the horizon. Low-lying billows flowed steadily as far as she could see.

No words formed. But she felt the baby rocking with her, within her, rocking in the wide sea. Her baby and herself, carried on the current that rolled from the horizon. She let her body ease then, closed her eyes and let her head tip back until her ears were covered and she heard a lulling drumbeat in the surf. Behind her the water piled up, heaved over, drove against the sand.

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Margetty Coe lives and works as a graphic designer and advertising writer in Philadelphia, PA. This is her first published story.

She can be reached via email at:emko [em.ko@verizon.net] .

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