I went to the beach for the first time since the Pandemic. It was night because we left the house late, and I could feel that the water was colder.
I took a hit from a vape so hard I felt like I was going to pass out. And I just stared out at the horizon. It was winding a little bit, I felt it pushing my hair back but I stood my ground in the lightly swaying water.
As I felt my head grow numb and distant, I stared at a boat sitting idly on the horizon. Or maybe it was just so far away any movement felt meaningless. It was just a light— it could've been a distant hotel or a lighthouse— but I think it was a boat.
Well, anyway, I looked at it and stared at it and wondered if it even knew. If the people on it even knew how much I'd kill to be where they are; out on the water, away from the land, further off of the shore than I could ever get with only my legs and swimming lessons to push me.
I looked at that boat for a long time, I guess I was just wondering what choices I could make now that would lead me further down the line to being on that boat. All the way out there. I thought maybe I should change my major.
I looked back at the horizon. I could see the stars way better than I could back home because there wasn't any light pollution.
Um. But I didn't look at them, I mostly just looked at the ocean.
The ocean was, well
Well, it was where I needed to be, I think.
I thought about my parents, I thought about how far away from that godforsaken house I was.
Out here, I didn't have to listen to my dad screaming at my mom over little things,
or my mom telling me I looked terrible,
or that she missed how I looked before I dyed my hair,
or that she thought I wasn't going to succeed,
or that I shouldn't talk about what she does in front of her friends,
or that she looked through my closet again,
or that I was a bad person for tempting my father,
or a million other things I did wrong,
I only had to listen to the ocean and my thoughts.
You were there, too.
And I felt bad,
because how could I say I hated it back home when you were back home?
How could I say my life sucked if you were in it? Isn't that selfish?
You were always there to help, you were the best thing I'd ever known.
You were on land.
So how could I say I hated the land?
And yet,
as I kept feeling the buzz of light-headedness hitting my brain,
and the water, cold enough to remind me of home up north but warm enough to remind me I wasn't there,
and the bottom of my shorts growing cold as the tide crept up my calves without me realizing,
and the close enough to a full moon in the sky,
and the light in the distance, whatever it may be,
and everything that had ever gone wrong in my life,
and every worry I had back in that house,
and everything I ever wanted but never had,
or hated but nevertheless was given,
or could ever happen for the next seventy-whatever years I have to my name,
or ever was on land,
or ever is in the ocean,
and is in front of me,
cold,
inviting,
comforting,
away from it all,
I only thought that I never wanted to spend a day dry.
I never wanted to walk in lieu of swimming,
or feel more than lukewarm,
or not feel the pressure on my chest from the water,
And it tore me apart because I wasn't built to be there.
I have no gills, no fins.
I'd be killed out there.
And I don't think I have the strength yet to kill myself over something I want.
So I looked at you, after looking in one spot for ages.
And walked away from the waves,
shuffling one disgusting unwebbed foot after another.
Because I knew that I didn't have the stomach for it.
Even if for as long as I've been on land I've looked at the ocean,
