(omg I actually wrote a chapter in prose! It didn’t take a miracle- it did however take being alone in a cabin by the ocean that lost its wifi for 1.5 hours)

Lårö lake, a spectra of green. The sun shaving flakes of gold through the surface, the inexplicable blackness beneath. No contours or outlines around, but the hand, numbed yellow, before her. Eyes wide, it floods you; it becomes you. Only two pirouettes for the green to blur; blur limbs, gravity. Until her aching lungs, as if suddenly inflated, spit her up. 

Above her, the world still miserably intact. Lars on his stomach on the grass, as engrossed in a comic one can be, legs swinging in the air. Ida dreamt of it; her brother running over the dock, a desperate, clumsy dive in, shirt still on. The magnetic side of the blackness beneath her suddenly shifted, from pushing away to pulling her, straight and motionless, into the abyss. Until Lars’ hand finds hers, drags her back up. Perfectly lifeless she’d lay, sprawled in the sun, shiny and pale, creature-like. But her eyes would flutter open, to Lars’ cry, his body collapsing over hers, sorrow and relief heaving through and out of him. She would smile, alive by nothing but love, pure with nothing but a will to live. 

Her sultana fingertips found the dock, and she pulled herself up. She could see their cousins, Maja and Kalle, having joined Lars. The two siblings were each flat on their stomachs, pinching each other. Maja, as always, shrieking- a cry of pain and delight. Kalle was the oldest of them all, older than Lars by two years, the biggest, strongest, and due to this Ida was of course, scared and infatuated. She pretended not to notice them as she went for her towel, wincing at their bashful closeness. Lars seem to pretend to not notice her. She dug in her purse, and took out the letter. Droplets from her hair bled out the ink. The paper wrinkled as if kept and re-read for years. It only arrived yesterday.

“älskling!

You should see the colours of the Marrakech market. They are so bright they are burnt on the inside of my eyes when I go to sleep, and re-appear in my dreams. The air is so thick and wet it feels like a thousand little eels are constantly sucking your skin, leaving you tired and dry. Work is well, we are on the 12th floor of a building, facing the river in the east. I have a cubicle, but at least there is working air condition so I am not complaining. I’m writing a piece on the lack of healthcare for expectant mothers- it’s intriguing and heartbreaking all at once!”

“Can I see?”

Maja blocked the sun, and goosebumps bit every inch of Ida’s skin. 

“It’s from mamma”, Ida said.

Maja sat down next to her, resting her head against her shoulders. Ida started to read. 

“Come on”, Lars moaned, slapping his comic shut. “Not again. I’ve heard this three times today already.”

Heart in throat, Ida was about to respond, when Kalle interrupted.

“Last one in is a…”

He started sprinting and the rest leapt after him. That was Kalle’s godly ability; to own and steer any moment his way. 

Back in the water, even with splashing and laughter around her, Ida wished again for it to reset her, bleed out her proportions, her perspectives. She fought a sudden urge to drag Lars down, wrestle him, tumble through the water, smear out time, find themselves in stillness, back as little kids, find each other again, find mamma coming home and this summer no longer being be so nakedly, burningly bright.