put on fins and masks. My new flippers look sleek and aqua blue against the white tiles of the floor.
Finally it is time again for all of us to get into the water. Sage moves close to me as we line up to splash in, him shivering, me trying not to look over the edge into the mouth of the water.
“Quit thinking about last time,” he says. “It’s going to be different.”
“We’ll see,” I say.
“Practice measuring your breaths, like she told us.”
I practice measuring my breaths, and it calms me a little. We watch our classmates line up and fall backward into the pool. I see them down there beneath the surface, not coming up for a breath, and all of a sudden a great excitement fills me. Although I know it is stupid, I feel as if we’re going to find ourselves in the ocean when we splash down, surrounded by coral reefs and fish, seeing things we’d never even imagined. When I crouch for my roll entry, Sage crouches beside me. Together we fall back and splash down. At first I forget to breathe. We’re underwater, after all. But when my lungs start getting tight I suck in a breath. The air is cold and surprising in my lungs, and suddenly I’m scuba diving, shooting out bubbles of used breath into the pool, and Sage is finning beside me.
When I think of Isabel this time it’s not as a mermaid but as the living girlfriend of my brother, wearing blue jeans, playing bass in the garage, telling me to try singing. She would have liked to see us diving, Sage and me, going down into the richest blue of the bottom. We tread water, watching each other through our masks. I cannot see his eyes through the glass, but I can see, reflected small and blue, a girl wearing swim fins and a metal tank, self-contained and breathing underwater.
Note to Sixth-Grade Self
On Wednesdays wear a skirt. A skirt is better for dancing. After school, remember not to take the bus. Go to McDonald’s instead. Order the fries. Don’t even bother trying to sit with Patricia and Cara. Instead, try to sit with Sasha and Toni Sue. If they won’t let you, try to sit with Andrea Shaw. And if Andrea Shaw gets up and throws away the rest of her fries rather than sit with you, sit alone and do not look at anyone. Particularly not the boys. If you do not look at them, they may not notice you sitting alone. And if they don’t notice you sitting alone, there is still a chance that one of them will ask you to dance.
At three-thirty stand outside with the others and take the number seven bus uptown. Get off when they all get off. Be sure to do this. Do not stare out the window and lose yourself. You will end up riding out to the edge of town past the rusted gas-storage tanks, and you will never find the right bus home. Pay attention. Do not let the strap of your training bra slip out the armhole of your short-sleeved shirt. Do not leave your bag on the bus. As you cross the street, take a look at the public high school. The kids there will be eating long sticks of Roman candy and leaning on the chain-link fence. Do they look as if they care who dances with whom, or what steps you’ll learn this week? News flash: They do not. Try to understand that there’s a world larger than the one you inhabit. If you understand that, you will be far ahead of Patricia and Cara.
For now, though, you live in this world, so go ahead and follow the others across the street to Miggie’s Academy of Dance. There is a low fence outside. Do not climb on it in your skirt. Huddle near the door with the other girls. See if anyone will let you listen. Do not call attention to yourself. Listen as Patricia, with her fascinating stutter, describes what she and Cara bought at the mall. Notice how the other girls lean forward as she works through her troublesome consonants:
G-G-GUESS Jeans and an Esp-p-prit sweater.
They will talk about the TV shows they watch, who killed whom, who is sleeping with whom; they will compare starlets’ hairstyles. None of this talk is of any
Finally it is time again for all of us to get into the water. Sage moves close to me as we line up to splash in, him shivering, me trying not to look over the edge into the mouth of the water.
“Quit thinking about last time,” he says. “It’s going to be different.”
“We’ll see,” I say.
“Practice measuring your breaths, like she told us.”
I practice measuring my breaths, and it calms me a little. We watch our classmates line up and fall backward into the pool. I see them down there beneath the surface, not coming up for a breath, and all of a sudden a great excitement fills me. Although I know it is stupid, I feel as if we’re going to find ourselves in the ocean when we splash down, surrounded by coral reefs and fish, seeing things we’d never even imagined. When I crouch for my roll entry, Sage crouches beside me. Together we fall back and splash down. At first I forget to breathe. We’re underwater, after all. But when my lungs start getting tight I suck in a breath. The air is cold and surprising in my lungs, and suddenly I’m scuba diving, shooting out bubbles of used breath into the pool, and Sage is finning beside me.
When I think of Isabel this time it’s not as a mermaid but as the living girlfriend of my brother, wearing blue jeans, playing bass in the garage, telling me to try singing. She would have liked to see us diving, Sage and me, going down into the richest blue of the bottom. We tread water, watching each other through our masks. I cannot see his eyes through the glass, but I can see, reflected small and blue, a girl wearing swim fins and a metal tank, self-contained and breathing underwater.
Note to Sixth-Grade Self
On Wednesdays wear a skirt. A skirt is better for dancing. After school, remember not to take the bus. Go to McDonald’s instead. Order the fries. Don’t even bother trying to sit with Patricia and Cara. Instead, try to sit with Sasha and Toni Sue. If they won’t let you, try to sit with Andrea Shaw. And if Andrea Shaw gets up and throws away the rest of her fries rather than sit with you, sit alone and do not look at anyone. Particularly not the boys. If you do not look at them, they may not notice you sitting alone. And if they don’t notice you sitting alone, there is still a chance that one of them will ask you to dance.
At three-thirty stand outside with the others and take the number seven bus uptown. Get off when they all get off. Be sure to do this. Do not stare out the window and lose yourself. You will end up riding out to the edge of town past the rusted gas-storage tanks, and you will never find the right bus home. Pay attention. Do not let the strap of your training bra slip out the armhole of your short-sleeved shirt. Do not leave your bag on the bus. As you cross the street, take a look at the public high school. The kids there will be eating long sticks of Roman candy and leaning on the chain-link fence. Do they look as if they care who dances with whom, or what steps you’ll learn this week? News flash: They do not. Try to understand that there’s a world larger than the one you inhabit. If you understand that, you will be far ahead of Patricia and Cara.
For now, though, you live in this world, so go ahead and follow the others across the street to Miggie’s Academy of Dance. There is a low fence outside. Do not climb on it in your skirt. Huddle near the door with the other girls. See if anyone will let you listen. Do not call attention to yourself. Listen as Patricia, with her fascinating stutter, describes what she and Cara bought at the mall. Notice how the other girls lean forward as she works through her troublesome consonants:
G-G-GUESS Jeans and an Esp-p-prit sweater.
They will talk about the TV shows they watch, who killed whom, who is sleeping with whom; they will compare starlets’ hairstyles. None of this talk is of any
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