Swimming Home by Deborah Levy Page A

difficulty to the edge of the pool.
    ‘Come and see what we found in the river.’
    They crowded around the bucket, which was half full of muddy water. A slimy grey creature with a red stripe down its spine clung to a clump of weed. It was as thick as Mitchell’s thumb and seemed to have some sort of pulse because the water trembled above it. Every now and again it curled into a ball and slowly straightened out again.
    ‘What is it?’ Mitchell couldn’t believe they had bothered to lug this vile creature across the fields all the way back to the villa.
    ‘It’s a thing.’ Joe smirked.
    Mitchell groaned and moved away. ‘Nasty.’
    ‘Dad always finds gross things.’
    Nina stared over Kitty’s shoulder, making sure not to look at her breasts, which were now hanging over the bucket as she peered in. She didn’t want to look at naked Kitty Finch and her father standing too near her. Nina could count the bones that ran like beads down her spine. Kitty was a starver. Her room was full of rotting food she had hidden under cushions. As far as Nina was concerned, she’d rather stare at the blotches of chewing gum on London pavement than at her father and Kitty Finch.
    Kitty reached for a towel. She was all fingers and thumbs, dropping it and picking it up again until Joe finally took it from her and helped wrap it around her waist.
    ‘What do you think it is?’ Kitty stared into the bucket.
    ‘It’s a creepy-crawly,’ Joe announced. ‘My best find yet.’
    Nina thought it might be a centipede. It had hundreds of tiny legs that were frantically waving around in the water, trying to find something to grip on to.
    ‘What exactly is it you are looking for when you go fishing?’ Kitty lowered her voice, as if the creature might hear her. ‘Do you find the things you want to find?’
    ‘What are you talking about?’ Mitchell sounded like a schoolteacher irritated with a child.
    ‘Don’t talk to her like that.’ Joe’s arms were now clasped around Kitty’s waist, holding up the towel as if his life depended on it.
    ‘She’s asking why don’t I find silver fish and pretty shells? The answer is they are there anyway.’
    While he talked he poked his finger through the wet curls of Kitty’s hair. Nina saw her mother and Laura walking through the white gate. Her father let go of the towel and Kitty blushed. Nina stared miserably into the cypress trees, pretending to look for the hedgehog she knew sheltered in the garden. Joe walked over to the plastic recliner and lay down. He glanced at his wife, who had walked over to the bucket. There were leaves in her hair and grass stains on her bare shins. She had not so much distanced herself from him as moved out to another neighbourhood altogether. There was new vigour in the way she stood by the bucket. Her determination not to love him seemed to have renewed her energy.
    Mitchell was still peering at the creature crawling up the sides of the red plastic bucket. It was perfectly camouflaged by the red markings on its spine.
    ‘What are you going to do with your slug?’
     Everyone looked at Joe.
    ‘Yes,’ he said. ‘My “thing” is freaking you all out. Let’s put it on a leaf in the garden.’
    ‘No.’ Laura squirmed. ‘It’ll only make its way back here.’
    ‘Or crawl through the plughole and come up in the water.’ Mitchell looked truly alarmed.
    Laura shuddered and then screamed, ‘It’s climbing out. It’s nearly out.’ She ran to the bucket and threw a towel over it.
    ‘Do something to stop it, Joe.’
    Joe limped to the bucket, removed the towel and flicked the creature back into the bottom of the water with his thumb.
    ‘It is really quite tiny.’ He yawned. ‘It’s just a strange tiny slimy thing.’
    A clump of river weed trailed down his eyebrow. Everything had gone very quiet. Even the late-afternoon rasp of the cicadas seemed to have faded away. When Joe opened his eyes, everyone except Laura had disappeared into the villa. Laura