The summer before sixth grade, I used to play dead in pools. I waded into the shallow end, and then I fell forward, and then I’d hang, sagging toward the bottom. The sun warmed my neck around my ponytail, and I’d squint through the chlorine sting toward the bottom. Pebbled. Rough. On a curve I couldn’t trace, either up or down.
Isaiah looked blurry through the chlorine film. “I thought—” he said.
I don’t know if Dad yelled before or after. In my memory, the yell blooms at the same time as the splash.
