As he slips below the water, I kick
off my shoes. Tucking my socks inside
them, I think, “Saving him will be the easy part.” Fully clothed, no towels, I don’t
want to get wet. I did not want Caleb to go swimming, but here I am at the end
of a stranger’s dock on Long Lake in the middle of April about to dive in after
him.
“Come on honey” I plead with Caleb one
more time, hoping to stay dry. “You know how to swim. Come to me.”
Sputtering for breath, he manages,
“I can’t swim, Mom, my shorts are too heavy.” Perplexed, I watch him slip below
again, fighting just to keep his lips above water. Suddenly, I am terrified.
Later I would feel ashamed to
remember emptying my pockets. The car keys, a folded tissue, a tampon and a
couple of chicklets land safely inside my shoe. My plan is simple: get in,
retrieve my 7 year old, and get out.
Rory told Caleb it was okay to swim,
but he did not stay around to supervise. In this horrific moment, I am angry at
the man who saw a vacant house on the lake, trespassed with his wife and kids,
said “yes” to swimming and walked away. I
should have protested. I should have stopped him. But I didn’t. I ordered the
oldest to watch the youngest on the beach and make sure she didn’t go in past
her knees. I delighted in my middle child’s enthusiasm as he tore off his
sandals and then ran the length of the dock, pulling off his shirt on the fly.
I see his face lit up, joyful. I see him hop up to the diving board and leap
toward the water wildly, arms and legs churning in the air.
Now I am watching him drown. Shoes
off, pockets empty, it’s time to be the hero.
Confident that a rush of adrenaline
will fuel me, I dive in and feel the weight of the nearly frozen lake breaking
over my head. A raw chill encases my
body. There is no adrenaline, no palpable heartbeat, only numbness and a kind
of deep shrinking. My rubber fingers
clutch my son’s rubber shoulders. He feels strangely relaxed, completely
trusting me. I hold his immobile body close, yet feel tangibly separated, incapacitated
by the cold.
I think, “We are both going to die.
They will find us, fetal, mother wrapped around son, frozen at the bottom of
the lake.”
Where was the super-human strength
I was supposed to have to save my son? Why am I so human? So… regular-human, so…
not-super-human, so… weak-human?
Emptied of breath, a desperate voice escapes my clenched teeth
“kick.”
Caleb says, “I am.” He is not
moving. He is still trusting, relying on me.
The 8 feet back to the dock looks
like a mile. Beyond the dock, some
movement catches my eye. It is my husband running down the hill to our rescue. Moments earlier I would have been glad to
welcome my man and watch him work while I stayed dry, but now an angry resolve strengthens
me. I kick with force enough to drag our bodies through the heavy water myself.
Caleb is taken to the hot tub to
melt away his misadventure. I need to thaw more slowly. I am in shock. Who is
this cape-less, shoe-less, belt-less, power-less
“hero?” I see myself as from above, lying alone on the dock, translucent and
more fragile than I ever imagined. The warm wooden dock holds my shaken frame. Through
closed eyes, I see the sun. Tears leak out and run toward my ears. In that
moment, I reluctantly accept my
secret identity. I am (pause) only human.
I am only human, and today, that is enough.
