The Water

As I sit here at the kitchen table allowing the sun that has crept in through the window to warmly embrace my skin while offering the security for which I yearn, I cannot shake the urge to want to reveal what has been on my mind since last night. What I experienced was nothing like what I had ever experienced before. I am confused as to whether the bizarre adventure was scary enough to be a nightmare or just an unsettling occurrence beyond reality. Would anyone even believe something so weird came from my mind? I questioned myself. 

The smell of jasmine interrupts my thoughts and tells me my sister has just exited the shower and is on the prowl for her coffee. I hate the caffeinated drink, but because I am an early bird and I know how much she loves it, I prepare a pot every morning for her. 

“Good morning, Sunshine,” she says as she sashays toward the cabinet in search of her favorite mug. She is fully dressed in a crop top and jeans with her wet hair wrapped in a towel and an unmade face.

“Morning, Teenie” I say with my eyes fixed on the window staring at anything or nothing at all in the distance while before me my bowl of Fruit Loops goes soggy. 

“What’s wrong, Tess?” Teenie asks me as she pours the hot java into her cup. 

She takes a seat across from me. I turn to her and she peers into my chestnut-colored eyes. I stare back with a matching set of eyes. She knows something is not quite right. In fact, my sister knows me better than I know myself. The emotional sensitivity phenomenon between the both of us is explained through our having been born just five minutes apart. I was positioned before her in entering the world. 

“Nothing. Well. There’s something. I gotta tell you about this dream I had last night.” The sense of urgency is reigniting through my veins. I can no longer keep it contained. “You know how we go on our annual family vacations?”

“Yeah.” Teenie takes a sip from her mug. 

“I dreamt we were on a plane to Key West, Florida.”

“Woohoo! Key West! Yeahhhh!” She throws her hands up in the air and snaps her fingers.

“Tennille, calm down. It was just a dream.” I lift an eyebrow in her direction and she simmers down.

“So we were on the plane. Me, you, mom and dad. But the plane wasn’t any ordinary plane. It was a military chopper.”

“Say what?!” 

“The doors were cut out and the engine was so loud I couldn’t hear myself think. We were thousands of miles up in the sky and moving at high speed.” 

“And what happened?” 

“I glanced to my right at the ocean beneath us and anticipated an enjoyable time. As the helicopter dropped closer in preparation for landing, I saw many people swimming, lounging in inflatables and having a good time in the water.”

“And?” Teenie’s impatience almost makes me not want to tell my story. I raise my eyebrow at her and she backs down taking another sip of her coffee. 

“Although it was only 4:00 p.m. during daylight saving time, strangely, it was darker than usual outside. I didn’t know if it was a possible arrival of inclement weather or something else in the atmosphere. I gazed upward at the rest of the sky above us and there were dark clouds like gray cotton candy taking up space and warning of rain to come.  

“I saw lightning and I heard thunder like the sound of a bowling ball knocking down a collection of pins. An overwhelming sense of insecurity fell upon me. I took another peek below us and I saw several rather tall rock formations jutting out from the ocean. The chopper bobbed and weaved around the large, stoic rocks. We were too close to the water and I could hear the music the people were listening to, their laughter and other joyful noises.”

Eyes wide open, Teenie cradles her cup between her hands as she holds onto my every word. She breaks her silence. “O-M-G! Tess, I can see it. I feel like I am there right now. This is so bogus.”

“There’s more. So I continued eyeing everything below. To my surprise, the crystal clear water allowed me to capture a glimpse of a humongous underwater statue of a woman bent in a posture where her head rested upon her knee.” 

“This isn’t the Key West I know,” says Teenie with her brows furrowed and her bottom lip poked out. “What was I doing?”

“Will you let me finish?”

She moves her hands in a gesture for me to continue. 

“You were sitting next to me taking in the view of everything. You know I can’t swim. So because of my fear and the fact that we were surrounded by water, I asked you if the pilots were going to drop us off there. And that’s when you turned to face me and said, ‘Yes, they’re dropping us off right down there.’ You pointed downward and suddenly . . .”

Teenie lays her hands flat on the table, leans closer to me and says, “Tess, you haven’t woken up. You’re still here.”

“Huh?” I feel the air knocked out of my lungs. I am falling at the speed of light from the chopper. My heartbeat is moving several miles a minute. I drop down into the water with a loud and powerful splash. The weight of the water on my body is too heavy. My nose receives a hint of jasmine, so I know she is near. I taste aqua in my mouth as I yell for help. On any other day, I would have appreciated savoring some H2O to satisfy my thirst, but right now, I despise it like an enemy and fear it with all my soul. 

“Help! Hellllppppp me!” I hear the other people in the distance, still having fun. How can they, while I struggle? I wonder. I am punching, kicking and screaming against the tides as I feel myself sinking deep into the abyss. Water is entering my lungs and I cannot breathe. I am choking as I am being overtaken by the pressure, the force beyond my control. The scent of jasmine has escaped my nostrils. I close my eyes, succumbing to my death.

I awake lifting myself up while grabbing my chest. I am out of breath and sweat drips from my forehead as if I had just ran a marathon. The sun shines through my bedroom window and reassures me that I am alive. It was all a dream. A terrible delusion. I want to forget it. I hop out of bed and start my day. 

I am at the table with a bowl of soggy Fruit Loops staring out the window and mulling over what is reality and what is not. Teenie disturbs me with her cup of Joe in hand as she pulls herself a seat at the table.

“What’s wrong, Tess?” 

I freeze as I realize this extraordinarily gut-wrenching event is set to auto-repeat.  

END