Chapter 2 - The Depth of the Water
The sound was a wet, sickening thud—the sound of dense tissue collapsing under violent impact.
A white-hot wave of agony tore through my core, sharp enough to shut down my lungs instantly. My vision fragmented into blinding white sparks. I felt something deep inside my body snap—a sudden, terrible tear—followed immediately by a hot, gushing surge of fluid pouring down the inside of my thighs.
My water had broken. Not gradually, but violently, ruptured by trauma.
My legs buckled beneath me. My body pitched backward, completely out of control, over the stone coping of the pool edge.
The world turned upside down. The blue South Carolina sky vanished, replaced by a sudden, freezing darkness as the chlorine water engulfed me.
Down.
The water was heavy, cold, and thick. Panic tried to claw its way into my mind, but the pain in my lower abdomen was so overwhelming that my muscles refused to obey. I couldn't kick. I couldn't sweep my arms. Blood—dark, swirling ribbons of crimson—began to bloom out from beneath the skirt of my pale dress, clouding the clear pool water around my waist.
I opened my eyes under the water. Above me, through the shimmering surface eight feet up, I could see the distorted silhouettes of my family standing at the edge.
I saw my mother, Eleanor, her arms crossed over her silk chest.
I saw my father, Richard, holding his glass of Scotch.
I heard their voices, muffled and strange through the water, but unmistakable in their cold, dismissive cadence.
"Let her float there," my father’s voice drifted down, completely devoid of emotion. "Let her think about her selfishness."
"Maybe now she’ll learn to share," Lauren’s voice followed, accompanied by a high, nervous laugh that echoed against the water's surface.
My lungs burned. My body was sinking toward the blue tiles at the bottom of the deep end. The dark crimson cloud around my stomach grew thicker, veiling my sight.
Noah, my mind whispered into the blue silence. Noah, please hold on.
My chest heaved on an involuntary reflex. Water rushed into my throat. The darkness at the edges of my vision expanded, folding over the shimmering light of the sky, until everything went completely black.
"Emily! Emily, wake up! Breathe!"
Hands were dragging me across rough concrete. Cold air struck my wet face, followed by a violent, racking fit of coughing as water surged out of my lungs onto the stone.
"Press the towel here! Fast!" a woman’s voice screamed above me.
I opened my eyes. The world was a blur of gray shadows and blinding sunlight. A face hovered over mine—Marissa, a thirty-year-old high school teacher who had come to the shower as a distant cousin on my father's side. Her face was pale with sheer terror, her yellow summer dress soaked through with pool water and deep red blood.
"Marissa..." I gasped, my throat feeling like raw glass.
"Don't move, Emily! The ambulance is coming! I called nine-one-one three minutes ago!" Marissa wept, pressing a thick white beach towel firmly against the front of my dress, right over my bruised, swollen lower belly.
Ten feet away, near the glass sliding doors leading into the main house, my family was still standing.
Eleanor was holding a small silver compact, checking her lipstick in the reflection. Richard was talking quietly into his cell phone, his back turned to the pool. Lauren was sipping her iced tea, her eyes fixed on her phone screen as if nothing unusual had happened on the patio.
Not one of them had stepped forward. Not one of them had offered a towel. Not one of them had touched the water.
"They... they watched me," I choked out, a fresh wave of agony ripping through my pelvis—a contraction so sharp it felt like a serrated blade tearing across my uterus.
"I saw her hit you, Emily," Marissa whispered, her voice shaking violently as she wiped wet hair from my forehead. "I was coming out of the bathroom. I saw Eleanor punch you. I ran as fast as I could, but you were already under... you were at the bottom for almost two minutes before I jumped in."
I looked down at myself.
The white towel Marissa was holding against my belly was already completely saturated with dark, venous blood. A massive, purple-black bruise, the size of a dinner plate, was forming across the center of my stretched skin—a physical imprint of my mother’s knuckles.
"My baby," I sobbed, the tears burning my chlorine-stung eyes. "Marissa, my baby isn't moving."
May you like
"Hold on, Emily! Please, just hold on!"
The distant, wailing scream of a siren broke through the humid afternoon air, growing louder as it turned onto our street.
