I did two crossword puzzles and one word search and then turned on the television and matched my breathing to the click of the channels, but nothing made it better. The next thing I knew, Leah handed me my bathing suit and I put it on underneath my clothes.

When we got to the pool, there was a man swimming laps. I sat on the bleachers, counting each time his arm sliced into the water. When I looked back up, Leah had taken off her shirt and was standing beside me in a shiny black bathing suit.

“Let’s go in together.”

I nodded, not really sure how I felt about the change in routine. Leah always sat and watched me. The ball inside me bounced harder, but I vowed not to disappoint her again, so I stripped off my clothes and stuffed them inside my bag.

She tiptoed around the puddles, reminding me of a ballet dancer.

“C’mon.” She took my hand and led me to the edge of the water. We sat together, the skin of our thighs touching, holding hands like little kids.

We slid in above our waists. She braced herself on my arms and arched her back so that the water lapped around her face. The tip of her nose disappeared every few seconds and then popped back up. When she straightened, wisps of hair streamed around her shoulders like yellow ribbons.

“Your turn,” she said, reaching out her forearms for me to hold.

I shook my head.

“Yes, Franny. Just try.”

So I gripped myself tightly to her and arched my head back, feeling the pulse of the water vibrate through me. I was floating, but grounded at the same time. When I came back up, she started to swim and I followed her, synchronizing myself so that I rose when she fell. I liked looking at her when she didn’t know that I was.

I’m not sure how long we swam like that, side by side, like twins.

Finally, she stopped. We bobbed up and down in the water, spreading out our arms and legs to keep afloat.

“Why didn’t you tell me how much fun I was missing?” she asked.

For a second, I thought she was angry with me for keeping something else from her, but she was smiling, so I smiled back. She shimmied her fingertips back and forth, making tiny little bubbles in the water, and then sunk down to her ears, blowing them in my direction. It felt funny seeing her wet. The only other person I had ever seen that way was Matilda when we were little and took baths together. Leah lifted herself up and floated on her back. Her body, at the mercy of each rippled wave, lay limp. I briefly worried that she had stopped breathing, but then her eyes opened and she was back with me, smiling.