In that instant, I blinked and saw everything with shocking clarity, as if I were still in it: The frothing water closes above me. I sink in the slow darkness, my torso thrust upward, arms floating backward; my skirts and hair billow around me, pushed and pulled by the current; eyes open, gazing upward as if to catch some last shard of light, mouth sealed by instinct, and then, when I can hold it no longer, an involuntary spasm of breath that drags rancid water into my nose and mouth, filling my lungs. My eyes widen with panic, my limbs flail in slow motion, and I’m alone—the cold, hard nothing of being no thing—and then at last surrender, my body flaccid, all exertion ceased. I am free of all pain, all feeling, all past, present. All resistance gone. The only sound is my own heavy heartbeat inside me, sluggish and faint. I am overcome with the most perfect floating stillness and tranquility—my body itself becoming water.

Just then, some small thing brushes my cheek like a kiss. My eyes open but can barely make out what shines in the dark near my face, all alone in the watery world. As it rolls, end over end, away from me, I see it, the gleaming silver band of Fanny’s ring, its carnelian round flashing as it floats away, having slipped from my finger.

A hand that seems to be my own, disembodied, reaches for it, dragging the water’s weight, fingers outstretched, but I cannot grasp it. I can only watch its faint glint, receding in the darkness.

Stay with me, please.

I want to live.

Instead, blackness wraps around me like a cocoon. I have no sense that it’s an ending, because I have no sense—no thoughts—at all.

But then, little bird, but then!

Time circles back for me, bends, and breaks.