I join my dad and Ivy. We teach my dad how to play Clueless, but he’s kind of useless at it. Then we race to the rope line and back. My mom stays at the water’s edge, watching us. Or watching beyond us. As if she’s trying to see the future somewhere far out from shore.

“Come on in, Mom!” Ivy yells.

She waves as if she can’t really hear what Ivy’s saying.

My dad glances over at my mom and makes a worried face, but quickly turns away when he sees me notice.

“Can I jump off your shoulders?” Ivy asks him.

He dunks under the water and Ivy tries to get her feet up on his shoulders, but she’s a lot bigger than the last time she did this with him, and my dad struggles to stand back up. I try to help, but Ivy falls backward on top of me. We try a bunch more times, but then Ivy gets water up her nose and my dad’s shoulders are bright red from all the slipping and sliding and we finally give up.

We float on our backs and look up at the sky, which seems to be getting increasingly cloudy.

I don’t know why my parents never take us swimming in the summer like this. I guess they’re always too busy or too tired. But this is nice. It’s almost perfect.

I look back to shore again, and my mom is gone. I search the whole beach for her but don’t see her. Then, finally, I see a lone swimmer at the far end of the beach, swimming along the rope line. She’s doing the crawl, lifting her head for a breath with every other stroke. She glides through the water with grace. I can tell she’s wearing her T-shirt and shorts. I must’ve been right about the bathing suit. I don’t point her out to Ivy and my dad, who are busy floating on their backs, sharing Monopoly strategies. Instead, I quietly swim out to her.

We swim side by side along the rope line, my mom not really acknowledging me, and me not really acknowledging her. I try to copy her strokes and keep up with her. When we get to the far corner, we stop and tread water to catch our breath.

“It does feel good,” she finally says. She smiles at me again and dunks her head underwater to get her hair out of her face. The dirt has washed off, and she looks less tired.

“So . . . do you want to tell me what’s going on with Micah?” she asks.