I go swimming three times a week. Mostly I walk to the leisure centre. If it’s raining I get the bus although I really don’t like to. I feel the stares. People can be very judgmental. They think you’re lazy. Look at that great whale of a woman they whisper. If I were that size, I’d be walking, they say. She wants to get some of that blubber off, they snigger.
But today the sun is shining so I don’t have to take the bus or their leery eyes. The ladies’ changing rooms are a dread-filled space. There are two sides divided by a wall of lockers. And there are too many mirrors, watching you from every angle with their spiteful glass. Choose your side. But don’t pick the wrong one. Don’t go to the right – it’s full of gym bunnies getting into their Lycra for spin class. Now, those are bodies for flaunting, oh yes. Tight, toned limbs with no hint of cellulite. No wobble. No blancmange belly or cottage cheese thighs. I chose a locker on that side once by mistake. They flitted away from me like a school of fish fleeing into the darkness, as if my fatness was catching.
Today though, the locker room is empty. I still choose the solitary changing cubicle in the corner in case anyone should come in while I’m mid-undress. I fold my saggy body into the bathing costume and fold my baggy clothes into an empty locker. I go through the narrow corridor, thighs rubbing, and I’m beside the pool. It is empty. Millionaire swimming is what I call this. For a moment, this is all mine, my very own pool all to myself. Floor to ceiling windows line the poolside and the water is dazzling blue, glinting and winking invitingly in the sun. Come on in, it laughs! The water’s lovely, it says. You’re lovely, it says. It winks again, flirting with me.
I creak in – my knees and hip ache these days but the doctor says I have to get some weight off, take the strain off my heart. I push off from the edge. The water sparkles cold against my skin and I float suspended like an astronaut in space, weightless, lighter than air. Light as a feather. What’s lighter? Air or a feather? I don’t care. I am caught in amber, massless. I plough through the water and leave furrows in my wake, collapsing behind me. There’s no one here, the water whispers. Go on, it teases. Have fun. No one’s watching. I surface and gulp in air while I glance around. Not a soul – they must be at a class, spinning their wheels. I twirl underwater – a graceful otter, a selkie, a mermaid. Legs clamped together and arms pinned to sides I whirl through the blue. I birl and I cartwheel. Forward roll. Backwards roll. Synchronised swimmers cheer me on from the sidelines, marvelling at my sleekness, my slickness. I dart, fish-scaled, through the corals, encountering reefs and sunken ships. I weave and dodge my way through the broken pillars of Atlantis. Waves crash ten thousand leagues above me and a passing blue whale sings its mournful aria. Starfish twinkle in a deep blue sky and shoals of sardines flash about me like silver coins thrown in a river. I come up and up and up through the bright water, pirouetting to the sunlit surface. ‘Brava! Brava!’, cries the water. Dolphins stand on their tails, shimmy out of the water. I break through the surface tension and stop, breathless, heaving, heart clanging.
I hear voices heading for the pool and make for the steps. Perhaps I can be out before they get here. As I wade, my costume gathers in great folds around me like a bell jellyfish. I grab swathe after swathe of material as it billows. I scoop up handfuls of Lycra and clutch it to myself as I hurry to get out. In desperation I climb out of the miles of soggy fabric, and walk on, bare-skinned. In they come, like a flock of chattering magpies, all for sorrow. They pass me and one of them laughs quietly, eyes sliding to the side. I stare ahead, my gaze flitting from face to face. I catch an admiring glance, an appraising look. Jealous eyes linger and narrow. I frown and hurry on, head down. Then I freeze, mid-corridor. There is no chafe of flesh.
I dart and look into the mirror… mirror on the wall. I turn, bewildered, and stare behind me just in case. But there is only me. Sylphlike legs and taut belly stare back. A thigh gap. There is no bra bulge or back fat. The bingo wings have flown and in their place are hard hills and valleys of muscle. Slender clavicle flows to plender gap between my collarbones. Plender gap, tender gap. Acromion points on point. There is no slackness, only sleekness. Skin smoothed tight over muscle. My heart bangs in the pulse point of my neck.
A commotion shakes me, wakes me from my daze. A bark, bark, bark from the swimming pool. I fly to the water and stop. A chorus of sea lions greets me, clapping and flapping my arrival. The God of the seas emerges, clothed in incandescence. Take my hand he beseeches. Come to me, Calypso, he implores and I am compelled into the water. The metal of his spear rests on my breastbone. I have no more need of air. I am a water thing. A sprite, a fish, a flash of light on blue, not flesh. I open my mouth to his kiss and all the water of the oceans pours in. I breathe it, greedy, thirsty. But then I falter, flounder, wonder. Am I Queen of the seas? I shake, I heave, I sputter. But it ‘s too late, I am wedded to the water. I choke a last astonished gasp as my heart gives out. It blooms like an anemone and wafts back and forth to the rhythm of the tide as each wave booms upon the shore.
Judith Meikle is a Scottish writer living in Kent, England with her husband, son and two crazy dogs. She is currently studying for a BA in Creative Writing with Falmouth University. When she’s not writing, she can usually be found curled up with a book.
Instagram: Judithmeiklewrites