Summer in Summer

I first saw her when my family and I went to the beach.

It was three o'clock in the morning, the moon was casting down a beautiful light of its own while the cool summer breeze brushed against me, making goose bumps appear on my skin. I was about thirteen years old, still a bit ill-tempered as it was too early in the morning to be going to the beach – but, looking back on it now, I am so incredibly thankful that my parents decided to make this a semi-annual thing.

I'd never been to that particular beach before. We had to drive for five hours to get to it, as my father thought that it would be ridiculous to just fly there when we were only going to spend a day out in that area. We rented a cottage and our mother had warned my sister and I not to go into the water just yet as it was cold, and I realized that we weren't the only ones there when I heard another voice say the exact same thing.

I turned my head to the right, and there she was. Clad in a loose tank top and some shorts, I remember wondering if she was out of her mind. Although it was summer, it was still unbelievably chilly, and I was positive that she had been completely insane.

For some reason I couldn't look away. She looked out to the sea and faintly said, "The water is calling me," and I remember stifling a smile as I'd heard it.

Weird, I'd thought fondly.

The woman – whom I later found out was her mother – let out a laugh, telling her that she should've been born a fish, which I silently agreed slightly with. Soon after, though, she began yelling as the girl rushed down the beach and into the water, submerging herself with no hesitance.

Esme, my little sister who was seven at the time, turned to mom and asked why the girl was allowed to swim and she wasn't, to which mom responded to with a shake of her head as she dug into Esme's backpack for her sweater. By this point, I was blatantly staring at her, wondering "who the hell would willingly swim in this temperature?"

Her mother tried several times to call her to the cottage and out of the water, but the girl paid her no mind as she floated on her back, just staring up into the night sky. I thought it was somewhat magical, the way she just looked so peaceful in the water. She looked at home.

She looked like she belonged there.

The second time I saw her was at the very same beach.

Esme pulled me along the beach and into the water, and I watched her with a small smile on my face as she swam with her goggles on. I followed close by, feeling the rough textures of the rocks and corals underneath my feet. I went to swim to Esme when something pierced my left heel, making me gasp as I flailed in the water. I hopped on one foot towards the shore, pain spreading throughout my left calf.

My legs gave out due to the pain and I fell onto the sand, my calves still in the water. My eyes widened as I pulled my left leg out of the water and saw several spikes attached to the heel of my foot. I reached over to try and pick them off when a voice shouted at me to stop, which promptly made me retract my hand.

I looked over and saw the girl from before coming over to me, eyes on my foot. "You're not supposed to do that," she told me, kneeling down in front of me and gently picking up my foot. She looked up at me, carefully laying down my foot onto the sand. "We're going to need a pair of tweezers. Do you mind coming with me?"

"Can't you just pull them out right now?" I asked her.

"I can't do it with my bare hands, otherwise I won't be of much help at all." Seeing my hesitance, she added with a smile, "Your cottage is right next to ours, so no worries."