Learning to Swim “I can’t swim!”, he yelled, “I can’t swim!”, as they grabbed him by his arms and his legs, lifted him up, swung him left and right and then released him, threw him, as far as they could, into the water, cold, wet, deadly, ubiquitous water, everywhere around him, and bubbles and green and blue and disorientation, no air anywhere, just water and he didn’t know which way to look, which way to go, what to do, he was kicking and screaming and bubbles were everywhere and light and darkness and no air, so the lungs started to burn and he couldn’t help it anymore and he inhaled and it was all water and the darkness started to narrow into a long, long corridor that started to close, until he felt huge, strong arms around him that grabbed him, hard, and pulled him, up, into the light and the sun and the corridor closed completely and it was all black. The pressure on his lungs made him cough with pain and water sprayed out of his mouth and air came into the lungs and he was alive and they were all laughing around him: “He’s alive! He’s fine! Told you he was gonna be fine.” He kept coughing and puking water and inhaling sweet air and life and he was crying and was miserable and happy. “I told you I can’t swim! I almost drowned!” “You’re fine!” “I can’t swim!” “You’ll learn!” “No, don’t throw me into the water!” “That’s the only way to learn!” “I won’t learn! I’ll drown!” But it was too late, they grabbed him again and as he was flying towards the water: “You’ll learn!”, he was only able to yell, one more time: “I won’t learn! I’ll drown!” The water was everywhere again, cold, deadly, and it was the same as before, but this time there were no arms to grab him in time, the dark corridor narrowed, it all just went black. They watched, surprised that it didn’t work. He would have yelled: “I told you!”, if he could have, but, unfortunately, it was no longer possible. The Endreadeo.html