Swimming

Sketch by Denis Barnham, Summer 1942, sourced from Malta Spitfire Pilot.

I looked down at the gang splashing about in the water and sighed.

“Why aren’t you joining them?” I turned, startled, and saw Ginger looking at me, newspaper in hand, with a quietly questioning gaze.

“I can’t swim.” I didn’t feel like explaining more. “Just…never learned. Too old to learn now, I guess.”

Ginger looked at me oddly. “Hmph.” He looked down at his paper, set it aside, then sat up, contemplating. I watched him, unsure what he was about to say. I glanced over at where Stringer was currently trying to hold a struggling, laughing Bingo under the water for a few seconds before the taller Trinidadian came up for air to get his revenge.

“I don’t-“ I swallowed nervously, and his eyes darted from me to the chaps in the water.

“Come with me.” He stood up quietly, offering me a hand. I looked at it, then back into his eyes. “Don’t you want to learn?”

“Yeah,” I said, nervously. Ginger helped me up and took me away from the loud, rambunctious crowd, climbing over ledges of yellow-white rock, me following closely behind him, glancing every once in a while back at the disappearing sound of shouts and jeering.

Eventually we dropped back down to cool, quiet cove. Sheer rock hid the pool below from the land behind it, and despite the craggy formations of stone that made up the rest of the curved bay, glistening sand sat at the edge of water. It was warm underfoot as I tentatively followed Ginger’s winding route down the rocks, amazed at how he navigated them as if he lived among them.

My climb down was much more stop-start and anxious, and I winced internally every time my foot slipped on a sharp stone and I latched myself to the rocks in panic. Ginger didn’t laugh or mock my fear, merely leading me down with quiet instructions until my bare feet were on the shaded sand.

“It’s…lovely,” I murmured. “Quiet.”

“Good spot to learn, I think.”

“Yes,” I agreed.

“Come on then,” he said, and began unbuttoning his shirt. I glanced back at the water, which still seemed to beckon to me like a siren, then turned to see Ginger cast his shirt aside onto a stone.

Now, I had seen Ginger without clothes before (you may remember some details of the morning after the night we spent together), so on paper, at least, I had seen everything before. On paper. It was quite different to see that again when I was awake, and aware, and in the sharp light of day. Ginger stood for a second, hands thrust deep into his trousers as he leant his head back in a sunbeam, and I felt my breath stilling as I took him in properly for what felt like the first real time. His red hair coiffed and curling in the breeze lit up like flares as the light caught strands of it.

I followed his profile down his forehead, past his eyes of azure, his sharp, strong nose and moustache to his chest, and at this point I knew he could tell I was staring, but honestly, how could I not? A bare chest, with a fuzz of light orange, and a mellow farmer’s tan (without any of the ghastly pinking one saw with most white men) that a thousand freckles danced across. He turned slightly to look at me, and I’m sure the half smile he gave me then as he caught me staring will be burned into my mind forever, along with the way the sun seemed to light up and catch every freckle on his skin.

“All good, Toussaint?”

“I-uh-yeah,” I blushed, turning away for a second. “Sorry.”

“Nothing you haven’t seen before,” he muttered, his smile practically audible to me.

“I know.” I decided to disrobe for my own part, if just to distract myself from watching him do the same. Whether it worked or not is up for debate, for I know I was catching glimpses of his broad chest and lean legs as he folded his clothes neatly on a rock and turned back to the water. As I finished sorting my uniform out, I realised that he’d headed away from the shore and up onto a high rock. I paused, watching him, wondering for a second before he leapt off in a smooth, wonderfully graceful dive, coming up after a second and shaking water off himself with a grin. He gestured for me to join him, so I did.

I waded in tentatively, my initial eagerness to join him ebbing quickly. I hissed a little as the water passed my waistline. Ginger was treading water ahead of me where the depth was deeper, but I halted, unable to make myself go much further than where I was. I resisted the urge to glance back at the safety of the dry sand behind me. The water around me seemed to swallow me whole, even at mid-chest height, and I caught myself counting my steps back to the shore as I wondered if a riptide or freak wave could carry me out to sea in an instant.

Ginger seemed to sense my discomfort and swam over to float beside me. “You don’t have to do this if you don’t want to,” he said quietly.

“No.” I shook my head, more for my own sake than his. “I said I’d do this, so I will.”

“Are you sure?” He gripped my left arm, the touch electric even through the water. The look of concern and tenderness in his eyes as he floated in front of me drove all my fear away.

“Yes,” I ventured, not quite sure if I was really talking. “I am.”

“Right.” He stepped up so we were standing together in the sea, the top half of our bodies still above the waterline. He took my hands, then paused and looked at them for a second, before turning so he was standing perpendicular to me. “What if we…start with just floating.”

“Floating,” I repeat. “Yes, that sounds…yes.”

“Okay, so just…lean back into my arms, okay?” I paused, then nodded, and leant back slowly, letting my weight fall onto his arms until my feet left the seabed below me. My breath hitched and I felt myself tense up as the cold water hit my upper body and neck. “Just breathe, Peter. You’ll be alright here.”

“Okay,” I murmured. Ginger’s hands were on my back and my head, his finger idly running through my curls even as he spotted me.

“Just focus on the balance, okay? Keep yourself as still as possible. Arch your back and body up and keep your ears just on the surface.”

“It’s difficult,” I muttered, blinking up at the sky above me. The water still sloshed about around my ears, my legs threatening to slip underneath.

“Kick your legs lightly,” he added. “Not too hard, just a little under the water.” I did as he instructed, and he nodded with satisfaction. “Now… stretch your arms out a little. It’ll feel right when they’re in the correct place.”

“Got it,” I said, trying to feel my way to the right place, feeling like a fool as I thrashed about.

“Don’t overthink it, Peter.” I tried to nod and ended up coughing water out of my mouth, earning a chuckle from ginger. I rolled my eyes but persisted, focusing on the sensation of the water flowing around and underneath me. His arms still held me up under the water, and as I took deep breath after deep breath. “Keep your back arched up, remember?” There was a pause as I adjusted, trying not to move my head. I could see Ginger in the corner of my eyes, and when he spotted me looking at him, he offered a reassuring smile.

“How are you feeling now?”

“Better,” I said. “Yes. Definitely better.”

“Let’s try the next step.” There was a shift in the water, and suddenly Ginger’s arm’s slipped out from underneath me. For a second, I panicked, and nearly thrashed about, but I could feel him watching me and stilled myself, concentrating on breathing and balance, holding my weight evenly. My heart’s drumbeat seemed loud enough to be heard in Valletta, but eventually it began to ebb, slowly and steadily, the sound of the waves and wind rising to replace it, the sharp cries of seabirds echoing off of the cliff as I felt myself bob around in the calm water. I was floating, on my own, for the first time.

I opened my eyes to see a world of blue and white. The sky was clear and unbroken above me, a few wisps of contrails and lost clouds meandering above me, as careless and idle as I was, lying here weightless on the surface of the Mediterranean Sea. The feeling of drifting a few inches this way or that, up and down, left and right creating an almost rhythmic calming motion, and I felt the tension drop out of my shoulders, arms and legs until I felt completely loose and untethered.

As I was about to say something to Ginger, something moved under me – maybe a fish, or seaweed, or even just the current. Whatever it was, the water I was lying in began to rise and fall, tossing me around. I wasn’t expecting it, but suddenly the balance I thought I was holding serenely was lost. I couldn’t find the right position – my arms sank - my chest dropped under the water, my legs thrashed about underneath the surface as my mind filled with the image of being dragged far out to sea, lost to everyone, Michael calling my name as I sank deeper and deeper, light and life ebbing away into darkness.

Something firm grabbed me and I whipped around, struggling, panic-stricken, grasping at whatever piece of flotsam was about to drag me out to sea only to find Ginger holding me up about water, his arms linking under mine and around me in a loose hug to keep me afloat. “It’s alright, it’s alright,” he reassured, pulling me closer as I continued to hyperventilate, adrenaline still rushing through my body. “It’s okay Peter. I’ve got you. Just hold on.”I could barely hear his words, but I nodded furiously, unable to convey anything more than that.

My instinct was to latch onto him, wrapping my arms and legs around him, but I calmed myself down, just throwing my arms around his neck while I calmed down. “Just…breathe, Peter, okay? Take your time, It’s alright.” I nodded again, closed my eyes and began to breathe deeply, still stuttering and gasping a little.

Eventually, once my breathing was even, and the wind around me had died down, I risked opening my eyes again. Ginger was looking straight at me, his whirlpool-blue eyes looking deep into mine, the concern on his brow matched only by the care in his eyes. The half-smile on his lips couldn’t help but make me smile again. “All good now, Peter?”

“Yes,” I whispered, eventually. “Thank you.”

“I’m sorry about that.”

“Why should you be sorry?”

“I didn’t like to see you startled, that’s all.”

“Ginger,” I chuckled, running a hand idly up the back of his neck slowly, “I’m fine. I had a little fright, that’s all. I managed, with your help. Thank you.” My feet were firmly on the ground now, but he was still holding onto me, his palms flat against my back, thumbs rubbing along my back muscles, and mine around his neck, running my fingertips along the bottom of his hair.

“Yes,” he ventured, eventually, his mouth still curled in that half-smile that made me want to grab his cheek, pull him in and kiss him. His eyes flitted down for a second, and I wondered if he was having the same thought.

There was a chatter and groan above us, and we both looked up to see two duelling planes pirouetting and dancing above us, their machine gun’s audible even ten thousand feet above us. I squinted into the sun, trying to pick two planes apart from their contrails. Eventually they buzzed away, and I watched them go, then turned back, expecting Ginger to be watching them too. He wasn’t, instead, he was watching me. “Everything okay?” I asked, cockily. “Worried someone will outdo your kills while you’re away?”

“Bugger the kill list, Peter,” he muttered. “I don’t care about that right now.”

“What do you care about then?” he gave me a tedious look as I chuckled at him, pulling him close so I could feel his chest against mine, the cool water flowing around us as the light rumble of the waves in the cove filled our ears.
He shook his head, smirking, “you’re quite something, you know.”

“Oh? How so?”

“I don’t really have a word for it right now.” His hands ran up and down my back again, learning the ripples and topography of my body almost subconsciously. “You’re just…quite something.”

“I’ll take ‘quite something’ from the Irish Question, I think.”

He blinked at me, “The Irish Question? Who the hell calls me that?”

I shrugged. “Stringer.”

“I thought he called me ‘the red-haired twat’.”

“Not as far as I’ve heard.”

“Hmph.” He seemed amused by the name. “What do you call me, Peter.”

“I call you Ginger, Michael.”

“Hmph.” His right hand came up to run through a patch of wet curls at the back of my head. “What would you like to call me?”

“Many things,” I breathed.

“Such as?”

“Can I tell you after I kiss you?”

“…yes.”