Water Babies (pt 1)

I'm sitting down by Lake Michigan on a sticky afternoon in July, crying just a little, thinking about everybody so far away: about Han, about my parents, about a rotten, handsome boy from college, but mostly about Gram and the water babies.
"Come back on in now," Gram would call out to us from her beach towel whenever Han or I would swim too far out past the dock on those summer days spent in Lake Tahoe. "Water babies gonna eat'cha!"
((When we were kids, once summer came around and it wasn't too cold to swim, Gram would take Han and me up to Lake Tahoe. Takes about an hour to get there from the house, so Gram told us stories to keep us from combusting out of boredom. You can't be bored when Gram tells a story, because Gram always tells stories that could make you pee your pants. You can't be bored while you are trying so hard not to pee your pants.

"The thing about the lake is," Gram would begin, peering at us in the rearview mirror. "Once a body sinks, it never comes back up. You know why?"

We'd shake our heads, wide-eyed.

"'Cause the water babies got it! The water babies ate it right up."))

Water babies, Gram explained, were souls who dwelled in the lake, people who had died but were unable to move on to the afterlife for some reason or another. They fed, Gram said, on children: kept their skin smooth as babies.
"Some of 'em just don't wanna go. Some of 'em can't go. Stuck underwater."

Whenever Han or I would swim too far out past the dock, Gram would call out to us from her towel on the beach. "Come back now! Water babies gon' eat'cha!"

Han usually didn't listen, I think because he wanted to find the water babies, wanted to know if they were real. He was curious about that kind of thing. I always came back, though, and laid next to Gram on her towel in the sun while she combed the tangles out of my wet hair.

I came to Chicago to become a responsible sort of person: the type who cooks for herself, speaks for herself, who does not cry over rotten boys and who does not sorely miss people all the time. That's my problem. I'm always missing people too much and people never stick around. I never stick around, either. It's like we're all in the water and sometimes we float towards each other for a while, but then the wind picks up, and we float away. We could stay right next to each other if we really tried, but usually we just go where the wind makes us go. It's all a part of being a responsible sort of person.

So far I'm not very good at it. I've been spending much of my time drinking with the other 20-somethings in my apartment building, getting chinese take-out, kissing several rotten boys, and doing quite a bit of crying. I'm homesick something awful, and to tell you the truth I'm starting to think it was a terrible idea coming out here at all, but I can't go home now. Besides, Gram had been so excited I'd be spending time in the city where she grew up. Even made me a list with all sorts of things to do, places to visit. I haven't done many of them yet but I just like reading the list over and over. Makes me feel better.
I did go to the Music Box Theater on Southport Avenue, which is on the list. Gram used to go there as a kid and see movies for a dollar. Now they show classic movies there. I went with Jordan, a boy in my apartment building who is only half rotten, last Saturday. I like going to the movies: sitting in a dark room in a cushy chair, eating junior mints, and being soaked up by the large beautiful faces on the screen.

I'm watching two young girls swimming in the lake. One is probably ten, the other seven. I wonder which of the adults sitting on the beach is their mother. No one seems to being paying too close attention to them. They are being good, though. Not going in too deep. The older one is convincing the younger girl that they are not actually swimming in a lake but are, in fact, swimming in snot. The younger one is getting quite upset and protests, but the older one explains.

"Yes because when you're in the water, your nose gets kinda runny, and you get your snot in it. And then after a while, it all just becomes snot."

The younger one is close to tears.

She says, "But I don't get my snot in it!"

"Well, the other people do." The older girl laughs and begins to sing, "We're swimming in snot, we're swimming in snot."

The older one's swimming a little further out now and I'm waiting for her mom to yell out something about the water babies, but nobody says anything.

I go to put my feet in the water, but it's cold, so I just stand on the wet sand. I look for water babies but I just see my own reflection. My eyeliner is kind of smudged from crying earlier and I've got some dirt on my chin. I rub it off and turn to head home.