Posts Tagged ‘drowning’

PseudoPod 510: Falling Under, Through the Dark

“Falling Under, Through the Dark” originally appeared in May 2015 in Black Static. This story was On Ellen Datlow’s list of Honorable Mentions for Best Horror of the Year 8.

Content warnings:

Spoiler

Grief; Loss of a child

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Falling Under, Through the Dark

by Damien Angelica Walters

Kara’s sitting at her desk when she falls. There’s no time for panic; it happens too fast. One moment she’s working; the next, she’s in the water. Gravity and the force of the fall plunge her into the depths and everything blurs. She wants to yell but her body needs to conserve oxygen and won’t allow it. Natural buoyancy kicks in and she bobs to the surface, eyes still burning from the chlorine.

Now her heart starts to race and she breathes in huge gulps of air, her mind already fumbling for statistics. Facts. Every day an average of ten people die from drowning, and of those, two are children fourteen and younger.

PseudoPod 394: Summer Girls

“Summer Girls” first appeared in Black Static #35, which was their July/August 2013 issue.

 

Podcast: Play in new window | Download (Duration: 36:32 — 0.5KB)

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Show Notes

Kameron Hurley can be contacted at the following link: Kameron Hurley.

Matt Wallace’s Slingers can be found here!

Summer Girls

by Caspian Gray

Something brushed his leg. For a moment he felt the sensation of fingers closing on his ankle. Dan started, then floundered away, panicked as a little kid at the first touch of seaweed. He composed himself in case Kayla was watching, but she was treading water further out, eyes on the horizon. Dan swam out to her, accidentally swallowing a mouthful of salt water, then splashed water on her back to get her attention. Kayla turned, pulling long strands of hair out of her eyes.

_The dead girl_, Dan signed. This was one of their home-signs, a single gesture not rendered in his bastardized ASL.

Kayla cocked her head. _Too early_, she signed. _The dead girl won’t be here ’til August._

_She touched me_, Dan signed. _She touched me._

Kayla swam closer to him. They treaded water, looking out over the dark waves for her bobbing corpse. There was no sign of her.

_Let’s swim back._