Tradition

I thought it would be fun when I asked. A spooky tradition for a dorky wedding. They were my closest friends, so they laughed with me and my fiancé- my husband, well Halloween has always been his favorite holiday. It should have been fun. Everyone we loved was in one place for one day.

Who ever thought that was a good idea?

The ceremony was by the ocean. A spot that was filled with fond memories. We used to swim past where the waves broke so we could float on the swells. It used to be such a good time except for the seaweed that wrapped around our legs or stomachs with its oily nasty kelp-feel. We called ourselves ‘floaters’ like the dead people found on Law and Order. Their bodies decomposed just enough that the gas inside would cause bloating which forces the body to float on water until the skin starts to liquify.

My sisters always joked I would marry a farm boy because I moved from coastal California to wheatland and who else was there? Just a bunch of gun-toting redneck cowboys. Lot of guns. More guns than any one person would need short of a war, or an apocalypse, or a dangerous showdown with ghost infested party guests.

I learned how to shoot when I was 27, a bit old for a convert from a liberal state.

My husband wanted me to be able to protect myself from “anything that could happen.” When I went on late night runs or out hiking or into the city, anything could happen. Didn’t I want to be prepared?

In this case, I was protecting myself from ghosts. It was a Roman superstition, but I only chose it because I was broke. Too poor to afford an elaborate dress. I had read that sometimes all the bridesmaids would match exactly what the bride was wearing to fool the evil spirits into attacking them in place of the bride.

It’s not the kind of thing you take seriously.

If it was taken seriously, no one would ever ask. I wouldn’t have asked. We made necklaces out of smarties to wring around our necks in true Halloween fashion and so we wouldn’t starve while getting ready.

In coastal areas, it is the little things that mark the season. The sun shines too brightly year-round for the cold to creep in and drag the leaves off strong, healthy branches. So, we count the spider webs as we walk in the fall, and the slugs we see leaving trails behind them in the spring. We buy pumpkins that we carve together, trees to decorate, eggs to paint, all together all year-round.

I never thought we would drown together.

It reminded me of the grunion runs. Grunions are these little silver fish that come out of the ocean and on to the sand to find mates. They arrive under the moonlight, thousands and thousands of fish flopping pathetically on the sand. Of course, all the teenagers would use them as an excuse to go to the beach at night. It was a cool thing to see. All those fish usually hidden by layers of water. They were always there, but we could never see them.

No one wanted to go to the beach the morning after though. See, the fish would show up at high tide. They were supposed to only stay in the sand for a short time then return to the water before the shoreline retreated.

That was never what happened.

Dozens of fish would get stuck in the sand. When the sun rose the next day, the sand would get hotter and hotter, so hot that by midday we needed to hop and run and sprint to avoid burning our feet, but the grunions couldn’t run. They suffocated on the sand. Next, their bodies roasted in the sun, all the water desiccating out. Their flesh and bones and organs disappeared quickly enough. The flies and seagulls and pelicans and sand pipers snapped at them until not even an imprint was left on the sand.

I usually prefer the sand first thing in the morning when it is so cold it causes my feet to cramp. I used to force my friends up and out of bed before sunrise just to feel the heat leach out of my toes. It hurt a little, just enough to make me feel alive without truly harming me.

I hated this cold. This wet, sloshing, salt in my mouth, pruned fingers, water gulping, vomit inducing cold hurt more than just a little. It didn’t make me feel alive, just panicked. Panicked enough that when I threw off the arms and hands and fingers clutching on to me, I was relieved to feel a gun in my hand.

Before today, guns had always made me more nervous, not less. I could never take the safety off until I was pointing exactly at my target, but now I didn’t want to look.

I fired and fired and fired and fired.

My eyes were shut tightly. Taking automatic weapons to the gun range was always sort of dull. Dull and expensive. Far too expensive on my budget. I could start and finish in such a short period of time. It almost seemed like no time passed at all. This felt different.

These bullets lasted forever.

I’ve never been a good shot. It hadn’t bothered me because it wasn’t something that seemed useful. Maybe I’m not such a gun convert after all, but with enough bullets and perseverance, anyone can hit something. Or someone.

I wonder, in situations like this, is it better to be possessed or to be killed by the possessed?

This was horrible. I was covered in warm liquid, the smell of iron in the air and I could hardly hear a thing. I always lost under water telephone, even in pools where the water didn’t move. Even in the jacuzzi when we were packed together, and the water was hot, and no one wanted to stay in for more than ten minutes without jumping in the pool to cool off. Was the water I was drowning in really warm?

The Pacific Ocean isn’t warm. It never has been. Then I realized-

My wedding wasn’t next to the ocean.

Don’t you know how expensive that would be?

We weren’t- where were we? Too warm. It was too warm here. The air was slimy, humid. I wasn’t in the ocean at all. We were in a field. Not a great venue for the middle of summer but there weren’t many options out where we lived. After all, we moved to the country so we could have space. We wanted a place where we could say who else is here? And we would know that the answer was no one.

Maybe people were here though. People like the grunions. Maybe they were here all year round, but we just couldn’t see them. Light moves differently in water. They could hide in the humidity while it chokes us.

When the authorities arrived, I tried to explain that they had been drowning me. I was told there was no water here. I tried to tell them that I was tricked by all the people still surrounding me. I was told no one was there.

Clinically insane. That’s what they said. They told me they would isolate me so I couldn’t hurt anyone, but they placed me in a room full of people. All the water in the air clung to me trying to drag me under. The water filled the inside of my palms and dripped from my forehead into my eyes, down my cheeks and onto my lips. The water was salty just like that night. It was ocean water. I knew it.