Re: The lake: close to the water
She wasn't going in the lake. Footing be damned, she wasn't going in the water. However still it looked right now, a silvered sliver of water unbroken, lakes had currents, they had tides. They had creatures and islands and will had shown up just long enough to be obstinate about lakes. Her feet gripped the wet ground tightly as she leaned forward. Her heels dug in and her toes curled and once she was sick, it felt less like standing on the prow of a boat going over choppy water in a thunderstorm and a moment between one thunderclap and the next.
He turned away as she got to grips with the new world, new her that had tossed up in the shallows of the lake. The water lapped and she turned her head deliberately away and sucked hard on the cigarette until all she could taste was ash. The sweat was still damp beneath the dress and she was aware very precisely of where he stood on the bank. She wiped her soles along the grass and she climbed two steps up the bank until she was taller than he was.
She watched him now, silently. She did not have the quiet of a woman who was alluring. Regret didn't make her over, she wasn't Pygmalion's favorite project. She looked out to the line of the water where it met the sky one bleeding into the next and wished the Russian roulette at the door allowed for a double-spin. Regret could take one of those canoes out onto the lake and drown. She wasn't charitable, she let ash tumble on the hem of her dress and her legs were bare beneath it.