Three Feet Deep

The river was rising when Elena showed me the photograph on her iPhone.

"He took this last night," she said, her voice flat. "From the balcony."

I looked at the screen: Sarah, my best friend since college, standing waist-deep in the dark water of the river that ran behind our building. She was fully clothed, her white dress billowing around her like a drowning flower. Her arms were thrown back, face tilted toward the storm-dark sky, rapturous. The timestamp read 3:14 AM.

"She doesn't remember it," Elena said. She wouldn't look at me. "She woke up soaking wet on the living room floor. No memory of going outside, no memory of the river. She thought I'd spilled something on her."

"You've never liked Sarah," I said, though I knew it was pointless.

"I like her fine. I like her a lot. But she's not well, Maya. This isn't normal behavior."

Outside, the rain drummed harder against the windows. We were at the kitchen table, two mugs of cold coffee between us. Elena and I had been together for eight months, serious enough that she'd given me a key to her apartment last week. Serious enough that she'd felt comfortable telling me she thought my best friend was losing her mind.

"She's been through a lot this year," I said. "The divorce, her mom—"

"I know. I know she has. And I'm sorry, truly. But this is concerning." Elena's phone buzzed on the table. She didn't pick it up. "There were footprints in the mud leading all the way to the water's edge, Maya. No footprints coming back."

I stared at her phone screen, at Sarah's exalted face suspended in the black water. Something twisted in my gut—recognition, or maybe its opposite. Sarah had always been drawn to water. In college, she'd swum in the quarry until her fingers turned blue. She'd drag me to the ocean in November, laughing as we waded into the freezing surf. But this was different. This looked like surrender.

"I tried calling her," Elena said softly. "She didn't answer."

"She's probably sleeping it off."

"Maybe." Elena finally met my eyes. "Or maybe she's back in the water."

The river was visible from Elena's balcony, a dark ribbon swollen with rain. Without thinking, I stood and walked to the glass doors. Below, the water churned against the pilings, white-crested and relentless. Somewhere in its depths, I imagined Sarah's white dress unfurling like a ghost.

"Call her again," I said.

Elena hesitated, then dialed. We both listened to the phone ring, and ring, and ring, until finally, Sarah's voice came through the speaker—cheerful, groggy, entirely alive.

"Hey! Sorry, I was dead to the world. What's up?"

I let out a breath I hadn't known I was holding. Elena's shoulders dropped. She turned off the phone and looked at me, and for a moment, I saw how tired she was—how much worry she'd been carrying, invisible to me until now.

"You're a good friend," I said. "To her, even though she's not yours. And to me, even though I made it hard."

"She could be yours too, someday," Elena said. "If she lets us help her."

Outside, the rain slowed to a drizzle. The river kept flowing, dark and patient, waiting for nothing. I sat back down at the table and reached for Elena's hand across the cold mugs, the dark water of our own histories churning beneath us both.