Chapter 5 - MARGARET REFUSES TO FEAR THE WATERMargaret recovered physically in months.
The pool remained harder.
Daniel covered it immediately.
Three months later, Margaret walked onto the terrace.
She stopped.
“Why is the cover still there?”
Daniel looked uncomfortable.
“I thought it would make you feel safer.”
“Take it off.”
“Mom.”
“You don't get to make the pool disappear because I’m frightened.”
“I was trying to help.”
“I know.”
She softened.
“That is the problem with people who mean well. We still make decisions for other people.”
Daniel stopped.
His father had done that.
Margaret had done it.
He had done it.
“Fine.”
The cover came off the next day.
Margaret sat beside the water with tea.
Weeks later she called a swimming instructor.
Daniel stared.
“You're seventy-nine.”
“Thank you for this breaking medical information.”
“You almost drowned.”
“Exactly.”
Instructor Maria met her twice a week.
Margaret hated swimming.
The cold.
Wet hair.
Being told how to breathe.
Every instruction irritated her.
She kept going.
At eighty, she could float.
Then cross the pool.
Slowly.
Daniel applauded.
Margaret splashed him.
“Patronizing.”
“You did it.”
“I moved twenty meters without dying.”
“Strong branding.”
She laughed.
The point was not proving Camille had failed.
Margaret refused to give Camille that much ownership.
The point was simpler.
Fear had entered her life through water.
Margaret would decide what water meant afterward.
May you like
Not Camille.
That difference became central to everything.
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