& as the days whirled by, she felt their friendship become an upstream battle, while he blindly knelt by the eroded bank with his thumbs in the dirt, recalling not memories with the fish, but dreaming of a future with the Sun. The surface of the water was warmed from Daylight, his reflection distorted by the movement. If she could only rise up, grasp his arm & pull him under. She longed for an unfiltered conversation in Darkness.

“At least speak of something substantial. No one but me will hear,” she glugged reassuringly on the surface.

He snapped back to reality from the familiarity of her words. “I’ve said in the past why I don’t like to go underwater. I’m afraid I’m going to sink to the river floor. I’m terrified of what I may encounter.”