Deep

"A person who's in deep needs a person who's willing to get drowned with them."

"Are you willing to get drowned?" I asked him as we sat on the glittering white sand beach of Cagwait, using a pair of slippers as makeshift seats to avoid the sand sticking to our pants.

"Drowned in the water?" he replied, his eyes fixed on the beautiful sunset, near yet so far from us. Sunsets always seem like the most beautiful endings in life.

"I mean being in deep," I said, gazing at the sea, which stirred waves of thoughts within me.

"What do you mean?" He looked at me, confused. Maybe he thought I'm being weird again.

"Nothing. It's too deep," I replied, offering a reassuring smile.

"I can swim," he told me. I was taken aback. The last time I checked, he didn't like discussing things like this.

"If you swim, you'll float. I'm at the bottom, drowning." As I said these words, a slight pain tugged at my heart.

"Then swim," he said, still confused.

"Can you get drowned with me instead?" It took courage to ask him this, and I felt a small sense of pride.

"Is it safe?" he asked. I didn't know how to react, but I felt another pang in my heart.

"No," I answered directly.

Drowning means suffocating with unsaid words, being held under by the heavy vines of past betrayals, and the strong current of overwhelming emotions. It was dangerous.

"Hmm, okay. I'll go," he said. I wasn't sure how to feel, but I knew he wasn't sure either. Maybe he said it just to give me some assurance, but I know.

"Then come. Stop swimming," I urged him.

"Why get drowned if you can learn how to swim?" he asked. I realized then that he couldn't leave the shore. He couldn't take the risk to dive for me.

"You are afraid."

"I'm not. There are options: to get drowned or to learn how to swim."

I was taken aback. I thought being here meant finding someone willing to risk everything, someone unafraid to be with me. I'm not born on the shore; I'm born deep within the ocean floor.

I don't need saving. I don't want to be saved. Swimming means staying on the surface, and that's too high for me. I want to be deep, to take things deeper. Being deep means a lot.

"I don't hate being in deep. It's just too much," he said.

Then maybe I am hard to love. I'm too much.

It was so deep that my mind went blank.