The Land Keeps Me Drowning

Chapter 1: Thirteen and Choking

(Marina’s POV)

The year I turned thirteen, the air inside our house changed.

Not suddenly. Not in a way that would have looked dramatic to anyone outside our family. Nobody lost their temper in a spectacular argument. Nobody threw dishes. Nobody stood in the living room and announced that our lives were collapsing. If you had visited us that summer, you probably would have said we looked normal.

That was the frightening part.

Everything looked normal.

The house still stood exactly where it always had. My mother still cooked dinner. My father still went to work every morning. I still went to school and complained about homework and forgot to unload the dishwasher unless somebody reminded me twice. From the outside, we looked like a family continuing its ordinary life. But inside the house, something invisible had started disappearing.

At thirteen, I didn’t know how to describe it. Now I think of it as air. Back then I just knew breathing felt harder. Children notice more than adults think. Adults imagine childhood as this soft blur where you don’t understand what’s happening around you, but that isn’t true. Children notice almost everything. We just don’t always know what the things we notice mean.

I noticed my mother stopped singing.

That sounds small. It wasn’t. My mother sang constantly.

She sang while cooking. She sang while cleaning. She sang while watering plants that refused to survive in our backyard. She wasn’t especially good at it. That wasn’t the point. Her singing made the house feel alive. Sometimes she forgot lyrics and replaced them with whatever she was doing.

“Where did all the clean spooooons go…”

Or

“Rina forgot her towel agaaain…”

Sometimes she made entire songs about grocery shopping. When I was younger, I used to roll my eyes and tell her she was embarrassing. She always answered the same way.

“You’ll miss me when I become famous.”

Then she’d laugh. Then I’d laugh. Then life continued.

One day she stopped. No announcement. No explanation. Just silence. I noticed it while sitting at the kitchen counter doing homework. She moved around the kitchen quietly.

Knife against cutting board.

Cabinets opening.

Water running.

No singing.

I looked up. “Mom?”

She turned. “Yeah Rina honey?”

“Why aren’t you singing?” She looked surprised.

Then smiled. “Oh.”

She shrugged. “I don’t know.”

And she turned back around. That should have been nothing. Instead I remember feeling unsettled for reasons I couldn’t explain. Like walking into your room and realizing somebody moved all your furniture half an inch. Technically everything is still there. But it feels wrong.

I noticed my father stopped laughing. That happened gradually. He wasn’t loud or playful. But he used to laugh easily.

Television.

Bad puns.

Stories from work.

He laughed with his whole face. Then sometime that year, the laughter disappeared. The television still stayed on. He still sat in his chair. But now he watched everything with this strange expression.

Not sad.

Not angry.

Just somewhere else.

One evening we were watching a game show. Someone gave an absurd answer. Usually Dad would’ve laughed. Instead, nothing.

I looked over. “Wasn’t that funny?”

He blinked. “What?”

“The answer.” His eyes moved back to the television.

“Oh.” he pause.

“Yeah.” But he didn’t smile.

And somehow that scared me more than if he’d been angry.

Then there were the envelopes. They started appearing everywhere. Mail had always existed. But suddenly it felt important. Envelopes stacked near the microwave. Envelopes tucked under magazines. Envelopes disappearing overnight.

White.

Yellow.

Some stamped.

Some handwritten.

Some with windows.

One afternoon I saw my mother sorting through them. She separated them into piles. One pile small. One pile large.

She noticed me watching.

Immediately gathered them together. “Nothing interesting.”

I asked “What are they?”

She smiled. “Adult stuff Rina.”

Adult stuff.

That became the answer for everything.

What’s wrong? Adult stuff.

Why are you stressed? Adult stuff.

Why are you arguing? Adult stuff.

Eventually I stopped asking, not because I lost interest. Because I started realizing adults weren’t avoiding answers, they were protecting something or maybe protecting themselves. Conversations started ending when I entered rooms. That happened enough times that eventually I developed a habit. I’d announce myself before entering. Make noise, close doors harder, walk heavier to give people time.

One evening I came downstairs for water. My parents were talking quietly in the kitchen.

The second I stepped in, silence.

My mother turned immediately.

“Oh.” Too fast.

“Need something?” Water.

I got water.

Started upstairs but halfway up I stopped and waited. Nothing.

Their conversation never restart, that felt worse than hearing whatever they were saying. Back then we lived in a modest suburban house forty minutes inland from the coast. White exterior with peeling paint. Two bedrooms upstairs, small backyard. Nothing remarkable. We are not rich nor poor. Just ordinary.

At thirteen I thought ordinary meant permanent. I thought adults built lives the way birds built nests. Once complete, they stayed. Nobody tells children that entire lives can disappear.

One night in early June, I came downstairs around midnight. The kitchen light above the stove was on. I saw my mother stood at the counter and she held an envelope but she wasn’t reading it. Just staring like maybe if she waited long enough, the numbers would change.

“Mom?” She jumped. Actually jumped.

Then turned and smiled too quickly. “Oh.”

She laughed. “You scared me Marina” Her smile looked assembled.

She just called me Marina, not Rina, not Honey. She's tense like she built it after hearing my voice.

“You should be asleep.” she said looking so stressed.

“I wanted water.” She folded the paper.

Too late coz I’d already seen it.

FINAL NOTICE. Red letters. Big.

I didn’t know what kind of notice but I knew red meant bad.

She noticed me noticing so she walked over and touched my hair.

And said “Everything’s okay.”

That was the first lie. Not cruel, just parental.

The kind meant to buy children another day, so I nodded and just went upstairs but I stayed awake. Around midnight I hear voices from other bedroom door. I was closed, but it sound so low.

“There’s nothing left to refinance.” all in silence.

Then “…Arthur…”

“I trusted them.” my father mumbled.

Another silence.

Then my mother. “We still have Marina.”

That was a long pause making me feel so curious about conversation, adult stuff .

“I know.” that was the only answer from my father.

I stared at the ceiling that night nothing happened.

But something had. Summer became hotter, our air conditioning broke my dad said he’d fix it later.

Later never came and the house became humid, airless, and sticky. Dad stayed out longer. That is when I knew.

Mom wrote lists and I found one.

Groceries.

Utilities.

Mortgage.

Gas.

Numbers crossed out.

Some are rewritten with smaller handwriting like she was trying to compress reality.

One afternoon I came home early and I saw Dad sat at the dining table but without television, no phone, just sitting.

“Dad?” He blinked.

“Oh.” Pause. “Rina.”

“You okay?” He smiled but I can see bitterness drawn with the smile.

“Sure.” I stood there.

Then asked “Did something happen?”

He looked outside and then back at me “Rina.”

His voice sounded strange. “Do you know what investment means?”

I shrugged. “Sort of.”

He nodded and then laughed once. It was dry. “No.”

He rubbed his face. “I made a bad one.”

That conversation with my Dad thought me something. Months later I’d learn about the land, development. partners, and fraud.

The money is gone and everything we had is gone.

But then all I knew was my father suddenly looked smaller, like someone removed something important from inside him.

August arrived, everything became quieter.

Then one night i rush from my room after hearing my parents shouting.

Real shouting. I froze but the continued walking downstairs.

Dad stood in the living room his face is red and Mom's pale.

“There’s nothing left, Elena!” I’d never heard him yell.

Mom said “We’ll figure it out.”

“With what?” He laughed but I see the tears cascading.

“They’re taking the car.” .

“They’re taking the house.”

My stomach dropped as I cannot process the words, adults weren’t supposed to say those words.

Mom whispered “We still have each other.”

Dad turned and he saw me, the his face changed with regret and exhaustion.

Then something colder he said quietly “A child who’s about to learn the world doesn’t care about her.”

Mom whispered “Arthur.”

But he walked out door and just gone. I stood there frozen, my mom crossed the room to held me.

She felt smaller as I whispered “Are we losing the house?”

She held me tighter then said “No.” Second lie.

That night I couldn’t sleep, the window remain open as I felt the hot air, dark room. And just everything felt wrong, too warm, too small. Words keep on repeating that my breathing changed, too shallow my chest tightened so I sat up and nothing helped.

Heart beating too fast.

I sat on the floor.

Closed my eyes.

And imagined water.

Cold water.

Quiet water.

Pressure.

Silence.

Not disappearing.

Just relief.

Years later I would learn words anxiety, panic, and hypervigilance. But at thirteen I only knew one thing. For the first time in my life I realized drowning didn’t require water. And something inside our house had already begun pulling us under.

After that night, nobody mentioned the argument that became the strangest part, I woke up expecting consequences.

At thirteen, I thought arguments worked like storms. They arrived loudly, broke things, then left evidence behind.

But the next morning my father was making coffee and my mother was packing my lunch, everything looked normal.

Too normal.

Dad asked if I had math homework.

Mom reminded me to bring home my gym clothes.

Nobody said the word house.

Nobody said the word money.

Nobody said sorry.

It felt less like peace and more like actors returning to stage after forgetting their lines. I sat at the kitchen table watching both of them. My father’s eyes looked swollen while my mother smiled too much.

I understood something without understanding it fully. Adults could decide to pretend and if they pretended long enough sometimes everyone else joined in. So I joined.