Free Diving In by Gretchen Galway

uncomfortable.”
    Nicki peeled the crust off her sandwich and ate it separately. “It’s hard not to share the joy.”
    “Look, it’s just the wading pool. When are you going to the beach? People actually drown there all the time. I looked it up. People don’t realize how dangerous it is. They put their back to the waves and whoops, bye-bye,” Betty said. “You should go there.”
    “I’d rather have sex on the registration desk with a bellhop.”
    Betty whistled. “That would work. I bet that’s your subconscious talking. Have someone in mind?”
    “I’ll write about whatever I want,” Nicki said. “If you don’t like it because you think it’s too much of a bummer, you can delete it.”
    “Just go to the beach. Even if you don’t go in because you’re freaking out, write about that. Most people never get to go to Hawaii.”
    Nicki shoved the last of her sandwich in her mouth. “You know, Betty, you’d have a lot more influence over my writing if you paid me.”
    “That’s so mercenary,” Betty said. “You should be ashamed of yourself.”
    “I’ll work my way up to the beach, but it’s not going to happen today.”
    “Just jump in and get it over with,” Betty said. “You freak out, you recover, you’re done.”
    “And then I can never do it again, because the trauma has been reinforced. I’m going to do this my way. You don’t like it, fire me.”
    “Take it easy, Nemo. I’m your biggest fan. Just trying to help.”
    After they hung up, Nicki decided to go for another swim. She wasn’t going to flood herself with her fears, but she could accelerate the desensitization a bit. Two swims a day in the baby pool instead of one wouldn’t hurt. Not fatally.
      She gathered her towel, hat, sunglasses, lotion, book, magnesium supplements, bottle of iced “Calming Caress” herbal tea, and phone loaded with relaxing hypnosis sessions she’d downloaded from a psychotherapist in Scotland. Just his accent was enough to take the edge off. You aaah the kind of pair-sin who is caaahhhm and confident…
    Earbuds in place, mellow Scotsman chanting in her ears, she returned to the pool.
    * * *
    Head high, legs bare, sunglasses disguising her worried eyes, Nicki strutted past umbrellas and palm trees, fragrant gardens, bubbling spas, and bodies, bodies, bodies. She wasn’t the only one with rocky nips under her bikini.
    She snapped a hot-pink blossom off a planter in the courtyard and stuck it in her hair, humming a recent hit single with the immortal words Get me some repeated for five minutes to a techno beat. When she reached the first of the hot tubs, she dropped her cover-up to her feet like a woman in a moisturizer commercial.
    She’d waded across the baby pool every day since Monday, and now the blasting panic was more of a dull, distant buzz. She was ready to tackle the hot tub. It wasn’t really a pool. More like a very wet sofa.  
    Telling herself it was all for fun, great material for the blog, no big deal, she stepped into the bubbles, still wearing her glasses so she could check out the other people.
    Men were everywhere at the resort. Young men, youngish men, not-so-youngish men. All of them were new, and none of them was Ansel. She scanned the area twice to be sure.
    Or Miles. Since when was this all about Ansel? He was an old problem. She was here to deal with the current, real problem, which was how a wonderful guy, who was Miles, a man who devoted his life to children just as she had, a man with charm and maturity, the one she knew would’ve made her happier than anyone else, never considered her as anything other than a coworker or friend.
    Ansel was ancient history. She didn’t need to forget him. That other guy was the problem.
    Ah, the water felt good. No surge of panic, though her nerves did jump at the shock of scalding water. Instead of hunching her shoulders, slipping under the surface, waiting for them to relax into their usual flaccid, placid selves, she arched her