Swimming Home

by Deborah Levy

‘Life is only worth living because we hope it will get better and we’ll all get home safely.’

When couples offer shelter or a meal to strays and loners, they do not really take them in. They play with them. Perform for them.

‘I’ve got an FFF inside.’ ‘What’s that, sir?’ ‘A fucking funny feeling.’

This was not so much an unspoken secret pact between them, more like having a tiny splinter of glass in the sole of her foot, always there, slightly painful, but she could live with it.

She admired their faith in the future: the belief that it delivered outcomes that could be organised to come out in the right shape.