Suicide Notes

by Michael Thomas Ford

I had a dream about Sadie last night. She and I were walking on a beach, talking about whatever we wanted and having a good time. Then, all of a sudden, she ran into the ocean. I thought she was playing, so I followed her. She was laughing and kept looking back to see if I was behind her. She started swimming, and I swam after her. She swam way out, and I was afraid we were going too far. I kept calling for her to slow down, but she wouldn’t. I couldn’t keep up with her, so I stopped swimming and let her get ahead. Finally she stopped and turned around. She called for me to come out to where she was, and I did. When I got there, she said, “Catch me if you can!” and dived down. I watched her swim beneath me. The water was clear, and I could see her kicking her legs hard and going deeper and deeper, down to where the water turned dark blue. Her hair was floating out around her head, and silver bubbles were coming from her mouth. I took a deep breath and dived after her, trying to catch her. She turned in the water and waved at me, trying to get me to come deeper. My chest was starting to burn because I was running out of air, and I pointed to the surface to tell her we should go up. She shook her head, and I saw her laugh underwater. Millions of bubbles shot out of her mouth and surrounded me like a net. I couldn’t see. Then I felt a hand grab my foot and pull me down. I tried to swim up, but that hand was strong. It was Sadie’s hand. Through the bubbles I saw her dragging m...