This time, when I get to the edge of the ocean I don't turn aside and I don't stop walking. Edges are an illusion. Set-dressing in our shared dream of order. 

I don't test the water this time. I don't break my stride. Seafoam teases my toes. I keep walking. Ankle-deep, the ocean is warm as bathwater. Up to my knees, I keep walking. The hem of my skirt is sodden and heavy; I keep walking. Thighs, hips, waist, breasts, the depression at the base of my throat are immersed. My chin, my lips. Deeper, forward. The sensitive place just behind my ear, where you tickled me with little kisses, accepts a wetter kiss and a deeper caress. I keep walking. 

Down here, my eyes adjust to the near-shore murk. Shadowy shapes drift past. I'm at 60 feet when I reach the Gulf Stream, river of clarity and life slashing through the haze. I recognize the distant blue boulders of coral and lengthen my stride. I smile as I enter our garden, remembering how it used to look through bubbles and how, when we haunted such places as divers, the loudest noise in the Atlantic Ocean was the sound of my excited breathing. (You said, the first time I stood with a 40-pound tank strapped to a 110-pound frame, "You look like a june-bug stealing a jellybean." Compliments were never your strong suit, but you could always make me laugh.) 

The rippled white sand burps up a stingray and I'm reminded to shuffle my feet. A school of silversides parts as I approach. For a moment they surround me, thousands of them, coin-sized and gleaming; I'm buried in treasure. Parrotfish, buck-toothed, gnawing at the coral, make a soft scraping sound. "They eat coral and shit sand," you said. Building future beaches, one teaspoonful at a time. 

Always on those weekend dives, I was too thrilled to be down here and breathed too fast. I'd use up a tank in no time, even at these modest depths. It doesn't matter now, because I'm walking and there's no stopping me. Has there ever been a more sensible way to move on? Will other illusions give way this easily?

You said, "You need to control your buoyancy." As if I didn't know that. As if I ever could.