Patti
How about we turn up in these?
She replied with a laughing emoji.
Sandra
Maybe not the first week
13
It was a busy weekend. Don and Laila asked Sandra if she could have Rana and Kali over on Saturday night so they could go out for a meal together, then they’d spend Sunday packing and getting the house ready for any viewers, it would be on the market from Monday. Sandra was more than happy to oblige, wanting to spend as much time as she could with her precious grandchildren before they moved away. She and the two children had a splendid time and when she told them about their swimming lessons, they were delighted. ‘You can do it, Nanny, just keep your legs up,’ Kali said.
‘And don’t swallow the water,’ Rana added.
‘That’s the trouble. I just can’t keep my legs up, no matter how I try – and I always end up swallowing the water,’ she told them.
‘You need to kick your feet really quick,’ Rana told her. ‘That’s what I do.’
‘And really stretch out your arms, it helps you move faster,’ Kali added.
‘I’ll try. Thank you both.’
Kali gave her a big hug, ‘You can do it, Nan. Just keep trying.’
‘I will. Now, I bought some new swimming costumes on Friday and I can’t decide which one to wear tomorrow. Can you help me choose?’
They both nodded eagerly and she went up to fetch the swimming costumes. She’d ended up buying three, a blue one with pink flowers on it that held in her tummy and had a little skirt that made it seem not so revealing, one with a lilac top and black bottom and a red polka dot one.
Kali studied them thoughtfully. ‘I think the blue one with the pretty flowers.’
Rana nodded. ‘Me too.’
‘That’s the one I thought,’ Sandra agreed. She leant forward and said conspiratorially, ‘My friend is wearing a leopard print one.’
‘You should have got a zebra print one, Nanny, then you could have both pretended to be animals in the water,’ Rana said. ‘That’s what me and Kali do when we’re swimming.’
Sandra smiled at the thought of her and Patti pretending to be a leopard and zebra. That would certainly liven up the swimming lesson!
‘I’m not sure about this,’ Sandra said when Patti called for her on Monday morning. She’d almost chickened out when she’d packed her bag this morning with the new blue and pink swimming costume and a towel. She’d suddenly thought, what the hell was she doing? Apart from the occasional dip up to her knees in the pool when they’d been on holiday, she hadn’t worn a swimming costume for years. It had been decades since she’d gone to the swimming baths, and then she’d only sat on the side while Brian went into the water with the kids. Butterflies were whirlingaround in her stomach as she thought of getting in the pool with all those strangers, memories of her swimming teacher at school shouting, ‘Legs up, Sandra. Legs up!’ But try as she might she could never get her legs to stay afloat and always ended up with her head under water. Gradually all the other kids in her class had learnt to swim, jumping off the side into the water with abandon, then streaking across to the other side. She could never pluck up the courage to dive in. She’d held gingerly onto the bar along the side of the pool all through the lesson, to the despair of her teacher. ‘Let go of the bar, Sandra. You’ll never learn while you’re clutching the bar.’ She was so relieved when she moved on to secondary school and didn’t have to do swimming lessons.
What if she made a fool of herself? She’d always been hopeless at swimming, why should she be any better now? She’d probably be splashing around, sinking under the water, not able to keep her legs up, just as she used to, while the others would soon pick it up and be swimming across the pool like fish.
‘It’ll be fun. Everyone else will be around our age and in the same boat,’ Patti told her. ‘Think how proud you’ll be when you can swim. You can surprise your grandkids by joining them in the pool.’
Yes, she would like to do that. Don and Laila were good swimmers and so were the children. Sandra had often envied them as they’d raced across the pool while she remained in the shallow end. It suddenly occurred to her that ‘she’d been holding on to the bar’ all her life. Maybe it was time she let go.
‘You’re right.’ She grabbed the tote bag that held her swimming costume and towel, then picked up the purple beret and perched it jauntily on her head. ‘Let’s do this.’
‘Are you ready?’ Patti called from outside Sandra’s changing cubicle.
‘Coming!’ She stepped out to see her friend wearing her leopard print swimsuit and holding her tote bag. ‘We need to pose for a selfie for our Insta account.’
‘Can I put my towel around my waist?’ She didn’t fancy a photo in her swimming costume. Despite Patti’s pep talk she was feeling anxious and self-conscious about being so undressed in front of a whole bunch of strangers.
Who would be in swimming costumes too and were also no longer in their prime, she thought.Patti had body issues too but wasn’t letting that stop her.
‘No need, I’ve brought some props.’ Patti took some swimming goggles, a snorkel and some colourful arm floats out of her bag. ‘Blow these up and put them on and I’ll try to take a selfie. I wish I’d remembered to bring the selfie stick Kit gave me at the weekend.’
