Floodable

Madeline Graham

          0
          Meredith was born in St. Francis Park, a floodable town, on the banks of a river. Some years, during snowmelt and spring rain, water spilled over the bluffs and the beaches. It settled in the low-lying fields; ditches turned into sluggish streams.

          8
          Meredith pressed her face to the window as her mother drove past the neighborhood park, which was a foot deep in water. There’s nothing so still as a park swing that has become the mast of a sunken ship in its own lake.
          Meredith often felt that she existed to tread water, empty oceans surrounding her. Always desperately hoping for someone to pull her into a lifeboat with everyone else. Because of this, she was too much for her parents, who were not affectionate people. They lived uphill, further from the river, in a place that never flooded.

          12
          At a later age than most, she had twenty-seven stuffed animals in rotation. Each night she slept with a different one, so none would feel left out, holding it tight against her stomach. During the day they stayed in a stuffed animal hammock, cuddled up together. She had once tried to climb up there, too, but the bolts came out of the wall leaving gaping holes and her dad explained to her that the hammock was only meant for toys not kids, so she didn’t try again. At night, when a car drove by, the headlights shone through and cast a giant shadow fishnet on the wall.
          Sometimes she dreamed she was on the swing in the park, and the water was pouring in from all sides, swallowing the ground below her. She pulled her knees up. Watching with dread as the water crawled up the poles of the swing frame, now just an inch under her seat. Felt that if she slipped or disturbed the water’s calm surface something terrible would happen.

          21
          Meredith first met her husband at the Jiffy Lube, where he worked. She pretended not to see him: long face and fingers, coveralls. He must have noticed her staring because he texted her later, from the phone number in her customer profile.
          He was so beautiful that in their first months together, sometimes she stared and forgot to eat. He dragged her to dry land so that she felt no longer too much.
          Her mother told her she was happy if Meredith was happy, but she said it too carefully.

          22
          At the wedding, they interlaced fingers. He cried, which she had never seen before. Meredith felt relief. That she would be safe forever.
          They bought a small house in the floodplain. It was all they could afford.
          Her parents told her the house would be cold and damp, that maybe they should rent an apartment in town. Meredith knew they must be thinking of what some people said, that the floodplain is so muddy you get stuck there.

          23
          The basement of their tiny cinder block home began to flood. The water seeped slowly from the northwest corner of the basement, filling dips and gullies in the floor. Broken spots that were not visible until the water revealed them.
          Meredith stood in the doorway of the home office. Her husband staring glassy eyed at the computer monitor and consumed in other virtual worlds. He did not notice she was there.
          She told him that the basement was inches deep in water. He jumped slightly at the sound of her voice, but he didn’t look up. He said he was in the middle of something. Said it is not a big deal, this area floods all the time. She imagined the water inching up his face, submerging his mouth and nose and still he wouldn’t look at her.
          She needled him, pressing her fingers into the soft wood of the door frame. When he finally looked up it felt like a punch.

          24
          Over time the metaphorical oceans that had long separated her from others began to return, sucking at the backs of her calves. Meredith bought a kitten. She wanted to hold the kitten near her stomach, feel the warmth, like a warm rescue buoy. But the kitten never wanted to be held very long, and ran around the house in circles.
          When her husband was at his desk, the kitten attacked his lower limbs, biting toes, climbing his jeans. On a good day, he laughed or dragged a string for the kitten. But often he kicked the kitten off repeatedly and eventually locked it in the basement so he could concentrate.
          Later he said the cat was too aggressive, and showed Meredith the scratches.

          28
          Sometimes, to get away from the flooding, she left her husband to spend the night at her parents’ house.
          Her room was repainted a palatable guest room shade, but they still had her Virgin Mary nightlight. The same one she used as a kid. She wanted to be a perfect circle like that. Joseph a little taller than Mary, holding her from behind, and Mary enfolding the baby, the warm light near her stomach. Holding and being held.

          30
          Meredith placed the wet vac in the basement puddles, creating a stream out of still water as it flowed to the nozzle. Watched small particles pulled into an inescapable current. And when shallow enough it began to thwuck, gasping hopelessly.
          When the basement was done it was dusk. She set up the portable sump pump in the yard. She bent into the darkening shadow of the neighbors’ house, finding the outlet partially by touch. As she switched on the pump, the light came on in her husband’s office, scattering shadows of damp grass blades across the lawn. She remembered her dream, and felt again crouched on a swing, poised above the water below. Clinging to the chains.
          She folded her arms tightly over her stomach. Watched the water flow from the small lake in the yard into the storm drain down the street, away.

Madeline Graham is a writer and Minnesotan. Her work is available in Southern Humanities Review, Redivider, HAD, and Forge Literary Magazine, among others. Find her on X @madelineRgraham or Bluesky @madeline-graham.bsky.social

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