I saw the water coming towards me. Or rather, I saw myself approaching the water. It had looked flat from above. As if the surface was smoothly undulating, like a pair of silk pyjamas carelessly thrown on the bed. My body was flooded with adrenaline. A chill like a shock ran through my body. I fell. My hands were clammy. The sweat glands had no time to produce moisture. I could feel the surface approaching. Like a wide-open mouth, it threatened to swallow me up. The roar of the waves was drowned out by the rushing wind in my ears. My arms flailed as if trying to gain control of the situation. But it was just me, at the mercy of gravity. It's interesting what mundane thoughts come to mind when you feel your end coming. I thought of my standard buffet style restaurant, an unreturned book and the warm smile of the librarian I never invited to dinner. Flashes of thoughts that wanted to tell me a story of my life that I didn't want to accept as mine and never would have. Me, immersed in the banality of life, exposed to the insignificance of my existence. And besides all that, the sweat. The cold heat in my hand, the pulling sensation in my feet that I always felt when I was on a rollercoaster or on a swing as a child. The discomfort of falling. The texture of the surface came closer and with it the spray of the waves, the darkness that seemed monstrous and dangerous beneath the surface, the uncertain and hostile. The waiting inside me, the tensing limbs, the agonizing seconds in fearful anticipation. Like when you're expecting a punch and wonder, with comical rationality, where it is. And then the impact. Muffled. Coolness. Hardness.
And then nothing.