Personal Best

Under the water I can hear nothing. For the moment: silence.
Then my mind gets going. I imagine that blub blub sound you hear in cartoons, and that distant pinging sound of TV submarines. The rush of rapids, the contraction of metal, the roil of waves, the intermittent buzz of Morse code. I imagine I can hear my own heart. Then, over all the imaginary noise, there's an idea. I blow out a breath and there it is—I sincerely hear blub blub.
I smile because apparently cartoons can be accurate. And then I smile again because smiling under water is the most morbid thing I can imagine. Like thumbing your nose in a fire.
"Are you going to answer me?"
From under water, in the bathroom, and up the stairs—I can hear her vocal chords actually straining. The water, my imagination. They're no match for her screeching. The vibrations against my back mean she's probably stamping her feet.
I decide to hold my breath a minute longer.
From beneath the surface of water, there is nothing more beautiful than a ceiling stretched out above you. Any ceiling. A ceiling of plaster. A ceiling of tile. A ceiling of sky. It chops up like a flag in a stiff breeze. Blub blub.
"Are you still in there? Seriously now. This is ridiculous. Are you going to answer me? Ri-DIC-culous!"
I decide to push my lungs to their limit.
I remember something. I once dreamed the world was a roadside puddle. I recall looking up through the murk and seeing the billowed-up sun just beyond the surface of the world, its face chopped up like that flag in a stiff breeze. Oil swirled pale rainbows where the light allowed. But It was so dim down where I was. I was disgusted by what had become of the world, until at some point, I realized I was dreaming and decided to get pizza. I distinctly remember wondering what pizza would taste like soaked in roadside puddle. It was the first thing that occurred to me.
"Can you get out? Soon? Hello?"
I hear her, but I'm too busy trying to remember what roadside pizza tastes like—and certainly too busy trying to remember not to breathe. It's been a minute and a half and I've almost beaten my record. Blub blub.