Death by Drowning

For the memory of Caroline Flack and those of us who know what it is like to drain people.



Swimming in the North Sea in February is not the kind of thing many would spend their day off work doing. In fact it was probably the last thing she would have ever imagined herself doing.

Yes she had dreamed of drifting out to sea one day, but it had been a gentle, soft, and inevitable imagining. A coming together of body, earth and soul. Maybe in the warmth of the seas in the South of France when she was in her 70s. It would look like an accident. And her boys would take comfort in the fact that their mum had always loved the ocean.

But she wasn’t in her 70s, nor was she in the South of France. And even though she loved the ocean, she hated the cold.

She could no longer recall the details of the busy buzz in her head that took her on her lonely drive that day. She didn’t remember where she was heading or what her intentions had been. Had she even had a purpose? Had she ever had a purpose?

In fact her head felt quite empty by the time she arrived at the hidden little cove just outside Whitby Bay.

You were up on the hilltop too weren’t you?
You thought you recognised the shape of her?
You thought the sudden shriek that came from her lungs when she flung herself into her icy homecoming, was the same sound that haunted your nightmares.

But it wasn’t was it?

And when you looked again, the image had faded.

You felt an uneasy relief as you told yourself you had imagined it all.

Afterall, it wasn’t like you could have done anything about it anyway.

Her brief existence had been as made up as those stories you imagined she told.

So you did what the world does everyday. You kept on.

And you did not see.

As her body fought with the daggers of the mighty ocean. As the waters enveloped and consumed her. Like a monster. You didn’t see her fight it. You didn’t see her lose.

It wasn’t peaceful, like she had imagined. It wasn’t romantic or beautiful.

It was death.

Death by drowning.