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Then the big wave comes. The boat jerks slightly, suddenly, and the three standing figures adjust their footing. I am looking at the inside of my eyelids the moment my grandmother disappears over the side. Bright red with white dots following the quick jump and curve of my eyeballs. Voices scream with the rush of bodies to the bow to look over the railing. Like a stone. Down, down my grandmother goes, fading into layers of darkness and shadow and finally and forever into memory.

    We spend the rest of the day until nightfall looking for her, some of the men diving in again and again. They slide into the water and return in frantic lunges for air. Those who are young and strong enough. Suit jackets and dress shoes are scattered over the deck. In their shoes, the divers have placed their watches and rings for safekeeping. Those who are too young or too old stand silently and look on in disbelief. I notice with shameful pride that my father stays under the longest. I wonder what he sees in that black underwater forest.

    My mother collects Ruby in her arms when the harbour patrol begins shuttling guests back to the marina. She goes easily, drained now and weak from the crying. My grandfather sits in a folding chair, waiting, as if for a train. Alone now, as I’ve never seen him before. The young man my grandmother kissed is still sitting on the dock, dangling his feet in the water. I can see he knows what happened. It isn’t long before the whole lake knows. The authorities begin dragging the bottom in a matter of hours. It’s twilight when my father surfaces for the last time and is pulled from the water, panting and blue, teeth chattering. By now most of the guests have been taken ashore. At the stern, early evening bees gorge themselves on chicken salad and melon.

    My parents decide it’s better to stay in Bobcaygeon tonight instead of driving all the way home, even though we’re unprepared. Between us there is not one toothbrush. Aunt Marian has already taken my grandfather back to Kingston.

    We check into a motel with a yellow vacancy sign shaped like a boomerang, its centre directed upwards to the heavens. The motel is just on the edge of town, where the wind in the trees and the thin traffic through the dark drowns out the sound of crickets and bullfrogs. The last available room has only two beds, side by side. I lie beside my sister’s small warm body, our parents an arm’s length away, and listen to their slow, deep breathing. Crisp foreign sheets prevent sleep. It’s years since I’ve slept in the same room with my mother, in the same bed as my sister. Another move backward in time. My father’s teeth begin to chatter. I hear my mother’s hand searching the dark to comfort him, her palm softly cover his crying mouth.

    In my dream a silent fraternity of boats gathers in the area where the accident took place, a congregation of those who believe the scent of a drowning attracts prize fish. They risk the chance of pulling her up for the equal chance of bringing in a trophy. I go down to the dock where my grandmother kissed the young man and watch the procession of fishermen float guiltily into the twilight. They don’t anchor. They consider the currents and follow my grandmother’s slow drift. I know their luck is good, for I hear them pulling the big ones out and the weight of the fish hitting against the bottom of the boats.

    At seven the next morning, the motel keeper comes to our door, rubbing his red puffy face. The sun is shining through the spotted window. We’re waiting for someone to tell us what to do next. On the brown dresser between the two beds little boxes of cornflakes and a carton of orange juice sit, a still life of this abruptly re-arranged morning. The man at the door tells my father there’s someone on the phone in the office. They leave together. While my mother and Ruby wash up in the bathroom, I slip out and walk down to the docks,