The game was simple.
You take a breath, then another.
You let the lake press its fingers over your mouth.
You pretend the world has stopped loving you.

She was eight, maybe nine,
all ribs and sunlight,
hair slicked flat as confession.
He was smaller, but a little older—
the kind of boy who laughs like a dare.

Below the waterfall, the water boiled cold.
Above them, their mother gathered shimmer— bits of fool’s gold,
the kind of treasure that glints just enough to hint at ruin.

She did not watch them. She trusted them.
That’s how these stories begin.

The girl went under first.
She liked the silence there,
the way the light fractured and the air turned to glass.
Her brother followed,
arms outstretched, eyes open to the blue-brown murk,
playing at dying.

When they came up—
gasping, laughing—
they decided to do it again,
this time louder.
This time, she would scream.
This time, he would make it sound real.

And from above, their mother turned.
The gold in her palm winked like a cruel star.
She heard them—
a sound no mother forgets.
Her heel slipped. The rock said nothing.
The world folded itself in half.

She struck the basin with her head—
a dull, wet smack.
Then the water took her.

The children surfaced,
faces raw with triumph,
water running from their noses,
the echo of their own joke still ringing
as silence replaced it.

They called again.
They waited for the scold, the sharp inhale,
the threat of no more skinny dipping.
The threat of going home.

But only the waterfall answered,
laughing in its thousand small mouths,
chewing the light,
mixing her fool’s gold with blood.

Later,
they would tell the story differently—
how she fell like a saint,
how they only screamed in delight,
how the water wanted her more.

But for now,
they were only naked children,
and the game was over,
and the world,
for the first time,
had rules.