O Macbeth: I will write about how my character kills yours.
“Don’t tell me you’re chicken,” Zahra negs as she slides her thong down her legs. Goosebumps sprout across her bare skin as a sudden gust of wind blows past them. “I took you for a lot of things, but not a coward.”
The taunting works in Zahra’s favor, somehow. Harry starts stripping off her clothes one by one, dumping them in a small pile on the lakeshore. Harry glares at her all the while, and Zahra gives her a wolfish grin before leaping into the lake. She catches a glimpse of Harry’s naked body diving beneath the surface, the water inky black in the night. Zahra can begrudgingly admit that underneath all those tacky clothes, Harry’s actually got a banging bod. What a shame.
“Race you to the deep end, Henri.” Without waiting to hear Harry’s surely aggravated retort, Zahra begins taking leisurely strokes to the center of the lake. Harry gets there first, a fact that Zahra only discovers when she gets hit in the face with a sudden splash of lake water. What a sore winner.
The new moon makes it hard for Zahra to see Harry’s expression as she says, “Come closer,” in her most enticing voice. “I want to tell you something.” But it doesn’t matter what Zahra says, because she erases the distance between them with one long stroke. Harry doesn’t move away, perhaps paralyzed by her own curiosity.
Without a word, Zahra reaches for Harry’s face and gently brushes away wet strands of hair. Harry flinches slightly, as if expecting something entirely different, but eventually relaxes against Zahra’s touch. And that’s when Zahra’s grip tightens, and she pushes Harry beneath the surface with all the force she can muster.
Of course, Harry struggles. Her arms flail, splashing water everywhere, and she manages break through to the surface twice before Zahra pushes her back down. In the end, Zahra’s will is stronger. Eventually, Harry’s arms go still and the water around them calms.
Zahra emerges from the water like Aphrodite being birthed from sea foam. She feels like a goddess, otherworldly, now having taken a life. Zahra burns her clothes so that it takes weeks before anyone thinks to check the lake for a body. They’ll call it a tragedy, and Zahra will agree that it was divine.
