“Claire, I brought six towels, a change of clothes, a big thermos full of hot chocolate, and a separate thermos of hot chocolate with some bourbon in it. I’m prepared.”
“And which one has the… which thermos has the bourbon?” Nina asked in a whisper.
“The red one.”
“Well, giving it to you now would defeat the purpose,” Claire said.
“Yeah, well, giving it to me now would ensure I actually get in the water,” Nina said.
They stood at the edge of the dunes and looked out at the Atlantic. It was enormous, and it was for sure freezing.
Harper had to admit that this was completely insane, even though she had been the one to suggest it, which meant she had no one to blame but herself and possibly the second glass of wine she had been drinking when she had texted the group chat about a polar plunge at Folly Beach at dawn.
Claire had replied, “Define polar plunge,” and Harper had replied, “Well, we run into the ocean in December as fast as we can.”
Nina had replied, “I’m going to die,” to which Harper had replied, “That’s the spirit.”
“Okay,” Claire said.
She pulled three bathing suits out of her tote bag. They were matching, navy blue with white polka dots.
They all had retro cuts that suggested Claire had given this entirely too much thought.
“Wait a minute. You seriously bought us matching bathing suits?” Harper said.
“Yeah, I found them at Dedrick’s. They were on sale.”
“Claire Morrison, you did not buy matching bathing suits for a polar plunge because they were on sale. You bought them because you just cannot resist coordinating things.”
“Well, both could be true.”
Nina took hers and held it up. “David’s mother is going to see photos of this and have an absolute panic attack.”
“Elena will survive,” Claire said.
“Elena will show up at my house with a casserole and then lecture me about pneumonia.”
They changed in Claire’s car, which involved a serious level of contortion that should not have been required of three fifty-year-old women at 6:30 in the morning.
Harper got her arms stuck in the seatbelt while trying to pull her top off over her head.
Claire accidentally honked the horn with her elbow, and Nina laughed so hard that she fogged up the windows.
They walked to the water’s edge in matching navy polka dots and bare feet. The sand was cold, and the wind was colder. Thinking about putting their bodies in it seemed insane.
“Rules,” Claire said, because Claire was not going to enter any body of water without establishing a firm protocol first.“We go in together, we go in up to our waist at least, we stay in for thirty seconds.”
“Thirty seconds?” Nina said. “That seems a little long. It’s half a minute in freezing water. Half a minute is a lifetime, you know.”
“Oh, come on, we can do thirty seconds,” Harper said. “I sit through board meetings that feel longer than thirty seconds in the Atlantic.”
They linked arms, three women in matching bathing suits at dawn on Folly Beach, the sky turning pink at the edges and the ocean seeming to wait for them.
“On the count of three,” Claire said.
Harper braced herself. “On three.”
“One,” Nina said.
