How It Feels To Float

Biz, 16, struggles with two traumatic realities: her father’s death by suicide when she was seven and her growing realizations about her sexual identity. To cope with this internal struggle, Biz imagines that she is floating above herself and the chaotic world around her. She has animated conversations with the ocean, with the photographs that she takes as part of a night photography class. Her only comfort comes from the visits from her father’s ghost, who shares stories of Biz’s childhood and calms her in difficult situations.

Biz is suspended from school after she and her friend Grace throw a rock through the window of a classmate’s home; the boy called Grace a “slut” for having sex, and Biz had falsely accused of sleeping with a classmate who sexually assaulted her. Biz usually covers up her emotions, but this leads to an emotional and psychological breakdown, and she realizes she needs to stop pretending she is fine. With the help and emotional support of her friends—Jasper and his grandmother Sylvia—her mother, and a helpful psychiatrist, Biz comes to terms with her family’s history of depression, anxiety, and suicide.