How It Feels To Float

Biz and Jasper frolic like “two merpeople” (234) in the ocean, and later, Biz takes lots of Polaroids. As the images develop, she sees one in which her father is surfing in the background. The photo speaks, and her father tells her he loves this beach, that he and Biz’s mother used to come there, and how much he loved her then. Jasper and Biz walk along the surf, talking quietly and wandering along the beach. On the back of the motorcycle on the way home, Biz decides she needs to find her father, to return to places that meant much to him, reclaim him. She begins to think of a road trip with Jasper.

When Biz gets back home late, she tells her mother about the day at Cunjurong. Her mother remembers a day she spent there with Biz’s father years earlier, although Biz already knows.

Jasper and Biz leave together for Sydney, Biz deciding that the city where her parents first lived would be the best place to start. As they head to the city riding along the ocean, Biz, still fixated on death, worries they might die in an accident. By noon they arrive at the apartment where her parents lived when her mother was pregnant with her.