Can and Will (Short Story‪)‬

She felt a seizure coming on for the first time in 25 years. The quarter-century anniversary of the convulsion named Gary. Retired at 43, now pushing 46, Tam barely owned anything but money. Brokering real estate in Phoenix had been an efficient distraction for twenty years. Since retiring, she dodged the news--not conducive to essential tranquility--but had been unable to evade elections auctioned to the highest paid attorney, terrorist sharks concealing themselves in the surf off playground beaches, passenger jets used as guided missiles, junk mail bacteria, and a whole family on the next block massacred by an estranged adopted son. Then her mother had sent a San Diego newspaper clipping about her brother, with a post-it sticky and the unforgettable maternal handwriting: "Gary's a hero again!" The first dozen years of her life, Tam had ridden a crest of seemingly inherited supremacy in water. In water her too-broad-for-a-girl shoulders didn't slouch to hide being too-tall-for-her-age. Her muscled back surged in rhythm with barely a splash. As a swimmer, her hair was never greasy or stupidly bowl-cut by her mother in the kitchen, but hidden in a racer's cap, cutting through an aqua clear pool like a speedboat's prow. A seizure in water was more than a danger to her brain cells or life: it could cripple her distinction, her pedigree. It already had.