Juli Zeh - Decompression

In the van, I asked them what no-decompression time was. Jola said it was the number of minutes a person could stay underwater. Theo added that it had something to do with nitrogen.

As always before the first diving session, Antje had briefed me at breakfast about our new clients’ level of experience. In the course of a trip to Vietnam some years earlier, Theo and Jola had taken a diving course and obtained entry-level certification — the “Open Water Diver”—and that was it. Their logbooks documented no more than ten dives. So in their case, a bit of theory couldn’t hurt. Basically, diving wasn’t a dangerous sport as long as you internalized a couple of rules. For their diving-license exam, most beginners learned a few sentences and set phrases by heart and forgot them immediately afterward. Maybe they could define no-decompression time , correctly, as the length of time a diver can remain at a given depth and still ascend rapidly to the surface without exposing himself to grave health risks. But only a few inexperienced divers had the ability to visualize the reality behind that definition. Most beginners were particularly unwilling to accept that their lives could depend on accurately calculating their no-decompression time. I was rather proud to think of myself as a conscientious teacher in this regard.

While we drove to Puerto del Carmen, I rolled out my standard explanation. The high pressure underwater, I said, causes nitrogen to build up in the body, in blood, tissue, and bones. You can imagine it as similar to carbon dioxide in a fizzy drink. As long as the bottle remains closed and under pressure, there’s no problem. But what happens when you open the bottle too fast? Something similar happens in your body when you stay underwater past your decompression time and then ascend to the surface too quickly. It’s not pretty.

Suddenly Jola cried out, “Stop!”

I slammed on the brakes. Jola had risen halfway from the passenger seat. “Did you see what was on the road?” she asked.

I leaned far out of the window on my side and looked back. “Nobody’s there!” I yelled.

“ ‘Everything is will,’ ” Jola said. “In giant letters, sprayed across the asphalt.”

I exhaled, put my hands on the steering wheel, and concentrated on letting my shoulders drop. “Are you crazy, scaring me like that?”

A car overtook and passed us, its horn blaring.

“A message,” Jola said. “A message for me. Written in German, even!”

“Sounds like a very German idea,” said Theo. He was writing in a notebook balanced on his knee. “Good title.”

“I can do it. I can do Lotte,” said Jola. “It’s only a matter of will.”

“Only if you know what no-decompression time is,” I said. “You have until Puerto del Carmen to understand it.”

I put the van in gear and stepped on the gas.

For starters, we walked down the little road to Playa Chica without any equipment. I pointed to a buoy in the water about seventy meters offshore.

“Swim there and back, is that it?” Jola asked.

“At a comfortable pace,” I said.

“But we’re not beginners,” Theo protested. “We have diving experience.”

“I just want to get an idea of what kind of shape you’re in,” I said.

Jola, who’d already pulled her sleeveless shirt over her head, stepped out of her jeans and stood there in a bikini. Theo looked around as though searching for his valet. Or at least a changing room. I helped him out of his linen suit jacket.

While he hopped around on one leg, trying to get his pants off, I observed his girlfriend. In my line of work, I had a great deal to do with bodies. Most clients chose to change into their swim clothes while badly hidden behind the back of my VW van. They’d stand there in gray socks and shabby underwear, looking at the ground because they were ashamed of their hollows and folds and spots. Jola, on the other hand, was not hiding herself. She stood in the middle of the quay, narrowed her eyes, and gazed at the horizon. She was perfect, a living statue. Thoroughly fit, toned, and yet soft. I assured myself that this was not a judgment on my part. It was simply a fact. I knew what a body like that required. Not only time, money, and discipline, but also a sense for the correct measure of things. The knowledge that beauty is to be found not in the extreme, but in balance. Jola had shaped her body like an artist. I frankly admired the result. I would have liked to offer her a word of praise, from one expert to another, but the danger of a misunderstanding was too great.

“Get out of the sun,” Theo said to her. “We can see your cellulite.”

Jola crouched and sprang headfirst from the quay wall into the water before I could call her to order. I considered whether I should break off this practice session and deliver a lecture on security. It was possible that Jola, as a sailor, could estimate how deep the water in front of a landing place was. Nevertheless, checking water depth before jumping in was normal routine. I decided against chewing her out; it was her first day. With one hand on the rail, Theo carefully walked down the steps to the sea.

While Jola swam a crawl, calmly propelling herself through the water, Theo practiced a mixture of breaststrokes and side-strokes. Jola was already halfway back when he reached the buoy. She turned over on her back to float and wait for him.

“What a slowpoke!” she shouted, kicking out when he got close and splashing seawater in his face. Then she swam away laughing, not back to the quay, but a bit farther off, in the direction of the beach. He didn’t catch up with her until they reached shallow water. She defended herself, squealed, flailed; he clung to her waist. I didn’t intervene. They might as well have been tussling children. I thought I heard them laughing. Then Theo lifted his girlfriend high in the air and flung her away. Jola screamed. There were rocks in the shallows, and those rocks were thickly covered with sea urchins. Theo came out of the water, put his linen jacket back on, wet as he was, and ran across the boardwalk to the public toilets.

I was alarmed to see that Jola was limping. As she came toward me, she raised one reassuring hand. We sat on a bench on the quay, and I put her foot on my knee. One of the sea urchin’s spines had penetrated the sole of her foot and broken off. I took out my pocketknife and did my best to think of her foot as an object. I worked until I could take hold of the spine, and as I drew it out, she stared into my eyes.

“So that’s it now,” I said. “No more fooling around. Accidents can happen too easily.”

“Believe me,” she said, rubbing her foot. “He meant to do it.”

The parking spots around the Playa Chica were assigned according to an unwritten law. Bernie’s white minibus with WONDERDIVE written on its sides was parked in the no-parking area near the steps leading to the boardwalk; he and his people were already in the water. As always, my vehicle was in the entrance to the old Spaniard’s place; once a day, he came out of the house to remind me of what he planned to do to me if I damaged his fence. Theo was leaning against my VW van, waiting for us. He took the cigarette out of his mouth to kiss Jola on the forehead, and she snuggled against him. “No more antics from now on,” I admonished, and both of them nodded as if they understood. I spread the canvas on the ground and set out wet suits, buoyancy compensators, diving cylinders, fins, and masks. I took off my shorts and slipped my feet into my sandals. Jola’s eyes strayed briefly over my swimming trunks.