After Chrissy regained control of her body, she received a call from a Samantha Mathews that same day. Chrissy's memories told me that she was also pregnant and was friends with Chrissy. Eventually she invited Chrissy to meet her at the outdoor pool. After the call and even at the family dinner, Chrissy thought about Samantha for a long time. They were both best friends at secondary school, but Samantha was always the one who was wilder and met all sorts of different people. Just before their final exams, they had a fight and Samantha disappeared from school and didn't graduate.
It was a big hurdle for Chrissy to meet her, as she was also a little scared. After all, she now had a family to worry about. It's not Chrissy's fault that Samantha went off the rails. I could feel how tense my landlady was. She was staring at nothing, thinking and reproaching herself.
'Is everything all right with you?' asked Zach as Chrissy stared into nothingness again while washing the dishes.
She nodded. 'Everything's fine. Don't worry.'
'Chrissy, I know something was wrong,' he insisted. After all, he was worried about his wife.
She took a deep breath and told him the story about Samantha. After the story, he told her not to blame herself and laughed a little. Zach knew many colleagues who ended up like him and he still met up with them when he was invited for a drink by others.
She left her thoughts behind while breastfeeding the baby. It helped that her partner motivated her, because Zach and Chrissy were going to visit Zach's parents over the weekend and possibly enjoy the silence a little.
Chrissy put on her bikini and took everything she needed with her. Samantha was already waiting for them at the entrance to the outdoor pool near the beach. They both saw each other approaching.
'Sam, hi, how are you?' Chrissy hugged her.
'Fine, thanks and you?' Samantha wanted to know.
They hadn't seen each other for a long time. After Chrissy had paid the entrance fee for them both, they talked about their lives and how they were coping.
Samantha admits to having made a mistake. She fell in love at a young age with Mitch, a muscular man who rode a motorbike. She enjoyed her time with him and stayed with him for some time. Away from friends and family, she wanted to marry him as well as have children with him. Even if they had nothing, she wanted him. One day, when his wife knocked on the door of the house, Samantha was shocked to learn that he already had a family. That evening, she confronted him to find out the truth.
In utter despair, she disappeared from the flat while he was still trying to justify himself. But in Samantha's eyes, he was already the arsehole to whom he had promised his love to a woman. She was squatting on the street, homeless and had no education. She struggled on the streets for food and water. Days and months passed. Chrissy was already starting to feel sorry for her.
Weeks later, an older woman offered her help, as Sam was barely thirty years old. She took Samantha in, offered her food and a roof under her head. The elderly lady supported her in her education so that she was able to train as a baker after all. She then met a new man who was loving towards her and now she was with him.
Chrissy couldn't believe how hard life was for Samantha. She wanted to make up with her former friend. Sam couldn't stop thinking about her words, because she had been right in the past too. They sat in the restaurant for several hours drinking coffee and telling other life stories. Hours passed when Samantha's phone rang. It was the reminder for her work shift.
'I apologise for everything I did to you,' Sam apologised to her friend again.
Chrissy was moved: 'It's all good. I'm glad you've found your way and I wish you all the best for you and your child.'
They smiled at each other once more before going their separate ways again.
Before Chrissy went home, she wanted to go for another swim. Chrissy slowly sat down at the edge of the pool. Her feet were already in the deep water. She hadn't been swimming for a long time. She jumped into the cold water with her baby bump and swam to the other side of the pool using the breaststroke technique.
After more than five lengths, Chrissy's left foot began to hurt so that she could no longer move it. She dived into the water and was about to give up from exhaustion. Just in time, as she began to panic, I took control of her body. I tried with all my might to get to the surface. It took a lot of effort to get to the surface because the baby's belly was too big and too heavy. When I reached the surface, I gasped for air before swimming on my back to the edge of the pool. My belly kept pulling me back down.
'Are you all right?' asked the lifeguard as he helped me to stand up and went to fetch a swimming ring at the same time.
'All good,' I replied and left the pool.
I felt Chrissy panic in her head. She was there, felt what I was doing, but had no control over her body. Her panic would have cost her her life. I squatted on the changing bench and left her body back to her.
'Holy shit,' she said after taking over the body. She still couldn't believe what had happened. It was the first time she had seen someone else take over her body. On the way home, she could hardly believe it herself, as if someone had been able to control her. She replayed everything before convincing herself that nothing out of the ordinary had happened. What should she have done? Say that someone could control her body. Firstly, nobody would believe that and secondly, she was panicking. A person could do many different things in a state of panic.