Hi, Mystery Hour listeners, Rabia here. I just want to remind you that today's episode will be the last of this season.

We're going to go on hiatus, but stay subscribed so you know where to find us next.

Now sit back, relax, and enjoy Swim at Your Own Risk by Nancy Novick from the Ellery Queen Mystery Magazine, January, February, 2025 edition.

I had not seen death up close yet that last year when we vacationed at the beach,

although my siblings and I were familiar with the concept of mortality.

A series of goldfish had been found floating, one by one, at the top of the tank,

within weeks of coming home from the local pet shop in their plastic bags. Far more gravely, our mother's father had died two years earlier

from cancer. Grandma followed six months later. From a broken heart, I heard Tammy tell her best friend

in a hushed voice, repeating what someone had told our mother. But these were the deaths of older relatives

whom we rarely saw and whose funerals our family did not attend.

None of this was on my mind during our trip to the shore that August.

These vacations were still the highlight of my childhood summers,

even though I'd just turned 12

and was growing more interested in my friends and girls and baseball.

I was only vaguely aware of the hints of changes to come.

As we did every year, we did not leave the house until after the dinner dishes were washed and put away,

a schedule that allowed us to arrive by midnight.

My mother seldom drove in those days, and my father preferred to avoid the daytime traffic,

and I realize now, the sound of me and my younger siblings, Jack and Tammy, who were six and eight

that summer, arguing in the back seat. On this schedule, inevitably, one or both of them would

fall asleep. My relationship with them was changing, too. They seemed too much younger than me to be my playmates.

And recently, my parents had started asking more of me.

...