That Time My Idiot Husband Insisted on Swimming with a School of Barracuda

How much say should any of us have in their spouse's choices?

Nov 27, 2024

For the audio version of this article, read by the author, go here.

Years ago, Michael and I flew to the Bahamas for the destination wedding of one of my college friends. The plan was to attend her wedding, then stay a few more days to enjoy ourselves.

But this was in Nassau, the Bahamas’ big city, and the beaches around our hotel were thronged with people. We used the local jitneys to explore the greater island of New Providence, but that was also pretty congested. Who lived in all these condos?

So we decided to hire a local boatman to take us to an uninhabited island far off-shore. The plan was for him to drop us off in the morning and then return later that afternoon to take us home.

When we arrived, the island was shockingly beautiful — exactly what we’d been looking for after the hullabaloo of my friend’s wedding and the chaos of Nassau.

But the sun was harsh. Had we brought enough sunblock? And water? This was an uninhabited island.

photography of foot tracks on seashore — *Photo by Nenad Radojčić on Unsplash*

It wasn’t until after the boatman left that I asked myself: What if he didn’t come back? We were the only ones on this little island — and we didn’t have a cellphone.

But come on, I was being silly. Wasn’t I? Once, Michael and I hired a float plane pilot to drop us off deep in the Alaskan backcountry — in grizzly country, no less. But three days later, that guy had come back, right on schedule.

Plus, we hadn’t paid the boatman yet. That meant he was definitely coming back, right?

We settled in to enjoy our afternoon of solitude.

We’d been dropped off in a cute little cove, and I decided to go for a swim. The water was so clear. I could see everything, including a fish that was, wow, really long and thin — at least three feet, but weirdly streamlined. Was this some kind of gar?

Then I saw its teeth. They were massive — and sharp.

This was no gar — it was a barracuda!

I quickly swam back to shore and joined Michael. “I just saw a barracuda!”

He looked up excitedly. “Really? Where?”

I gestured out to the water — vaguely. “Out there. But I don’t think you should go see it.”

“Why not? Barracuda are harmless.”

“I’m not so sure about that. You should see this thing’s teeth.”

“I want to. Where was it?”

“I’m serious,” I said. “I’m not sure we should be swimming here at all.”

Michael looked at me like I’d just said I’d seen a mermaid. “Are you kidding? What else are we going to do all day?”

“Well, we can hike the island. And we can walk around the—”

“You’re being silly,” Michael said. “We came all the way out here. Besides, I wanna see the barracuda.”

Was I being silly? Maybe barracuda were harmless. This was before you could look up answers to questions like that on your phone.

And it’s true, I’d always been more cautious than Michael. One of the things that had drawn me to him was his travel confidence — and competence. Even so, he wasn’t some crazy risk-taker.

But I wasn’t some kind of travel-lightweight either. Hadn’t I joined Michael on that trip into the Alaskan backcountry? Although once I’d learned there were grizzlies all around us, I’d barely left the cabin and the outside deck.

Michael went for his swim. What could I do? He was his own person. But when he returned, he said he hadn’t seen any barracuda.

After that, we had our picnic lunch, and then we explored the little island. It was fun that we were the only people there — if also still a little unsettling.

It was late afternoon when we returned to our pick-up spot. The boatman would be arriving soon to take us home — assuming this wasn’t the first act in some horror movie about secret drug traffickers like in The Beach.

Not that I’m high-strung or anything.

“Let’s go for another swim before the boatman gets back,” Michael said.

Of course I wanted to go for another swim. It was the perfect little bay for swimming. And barracuda were everywhere in the Caribbean — and they were harmless. Right?

aerial nature photography of green palms on seashore during daytime — *Photo by Nattu Adnan on Unsplash*

But I didn’t stay in the water all that long. And when I turned back to look at Michael, still frolicking out in the surf, I saw something glinting near him in the water.

I stepped down the sand, staring outward.

There were objects in the water, long and narrow — and silver. But no, they couldn’t be barracuda — there were too many of them, two dozen or more. Besides, they weren’t moving. They hung in the glassy water, motionless, like horizontal knives, levitating but frozen in time.

Then one drifted slightly to one side.

“Michael!” I said. “There’s a whole school of barracuda out there!”

“Where?” he asked.

I pointed fairly frantically. The fish were about twenty feet from Michael. And there were so many. At this point, it was almost like a joke, like the universe was conspiring to prove I had a point about the danger of swimming here.

But Michael barely looked over. I thought he’d wanted to see the barracuda! And why wasn’t he getting out of the water? On the contrary, he kept splashing around.

“What are you doing?” I called.

He looked over at me, confused. “Huh?”

“What about the barracuda?”

“I told you, they’re harmless.”

Was this some kind of power struggle — Michael didn’t want me telling him what he could or couldn’t do? Or was it just a difference of opinion — a conflicting assessment of risk? It was true: I could be too cautious.

I was annoyed but relieved when he finally stepped up out of the water.

But no, he’d only come out so he could climb up onto a rocky outcropping to jump back in.

Right near all those barracuda! The most unnerving part was how still they were. I didn’t know anything about barracuda, but somehow I did know that when they all attacked Michael, it would be in one sudden, simultaneous flash.

“Michael!” I said. “What are you doing? Can’t you see all the barracuda?”

“I told you,” he said. “Barracuda don’t attack people.”

Maybe this was a power struggle and a difference of opinion. But what could I do? At this point, we hadn’t been together nearly as long as we have now, and neither of us had yet to master the ebb and flow — and occasional schools of human-eating fish! — that are a part of all relationships.

The whole time he kept swimming I held my breath along with my tongue.

But finally he climbed out and dried off.

We didn’t talk as we waited for the boatman’s return. I was torn between being annoyed with him for not listening to me and annoyed with myself for overreacting.

Finally, the boat reappeared, and Michael and I climbed in.

a boat floating on top of a body of water at sunset — *Photo by Umair Dingmar on Unsplash*

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As we headed back to Nassau, the boatman asked us, “What did you think?”

“Fine,” I said. Then I couldn’t help adding, “Hey, when we were swimming, we saw a whole school of barracuda. Are they dangerous?”

“Oh, barracuda never attack people,” the boatman said.

Next to me, Michael leaned back in the boat — smugly, I thought.

“Except…” the boatman went on.

“Except what?” I said.

“Well, every now and then, they’re unpredictable. Then you better watch out ‘cause they can rip a person to shreds.”

Now I leaned back in the boat, exactly as smugly as Michael had seemed before.

Michael and I still don’t agree about his swim with that school of barracuda. He calls it a fish tale, if you will, focusing on the first part of what the boatman said — and, in fact, there have only been 25 reported barracuda attacks in the last century and only a few deaths.

But I always give him the fish-eye, focusing on the second part, where Michael could have been ripped to shreds.

“And even if it was only a tiny chance, why take the risk?” I always say.

“Because it was a beautiful day,” he says, “and I wanted to go for a swim. And if you’re always worried about barracuda, you’ll never get in the water at all.”

I confess I’m always tempted to offer a more manipulative argument: “If you loved me, you would have come out of the water anyway.”

But, of course, he could just as easily reply: “If you loved me, you wouldn’t have asked me to.”

After three decades together, and more than twenty years after this happened, Michael and I have mostly called a detente on the “swimming with a school of barracuda” incident — the title of this piece notwithstanding.

After all, he didn’t do it out of spite (I don’t think). Plus, it really was an incredible day out on that little island.

Anyway, we now have bigger fish to fry.

But if he ever tries anything like this again, well, there are always other fish in the sea.

Brent and Michael Are Going Places

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