My daughter’s first word reached me beneath the ocean

Dear Delyara, I am an engineer on a research submarine, and messages from home reach us in short batches when communication allows. Today, at a depth where sunlight no longer exists, I received a video of my daughter saying her first word. She was sitting in her high chair with banana on her cheeks. My husband pointed the camera toward her and said, “Say Mama.” She looked directly at the screen and said “light.” Not Mama. Light. The crew laughed when I played it for them, and I laughed too because it was beautiful and because I did not know what else to do. I have spent four months maintaining systems that keep twelve people alive beneath freezing water. I know how to diagnose a pressure leak from a change in sound. I can calculate oxygen consumption while half asleep. I was not there when my child discovered language. By the time I return, she may be walking. She may reach for my husband when frightened because his body is the one she knows. Tonight, through the small round window, there is only black water and the faint beam from our exterior lamps. My daughter chose the word light while I was living in darkness. I keep replaying the video, listening to the confidence in her tiny voice, wondering whether she was naming what she saw or asking me to come back toward it.