Through the Tunnel

"Through the Tunnel" is a short story written by British author Doris Lessing, originally published in the American weekly magazine The New Yorker in 1955.

His conscientious mother sends him on his way with what she hopes is a casual air, and Jerry leaves behind the crowded “safe beach” where he has always played.

Looking back to shore, Jerry sees some boys strip off their clothes and go running down to the rocks, and he swims toward them but keeps his distance.

To be with them, of them was a craving that filled his whole body.” He watches the boys, who are older and bigger than he is, until finally one waves at him and Jerry swims eagerly over.

Believing they are leaving to get away from him, he “cries himself out.” He spends the next several days contemplating swimming through the rock tunnel himself, and he practices holding his breath underwater.

After one round of practice, his nose bleeds so badly that he becomes dizzy and nauseated, and he worries that the same might happen in the tunnel, that he really might die there, trapped.