Leah in Our Wives Under the Sea: Character Analysis

Overview

Leah is one of the two central narrators of Julia Armfield's Our Wives Under the Sea, and her chapters form the deep-sea spine of the novel. She is a deep-sea explorer who, along with crewmates Jelka and Matteo, becomes trapped in a submersible that loses contact with the surface and sinks to the ocean floor. Her chapters recount the physical and psychological ordeal of that descent and the long, strange time spent in the dark, while her wife Miri's chapters document Leah's return home and her gradual, unsettling transformation. Leah is defined by her lifelong fascination with the ocean, her methodical and rational temperament, and her deep but often unspoken love for Miri. The novel presents her as someone who has spent her life trying to understand the sea, only to be fundamentally changed by it in ways that resist explanation.

Plot Role

Leah is the protagonist of the underwater timeline. Her chapters alternate with Miri's, and together they build the novel's dual structure: one thread follows the mission's failure and the crew's survival in the abyss, the other follows Miri's attempts to care for a Leah who has come back altered. Leah's role is to give the reader direct access to the submersible's descent, the breakdown of the crew, and the mysterious events that occur on the sea floor. She is also the hinge between the two worlds—her body and mind carry the ocean's effects back into the domestic sphere. Her narration is precise and technical, often explaining submarine mechanics or oceanographic facts, which contrasts sharply with the increasingly surreal and fragmented experiences she describes. This tension between her rational voice and the inexplicable events she witnesses is central to her character.

Motivations and Traits

Leah's primary motivation is a deep, almost instinctual pull toward the ocean. The text shows this through her childhood: at twelve she read about the Challenger Deep in one of her father's books, and she loved how the book spoke of the deep ocean "not as something to be survived or conquered but simply navigated" (Chapter 11). Her father's inscription—"Property of Michael Henry Frayne, on long lease to his daughter Leah"—suggests an early encouragement of her curiosity. She later worked at an aquarium as a teenager and pursued a career in marine research and conservation. Her knowledge is encyclopedic: she can describe the five ocean layers, the mechanics of submarine ballast tanks, and the adaptations of deep-sea creatures. This expertise is both a strength and a limitation. It gives her a framework for understanding the environment, but it also fails her when the situation becomes inexplicable.

Leah is also characterized by emotional restraint. Miri calls her quiet spells "sunken thoughts," and Leah recalls how Miri would tap her skull and ask, "How'd they get so far down in there?" (Chapter 3). Leah often retreats into her own mind rather than confronting problems directly. During the crisis, she notices the smell of burning flesh but says nothing to back up Jelka's claim. She delays checking the shower's distillation system because she doesn't want to think the worst. She hides a bottle of wine rather than sharing it. These small acts of avoidance accumulate, and they become significant in her relationships with her crewmates and with Miri.

Chronological Arc

Leah's arc can be traced from her childhood fascination to her transformation at the novel's end. The outline and evidence show several key stages:

Childhood and formation: Her father teaches her to swim by throwing her into a pool, and she reads about deep-sea exploration. She develops a love of the ocean that becomes her career.
The mission: She is part of a three-person crew on a routine research dive. Twenty minutes before losing contact, Jelka smells meat, and Leah smells it too. The comms panel cuts out, and then the entire system goes offline. Leah realizes the comms "hadn't faded like a wavering signal so much as been switched off" (Chapter 3).
The descent: The submersible continues to sink with no way to control the ballast tanks. The crew tries to follow protocol but has no functioning system. They eventually come to a gentle stop on the sea floor.
Time in the dark: The crew loses track of time. Jelka begins hearing sounds the others cannot, and Matteo becomes increasingly paranoid. Leah tries to maintain routine—jogging in circles, making coffee, telling stories. She dreams of Miri and of the octopus from her aquarium days.
Jelka's disappearance: Jelka goes through the escape trunk, which floods and opens. Leah and Matteo are left alone. Leah feels guilt for avoiding Jelka's touch when she reached out.
The encounter: Leah pilots the craft across the ocean floor and encounters a vast creature. She and Matteo eventually surface, though the details are fragmented.
Return home: Leah returns to Miri changed. She bleeds from her gums and pores, her skin shifts colors, and she spends increasing amounts of time in the bath. Her transformation culminates in her becoming transparent and breathing underwater.

Relationships

With Miri: Leah's relationship with Miri is the emotional core of the novel. The text shows their early courtship—late-night films, kisses in the street, a wedding at the town hall. Leah is devoted to Miri, but she struggles to communicate her experience after the dive. She tells Miri that "there was too much water and they let it get in," but she cannot explain what happened. Miri becomes her caregiver, and Leah's physical changes strain their intimacy. Leah's thoughts often return to Miri during the ordeal; she thinks "Miri Miri Miri" as she surfaces. The relationship is marked by love and by a fundamental failure of communication.

With Jelka: Jelka is Leah's fellow crewmate, a marine ecologist with a religious background. Leah observes Jelka's praying and her stories about saints. When Jelka begins hearing voices, Leah initially tries to support her but later avoids her touch, a decision she regrets. After Jelka's death, Leah feels guilt: "Of everything, this is the thing that makes me feel worst" (Chapter 31).

With Matteo: Matteo is the engineer. He is practical and increasingly paranoid. Leah tries to keep the peace between him and Jelka. After Jelka's death, the two are left in a strained silence. Leah eventually pilots the craft, and they surface together, holding Jelka's rosary beads.

With her father: Leah's father influenced her love of the ocean. He taught her to swim and gave her books. After his death, Leah saw him many times without speaking to him, until he stopped appearing. This experience with grief and the supernatural foreshadows her own ambiguous transformation.

Key Decisions and Consequences

Not backing up Jelka's claim about the smell: When Jelka says she smells meat, Leah stays silent. This is a small decision, but it establishes a pattern of avoidance that continues throughout the crisis.
Taking Matteo to the rear chamber: Leah decides to leave Jelka on the main deck to assess the situation. This is a practical move, but it also distances her from Jelka's distress.
Avoiding Jelka's touch: When Jelka reaches out to her, Leah dodges her. This decision haunts her after Jelka's death.
Piloting the craft across the ocean floor: After Matteo becomes incapacitated, Leah takes control and moves the submersible. This leads to the encounter with the creature and ultimately to their surfacing.
Hiding the wine: Leah finds a bottle of wine and hides it rather than sharing it with the crew. This is a minor act of self-preservation that reflects her isolation.

Themes and Symbols

Leah's character is deeply tied to the novel's central themes. Her transformation embodies oceanic transformation: she becomes something other than human, her skin shifting colors and her body adapting to water. Her inability to explain her experience to Miri illustrates the failure of communication and support systems, as both the Centre and the couple's own attempts at therapy fail. Her return home, where Miri must grieve a person who is still present, connects to ambiguous grief. Leah's scientific knowledge proves insufficient to explain what happens, touching on the limits of knowledge. Finally, her fragmented memories and her dreams of a changed Miri reflect the erosion of memory and identity. The ocean itself is a symbol of the unknowable, and Leah's journey into it is a journey into the limits of human understanding.

Questions and Answers

1. Why does Leah believe the comms were switched off rather than having failed?

Leah explicitly states that when the system went offline, it occurred to her that the comms "hadn't faded like a wavering signal so much as been switched off" (Chapter 3). This is a factual observation from her narration, though the cause is never explained. It suggests an external agency, which becomes a source of Matteo's paranoia later.

2. What role did Leah's father play in her love of the ocean?

Leah's father taught her to swim and gave her books about deep-sea exploration. The text shows that at twelve she read about the Challenger Deep in one of his books, which had an inscription naming her as its long-term borrower. She later reflects that his teaching—"better to keep busy"—stayed with her during the ordeal.

3. How does Leah react to Jelka's hearing voices?

Initially, Leah tries to support Jelka, but she also avoids her when Jelka reaches out. She tells Jelka there is nothing to hear, and she feels guilty for not touching her. After Jelka's death, Leah says that avoiding her touch is the thing that makes her feel worst.

4. What does Leah dream about while trapped in the submersible?

Leah dreams about Miri, often in the aquarium where she once worked. In one dream, Miri kisses her and tells her she loves the way the water moves. She also dreams of the octopus named Pamela, and in a later dream Miri appears changed, moving on all fours and not toward her. These dreams blend memory, desire, and transformation.

5. How does Leah change physically after returning home?

Leah experiences bleeding from her gums and pores, a silvery change to her skin, and a growing need to be in water. She loses a toenail, her eye becomes a semisolid globe of water, and eventually her skin grows transparent, revealing her ribs and lungs. She is able to breathe underwater without air. These changes are described explicitly in Miri's chapters and represent Leah's full oceanic transformation.

For a deeper look at how Leah's story ends and what it means, see the ending explained page, or explore the questions and answers for more discussion.