Chapter 17
Lucas
Wind howls down from the headlands and slams itself into the surf like it’s trying to erase the whole coast. If you spend enough time on these beaches, you get a sixth sense for the ways a day can go wrong.
All mine are ringing right now.
I’m stationed in the lifeguard hut on the north end of Seamuse Village Beach. My shirt’s already plastered to me, and my hair is doing its best impression of a tumbleweed. The water’s churning white like someone dropped a grenade in it.
Ten meters out, the chop alone would eat a rubber raft for breakfast, let alone any tourist dumb enough to swim beyond the flags.
There’s supposed to be a supervisor who makes the final call on closing the beach, but he’s on some “training course” in Penzance and left me the keys to the entire operation.
There’s a perverse satisfaction in that.
Trust, or desperation, depending on how you read it.
It’s not even half-eight, and I’m already running triage. I scan the wet sand. Families with pastel towels and jelly sandals are dotted along the shore, along with couples holding hands and a dozen local kids doing whatever it is feral children do before the ice cream van starts up.
“Bit gnarly, isn’t it?” says a dad in the world’s loudest board shorts, gesturing at the horizon. He’s got a little girl on each arm, both with matching braids and gap-toothed grins.
I give him the safety talk—flags, currents—but he’s already clocked the crazy in the surf.
Good. A parent with functioning threat perception.
I should probably just shut it down now. Still, I have this thing about following the chain of command, probably because the one time I didn’t, it ended in a two-week HR purgatory and mandatory “assertive communication” class. No one wants to be that guy, until you have to be.
I’m debating whether the risk is worth the paperwork when I spot him—a kid, maybe six or seven—absolutely eating it in the shallows three meters beyond where the waves are starting to stack.
I see the parent, too, a mum wrapped in a towel and deep in a phone call, facing the wrong direction.
The kid is wearing inflatable shark fins on his arms that are starting to flail.
I’m off the chair and running before I’ve even decided to move.
There’s a rhythm to sprinting across sand.
I take the water in two strides, throwing myself into the surge just as the kid’s head disappears under a blanket of foam.
For a second, I’m six again, playing chase-the-tide with my dad, but then the adrenaline takes over and every muscle in me is on point.
I see the kid’s shape just as a wave pitches him up, eyes wide and mouth open, arms windmilling for balance.
He’s coughing but conscious. The current drags him parallel to the shore.
I have to angle against it, every stroke a battle.
When I get there, I wrap an arm around his chest, plant my feet in the sand, and pivot us so my back takes the brunt of the next breaker.
It’s a shitty ride, but I keep his head above water and talk him through the worst of it.
“You’re okay, mate. Got you. Just hang on.”
He’s coughing so hard, but he clings to me like a barnacle. I don’t think he’s noticed how fast we’re drifting down the beach. I clock the flags. We’ve already passed the safe swim zone and are heading straight for a spit of rocks that could shred us like brisket if we hit at the wrong angle.
I start side-stroking, keeping him high on my arm.
The undertow hits us without warning, a suction so strong, my feet leave the bottom.
We’re both airborne for a beat before being slammed down again.
The kid goes limp, which is scarier than if he’d fought me.
I manage to grab him by the waist and kick like hell, surfacing just as another wall of water breaks right over us.
I swallow half a pint of salt before I get us both above the foam.
On shore, people are starting to yell—high, panicked voices, hands waving, parents running. I tune it out. There’s only the next breath, the next stroke, the kid clamped against me. Two meters, then three, and my feet hit sand again. I lunge forward, dragging the kid up the slope.
He’s shivering and spitting up water, but he’s alive. I lay him on his side, tapping his back, and he gives me a wet, hiccupping laugh.
“You’re safe. You did brilliant,” I say, but my own voice sounds strange in my ears.
Someone puts a towel over the kid. I blink salt out of my eyes to see his mum, pale and shaking, clutching her phone with one hand and her son with the other.
She’s babbling thank yous, but I can’t focus.
My own chest feels like it’s being worked over with a sledgehammer, and my head is throbbing.
I taste blood—bit my tongue somewhere in the melee.
A rescue far more harrowing than Helena’s was.
A crowd gathers. I want to tell them to go away, to give the kid some space, but the energy on the beach has shifted. All eyes are on us. I check the kid’s pulse, steady enough, and try to stand, but my legs don’t agree with the plan. I sink down beside him, panting.
Someone shoves a bottle of water into my hand. “You okay?”
My world is slightly spinning, but I try to play it cool. “Yeah. Just need a sec.”
The head lifeguard from the south tower jogs up with his radio already at his mouth. “We’ve got ambulance inbound, Lucas. Sit tight.”
I try to argue, but my words stick. The cold is hitting me now, a delayed punch in the gut. There’s a ringing in my ears.
The paramedics show up in what feels like seconds but is probably ten minutes. They’re quick and calm, already triaging as they reach us. One takes the kid, wrapping him in foil and checking his breathing, the other leans down to my level.
“Name?” she asks.
“Lucas Harkin. I’m fine.”
She smirks, pro-level bedside manner. “Sure, you are, mate.” She checks my pupils, shines a light in my eyes, then moves to the scrape running along my jaw. I hadn’t noticed it, but there’s blood, so she wipes it with a practiced flick.
“Can you stand?”
I try, make it halfway, and sit back down. “Not my best work, but yeah.”
She gives me a knowing look. “Ambulance ride for you and the boy. We’ll let the crew cover the beach.”
It takes two of them to get me upright. I glance back and see the little kid, wrapped like a burrito in tinfoil, staring at me with huge eyes. I flash him a thumbs-up, and he grins, mouth stained purple from whatever he ate for breakfast.
As they lead me up the sand, past the gawking beachgoers and the line of umbrellas bent double by the wind, I catch the scent of ocean off my own skin. It’s everywhere, in my nose and throat, more vivid than ever. The other lifeguards are already resetting the zone.
Life moves on, even if you almost drown.
They strap us in side by side in the ambulance. The kid’s still shaking, but he clings to my wrist.
“It’s okay,” I reassure him.
The doors slam shut and the siren starts, echoing in my chest. I close my eyes and let the blur of motion take me.
Next time I just issue the red flag and take the HR courses.