Chapter 19 #2
I follow his lead, letting the water slide through my fingers, simply letting the mass of water carry me. I feel glorious, weightless, and free.
Suddenly, the water begins to whirl and I lose control of the direction my body is going. My breathing speeds up and when another wave rolls over the surface, salty water gushes through my snorkel and into my mouth.
I can hear my heart pounding in my ears when I taste the salt on my tongue.
I’m starting to cough, but there’s nowhere for the water to go.
I need to get this snorkel out of my mouth.
It needs to be out of my mouth right now.
But I can’t seem to grab hold of it and I’m overcome by a paralyzing sense of panic.
My hands are tingling and getting heavy.
I desperately try to move my arms and legs, but I’m completely frozen.
I have lost all control of my limbs. The fear in my chest—the kind of fear I’ve only ever felt once before—is getting more intense and I’m wide-eyed as I watch everything transform into a blur around me.
And then, a big, strong hand wraps around my upper arm, pulling me back up to the surface. I feel my snorkel get ripped from my mouth and I begin to cough wildly. Fresh air rushes into my lungs, my chest heaving rapidly as I reopen my eyes.
Elias is staring at me with a look of unfiltered fear on his face as we bob up and down in the water. He’s gone completely pale and the grip he has on my upper arms is painfully tight. The speedboat that caused this rippling wake, went on its clueless way, already far away from us again.
Are you... Are you okay? he asks with a trembling voice as his eyes dart over my face looking for a sign of life that isn’t just me coughing up water with the force of a sixty-year-old chain smoker.
My throat is burning, but I nod. His face relaxes a little as he slowly swims me back to the boat. Before I can even attempt to climb up the little ladder, he grabs me around the waist and lifts me up onto the deck.
With trembling legs, I stumble over to the bench and sit down, slowly beginning to grasp the full extent of what could have happened just now. Only a few more minutes and I would have needed to be resuscitated...or worse.
My lungs are still rapidly gasping for oxygen, but I manage to gradually extend my exhales and bring my heart rate back down.
Elias has scrambled onto the boat and he’s now sitting on the bench opposite me.
His hands are shaking, he swallows repeatedly, and the colour has yet to return to his cheeks.
A brief silence falls between us in which he stares at me intensely, rubbing his forehead.
Then, his gaze drifts down lower and... Is this guy seriously staring at my boobs again?
Where did you get that necklace? he finally asks me in a gravelly voice, pointing at my chest.
I blink a few times and part my lips a little. Of all the things he could have just said, this is the last thing I would have expected.
I... Um... What? I scratch out. I swallow, my throat still sore from the salt water.
Elias gives me a concerned look at the sound of my voice and hands me something to drink. I take a few impatient gulps. It seems to soften the ache.
Where did you get that necklace? Elias repeats. When I fail to reply because I’m still chugging down water, he adds, Any chance you got that stone about twenty years ago from a boy you met on the beach after his brother attacked your sandcastle?
I stare at him, mouth agape. How... How do you know about that?
Elias runs his hand through his hair a few times while he looks at me with an expression I can’t quite figure out. Once upon a time I gave that stone to a girl who was afraid of the sea.
My breath, barely back under control, begins to speed up again.
It’s him. He’s the boy who helped me rebuild my sandcastle.
He’s the one who helped me conquer my fears all those years ago.
Elias is the boy who gave me the talisman that I was so attached to—despite numerous successful EMDR sessions with my psychologist—that my mother finally decided to have it made into a pendant.
I found it on the beach, he says. The side of his mouth quirks up and the tightening feeling I had in my chest is replaced by a warm glow.
I’m riveted. I thought I’d made some incredible discovery because I’d seen the same kind of gems in my mother’s jewellery before.
She had convinced me that they had magical powers.
He chuckles, likely remembering how gullible we were at that age.
I found out later that day that it had fallen out of her earring.
She sifted through the sand near our beach towels, but never found it.
I was too scared to say I had given it away, so I just helped her look instead.
At that memory, the other corner of his mouth pulls up, too.
I want to say something, but I’m not sure what.
I’m speechless. I had thought of that selfless boy so often.
Thought of how he helped me. Every time I visited my grandparents and saw a boy with messy black hair walking around on the beach, I was desperate for him to turn around.
For it to be that boy. But it never was.
Elias pulls his eyebrows together a little and he gives me a serious look. Don’t you think you should have mentioned a near-drowning trauma before we got into the water? If I had known, I never would have brought you snorkelling here. We could have gone somewhere so much shallower.
I... I... I bite my lip and stare at my hands, folded together in my lap. I thought I was over it. I’m sorry.
His expression softens and he sits down next to me, squeezing my knee. You don’t need to apologize. It’s just that... that... Shaking his head, he rubs his face with his hand. You scared the shit out of me.