AllFreeNovel
Share Us
“Disappear?” I rubbed my face, feeling the grittiness of sleep—or maybe dried seawater—on my cheeks, and the welt from where the branch had hit me the night before. “Where are you going?”
“I need to go check on Romi,” Joel said. His expression was worried. “She’ll have been all alone in her villa in that storm, and she’s probably losing her mind about me. I need to make sure she’s okay.”
“I’m so sorry, of course you do.” I sat up properly, swung my legs out of bed onto the damp boards, and looked out at the stretch of water between us and the island. The storm seemed to have passed, but the sea was still a far cry from the clear, tranquil blue it had been when we arrived. It was cloudy gray with stirred up silt, and the huge breakers were still crashing into the shore. The formerly pristine white beach was strewn with debris—broken furniture, branches, coconuts, and brittle chunks of coral flung up from the depths. More than that, the whole shape of the beach itself had changed—a deep channel had been scoured out of the far end of the curve by the surf, while sand had been flung far up, either side, into dunes that hadn’t existed last night. If I squinted, I could make out, even from here, some of the damage that the storm had wrought on the island itself. Dozens of trees had come down, and between the trunks of the remaining ones I could see the white glint of villas that had been previously hidden by forest. As I watched, a huge tumbleweed of something pale and straw-colored cartwheeled across the beach—but it was too large and too irregularly shaped to be an actual tumbleweed. It took me a few minutes to recognize it for what it was—the roof of one of the villas, or at least a good chunk of one. I felt a shiver of apprehension run through me.
“How are we going to get across?” I asked now. Joel bit his lip.
“I’ve been watching the surf and I think I can swim for it.”
“Christ.” I looked out at the crashing breakers. “Are you sure? It’s pretty rough.”
“I think so. The jetty’s basically gone—and it’s probably more unsafe to go wading around all those submerged posts, anyway. Easy way to break a leg. And there’s a rip, but it’s going down the far side.” He pointed at a deceptively smooth streak of water coming off the northern edge of the beach, following the path of the scoured-out channel. “I mean, it’s rough, but I’m a fairly strong swimmer, and I’m used to surf. I think I’ll be okay.”
“And what about sharks?” Even as I said the words they sounded faintly ridiculous, but this was the Indian Ocean. It wasn’t a hyperbolic question to ask. But Joel was shaking his head.
“I asked one of the producers yesterday. He said the big ones can’t get inside the reef. They stick to the deep water. I’ll be all right, I promise.”
I nodded and, pulling the heavy bed away from the French doors, I opened them a few inches and squeezed through. Outside, the surf felt, if anything, more intimidating, but the wind was blowing onshore and I had no reason to disbelieve Joel about the riptide. Joel had followed me, and together we stood shading our eyes and gazing at the shore.
“Are you a surfer, then?” I asked. Joel shrugged. A figure had appeared in the far distance, stumbling along the beach, but I couldn’t see who.
“Not anymore, really, but I guess you could say I was. I grew up in Cornwall. We were always messing around in the sea. You learn the basics.”
“So how do we do this?” I said. The figure had disappeared into the trees.
“We?” Joel raised an eyebrow, and I shrugged.
“Look, I’m not staying here by myself. I’ve never surfed, but I did get my silver swimming badge.”
“Okay,” Joel said mildly. “If you’re sure. Do you want me to go first? Just in case?”
I thought for a moment, and then nodded. There wasn’t really much benefit in us swimming together. If anything, we were less likely to notice the other getting into trouble. Joel was already stripping off his clothes.
“So the thing to do,” he said, as he pulled his T-shirt over his head, “is kind of body surf on the waves as far as possible. It’s not as easy without a board, but the energy of the wave will do the hard work, particularly with an onshore wind. And if you find yourself in a rip, don’t try to swim against it, that’s a fast way to drown. Swim sideways if you can, get out of its pull, or if you can’t, just hang tight and wait for it to exhaust itself. Though that might be a gamble if it carries you out beyond the reef.”
I nodded. Joel was down to his pants, and now he took off his glasses, looking blankly around.
“Shit. What do I do with these? I can’t wear them, they’ll get washed away.”
“Um…” I had a sudden idea, and going back into the villa, I rummaged in the bathroom and came back with my washbag, a simple drawstring bag made of waterproof material. It was the only thing I’d brought across to the water villa, aside from my pajamas. I dumped out my shampoo and deodorant and handed it to Joel.
“Will this do?” I asked. “It’s strong, and you could tie the straps to your wrist.” Joel nodded, tied it tightly around his arm with a double knot, and then shrugged.
“Well, wish me luck.”
“Good luck,” I said. My heart was in my throat as he stepped closer to the edge of the veranda, where the waves were buffeting with a force I could feel shaking the decking. He stood for a moment, inhaling deeply, and then poised himself and dived, with a surprising grace, into the surf.
For a long time, he didn’t surface, and I found I was counting under my breath, watching for his head to come up between the waves. Thirteen elephants… fourteen elephants… when I got to twenty-two elephants, I was beginning to get seriously worried. Had he got caught in some underwater current not visible from the surface?
But then, just when I was beginning to debate if I should wait a little longer, or strip off my own clothes and jump in, and whether that would do any good at all or just result in both of us getting swept out to sea, his head came up between the waves, much farther away than I would have expected, and he caught a wave, and let himself be carried almost halfway to shore.
When he finally scrambled up the beach on his hands and knees, I felt like applauding. But then he turned and waved, and I realized it was my turn.
The thought gave me a jolt. What I’d told Joel was true, I couldn’t stay here all day, and I did have my silver medallion. But it was a long time since I’d done any serious swimming, and what I had done had been pretty much exclusively in swimming pools. Also, the dress I was wearing was woefully unsuitable.
“Just a sec!” I yelled across to Joel, though I wasn’t sure if he’d be able to hear me above the sound of the surf. I turned my back and began pulling the diaphanous maxi dress over my head. Once it was off, I stood for a moment at the edge of the veranda, feeling strangely vulnerable in my bra and knickers, and trying to summon up my courage. Then, knowing that my nerve would fail me if I waited any longer, I jumped, with considerably less grace than Joel, into the waves.
The first thing that shocked me was that it was very cold. Much, much colder than the baby waves I’d paddled in with Nico yesterday, when we first arrived. Colder even than last night, when I’d waded across the jetty to the island. Evidently, the storm had stirred up water from the deep, untouched parts of the sea, the part where even the tropical sun rarely reached. With unpleasant images in my head of giant squid and those weird eyeless fish with glowing antenna, I took a deep breath, and began to strike out for shore.
