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“Nah, you’re all good man. No one else was crazy enough to attempt that wave.”
“Well, thanks anyway.”
“No problem. See you back out there sometime.”
He jogs back into the water with his board under his arm and then swims out to his friends. I scan the water but there’s no sign of the woman who had me so spooked.
Strange.
“What the hell was that all about? I saved your board for you, you’re welcome by the way. I better not have bust my stitches running down the beach for this piece of junk,” Bhodi pants, flopping down on the sand beside me with Betsy next to him.
“Thanks, mate.”
“What happened?”
“Not a clue,” I say, unwilling to share my crazy thoughts right now. I need to figure this out for myself before Bhodi starts weighing in with his special brand of scepticism.
“Cove!” Malia cries, racing from the ocean with her board in tow. “Are you okay?”
“Yeah, I’m fine. Just embarrassed.”
She frowns and pouts. “What have you got to be embarrassed about? That was an epic ride. You did so well.”
“Thanks, Mai-Tai.”
“Do you want to go back out there?”
I shake my head. “Nah. I’m starving,” I lie. “I’m going to eat whatever snacks Bhodi’s left for us.”
“Fuck you, man. I didn’t touch a damn thing.”
I chuckle at Bhodi’s retort, feeling a sense of relief that the tension has dissipated.
“Sure thing, buddy.”
As we grab our boards and start walking back to where Bhodi was sitting, I can’t help but feel like I’m being watched. I turn around, scanning the beach, but I don’t see anything out of the ordinary.
“Cove? You coming?” Malia calls out to me.
“Yeah, just a sec,” I reply, still looking around.
And that’s when I see her again. The woman from my dreams. She’s standing on the top of a nearby cliff, watching us intently. Her hair is whipping violently in the wind, and her eyes are fixed on me.
The hairs on my neck stand on end.Who is she and what does she want with me?
“Yo, Cove! Come on, man!” Bhodi’s yell snaps me out of my trance, and I tear my gaze away from her and rush to catch up with my friends. When I look back over my shoulder, she’s gone.
I don’t know what went down in the water. Cove is way too shaken for it to be a simple case of wiping out, no matter how hard he hit the water. He was under too long. And I know for a fact that he had his leash on, so how could it have come loose and his board have ended up right along the shore?
Just before he caught that wave, I had the strangest feeling of being watched – and I don’t mean by Cove or Bhodi. The air seemed to crackle with magic, almost like the rogue wave which came out of nowhere was conjured just to catch Cove unaware. But no matter the guys telling me magic is real, that sounds crazy even to my own ears.
We sit together on the sand, drying off and finishing the little picnic Cove put together for us. Cove and I share water from a reusable bottle while Bhodi drinks from the bottled stuff they all seem to prefer. It’s been a few days now since Cove stopped drinking it, I should ask him how he’s feeling, if he’s noticed any changes. But it’s not a conversation I want to have in front of Bhodi. Clearly, he thinks we’re stupid because he’s still drinking it without complaint. I keep wondering if I’m being silly about the water, but then I recall what the professor said to me in the police station: You thought it was the other water. The one that makes you forget.
God, I really hope he returns soon. I need answers.
And now I feel like a dick for thinking that when he took off to defend his actions. Hekilledsomeone for me. We’ve not heard from him since. I’ve no idea what the punishment for murder is where he’s from, and I’m here getting impatient about wanting answers over a bottle of water. I’m fucking selfish.
As I sit there on the sand, lost in thought, a hand rests on my shoulder. Cove, his face still pale from the incident in the water, sits down beside me, his eyes searching mine for something.
