by Kat T. Masen
Jesus, what a dick. It’s like Rob’s gone through a midlife crisis at the age of twenty-eight. He has a job at some posh real estate agency and has used his clients as a reason to purchase this unaffordable car. What does Zoey call it again? A penis extension. She doesn’t seem to comment, though, instead looking rather pleased when he drives past.
“Oh, you didn’t tell me Rob from your gym was coming. And in his new penis mobile.” She smiles instantly, posing comfortably with her hand resting on her hip.
“Would that have made you complain less?”
“That depends. What food did you pack for me?”
“You don’t want to know.”
She squats opening the cooler and rummaging through the ice. “Oh, c’mon, Drew!” She raises her arms in frustration. “It’s the beach for crying out loud. It’s beer-and-chips kinda eating.”
“How about cucumber juice and carrot sticks?”
“I’m not talking to you for the rest of the day. In fact, I think I’ll go help Rob unload his nice car.”
She throws her T-shirt onto our pile of stuff, skipping over to Rob like a teenage girl with a crush. Jesus Christ, her tits are bouncing like crazy, and again, it prompts every dick to look at her, including Rob, his eyes bulging like an over-excited cartoon character.
The both of them begin talking, followed by laughing, and with that all sorted, I pack my gear and get ready to hit the waves. The three of them, including Isaac, walk over and drop their stuff beside mine.
“We’re going for a swim. Back soon.” She winks, linking her arm into Rob’s as they turn toward the beach.
Isaac grabs his board, and I follow his lead, leaving our belongings as we walk over the hot sand.
The water is refreshing, cooling my heated skin as we swim out past the shallow water and families frolicking in the waves. The water begins to rock, and I get ready to ride the wave noticing Zoey in the corner of my eye, waving her arms with Rob smiling beside her. They seem to be having fun, so I ignore them, focusing on the strong current moving my body. The wave moves toward me, and I’m on a high riding my board until the wave dies off. Isaac’s only a short distance away, swimming toward me when the ocean calms. His fast strokes bring him closer, and I can see his face is panicked as he tries to communicate.
“Dude, Zoey looks like she’s in trouble.” He motions for me to look at the beach.
My eyes scan the body of water where I saw them last. Nothing. When Isaac points to the beach again, I only see legs peeking through a crowd. It could be anyone, but then Rob is jumping about and waving his arms frantically, and he becomes my primary focus. Abandoning my board, I swim as fast as I can until I’m at the shoreline. With barely any breath, I race over, shoving people out of the way. Zoey’s lying on the ground, unconscious. Her face ghost-white and lips a shade of dark gray.
“Where’s the lifeguard?” I yell, glancing around me in sheer panic.
A stranger respond’s instantly, “They aren’t on duty yet.”
“Then fucking call 911!”
I call her name, but she doesn’t respond. Studying medicine should help me at a time like this, yet terror-stricken nerves swamp my body causing the shakes. I need to clear my head so I can remember the basic steps. Come on, Drew, you fucking know this! This is basic everyday knowledge. Calm the fuck down and don’t let her die.
“She got caught in a riptide. I got scared, and I didn’t know what to do,” Rob stutters in a rush, pacing beside me with his hands frantically running through his hair.
Three, two, one.
Nothing.
“C’mon, Zo. I was lying about the carrot sticks. Wake up please,” I beg softly.
My heart is racing a million miles a minute. I’m thinking about how if anything happened to her, I wouldn’t know what to do with myself. Get your shit together. Follow the CPR steps again.
I place my lips onto hers, blowing into her mouth, desperately trying to resuscitate her, all the while praying she can hear my thoughts. Fucking wake up, Zo. I wouldn’t know what to do without you. I need you.
Everything I’ve ever complained about, I want back—her annoying quirks like singing Madonna off-key in the shower, dropping crumbs on the sofa, her loud snoring, her hair pins scattered all over the apartment, and the way she lies in my bed talking to me for hours about her day or some random television show she landed on while channel surfing. Oh, and her obsession with fictional characters.
I want it all back, every bit of her back.
I can’t fucking lose her!
Pressing my lips against hers once again, I beg the Lord above to bring her back to me. They feel warm, full of blood. They’re soft, they have life. I pull away slowly and see the green orbs staring back at me. The second they do, my heart falls back into place.
“Drew,” she mouths, barely above a whisper.
“I’m here, Zo.”
I know she can see me. She’s spoken my name.
Her eyes dart back and forth, the panic building when she realizes everyone’s watching her. A second later, I abruptly turn her over to her side, the fluid projecting from her mouth.
Chapter Three
Zoey
His voice is all around me.
Begging me to look at him.
Praying for me to come alive.
Telling me he can’t live without me.
And I try to reach out to him, but he’s not anywhere within reach.
Then it happens.
A warm feeling graces my lips.
And it feels nice.
Really nice.
I don’t want it to stop. It comforts and fills me with peace and serenity racing through my veins and warming my flaky, cold skin. I want to savor this moment. Stay like this forever where everything feels just right, almost perfect.
Then out of nowhere, the sensation stops. The bitter cold harshly knocks me back and forth followed by the terrifying feeling of the unknown.
My eyes open wide, and there he is—Drew.
I call his name, and he smiles back at me.
He’s right by my side. He is real. I’m not dreaming this. I’m alive.
This euphoria, this short-lived relief, disappears. With my chest heaving and my breaths short and quick, my lungs cave in a panic, and there’s a rush to move me. I don’t know what’s happening. The voices are muffled. My chest is regurgitating some sort of fluid. I’m terrified. What’s happening to me? The fits of panic pump heavily through my weak limbs as I lie here, wherever I am.
“Drew… Drew…” I call his name, my voice raspy and strained. I reach out for his hand, and he holds onto it observing me with sorrowful eyes.
“I’m here, Zo. I won’t let go of you. I promise.”
People are surrounding me—strangers. Dressed in blue uniforms, a man and woman check my limbs and begin speaking to me. Several questions are asked, but I can only manage to answer a few as I’m lying here like I am in a freak show while the crowds watch in anticipation. Now I remember what happened. Rob was telling me a joke, and I was flirting and trying to show off, then all of a sudden, I lost control. The waves forced me under, and then my body was pulled beneath the surface with such a strong force.
The paramedics tell Drew I’m fine, but as a precaution, to take me to the hospital. Drew’s shoulders are slumped, and his face is full of worry. His eyes appear bloodshot. His normally tanned skinned looks pale and cold just like mine.
“I’m sorry,” I mouth over and over again.
The paramedics pack up their equipment as people start to disperse. As soon as they leave, Drew diverts his attention back onto me, scooping my body up in his arms and carrying me to the car with Rob and Isaac following closely behind. My head remains next to his chest, closing my eyes to control the tears that want to escape. He has a few words with the guys, then places me carefully in the car.
After a short drive, luckily we don’t have to wait long at the hospital. They run some tests and let me go, advising me that every
thing’s clear, but if I don’t feel well, to make sure I see my doctor immediately.
On the drive home, the weight of today exhausts me. I rest my head against the window and close my eyes again, not wanting to talk about what happened or how foolish I was to be so careless in the water. All because I was trying to impress Rob because my confidence’s shattered, and just once, I wanted to feel wanted by another man.
I doze off for most of the ride home opening my eyes when we’re parked in front of our apartment. Drew rushes to my door and opens it, reaching out his hand.
Offering a weak smile, I tell him, “I can walk.”
“It’s three flights of stairs.”
“I know. Remember? I’m the silly one who thought it would be a good idea to rent this apartment thinking the view was spectacular.”
“And how many times do you sit on the balcony?”
I manage to laugh, but it’s followed by a violent cough. Drew’s watching me, worried, and to rest his paranoia, I latch onto his arm for support. Okay, three flights of stairs could be compared to walking up Mount Everest. With no energy, I feel weak and ready to sleep again, unprepared for the physical toll today has taken on my body.
We enter the apartment, and immediately, I want to lay on the sofa and rest my eyes and body. Drew suggests I take a long shower to remove the sand off me.
In the shower, the hot water relaxes my tense muscles, and the struggle to keep my eyes open becomes too hard. There’s a knock on the door, and Drew asks me if I’m okay. I yell back and shut off the water, dry myself, then change into my tee and boxers. My hair’s soaking wet, so I run the hairdryer for a few minutes, still leaving it slightly damp.
As soon as I open the door fully dressed, Drew’s standing at the entrance blocking my way. With his arms folded, he presses his lips together, almost biting his tongue. He must have taken out his contacts. He’s wearing his glasses, his eyes narrowing underneath his lenses.
“You weren’t singing,” he thunders.
“I’m tired.”
“Well, if you were singing, then I wouldn’t have been panicking for the last fifteen minutes.” He motions with his hands in frustration. “I was this close to breaking the lock to see if you were okay.”
“I don’t lock the door, you goose. Besides, if you came in, you wouldn’t have seen anything you haven’t seen before.”
“That’s different,” he mumbles awkwardly, scratching his stubble and avoiding my gaze.
I shake my head at his awkward demeanor. “Oh yeah, shaving my vagina is totally different.”
“Can we not talk about that again? I made you some soup.”
“Sure, I’ll stop the vagina talk as long as there’s some pizza on the side.”
“Continue with the vagina talk.”
Crap. He called my bluff. I don’t care for vagina talk either.
I slowly make my way to the kitchen not wanting to admit I’m starving, and Drew’s soup smells like heaven. After devouring two bowls, heaven’s an understatement. Perhaps I have been eating way too much pizza.
“What’s in this again?” I ask with slight hesitation.
“I never told you. Some things are best left a mystery.”
Great, some healthy concoction that will probably give me the runs. Pizza doesn’t give you the runs unless, of course, you ordered from that dodgy wannabe Italian chef around the corner from the apartment.
We both sit silently at the table finishing our bowls without saying a word to each other. The kitchen’s small but large enough to fit a round table in the center with four chairs. The apartment was built sometime in the sixties and still has this retro feel to it. I love the charmed it oozes but Drew often complains it’s not modern enough. Since he enjoys cooking, he has every right to complain about the rundown stove with only two burners that work and the oven that can barely fit a roast. Again, this is the beauty of pizza. It gets delivered to your door with no cleanup necessary.
Drew stands up and collects the dishes, then walks over to the sink and runs the tap. The gentle fall of the water makes me yawn, and he’s quick to notice that my head has almost fallen onto the table.
“You look tired. Let’s get you to bed.”
I’m not about to argue. He walks me to my room, and as soon as I’m under the covers, the battle to keep my eyes open is too much.
“Stay with me… till I fall asleep,” I beg softly.
Drew lies beside me on the bed and rests with his arm propped up stroking my hair out of the way. It feels nice. It feels like home. When the exhaustion creeps in, I begin to sob. “I thought I was going to die.”
He pulls me into an embrace and kisses the top of my forehead, my heavy sobs buried into his chest. The emotional trauma of almost drowning has finally caught up with me. Although there are parts that remain hazy, the terror I felt when I lost control and got caught in the riptide start to invade my memory, leaving me shaking as my sobs echo throughout the room.
“I was terrified, Zo, but you pulled through. You’re here. That’s all that matters now.”
In between my cries, I softly murmur, “Thank you… for making me come alive again and for everything you do for me…” I pause and then yell out, “Pineapples.”
“Pineapples?”
“The pineapples… on my bikini. It’s good luck. Maybe that’s why I’m still here.”
My eyelids become too heavy, and sleep is imminent. With the warmth of Drew’s body beside me, I bury myself into his chest, never wanting to let go. His lips brush against my forehead, the sentiment not lost on me even in my exhausted state. Soon, I fall into a blissful and dreamless sleep.
When I wake up, it feels like I’ve been hit by a truck. It’s dark outside, and the moon is hiding behind the clouds, shadowing the walls in my room. It’s a struggle to move, and I barely manage to twist my body to see the time. It’s after eight.
Have I really slept that long?
What does it matter anyway? It’s not like I have anywhere to be.
My bed is empty, and for a split second, I imagine things. But soon after, the aches and pains seep throughout every muscle in my body and becoming difficult to ignore.
You nearly drowned. How could you forget that!
Tilting my heard toward my nightstand, I stare deeply at the gold pineapple ornament sitting beside by lamp. I have this thing—about luck—and pineapples are supposed to bring luck.
When I was nineteen, I took my first trip to New York City with a couple of girlfriends. We ate at a small restaurant in Chinatown that was oddly decorated with gold pineapple ornaments. Curious, I asked the lady serving us, “Why all the pineapples?” I remember her exact words, “Pineapples bring you wealth, luck, and fortune.”
With an aged face and gray hair, her wise words always stuck with me. That, and she looked like the female version of Mr. Miyagi, even sporting a slight beard.
When it came time to crack the fortune cookies, my cookie was not fortunate saying something about a storm ahead. I remember sinking into my chair jealous that all the girls got messages about love and happiness but then Mrs. Miyagi handed me one of the gold pineapples. She told me never to let it go and to keep it somewhere safe.
And I did—beside my bed.
I don’t know what saved me today, but the pineapple appeared more golden than before. I’ll keep this theory to myself since Drew doesn’t share the same beliefs as me.
The apartment is dead quiet. Nothing unusual for a Saturday night, since Drew works three weekends in a month. I stand, a little unsteadily, and make my way down the hall to the living room. There’s a faint light flickering against the walls. It’s the television which happens to be on.
The moment Drew lays eyes on me, he jumps to his feet, helping me onto the couch. “Hey, how you feeling?”
“I’m okay. Just a little sore,” I offer, not wanting to worry him further.
I grab the small pillow and place it on my lap, hugging it as we watch some thriller playing on the
television. Drew knows that movies involving possessed children freak me out and switches the channel to a more laid-back program.
We watch in silence until Drew disappears into the kitchen, returning with some painkillers and water. Standing over me, he extends his hand, and I reluctantly take the pills. I hate taking medication, especially when the pills are the size of a crater. Something about them terrifies me. It usually takes multiple tries to swallow even when I cut them in half. What idiot invents pills so big, anyway?
“C’mon, Zo, just swallow. Don’t overthink it.”
“Such a guy thing to say,” I deadpan, before throwing them to the back of my throat, following with a huge gulp of water. It fails on the first attempt, forcing me to drink more water and attempt round two.
“See, not so hard. Excellent gag reflex,” he compliments.
A trickle of water escapes the corner of my lips. I smack his arm, then wipe my chin.
“Don’t ever make jokes mid-swallow.”
“I’ll remember that for next time.”
“Uh huh, whatever. What time are you heading out?”
Drew smiles, looking pleased. “I’m not.”
“It’s Saturday night. You always go out—”
“Not tonight.”
I fall into silence staring at the television. Today’s events really took a toll on me. Apart from the physical state, my mental state’s confused. There’s no reason I should have survived. Everyone knows how rough the sea can get, and I was plain stupid. I’m not a religious person either. I never go to church since my parents dragged me at a young age. There’s no rhyme or reason for why I’ve been given a second chance.
But I sat here, breathing, all the while thinking that I couldn’t waste a single moment living this sheltered life because some guy cheated on me. It wasn’t just the cheating. It was everything he made me feel about myself—insecure and unwanted.
Before Jess, Zoey Richards ruled the world. I was this close to accomplishing everything I had worked so hard for. Women envied me, men wanted to be with me. The world was supposedly my oyster, yet I chose the rotten one. They teach you everything at college, everything but how to stay away from the bad oyster.