Kook

by Chris Vick

  A moment of wondering. Is he still on it? Is he okay?

  Then he appeared, off the back of the wave as it got into deep water. He was forced a couple of feet into the air from the speed. The board landed with a smack. So did G. He got back on it and came paddling back out to us.

  We cheered and whooped and punched the air.

  After all that, he’d made it look easy. It was clockwork. Mechanical. Straightforward. As long as you did it right; didn’t do anything random.

  I’d already thought I could do it. Now I knew I could.

  Big G went and got one more, then came and joined us.

  I was up next, with Skip. Big G had already decided that. I think he wanted us all testing it – and being tested by it – before Jade got into it.

  “Man, I’m ready,” said Jade. “How about I go?”

  “No,” said Big G. Jade didn’t complain, but I reckoned she was being crafty. She could let us make all the mistakes, learn from what she saw, then swoop in when it was her turn and do it right.

  So now was my time. No more weighing it up, no more thinking. Just doing. I was as nervy as hell, and afraid, but really excited too. I knew I was going to do it. I had to know I was going to do it.

  I needed to ride one of the guns. Time to swap.

  I got off my board and into the water. I swapped leashes with G and climbed on to the gun. Skip was already on the other. He sat, glued to the board, arms folded, looking at the reef.

  “Skip,” said Big G. “Come on, mate. Your turn.”

  “I dunno, maybe I’ll watch Kook get one first.”

  “You said you’d go, instead of Rag,” said Big G.

  “I wouldn’t wait too long if I were you,” said Jade.

  “Um. Maybe I’m not ready yet. If Kook gets a wave, I’ll do it, how about that?” said Skip.

  “Well,” said Jade, “no one goes in alone and I don’t like all this sitting around anyway.”

  G just shrugged. “Why not?” he said. Skip and Jade swapped boards and leashes.

  So it was going to be me and Jade, with Skip and G sat on the edge watching in case of trouble. It made sense to me. With Jade with me in the line-up, and those guys keeping an eye on us, I’d feel as safe as I was going to.

  We paddled towards the reef. Compared to my new board or Old Faithful, it was like being on a boat. The thing had to be over seven and a half feet long, thin and pointed, but with plenty of volume. It didn’t sink under me at all. I’d paddled it before, even caught small waves with it, using it like a longboard, just to test it out, so I was used to the feel of it. This was a whole different scene, of course, but it still felt good. It felt like I could ride it. And that was half the battle. If it felt right, I could do it. I kept telling myself that.

  Jade paddled beside me, fast and steady. I stayed out back and on the shoulder, thinking I’d sit a few out, build up to it. But the first wave that came along was shaping nicely. It was big enough to break where I was. Jade was further in, she had to paddle out to get over it or get a pasting.

  I did a quick calculation. It looked like it would break before it hit me, but to the right, on the reef. I could get it just after it had started breaking, use the steepness and feathering white foam to push me along the wall.

  I was in the right spot, the perfect position.

  I turned, pointed, angled the board slightly, waiting as I paddled forward, expecting the pull of the wave as it caught up with me. I tensed, expecting it to get me. But I didn’t feel anything. Nothing. Where was it? For a second I thought maybe it had flattened out and was going to roll under me.

  There’s a moment, just before you get a big wave, when you feel you should be up the face already. Like it’s turned up late. For a second you’re confused. Then…

  Time slowed. Paused. I wasn’t going forward or backwards; I was still.

  Then. In that second. I was stone-cold certain I was going to get that wave. It was a concrete moment of knowing.

  It was happening. Now. All that stored-up energy was about to explode.

  Time sped up.

  I was rising, up the face of the wave. I paddled hard, to get ahead and get moving.

  A valley opened up in the water in front of me, a wrenching, yawning pit. The board was already angled, going right. I looked down the shoulder, hungry to get on it before the wave pitched too steep.

  I got to my feet. Slowly. A frozen, tightrope moment. Wobbling. Heart in mouth.

  Then.

  Whoosh.

  I was racing, the board chattering on the water, rushing, my legs fighting to keep it under control.

  I was standing on a board, riding down a mountain.

  I made a long, smooth, slow turn, pointing the board along the wall of water.

  The wave ahead suddenly curled up, towering, teetering. The top of it, way, way above me, frothing, boiling, opening into a giant jaw. Becoming a cave.

  Then it was over my head. A ceiling of water. A second. Barrelling. But I was going so fast, I shot out of the cave, screaming along the wave. So fast I got ahead of the breaking part of the wave and shot off the back. I flew along the surface, bouncing like a ball before the power beneath me washed away and I fell off the board.

  The whole thing had lasted a few seconds. A lifetime. I got back on and started paddling.

  I heard a trembling voice. “Holy shit, holy shit!”

  My voice.

  My skin was on fire. I was shaking. My shoulders were trembling. But deep inside, in my core, I was solid rock.

  G and Skip hooted and screamed, punching the air. As I paddled towards them, I looked to the reef, for Jade, wanting to know if she’d seen. She was right in the zone, by herself, looking out, waiting for a wave.

  “How was that, Kook? Tell us about it,” said G, grinning. It was almost a joke. He knew I couldn’t say. Not because I couldn’t find the words, but because I couldn’t really speak. You can’t when you’ve had that much adrenaline shot through you. He knew that.

  All that came out was, “Woah. Holy shit, holy shit. That was… holy shit, holy shit.”

  “You’re next, Skip,” said G. Skip stared at me, wide-eyed, like I was a real freak. Something to be afraid of.

  “I’ll um… I’ll go in a bit. You go again, Sam.”

  Again?

  I’d done it.

  I’d done it.

  It had got Dad. But not me. I’d done it. I could sit out the rest and watch the others, then pack up the memory and go home. Why chuck myself into another raging wall?

  But truth was, I wanted it again. Bad. I was already crashing from that insane, skin-screaming high and needed to get the same again.

  I looked at the reef, at Jade, paddling about, waiting for her first wave.

  The wind had dropped completely now; the waves were even cleaner. Seriously heavy, but manageable. The sun was coming out too, burning through the clouds. It was getting lighter. The mood of the place was good. The door was open. This place, which had seemed like a near impossible nightmare from the cliff, was becoming our playground. The storm had let us in. Given us its secrets. We needed to get it while we could. Shit, it wasn’t even cold. Not in the winter suits.

  I headed towards Jade. I watched her go for two waves, shouting “go, go, go!” at her. But they went under her. She knew waves; she had to be in the right place. Maybe she was too light, I thought, too little for the board. Something like that. Yeah, that had to be it. But then, I thought, it would make her faster, more likely to get it. It didn’t make sense. Whatever it was, sat where she was, she couldn’t catch one. She needed a more critical, later take-off, to be further inside. But if she got that wrong…

  She paddled around, hunting. She’d look set up for a wave and so nearly get it. But it would go under her, or was threatening to crash so she had to paddle over it. She wasn’t getting lucky. Or maybe these waves just didn’t behave like normal waves and somehow she was judging it wrong.

  As I got close, I saw her mouthing
, swearing. She slapped the water with frustration.

  I was near her now, almost near enough to talk, but another wave came steaming out the ocean same as before, and I was in the right spot and I had to turn and paddle and get the wave. If you get the gift of a perfectly set up wave, you take it. I’d learnt that much.

  It was the same as before. Better. I was mad high as I came off the wave, just as I had been with the first one, but more confident, more in control.

  I paddled back to the others, planning to either persuade Skip, or have another go myself.

  When I got there, me and G put the screws on Skip.

  “Do it, man,” I said. “Just do it. You can. You’re a way better surfer than me.”

  “S’up to you,” said Big G. “But this is like our only chance… and… did you hear that?” G cocked his head, listening in the stillness.

  “What?” we both said.

  G put a hand to his ear. “Shouting,” he said.

  “Hey… hey.” Rag was a long, long way off, but he was shouting loud enough for us to hear. Just. And waving his arms like a madman.

  We’d been so busy talking we hadn’t looked out.

  Bumps. Little lines. Slight rises in the ocean. Nothing more than that. But way off. Far off. Miles off.

  The only wave you see that far off is a really, really big one gliding over some reef or rise in the ocean floor.

  “Jesus,” I said. “Jade. I’ll go.” I started paddling. Fast.

  I wasn’t worried. There was plenty of time to get her out of there, or just further out to sea so the set went underneath us. Even so, the others started shouting and waving. I paddled as fast as my adrenaline-shot arms would take me.

  She was sat, up, alert. Had she seen it? Then she started paddling out.

  Great, she’s going over it, I thought, getting into the deep, away from the reef, before it shows itself. Before it breaks. But before she’d gone too far, she stopped and sat up. Looking. Waiting for it to appear again.

  I felt sick.

  She’d gone out to meet it. To get in the right spot to catch one when the set came through.

  “No way,” I said, to no one. “She’s nuts.”

  I couldn’t see the waves. They’d gone over whatever they’d found on the ocean floor and back into deep water. Hidden. But they were coming, gathering speed and size.

  There was still time.

  I reached her, only yards away now.

  “What you doing?” I said, sitting up on my board, right next to her. She didn’t look at me. She was focused on the horizon.

  “Surfing.”

  A gust of wind ripped across the water. From nowhere.

  Then we saw it. A long way off still, but closer, and rising out of the sea.

  Behind it, there were clouds, a whole gang of boiling, rolling grey clouds, moving steadily towards us, like that wave was the leader of some gang.

  “Set’s too big. Come on, follow me.” I turned the board, ready to paddle out of danger and back to the others. I thought she’d follow. She didn’t budge.

  Jade looked out. The wave was nearer now, rising properly. Her eyes jolted with shock as the wave began to form. She could see the steel truth of what was coming at us.

  We had seconds to decide. I’d spent weeks following Jade. Now she had to follow me. Had to.

  “It’s too big!” I said.

  “No, it isn’t.”

  “Jade, listen to me. You can get another one.”

  “I’m getting this one.”

  It was rising. Closer. Faster. She made her choice. Saw where it was, and knew where she needed to be. A final adjustment, making sure she was in the right spot. She got on the board and paddled away from me, right to the furthest edge of the reef where only the biggest wave would break. Getting ready.

  I paddled behind her and grabbed her leash. We were stuck there, her paddling, me stopping her. This wasn’t good. We needed to get out of there. Quick.

  “Let go,” she shouted, still paddling, but going nowhere. She turned her head, glaring at me. Her voice and eyes diamond hard. “Let. Go!”

  The others screamed.

  “Get out of there!”

  “Move. Now!”

  The wave was coming. It was different from the other waves that day. Bigger. Uglier. Lumbering and lurching. Not predictable. No real shape yet, just a lump, mutating in the wind. It reminded me of her drunk dad, staggering towards her, fist raised.

  A hard blast of wind blew across my face, stinging like a whip. Not just the wave coming now. The storm too.

  Jade sat up and turned her board. Great. She’d seen sense; she’d come with me. We had to go…

  I let go of the leash, she lay down, paddled towards me.

  “You don’t fucking own me,” she said, just like she’d said it at the rave. She sat up and pushed my arm, hard. I wobbled, making a grab for the board. But she’d unbalanced me. I fell off. I got straight back on. But she was away from me already. She took one last look at the wave, turned and paddled towards the island, getting speed, ready to catch the wave.

  It came up in front of me. Enormous, finding its shape now, finally showing itself. It was terrifying. It blocked out the sky.

  I couldn’t catch it. And I couldn’t catch Jade. The only way to go was over.

  Again I thought of chucking my board and diving, but it was so big, with so much face, I knew I’d never make it under the wave.

  So I went up it, vertical, climbing and climbing, ready to be thrown. Knowing it was too late. Knowing. But paddling like fuck anyway.

  I waited for it to throw me.

  Waited. I was going backwards. I was almost vertical.

  Almost.

  Then I was over. A miracle. Paddling in a fit, desperate to get forwards. It was sucking me backwards. I kept on. And on. The pull weakened.

  I’d made it over.

  But…

  Behind that wave, another one.

  This was a cartoon. A joke. A special effect. It couldn’t be real. It wasn’t even a wave. It was something else. Something no one sees and lives. Something that filled the sky, eating all the water in its way. A wall of ocean, with rivers of white, wind-blown froth running down it. And a wall, stretching out forever in both directions.

  The whole thing was driving at me, teetering. There was no hope of getting over it. None. It was standing up, gathering force, getting ready to kill me.

  I fell off the board, pushed it away, hard as I could, then took a huge gulp of air, and dived, deep.

  But not deep enough.

  It pulled me, right inside the heart of it. Paused for a second. I put my arms over my head, pulled my feet in, making myself into a ball.

  I was inside it, caught in it.

  Then it threw me at the surface, into the pit. Into an explosion of blue and white.

  MY ARMS AND LEGS were ripped away from my body. It turned me over and over, spinning and churning, pushing me down, crushing me. It was worse than any kicking, or beating. Unbelievable force was pounding me downwards, turning and twisting my helpless body.

  When I stopped spinning, I didn’t know up from down. It took me a second to realise I was being dragged.

  The board was right in the wave. The wave pulled at the board; the board pulled at me. Like a giant trying to pull my leg out of its socket.

  It had me and wasn’t letting go. It dragged me, fast, for long, long moments. There was no fighting, no way of dealing with it.

  It went on. And on. I was waiting to hit rock. Expecting it but not able to do anything about it. My lungs were getting tight.

  I held on.

  Desperate to breathe. Getting more desperate.

  The second I felt the wave weaken, I started swimming. Up.

  I broke the surface and sucked air.

  I looked around, frantic.

  Where was Jade? Had she got the same beating? Or had she got the wave?

  The sea had changed. Just in the time I’d been under. A sharp w
ind blew thick rain across the surface. The sea was now rolling and lurching, sick from the punch of the wave.

  “Jade!” I shouted. I spun around, looking for her. For the others. For the island. Where the fuck were they? How far had I gone? Froth and sea spray blew hard, stinging my eyes, blinding me. I looked the other way, but all I could see was rain and heaving water.

  The whole sea was rising up; rollercoasting, making it impossible to get a grasp on where I was or what was happening.

  Something was floating near me. Something jagged and broken.

  The board. The wave had snapped it like a twig. Shit. There was about three feet of it left, still attached to the leash. To me.

  It was a lifeline. Under the surface it was air that kept me alive. Up here, it was the board. Or what was left of it.

  I swam over and got on it. There was enough left to float me. I looked around me, just to make sure there was nothing looming out the ocean, making sure I had a few seconds at least so I could get my bearings. But I couldn’t see.

  Had Jade got the wave or not? If she had, she’d be in the channel. If she’d wiped out, she’d be near the inner reef. Or would she be washed so far she was over both reefs, in deep water, and safe? I had no idea. But I reckoned the others were near, they’d have seen, they had her back. They’d have found her. Rescued her.

  Wouldn’t they? But then… They hadn’t found me. Not yet at least.

  I wanted to know where she was. Where the others were. Wanted to get there. But I couldn’t see anything, not with the foam, not with the wind blowing water in my face. I didn’t know anything.

  The sea and the sky didn’t give any clues. The storm was confusing me, hiding everything.

  I felt swarming water against my legs. I watched a lump of foam streak by me. I was moving, fast, caught in a stream of water. It had to be a rip. Tonnes of water had smashed on the reef, now it had to go somewhere. Out to sea. That meant I was being washed quickly away from the reef, and from Jade too. The island had to be in the opposite direction to the way I was going. I tried to paddle the half board, tried to get out the rip. But the board wasn’t steady beneath me. I couldn’t paddle it. The rip ran away with me like a cork in a river.

  The rain and wind suddenly got more intense. I paddled in a frenzy, trying not to swallow the water being blown in my face. If I could get out the rip, make it to the channel, find the safe place…