Page 52 of These Reckless Hearts

In the chaos, I can’t find Wyatt or Lucas—and now Stone. Hell, I can barely breathe. The water forces the tent flat against me like cellophane, pinning me in place. I shove it away just to breathe, but without warning, a wave takes me under.

Objects in the tent are thrown against me: camping gear, clothes, limbs. I don’t know what’s what. I reach out blindly, searching for air because that’s all I’m begging for.

My lungs start to ache, and the impulse to take a breath overtakes everything until I drag water in and choke.

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The burning intensifies. I scream internally, choking and spluttering on the roaring fire ripping through my chest and throat. I can’t take much more. I push off anything I can, but I don’t know which way is up. The sides of the tent stick to me like vacuumed plastic. I shove against the material, trying to feel my way through tosomething.

The rapids change course, and a swift current leads me away from the hard surface. Finally, the force of the water propels me upward, and I emerge on the surface, immediately breathing in welcome gasps of air. Another head pops up next to me as I’m thrown about, and Wyatt’s frantic eyes meet mine. “We’ve got to get the fuck out of this tent!” Its soggy weight is like a second-skin on our backs, but it billows out in front of us. The air mattresses must have popped but other gear is riding the white water just like us.

Somewhere in here, Lucas and Stone must still be underwater.

I spit murky liquid away from my mouth, and hiss when my leg snags on something that tears my skin. “Where’s the zipper?”

A hand wraps around my knee, and I plunge my arm under to haul whoever it is upward. Lucas breaks the surface, gulping in air. His eyes are bloodshot and wide. He coughs, choking on the rushing water that threatens to swallow us again.

“Where’s Stone?” I cry. He was holding me when this started. I met his eyes right before we upended.

“We’ve got to get out of here,” Wyatt reiterates. He brings out a knife and flicks it open. Taking the tent into his fist, he drags the blade through the thick material.

Water pushes us faster and faster, hurtling us down the mountain. We freefall for a few seconds, our screams filling the tent until we come to a jarring stop and have to swim our way against the current to resurface.

“Fuck! I lost my knife!”

Stone’s head bobs into view.

My heart pinches, and I screech at seeing his limp body. Lucas and I flip him over, but he’s not breathing. “Wyatt! Please!”

Wyatt frantically searches the side of the tent. He disappears for a few moments as branches start to tear holes into the canvas, and the water turns murky with dirt and rocks. Lucas and I hold onto Stone like we can do something for him, but all we can do is hold him above the rapids so he doesn’t get lost again. Breathing raggedly himself, Lucas forces Stone’s mouth open with his finger and pounds on his friend’s chest.

Wyatt finally appears again, breaking through the crest with a huge breath. “Got it!”

All of a sudden, a massive rush of water sweeps through as if a drain has opened. I get sucked under, hauled over rocks and tangles of branches as I fight for air once more.

I lose them, all of them. The physical pain is nothing compared to the feeling of loneliness closing around me.

My body twists and turns from the rushing water taking me this way and that. My limbs ache and burn from fighting against the force of the current. Out of sheer luck, I emerge again and drag in a breath of much needed oxygen.

The tent rushes past me, and I scramble toward the creek bed I spot to my left. My fingers sink into the muddy bank and drag as I try to gain purchase. The current is too fast to stand up in even though the water isn’t deep. Branches and other natural objects tear at my clothes. Something sharp sticks into me, and I cry out.

Finally, my fingertips wrap around a bush lining the bank, and I force my hands together. I hold on with all my might as the rush batters me on all sides. The usually tame creek that runs through the mountains has somehow turned into a massive whitewater river complete with rapids and current and crests of white. I use everything I have left to put one fist over the other, tugging myself higher and higher until I’m able to throw one leg out of the creek and scramble onto the dry, rocky mountain floor. Dragging in breaths that feel like a hundred pointy objects stabbing me all at once, I attempt to get my bearings. My clothes are torn and soaked through; my usually wild hair is a mess of tangles and mud.

I pull myself to my knees. “Stone!”

Once my vision clears, my mouth drops. I’ve never seen anything like the sight before me. It’s literally as if I was discarded into a raging river. The rain we had couldn’t have done this. I don’t think. But it’s the only explanation I can come up with as my brain tries to make sense out of what’s happened.

It doesn’t matter anyway. What matters is that I don’t know where they are.

“Wyatt!”

My cries become desperate, ending on sobs that rip my heart open. Stone was underwater for a very long time. He wasn’t breathing....

“Lucas! Please!”

Trees, bushes, and rocks get swept downriver, thrown against boulders and over drop-offs that end in waterfall-like turmoil before moving on again. I can only imagine the hard surface we were thrown against was one of those huge, gray rocks that can weigh up to a ton. I start to shiver as I search for the tent. I don’t know if they’re still inside it or if they got sucked out like me.

“Ninja! Pete!”

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