Page 22 of Loathing Ryan
Bells was paddling the best she could, but I knew she was getting tired. I could see how her arms weren’t digging into the motion as vigorously as before. I worked harder, trying to pick up her slack.
The rain was unrelenting. It kept coming down in large sheets, blurring my visibility. The river waters were getting higher and higher, and the rapids becoming more aggressive. Up ahead, I noticed we were coming up to the split-off. Which one was it? Was I supposed to go right or left?
Shit. I should have paid attention to that counselor. True, I had kayaked on this river every year since sixth grade. But with the given circumstances, my long-term memory was shot. I was focused on paddling right now.
I made an educated guess and steered our kayak over to the right river fork. Izabel followed my lead and still made a valiant effort to help me paddle. Thunder and lightning cracked across the sky, and we both flinched. The clouds were a dark gray, making it even more difficult to see.
We paddled and paddled.This was the wrong way, I thought with a sinking feeling. I took us the wrong way. Who knew where we would end up now. I looked up to Bells, whose hair was a mess and soaked to the bone.
The kayak lurched as it got stuck on something underwater, probably a tree. Izabel screamed as the little boat tipped over to the side, dumping us into the water and the heavy current. I was immediately shocked by the cold water. I kicked and scrambled to the surface, gasping for air. The water was moving too quickly as I struggled to swim to the river’s banks, where I could pull myself out. I landed on the solid ground and coughed as I fell back onto the sand, breathing heavily.
“Ryan!” I sat up straight as I heard my name being called. I looked on either side of me. Where was Izabel?
Hopping up, I rushed over to the edge of the bank I was standing on, my eyes straining through the rain to find her. There. I saw the bright orange corner of her life jacket just barely sticking out above the currents. She was stuck in the middle of the river, holding on to a branch for dear life, the water raging around her.
Shit. She said she wasn’t a good swimmer.
The thought came and went, and before I really knew what was happening, I was running farther up the bank to jump into the river and work my way down to her. I dove in, the cold water sliding over me. When I surfaced, she was only a few feet away. I swam as hard as I could to get to her, fighting against the current threatening to drag me in the other direction.
“Bells, put your arms around my neck,” I instructed her when I reached the branch she was clutching.
“I can’t.” She was crying, scared out of her mind. “I’m too heavy. I’ll sink you.”
“You won’t,” I assured her. “Bells, just trust me, please. We have to get out of this water.”
She whimpered, but finally, let go of her branch and wrapped her arms around me. I gripped her waist to situate her how I needed her. A small part of my brain noticed how she felt pressed against me.Not the time, Ryan. I took a deep breath, refocusing on my task, and started swimming as best as possible, my arms working overtime, carrying the two of us to safety.
Izabel pressed her face into the side of my head. She was gasping, trying not to get water in her lungs. I held my breath, swearing I wouldn’t breathe until we hit the bank.
After what seemed like hours, I felt the land beneath my toes. We were still in the water, but I allowed myself to breathe, knowing I was close. I kept going, holding Izabel tightly to me. She had a death grip on my shoulders, her nails digging into my skin. I wouldn’t be surprised if she drew blood.
I flopped down onto the bank for the second time, catching my breath. As I sat there with Izabel in my lap, both of us tried to steady our heart rates. The river raged behind us. I knew that it still wasn’t safe here.
My eyes traveled up the bluff that was in front of us. We could get up there. I didn’t know how high the river would rise with all of this rain, so we had to get up somehow. Then I saw a makeshift path. There were a few trees that we could grab onto that would easily hold our weight.
I stood up, putting Izabel on her feet. She was shivering, cold, and wet. I placed my hands on either side of her face, forcing her to look at me. The wind and the rain were loud around us, but her blue eyes finally met mine.
“Hey, hey, hey, I’ve got you. You’re going to be okay. We’re going to be okay,” I told her, trying to be as sincere as I possibly could. Her wide blue eyes tracked mine as she held on to each word I said.
“We have to get up that bluff.” I nodded behind me. “I don’t know how much the river will rise, so we need to get up somewhere high.” She nodded.
I grabbed her hand and dragged her to where I saw a possible pathway. “Bells, I’m going to have you go first.” I turned around and met her eyes again. “I’ll be behind you. I need you to trust that I will not let anything happen to you.”
She was still shaking. The poor girl must have been in shock. But she nodded again, went ahead to where I directed her, and started climbing. I stood below her and watched, ensuring her hands grabbed onto sturdy things, not anything that would cause her to fall. Once I felt sure she had a handle on it, I started climbing behind her.
Izabel had reached the top, quickly scrambling to more solid ground. The ground was slick, and the dirt soon turned to mud right before my eyes. My hands worked to find a firm grip, and I struggled up to the top. I was almost there. I strategically placed my foot on a sturdy-looking rock and pressed my weight into it.
As luck would have it, the minute I put my weight on it, I felt the rock give way underneath me. I shouted as it tumbled down the bluff, leaving me holding on for dear life to the branch I had a grip on. I slipped down the hill a bit, getting muddy on my way down. I felt something sharp dig into my side, tearing the skin as I dropped.
“Shit!” I hollered as I felt it tear into my flesh. “Fuck.”
My hands and arms were burning as I tried my hardest to hold on. The branch was slippery enough as it was from the mossy bark growing on it, but the rain made it more challenging. I grunted out in frustration. Using all of my upper body strength, I pulled myself upward.
Izabel’s face appeared over the side of the bluff. Her hair was stuck to her forehead, making her eyes a startling blue that I could see clearly despite the darkness from the storm. “Ryan, are you okay?” she called to me, looking worried. She extended a hand. “Let me help you!”
As I did another pull-up, I groaned again, grabbing onto the next available support. My feet scraped against the side of the bluff, trying to find a firm footing. “No, I’ll pull you back down,” I told her in a strained voice. “I’m too heavy.”
“What can I do?” she pleaded with me.
