Page 34 of Between Here and the Horizon
“All right, Linneman. Let’s get her in the water.” The two men picked up the boat via the plastic strapping on the side of the vessel, and then hurried it down to the water. “Lift!” Sully yelled. “Walk her out past the break!”
That made sense. The waves were still high, still rough. If they tried to drive the boat out, they were going to be smashed back time and time again. With the boat hoisted above the water, resting on Sully and Linneman’s shoulders, they lifted it every time a wave crashed against the shore, threatening to push them back inland. Soon they were shoulder deep in water, out past the break, and they lowered the boat into the water. Sully vaulted into the boat, holding out his hand to help Linneman in after him.
“Be careful!” Linneman’s wife shouted. And then, under her breath, “Lord, please be careful. I don’t think I can watch.”
Sully levered the boat’s small engine down into the water and cranked it; I couldn’t decide whether the fact that it started immediately was reassuring, or if it would have been better for the thing to have failed and left them sitting there on top of the water.
Sully was a machine. Efficient. Fearless. Determined. He didn’t look back at the shore once. They tore off away from land, the boat bouncing along the water like a skipping stone every time it hit a patch of rough water. Mrs. Linneman started crying.
I ran back to the car as quickly as I could—the children were both still passed out, thank god. I grabbed Connor’s old binoculars and then raced back to the shore, frantically scanning through the lenses to find Sully and Linneman, but all I could see was roiling, angry, gray sea, and roiling, angry, gray sky, and my heart wouldn’t stop hammering in my chest.
Ten minutes passed. Fifteen. Twenty.
No sign of the boat. No sign of anyone in the water. Michael and his friend were helping Ambulance Guy, who had finally woken up and was swabbing the cuts on his face from a medical bag at his feet. Nausea twisting through me like a snake, I headed down the pier again, counting the steps, trying not to panic.
“How deep is the water?” I demanded. “They’re not that far out. Why haven’t any of the men been able to swim back to shore yet?”
Michael opened his mouth and then closed it again, apparently frustrated. “It’s not that simple, Ophelia.”
“The water’s very deep,” the guy cleaning his cuts said. “The whole island was volcanic. The land falls away straight down underneath the water. Cliffs, dropping for hundreds of feet. And how far can you swim, Miss?”
“I don’t know. Over six hundred feet, that’s for sure.”
“In open water? In a storm? In the freezing cold? And in the dark? I don’t think so.”
That shut me up pretty quickly. He was right. Maybe in a swimming pool I could swim for six hundred feet. Further. But with conditions the way they were out there…
“If the men went into the water, they probably would have tried to swim into shore, but they never would have made it. The water’s too rough, but more importantly it’s freezing cold. You can only survive a matter of minutes in water like that.” Whoever this guy was, his attitude stank. He barely looked at me as he spoke, dabbing a cotton pad angrily against his lip. He was around my age, late twenties, and his Boston accent told me he wasn’t a local.
Michael put a hand on my arm, warning me with his eyes—probably not a good idea for you to be here right now.If circumstances were different, I’d give this guy as good as he got, but I was exhausted. And looking for Sully and Linneman was far more pressing a task. I slipped by the men and walked all the way down to the end of the pier, holding each breath for five steps, holding each breath for as long as I could, as if that might somehow help.
I peered through the binoculars, scanning the sea, and I waited. The gray and white and black stretched on forever. Eventually, I saw something moving through the water. A boat? No, a rock. No, definitely…it was the boat. Tearing inland, I couldn’t track it well enough at first to see how many men were on board. And then I could make out the shape of one man. Just one. The boat was too far out to tell who it was: Linneman, Sully, or someone else entirely. I took off at a sprint, crashing down the pier, past Michael and the other two guys, back down onto the beach.
The boat was coming in fast. It slowed as it approached the shore and the break, but it was still traveling at a rate of knots. Cutting through the white caps and the rollers, it almost rocketed straight out of the water when it hit land. Linneman was first over the side of the boat.
“Quickly. Get them out,” he yelled.
Hands everywhere. Bodies, pushing and shoving. Ice cold water spilling over into my shoes, feet instantly tingling with pain. Water up to my knees, and then up to my waist.
“Ophelia, get back. We can handle it. We’ve got them.Please!” Michael, shoving me back to the shore. I stumbled, fell down in the wash. Hands helping me up, and then bodies being lifted over the side of the boat.
Cold.
So cold.
Soaked.
Lifeless.
“Does anyone know CPR?” Linneman was shouting. “Someone, start checking for pulses.”
Then Sully.
He was drenched, hair plastered to his head, breathing hard, his thin white t-shirt stuck to his check, rucked up at the back, exposing two long, bloody scrapes, and a patch of angry red skin. He jumped over the side of the boat, and then somehow managed to lift another man out behind him, throwing him over his shoulder like a sack of wet cement. The moment he saw me, he started to run through the water in my direction.
“Don’t just stand there, Lang. Come on. Rally.” Grabbing me by the arm with his free hand, he started dragging me out of the water after him. I tripped and stumbled, barely kept up, but then I was on my knees in the sand, ears full of water, and Sully was taking my hands and placing them on the lifeless man he’d laid out in front of me.
“Like this,” he said. “Link your hands together and compress. Up and down, up and down. Don’t stop until I get back.”
