Unexpected Bliss

6| Crashing Night Waves

10:06 PM.
I stand on the beach looking out at the moonlight dancing across the night waves and fully immerse myself in the sound of them crashing on the shore. I close my eyes and clutch my board to my shivering body, with only a bikini on and my hair blowing away from my face, leaving my skin chilled and bare.

What am I doing here.

I'm about to turn around and leave but when I spin around it's into a pair of arms.
"You came." I slowly look up to see a shirtless Nate, hair sprewn all over over and blowing in the wind with a huge grin on his face, his eyes glowing in the moonlight.

"I just was around." I say backing out of his embrace.

He smirks. "Oh I'm sure you were golden girl."
He winks and then picks up my board and his and runs down to the beach, throwing them in the water.

"What are you doing?" I say from my same spot, having not moved.

"Come on the water feels great" he says with a hopeful smile on his face. "I'll break your board if you don't."

Ok, he crossed the line.

I run in as fast as I can and dive into the water. When I pop up, Nate is already paddling further out. "What are you just gonna let me catch all the waves then?" He says as he quickly paddles out further. I roll my eyes and follow him, easily picking up the pace and catching up to where he is. Once I make my way over to him he turns around and hops on a wave.
"You wanna know how I won that competition? With this." He slides on the edge and ends up doing a double flip with a turned twist through and up and over the wave. He rides it pretty far out, then paddles back to me. "Now you try it." I widen my eyes at him.

"You won't bump me off this time?"

"No promises" he says with a wink. I catch another wave and mimic his exact moves almost perfectly, but I add in a little more air to mine and a little more glide. I then paddle back to him and sit up on my board, untangling my hair.

"How was that?" I ask with an amused face.

"Eh, I've seen better." He says as he hops back on another wave. This boy. I turn around and start playing with my leash again. It was still bugging me and I didn't know what to do about it.

"Did you see that!?" Nate says from behind me. I turn around to face him, and look him up and down.

"Eh, I've seen better too, so I figured, why watch?" I say as I hop on another wave myself. As I'm doing some of my best turns and flips and tricks I stop thinking about what I'm doing and close my eyes, and think about how good of a comeback that was. I totally got him.

BOOM

My thoughts come to a complete halt as my body collides with the sharp reef underneath me. The whole lower part of my right leg is scratched and bleeding like crazy. I open my eyes underwater and I watch my own blood disperse and slide around through the waves. I feel the saltwater edge it's way into my cuts and sting every part of me...

I'm drifting and unable to get back onto my board when a pair of strong arms pulls me up gently, but with speed onto my board and I'm pulled at the speed of light through the water. I try to bring myself to paddle and sit back up, but every move I make only makes things worse. I cry out as saltwater makes its way more and more into my cut, each wave stinging the life out of me. I'm lifted off of the board and gently put down on the sand. I watch Nate as he quickly runs over somewhere I can't see because of the darkness and I start to get nervous. What if he's just going to leave me here...

I try again to bring myself up to a sitting position but land on my back again clumsily.

"Here." Nate says gently lifting me up and sliding a blanket under me and then a towel over my shoulders and back. I smile in thanks to him but then have to steady myself, almost falling over. He places a strong hand against my back and then sits slightly behind me but still next to me, keeping me from falling over.