Alone At Sea-A Suite Life On Deck Fanfiction

Part Four- Secrets

Cody rushed away from Mrs. Tutwiler' cabin. His vision blurred through the tears forming in his eyes. He cursed himself for tearing up again. His breathing became labored as he pushed through people on the deck and ran through a door and down the stairs. He exited on a random floor and hurried down two corridors of cabins before he felt a wave of dizziness hit him like a hammer. He leaned against the wall, breathing fast. He swallowed, trying to ignore the sick feeling in his stomach. Why was this happening to him?! Cody slid down the wall slowly, leaning his head back and trying to breathe. His whole body was trembling, vibrating by almost, with a fear stemming from some unknown source. His brain was going places he hated-dark, scary places.

Not scary like when he and Zack would stay up late after their mother had left for a late show and watch horror movies.

Scary like wanting to hurt himself.

Scary like when you're in a pool and you try to see if you can touch the bottom of the deep end, and on your way to the surface, you run out of air. Your head feels like it's gonna explode, and your lungs burn. That moment when you feel like you're going to die. When you finally reach the surface and you can't get enough air into your body fast enough. You feel weak.

But that didn't make any sense. He wasn't in a pool, and he would never hurt himself...Would he? 'No! Don't be stupid! Of course not!' He told himself. Cody shook his head, blinking hard, trying to clear his head of the disastrous thoughts. He put his head down on his arms, the dizziness getting to him.
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Cody had no idea how long he'd been sitting there. His breathing had returned to normal, and the dizziness and nausea had ebbed away slowly. He was still shaking, his head was pounding, and he was exhausted, but other than that he was back to "normal". He still had his head down. Cody had a weird feeling in his stomach that he couldn't place. Like he was being watched? To be honest, he didn't care enough to check. That is, he didn't care, until someone announced their presence next to him. Then, his heart dropped and every fiber of his body screamed at him to run.

He was sitting in the hallway, head down, when someone cleared their throat. Cody jerked his head up to see Mr. Moseby standing next to him. "Please don't run." Was the first thing out of Mr. Moseby's mouth. How did he know Cody wanted to run? Was it that obvious? Cody's heart pounded out of his chest. "Don't get up. It's alright." Mr. Moseby said, slowly bending down and sitting down on the floor against the wall opposite Cody. The teen was completely on edge, and he pressed himself against the wall.

"You know, when I was your age, I never really liked the ocean very much." Mr. Moseby said. Cody frowned slightly. "I know. It's silly. I loved swimming, but the ocean always scared me. The sharks, the dark, the depth. I never told anybody. I thought they would make fun of me. I thought they'd laugh. So I hid it. My friends caught on eventually, though. They'd invite me to the beach and I'd tell them I was busy. Sometimes, I'd even get my mother to say no for me." The manager chuckled. Cody looked at him, confused. "One day, I agreed to go to the beach. All my friends ran towards the water, and I held back. I stayed by the towels. One of my friends, Jazmine, noticed, and she asked me why I didn't look like I was having any fun. I lied, naturally, telling her I was sick. She didn't buy it, you see, we were quite close. She knew me very well. Well, I gave in and told her I was scared. And you know what she did?" Mr. Moseby looked at Cody, who shook his head. Mr. Moseby smiled.

"She took my hand, helped me up, and led me down to the edge of the water. She held my hand as the water came up and touched our feet. When she saw that I was about to run, she squeezed my hand and told me it's not so bad. She took a step out further, and encouraged me to follow her. I was terrified. But she helped me. Eventually, we made it to where the water went up to my knees. And I was fine. The rest of our friends ran up. They were all excited to see me in the water with them. Jazmine told them why I'd never gone with them before, and the rest of them all high-fived me and smiled. They were glad I told them. And once I had, I could have fun with them again. And they never laughed at me. They never made fun of me for being afraid of the water. They never pushed me to do something I didn't want to, unless they were sure I'd be okay with it." Mr. Moseby crossed his legs.