Falling For Him ✔️

Chapter XIV. WELL, SHIT

Water rushed over Axel as he was flung into the river, his clothes, alongside the phone that he had had in his pocket, into the water with him. He'd worry about that later, after they got back into the canoe.

Despite the humid, hot weather, the water felt so cold against his skin it almost stung, yet it was refreshingly nice compared to the blistering heat of the sun beating down on them.

He came up from beneath the water gasping for air, eyes wide and searching for Will and their canoe.

A few feet away from him was Will, treading the water.

"Shit," Axel breathed out, swimming towards their canoe.

Luckily, they were in more calm water now, yet flipping their canoe over without life jackets... that'd be nearly impossible, especially with someone who'd never had to deal with a flipped canoe before-let alone someone who had never actually been canoeing.

Axel reached the canoe and rested his hand along it, putting barely any of his weight on the silver canoe. With his other hand, he motioned for Will to swim towards him.

"We should sue them for this," Will muttered as he reached the canoe, water dripping from his ink black hair. His soaked shirt clung to his skin.

Axel quickly looked away. Now is not the fucking time to ogle, he told himself.

"Just help me flip it, Will," he said.

"Because I know how to do that," he deadpanned, rolling his eyes.

Just as Axel was about to respond, his eyes went wide and he cursed. "The paddles," he said. "Where the fuck are the paddles?"

They both whipped their heads around to search for the oars that they had been clinging onto moments before their canoe had tipped. They were nowhere nearby and Axel wanted to scream.

"Well, I found one," Will muttered, pointing at a single oar floating down the river.

It was too far away to risk swimming towards it without a life jacket. Axel would probably pass out from swimming back towards the canoe with the paddle in his hands, especially since his arms were already so weak from the hours of canoeing that they'd already done.

He was probably dehydrated as well.

"Shit," he muttered for what felt like the millionth time that day.

A moment of silence passed as the reality of their situation sank in.

Their canoe had flipped and it was probably going to be impossible to flip it back over without getting water back into it due to the lack of basic protection their coaches had failed to give them, the basic protection being life jackets. They'd lost both of their oars, so even if they did get back into the canoe, it'd be nearly impossible to actually canoe down the river. They still had another bridge to pass before they would reach the mark as well.

That was probably at least a mile or two away.

And, Axel realized with horror, both of their phones had been soaked. His was as good as dead.

He just hoped that Will's rich self had a water proof phone so that they could call for help.

"How do we flip it?" Will asked after a moment.

"You're supposed to go under the canoe and then we push it up to release the water. Then we flip it after." Axel glanced at Will. "Without life jackets," he said, frowning, "it'll be pretty hard."

"Should we just push it to the land?"

He shook his head. "I'd die of exhaustion before we even made it there."