Finding Abby

22

The next day I get up early and while the house is quiet and settling down from last night, I pull a jumper and shorts over my bathers. I send a quick message to Finn to tell him where I'm going before I tip-toe past Ben sleeping in the lounge and grab my bike from the back porch.

It only takes me about twenty-five minutes to ride down to the secret spot at Killarney Beach that Minda and I go to because it's less busy than Port Fairy. I don't even have to watch for traffic as my bike coasts down the road because there isn't any.

When I get there, the sky is a swathe of gentle blues and pinks in the sunrise. I dump my bike in the grass by the dirt road and stride up the sandy path to the top of the dunes. In front of me, the shimmering water stretches forever. Holding back my hair, which blows wildly around my face, I slip off my trainers and slide my feet down the sand onto the beach.

Sometimes this beach is full of stinking, rotting seaweed that makes my nose sting and Minda howl with disgust. But not today. Today it's a pristine, graceful arc of pale yellow backdropped by a row of regal pines.

There's no one around apart from a lone fisherman down the beach closer to town whose dog darts back and forth, barking excitedly between the dunes and the waves.

I pull off my jumper and shorts and pile them up, placing my shoes on top to make sure they don't blow away. I make sure my phone's safe inside my pocket.

The sand is cool between my toes and gets more biting as I head towards the water. This is the moment where I've learned not to hesitate. Once the waves tease at my ankles sending chilly fingers up my calves, I force myself to stride in further. My stomach clenches in anticipation. Ice blood shoots through me as I surge through the water, all my muscles working hard to pull me through until I hit the bigger waves at my waist. I have to gasp with the harsh cold.

All around me is a shimmering, shining ocean and above me is the clear, pastel sky.

I see my chance and dive under a heave of a wave that's heading my way and then I'm in. The muscles in my arm power through the water and I'm hitting the top of it as hard as I can, thrashing my feet with all my energy, getting myself in sync with the heaving and pulling of the water. I strike out and swim, blood warming up, beyond the waves to where the ocean is an expanse of miniature turrets and tufts.

I can only just reach the bottom with my toes.

I breathe in deep, and sink down, down, down to where the sand and the seaweed shifts and plays in the undercurrents.

I'm floating, hanging there, looking up through the glittering water to the sky. I'm weightless and still, washing forward and back with the soft pull of the undertow.

I think of my dad.

I think of his last words.

I'm drowning.

I close my eyes.

I think about Mum, under the bodies, terrified and holding on to the fragments of a life for such a long time.

I think about Finn and how much he fills my heart up and how much space he lets me have around my heart.

When I feel my lungs about to burst. I push up, up, up, and then I'm on the surface, breaking through back into the world. Gasping in long breaths, I push my hair from my face and bob along with the water, letting my tears mingle with the salty sea.

When I turn around ready to head back to the beach, I spot Finn jumping down the sandy path onto the beach, waving at me.

When I raise my hand to wave back, I see Finn through the tiny shower of droplets that fall from my arm.