Andrew Klavan - If We Survive

But frankly, I didn’t think we were going to live long enough to die that way. Because just then we sank down into the first swirling whirlpool of white water. I clasped Nicki as securely as I could as I was spun full around sharply and then flung up to the surface. Gasping for breath, I looked downstream. I saw we had entered a smooth black, rapid flow that was pulling us inexorably toward another sucking drop of white foam from which two sharp rocks jabbed up into the air. The rocks were close together, no more than two feet apart—they stood like a sort of gateway. And I could see exactly what was going to happen when we hit them. First, we’d suffer the impact—the shock of the blow—then we’d be pulled quickly into that gap between them into the length of foaming, speeding waves beyond. After that, it was all a tumbling rush of white water. There’d be no stopping our progress until we went over the falls.

I had maybe five seconds before we hit—time enough for the full situation to flash through my mind. Five seconds— and then four…

And then I had an idea.

There was no time to think it through, no time even to wonder if it would really work. I just acted in the little time I had left. I shifted Nicki and clamped her tight against me with my right arm. With my left hand, I grabbed hold of my rifle. I stripped the strap up over my head as we rushed and spun through the black water toward the two rocks.

Already, the rocks were on us, a second away. I turned in the water, turned upstream with Nicki held in front of me so that my body would hit the rocks first, taking the worst of the impact for her. I stretched out my left hand, holding the rifle in front of us.

We hit the rock. It was a blow, all right. It caught me right in the soft spot on the side of my back. I made a noise like “ oof! ” and the breath was forced out of me. The shock stopped our progress for an instant—and in the next instant we were sucked into the little gap between the rocks—sucked down toward the last stretch of rapids.

The water turned us. I was helpless to stop it. It sucked Nicki through the gap first.

“Will!” she shrieked.

I went through right after her, still clasping her tight.

And still holding that rifle out in my left hand—holding it out to my side now, upstream, making sure it was the last thing to come through the rocks, making sure it was stretched out lengthwise across that narrow gap.

The rifle struck the rocks. And stuck—it was wedged across the small space, unable to pass through.

The AK-47 machine gun was close to three feet long— longer than the gap between the rocks was wide by nearly a foot. I think if we had hit any harder, it would have rattled through—the weapon might even have just shattered, just come apart in my hands. But that first impact of my body on the rocks had slowed us. The gun didn’t hit all that hard. It stayed together, and I had time to maneuver it so it was securely braced against the rocks on both ends. I held the rifle with one hand and kept my other arm wrapped around Nicki—and the rifle held us both in place.

It all happened so fast, it took me a moment before I realized— realized with amazement—that my idea had actually worked. We were held there, just above those final rapids, just above the falls.

Breathless, I looked around to get a sense of our situation.

The water continued to rush over us, to pull at us and sometimes drag us under, but we had stopped moving downstream. In fact, we were in a place where the rocks gave us some shelter from the pounding of the current. As long as I kept hold of the rifle—and Nicki—and as long as the rifle stayed wedged in the rocks, we would be safe.

At least that’s what I thought. Until I saw the crocodile.

It surfaced upstream where the white water began. As I gasped up out of the current, I caught the black flash of its head peeking out above the water. So much for it staying upstream. It was looking straight at us, coming right toward us. There was no question about what it was going to do.

It was an awful moment—awful. Even standing before the firing squad hadn’t felt as bad as this. The firing squad— that was just death, you know. A few seconds of fear, maybe an instant of pain and it would have been over. But to have this creature tear us apart, to have it devour us: to me, that was a nightmare of horror.

The croc took one look at us and disappeared again under the water. It was heading toward the rapid black flow that had just carried us into the rocks. Now the same flow would carry the crocodile to the place where we were trapped.

The beast was now gone from sight—but unfortunately, before it went under, Nicki caught a glimpse of it too.

I had seen her hysterical before. I had heard her crying and pleading as the firing squad forced us to the wall. But this was beyond that. She just went crazy now. She just started screaming. Like the girls in the horror movies, you know: just one deafening, high-pitched shriek after another—wordless shrieks and then my name. She’d get cut off as the river doused her and dragged her under and then she’d bob to the surface again, screaming and screaming.

“Will! Will! Will!”

I held tight to the rifle to stay in place, to stay above water. I swallowed hard. My spit tasted like copper. That was the taste of fear, I realized. I was sick with fear.

But I knew what I had to do.

Nicki was flailing in my arms, twisting and thrashing, trying to escape my grip, trying to get away from the invisible onrushing crocodile. But that was no good. If she’d broken out of my grip, she would have been swept immediately into the rapids and over the falls to her death. I had to use all my strength to hold on to her. But I did. And I forced her around me, forced her up to the rifle.

“Will! No! No!” she screamed as I pressed her up against the wedged rifle.

“Nicki!” I shouted—shouted as loud and forcefully as I could over the rushing noise of the water. I sank under. I pulled myself up. Gasped for air. “Grab hold of it! Grab hold of the gun! Grab hold!”

She wouldn’t stop shrieking. She wouldn’t stop flailing.

“Let go of me! Let go of me! It’s coming! Let go!”

“Take hold of the rifle! I’ll protect you!” I shouted.

Her scream became babbling words interrupted by gulps and gasps.

“You can’t… You can’t…”

“Grab hold, Nicki!”

Confused—terrified beyond rational thought—she did what I said. She put her hands on the rifle between the rocks. She gripped it.

And I, still holding the rifle myself, let go of her and ducked under the water.

It was hard to fight the current, but my grip on the rifle gave me a little leverage, and I only had to maneuver myself a few inches upstream. Then I splashed to the surface—and now I was in front of the rifle, held in place by it, while Nicki held on to it behind me.

“Will!” she sobbed. “Will!”

The water drove into my face. Gripping the rifle, I fought my way out of it. “Just hold on,” I gasped. “You’ll be all right.”

I wasn’t shouting anymore. I didn’t have the strength—I was too scared. I didn’t even know if she could hear me over the white water. I was staring in the direction I’d last seen the crocodile. I couldn’t see it now, but I knew it was still coming—I knew it was almost there, almost on top of me.

I just hoped it wouldn’t take both of us. I just hoped that one of us would be enough.

I wondered if I would see it before it struck or if it would hit below the surface and just cut me in half before I realized it was there. I wondered how long I would have to live with the agony of being eaten alive before I mercifully died.

Then I stopped wondering. Suspend the imagination, I thought. Don’t worry about anything. Pray about everything instead . It was the only way I could stay in place, the only way I could keep up my courage—what there was of it. Which wasn’t much.