Virginia Moffatt - The Wave

That’s until the cold begins to seep through my wetsuit as the waves begin to strengthen in intensity. Ploughing back to the breaker zone begins to be an effort. Pride won’t let me stop till she does, and I am grateful when, at last, she shouts this should be the last one. I ready myself for the coming wave, rising at its approach, and then … disaster. The surf is stronger than I anticipated, I turn too sharply and slip off the board, my foot tangling in the rope. Suddenly, I am dragged under the water, eyes stinging with the salt, a rush of blue, green and yellow, a deafening gurgle of sea pounding my ears. I try to force myself upwards, emerging to gasp a breath before another wave knocks me down again. My lungs begin to hurt with the pressure, my eyes to tingle, my head to pound, as I flail up and down through the foam. Fuck, this is what is like to drown. As I slide down again, it crosses my mind that I might as well let it happen now. If I survive this, I am only delaying the inevitable. Why bother fighting it for the sake of a few more hours? But even as I have the thought, something inside refuses to give in to it. I push myself up through the water, and suddenly there she is. Her arms are round me pulling me through the waves. It wasn’t quite the way I planned it, but I love this sensation, lying back safe, cradled, as she transports me to my board, pushes me up, and helps me get back to the shore.

Once out of the water, and after we have disentangled the rope, I am able to sit back and catch my breath. I rub my ankle, red from the pressure of the rope, and thank her. ‘Thought I was going to drown for a minute …’ I grin as the thought occurs to me, ‘Ironic, considering.’ She grins back. When we introduce ourselves and I explain her Facebook post brought me, her smile is even warmer; I melt. I can’t stop myself from giving her a dopy smile in return. Luckily she decides she needs to change, giving me the excuse to return to the surf hut and do the same. By the time we meet at her car to collect the rest of her gear, I have composed myself enough to ensure I don’t make an absolute tit of myself.

Half an hour later, we are sitting back at our tents, with a cup of tea and two large slices of Madeira cake. She has taken off her wetsuit, and is now dressed in shorts, a loose cotton shirt and a bikini top that is low cut enough to give a good view of her breasts. I look away quickly, hoping she hasn’t noticed me ogle them, though her arch smile suggests I haven’t been as discreet as I’d wished. I resolve to rein it in. I need to take this easy if I’m to have any success

‘So what now?’ I say as I finish the last gulp of tea.

‘Fancy a swim?’

‘Always wait at least half an hour in case of cramp.’

‘Says who?’

‘My mother,’ I say, laughing ‘Fuck knows if it’s true. It’s just what she always said. Which reminds me. ‘I suppose I’d better call her …’

‘… but you don’t know what to say?’

‘Nope. How about you?’

‘My parents died a long time ago.’

‘Sorry.’

‘Don’t be. Are you close to your mum?’

‘Not especially. She lives in Poland now. She’s a bit of a recluse.’ To be honest, I don’t know if she’ll even have seen the news. It’s been at least six weeks since we’ve spoken, so how can I ring her now and tell her I’m going to die tomorrow? I could add that our relationship, always a tricky one, had got worse after Karo’s death, but that’s way too intimate for someone I’ve just met. I take a different tack.

‘What do mums know anyway? Let’s risk cramp.’

The wind has died down, but the current is still strong. Without our wetsuits the water is gaspingly cold, though once we start moving around we soon warm up. We race each other across the bay, dive and tumble, splash and jump the waves as if we are ten years old. It is exhilarating till the exertion of the surfing catches up with us and we decide, simultaneously, to head back to our camp. We dry ourselves off before flopping onto the towels. Poppy starts spraying suntan lotion.

‘Do my back and shoulders, will you?’ she says sitting up. Her skin is soft to the touch; I rub the lotion quickly and pull on a shirt before she can return the favour. I dive back on the towel and pick up my book; the last thing I need now is an embarrassing arousal. Particularly when she is lying so close to me. I wish I could reach out and touch her, confident that she’d respond in kind but she has given no indication that such advances would be welcome and I don’t want to push my luck. I force myself to focus on the page.

Soon, my eyes are crossing and before long I am asleep. I am walking in a forest with Karo and Mum, who is a few yards ahead of us. Karo and I are getting tired, we ask Mum to slow down, but she quickens her pace. Mum, we cry, slow Down, Wait for us. She doesn’t seem to hear us, and so we raise our voices louder. She stops this time, turns round and looks at us . But Karo, Yan, you can’t follow me . You’re dead. Why didn’t you tell me you were going to die? I wake with a start. My eyes are full of tears, and to my embarrassment I have dribbled on the towel. I can hear voices above my head. I wipe my eyes and mouth discreetly and sit up. We have a visitor, a white woman in her sixties, who is sitting beside Poppy, talking quietly.

‘This is Margaret,’ says Poppy. ‘She was in her car, but she needed some fresh air. Margaret, meet Yan.’

‘I’m not sure if it’s sensible,’ Margaret’s voice is shaking, ‘I should be on the road, really, but the traffic …’ I exchange a glance with Poppy, not sure whether I should feel glad or sad to be proved right. Margaret takes a deep breath and carries on, ‘It was so hot and there were so many cars – I just had to get out …’

‘Looks like you need to rest for a bit,’ says Poppy. ‘Why not stop and have a drink, then check traffic in a while. If things are better, you can get going, but if not, you can stay as long as you like.’

I know it is churlish, Poppy is right to be so sympathetic and, after all, this is what she promised she would do. Still, I can’t help resenting this stranger interrupting our little idyll. I am not sure I want to share her with anyone.

‘This is so kind of you.’ Margaret accepts a proffered cup of tea.

‘Don’t mention it,’ says Poppy. ‘The more the merrier, wouldn’t you say Yan?’

‘Of course.’ I am forced into my very best polite smile. I even let her know she can use the surf club if she needs to recharge her phone. But, although I take the tea Poppy offers, and join them on the chairs, I don’t join in the conversation; I pretend to read my book instead. It’s not Margaret’s fault – she seems pleasant enough - it’s just that she’s shattered the intimacy Poppy and I have been building up. And now there are three of us, the atmosphere isn’t quite the same. .

I can see it is going to be a very long night.

I am in the middle of ironing when I hear the news. I’m still trying to work out what I think about the end of a play that I’ve just heard and at first I’m not really paying attention. It is only the mention of La Palma that makes me take notice. All at once, I am back in that horrible room sifting through paper after paper, trying to make rational decisions about which organisations to save and which to cut. Every decision was a bad one, but at the time some options were more palatable than others. La Palma was one of many such arguments. David tried to persuade us we needed the early warning unit because one day something bad would happen. He used the example of Cumbre Vieja to illustrate his point, providing graphic detail of how monitoring seismic activity could prepare us for its possible collapse enabling us to evacuate. His projections even identified Cornwall as a high risk area.But Andrew was equally persuasive the other way,arguing that we couldn’t afford the luxury of spending money worrying about things that might never come to pass. Now it seems that that David was right: the decision we made was the worst of all and I am caught in the middle of it. Shocked, I drop the iron on my favourite shirt. It sizzles, marking the material with a permanent burn as I pull it away. I curse and then it occurs to me that a ruined shirt might be the least of my worries.