Diana Peterfreund - Rites of Spring (Break)

Then don’t drug me next time! Don’t render young women unconscious! Don’t —I felt blood in my mouth from biting my lip. Just get through this.

The boat tipped and rocked hard as it hit the water, and I held my breath. Thank God I was unconscious for the trip over. How could I stand this? How could I do it? Water sloshed against the side of the boat and over the rim as Darren pulled himself inside. I was going to die. I was going to die. I was sitting inside a thimble, bound from head to foot.

“Untie me, please!” I cried, no longer able to keep the hysteria from my voice.

“Hold on,” he said, annoyed, then leaned across me to undo the bonds on my hands. I felt the boat tilt as the weight inside shifted, and he fell against me. I froze, so terrified that I barely noticed the sick sensation of his body on mine. Don’t tip, don’t tip… And then, sweet relief as the pressure on my wrists eased.

If I were James Bond or Jason Bourne or Sydney Bristow, I would have punched him while he was still off balance, then hit him upside the head with an oar. But I could barely feel my fingertips. I shook my hands as he sat down, trying to get sensation back into my limbs. And as he settled himself on the far bench, expression wary and watchful, I made a few grabs for the oars. A quick glance behind me showed the sandbar of the crescent beach, several hundred yards away, nothing more than a lighter gray stretch against black water that might as well be an endless chasm.

The first stroke was torture. Every muscle in my arms ached. When one of the oars hit the sandy seafloor, the resulting jolt almost knocked me to my knees.

“I can’t,” I cried, letting my hands drop.

Darren snorted. “You’re such a whiner. I don’t think the boys would be breaking this easily.”

Is that what these hypothetical hostage games of the Gehrys were supposed to do? Teach the hostages not to break? What was this, a way to prepare young Diggers for the rigors of war? Make them into little spies? I clenched my jaw and picked up the oars again. Fine. I was in Rose & Grave. I could do this.

Don’t think about the water. Pretend it’s knee-deep the whole way across. I started again. Pull. Pull. Don’t look. Pretend every stroke sends you sailing.

Still, it was endless. “You’ll tell me if I’m off course, right?”

Darren said nothing. He was staring out over the water, eyes narrowed.

I looked over my shoulder to see what it was that had caught his attention.

A light! A boat. And there it was, the sound of an engine in the water. Still so distant, but if I was correct, it was coming from the dock at Cavador Key.

“Here!” I shouted, dropping the oar to wave. “Over here! Help!”

Darren smacked me in the dark. “Shut up!”

“Game over,” I mumbled, and leaned down to undo my feet. The knots weren’t budging. “Help!” I shouted with all the strength left in my voice. “It’s Amy! Help, I’m hurt! Please! Darren—”

And then he landed a real blow and I fell over, my head pounding. The boat tipped wildly, and a small wave crested the side and splashed over my face, stinging the raw skin there.

Darren shoved me out of the way and tried to grab the oars.

“Darren, just stop,” I begged him, even while I fumbled for the rope around my feet again. “You can’t outrow a motorized boat. Come on.”

“Shit!” he exclaimed. Now I could hear voices, along with the motor and the light.

“Help, please! Please help me!” I kept screaming it over, and over, screamed it until my voice gave out. The light kept getting bigger, the voices louder. They were yelling, yelling my name.

“Shit!” Darren said again, and then he was standing.

“No!” I said, and grabbed his arm, just as he dove over the side. The pressure of my hand on his threw him off, and he hit the edge of the boat with a loud, metallic thud.

The boat tilted far to the left, and then to the right.

And then, once more, the world turned upside down.

In the night, underwater might as well be deep space. Just as cold, just as black. I heard nothing, saw nothing. I kicked my legs, but the knots remained. I could move my feet within the bonds, but not enough to pull them apart. The skin around my ankles burned, the only warmth in all that freezing water.

And then I broke the surface, not coughing, and sucked in air. The cold had shocked me awake.

Why was it so quiet? Where was the other boat, where were my rescuers? Where was Darren? I heard no splashing but my own, and the soft susurrus of waves against the side of the boat. I grabbed for it, but my fingers slid off the smooth underside of the hull, and then it slipped away. So cold. So cold.

No! I was turned around, or something. I couldn’t see. I couldn’t see anything, could barely tell where the water met the air. And my arms. My God, my arms. They hurt so much. I couldn’t do it.

“Help!” I screamed, and promptly went under.

Breathe, Amy. When you breathe, you’re lighter than water.

Who had said that? Poe? In his silly little swimming lessons? Dead man’s float. What an awful name. I clawed my way to the surface once more, took another deep breath, and let my face sink into the water. And amazingly, miraculously, it worked. The blood rushed from my ears and I could hear again. The motor was close now, people were shouting. I could see the light playing on the water from behind my eyelids. I lifted my face and breathed again. “Over here!” I shouted, and breathed again, quick. My arms, my arms…

There was a huge splash next to me and then an arm around my waist. Someone shoved something under my armpits, something that lifted me up out of the water.

“Amy, are you all right?” George’s voice. There was a light in my face.

I opened my eyes. “My feet…” I said, “…tied.”

I could see George’s expression flash to horrified. “Oh my God.”

And then I was being dragged against the side of the boat, hands on my wrists, scraping against the skin there, and I remember saying the word “Darren,” and then there was more splashing. I heard them say they’d found him, and then they covered me with blankets and I remember Jenny and Demetria holding me in their laps and crying, and crying, and crying…

“Her face…”

“…hypothermia sets in.”

“Keep her awake, keep her awake…”

George’s voice, in the midst of some unthinkable rage. “Tied her up. Tied her up! ”

“Drink this.” I think it was Jenny, holding a mug to my mouth. I batted it away. No more drugs.

“Amy, please, it will warm you up.” I breathed in some sickly sweet smell and it was too much. I rolled onto my side, retching, coughing.

And then, I felt hands on my face, pulling my hair back against my neck, caressing my forehead and my cheeks. Demetria’s voice was very soft, and very firm. “She’s been drugged. Look at her eyes. This is what it looks like. The motherfucker…”

And then there was more screaming that broke through the fog of my brain. I blinked my eyes open. I was lying on the deck of the boat, and two people were holding Demetria back from attacking a bundle on the other side of the deck. Darren. He was wrapped in a blanket as well, holding a dark red towel to his head. No, it wasn’t dark red. It was just turning…

“He’s bleeding,” I said to Jenny, but she didn’t respond.

And now Demetria was screaming at the man driving the boat. “Take us right to the mainland,” she shouted. “Right to the police.”