The Number 8
Page 14
All night, Asmir and Becki had been exchanging looks. He wasn’t sure whether it was getting more flirty now or whether it was just getting creepy. But he quickly decided that he wasn’t satisfied to just share a few seconds of eye contact here and there.
As he got up, he tried to be discreet. He tried not to attract any extra attention, but this was hard as he had been the one telling most of the stories. Becki was sitting on the opposite end of the table and trying to speak to her without the rest of them seeing would be tough. Usually he didn’t care what people thought, but Dick was really pushing his buttons and if he saw Asmir trying to take a girl outside, he would probably say some snarky comment which would lead to a fight and he wasn’t too excited for Becki to see him like that so early on. So, he was trying his best to avoid that.
Asmir walked towards Becki, pretending to text someone. He raised his gaze for just a second and saw her staring back at him. Then, like they had communicated telepathically, she got up and walked out of the door ahead of him. It seemed that no one had noticed this except her friend Annie, who was attempting to cover a smile with her hand. It had worked out, just as if it had been choreographed to perfection.
Asmir edged his way through the open doors, only to find no sign of Becki at all. To the left was the bus, the lights were out and there was no sign of life. To the right was the outside set of stairs that led up to their room. The door was closed and there was nowhere else to hide.
“Becki?” he called out. “Where are you?”
“Down here,” she replied, her voice like a whisper.
He spotted her standing by the river. She had her back to him.
“Oh, I didn’t see you down there. How you doing?” he asked.
“Bored of people telling false stories. They forget, for a lot of them, I was there. I know it’s not true.”
“Yeah, well, I was the one doing most of the storytelling and I take offense to that statement,” he joked. “Yes, they have been exaggerated, but, they’re not false.”
“Oh really? What about the one about you saving my life as the current pinned me to a rock?”
“It happened just as I said. You fell out of the boat and were underwater for nearly a full minute and I jumped in and pulled you out. You should really be thanking me.”
Becki turned towards him and crossed her arms.
“I remember it a little differently. See, I remember that it was the very end of the rapids and we were all paddling to the sides. There was almost no current and most of us decided to jump out and swim the rest of the way. I jumped out the boat and was under for maybe two, three seconds. You jumped in and grabbed me from the back and dragged me to the side.”
“Well, there are two sides to every story. You are entitled to your opinion and I respect that,” he continued to joke.
“You didn’t save my life, Asmir, you actually nearly dragged me under.”
“Well, the intention was there. I thought you were in danger, I jumped in after you. The details may have been a little different. It was cold, our adrenaline was pumping and we were crashing through ice-cold water. Who could remember exactly what happened?”
“Me. I remember,” she smiled. That was a good sign, but he was starting to think that maybe she was annoyed with him.
“Rain’s stopped.”
“Nice segue, genius,” her expression more playful than annoyed.
“So what are you doing all the way down here, by the river?”
She didn’t reply, instead she started taking her clothes off until there was nothing left but her bra and panties.
“I’m going swimming,” she said before diving head first into the river.
Asmir just watched, his mouth agape. He didn’t know what was more shocking, that this girl had just stripped down to her underwear in front of him or that she had just jumped into freezing water without a second thought.
He waited for her head to pop up before saying, “You know there was a reason that we were wearing wetsuits earlier, right?”
“Stop your whining and get in.”
“The river is moving really fast now, the rain has…”
“What did I just say? Are you coming in or what?”
“No, I’m good. I’ll just wait out here.”
It was clear she was a strong swimmer. She was moving into the areas where the current was weakest with ease.
“Suit yourself,” she said and dove under again, reappearing a few meters away from the bank. “Could you hold this for me? It’s a bit restrictive.”
She threw something at him. At first he thought it was a rock or a shoe but he soon felt that is was too light to be a shoe or a rock. He looked down at the item in his hands. It was her bra.
He placed it on the ground and got down to his boxers as quickly as he physically could. The moment he had seen that in his hands all the other arguments vanished and getting into the water was the best idea in the world. As he stripped down, he heard her laughing from the far side of the river.
She must think guys are so predictable, he thought. She wasn’t wrong there.
He took a run up and dived into the icy waters. The moment his head went under all the thoughts he had been having were gone and replaced by one; get to the surface.
His head breached the surface of the river and he began to desperately gasp for air. If he had been at all foggy before, he was sure wide awake now. His body tingled all over and let him know that it was in fight or flight mode. But as he broke the surface a larger problem became apparent; he was about five feet from where he had jumped in and moving fast.
“This current is too…strong, we need to…get out,” he spluttered, as he tried to keep his head out of the water.
“Swim over here,” Becki said. She was in a quiet area of the river towards the inside where the current wasn’t so strong.
Asmir paddled furiously, raising his head every few moments to see if he had made it any closer. Each time he seemed just a little further away. He upped his speed, his arms and legs moving as fast as they could go. This time when he raised his head, he was closer. He kept at this for about thirty seconds, each stroke getting him closer.
He raised his head. He was about one meter away from Becki who was reaching out to him, but she clearly didn’t want to drift into the danger zone. He was so close that he wanted to reach out and try to take it, but he knew that if he missed, it would put him back about another meter or so and he didn’t have the strength to lose that much ground.
Then something put an end to his fight. His right leg smashed into a rock that was hidden just below the surface. His knee cap hit the jagged edge and sent a searing pain shooting up his leg. His shriek was muffled by the water and his arms automatically grabbed for the source of the pain. His head breached the surface again and allowed his screams to be heard, but not for long, because he fell under again.
“Swim to the side,” Becki called out as Asmir surfaced again.
He caught a glimpse of the bank and tried to paddle to the edge, but his body was in shock and he could feel himself panicking. The bank looked miles away and the current had caught him powerfully and was dragging him further down. About thirty meters away he could see the rapids. This should have made him paddle faster to the edge, but instead, he froze. Fear and panic had taken over. He wasn’t even noticing the cold any more, he wasn’t noticing anything. He drifted down the river another five meters. Then, he felt the crunch of his body bouncing off of another large rock and that was the last thing he remembered.
Chapter 33
Asmir woke up on the muddy bank, his head throbbing and his body shivering hard. Annie knelt over him, her hair and clothes soaking wet.
“It’s not your time yet, Asmir,” she said, half smiling, half scowling.
He lifted his head to look around him. In the distance he could see Becki running along the edge of the river in only her bra and panties.
“Oh my God, Asmir, I’m so sorry,” she said. She was wide-eyed
and clearly distressed.
“Becki, what were you thinking?” Annie growled.
She didn’t reply. She just got on her knees next to Asmir and touched his shoulder lightly. He winced in pain. Annie saw this.
“Asmir, I don’t think you have any broken bones, but you’re going to be bruised tomorrow that’s for sure. You want me to get Dante?”
“No!” He coughed, trying to raise himself to a sitting position. “No one can know about this.”
The two friends shot each other a look of amusement, but nodded in agreement.
“Did you…?” Asmir stuttered, pointing at the river and then back at Annie.
“After you crashed into that rock and blacked out, you drifted into that little corner,” Annie said, pointing to a small area on the far side of the river that was sheltered from the current. “But yes, I saved your life. You were face down and I pulled you out.”
“Did you…?” he said, this time pointing to his lips.
This prompted a reaction that he wasn’t too happy about. Her eyes widened, her eyebrows shot upwards and her mouth made an “O” shape.
“Ohhh, no, no, no. I pulled you out, pushed on your chest a couple of times and you spat out half the river. But I probably would have, to save your life. But only to save your life.”
Asmir felt a little offended, but he let it slide. She had saved him.
He let his head fall back onto the ground and took in lungfuls of air. Annie got to her feet, while Becki stayed by his side. She wiped the hair off his face and continued to whisper that she was sorry.
“I’m going to grab some towels for you two. Stay here, we don’t want anyone else finding out about this, or you will both be in some serious trouble. I’ll be back soon.”
With that she left. He stayed on the ground for a few seconds more. The clouds had cleared and all he could see were stars. It would’ve been beautiful if he hadn’t been battered, bruised and barely breathing.
“This was not how I wanted the night to go,” Becki said, her voice soft and sincere.
“Yeah, well, it wouldn’t have been my first choice for a date either,” he said, speaking very slowly and laboring over each syllable.
She surveyed his body.
“Your knee, Asmir. It’s bleeding pretty bad.”
“I can’t feel it. It must be the adrenaline. My body feels like one big bruise right now.”
He managed to turn his head slightly towards her. He could see she was shivering.
“You know how people tell you that an adrenaline rush is fun?” he said, still wheezing.
She nodded.
“It’s not,” he said.
Becki smiled at him for a second. She placed her cold hand on his face and kissed him lightly on the cheek.
“I’m so sorry,” she whispered again.
“Apology accepted. You’re freezing. You should go inside and jump in a warm shower.”
“I’m staying,” she insisted and he was glad.
It was another minute or so before Annie returned with two towels. Asmir had finally found enough strength to get to his feet. His legs ached and he felt like he had been punched about thirty times right in the stomach but, with a little bit of assistance from both girls, he made it back inside. Most people were still downstairs. The incident hadn’t attracted any attention because the music in the bar was way too loud to hear him scream. Annie had only come outside because she was checking on her friend. Asmir had got lucky. Very, very lucky.
They offered to help him back to the room, but he declined. Instead he let them go on ahead and hobbled slowly behind them.
The shower was a welcome relief. All his movements were labored and at one point he didn’t move for a whole two minutes. The hot water loosened him up and allowed him to clean his wound effectively. It relaxed him and most importantly it washed away the adrenaline and restored some balance within his body.
When he got back to the room Annie and Becki were both in bed and were either asleep or feigning it, but they clearly didn’t want to discuss what had just happened.
He dried himself off and jumped into his sleeping bag. The order went Dante, Annie, Becki, him. They hadn’t exactly planned it, but he had definitely made a point of throwing his stuff down the moment he saw Becki do the same. Looking across the row he could see that they were all in different positions. Dante was curled up facing the wall. Annie was lying on her back with her head turned towards Dante. Becki was sleeping facing him and away from the others. He knew how he would sleep because it was the same every night. Face down with his arms under the cold side of the pillow. So, he assumed the position, his arms aching and his chest bruised. He made sure to face away from the sleeping Becki. He didn’t want her to wake up with his face inches from hers. He liked her and that sure as hell would not help.
Asmir got comfortable and shuffled himself a little deeper into his sleeping bag. He could hear Marco snoring. It was very loud for such a small guy, but he didn’t have the strength to care at that moment. All he could do was lie in that warm room with ten others and yet another twenty still to arrive and think about what he had just been through. But his main and overwhelming thought was that, as irrational as it may seem to Dante the next morning, Annie and Becki would no longer be suspects in his mind. They were clean.
Chapter 34
It was morning and the soft tapping of rain on the thin, glass windows of the lodge woke Asmir up. After his exertions the previous night his body had allowed him to sleep peacefully despite the battering. That morning, however, it was a different story. His chest was so sore that even moving from his front to his side was unbearable. He could breathe, so chances were his ribs weren’t broken but his whole chest was extremely tender. The cut on his knee was also stinging but the ointment he had used before he had gone to bed had definitely helped. He didn’t even need to check. He knew both areas would be bruised and he wanted to avoid any questions about them from other passengers, so he wormed his way out of his sleeping bag and got to his feet trying not to make a sound. This wasn’t easy because every move he made felt like another knife being jabbed into his chest.
Unlike the previous evening, it was cold in the room. The heat of the thirty-plus bodies had somehow evaporated and all that was left was a nasty chill that made Asmir shudder. Everyone had their sleeping bags pulled all the way up to their necks or over their heads.
Asmir checked his phone. It was eight o’clock and it was clear that they were all going to be late leaving because the bus was scheduled to leave at nine. Quietly, he tiptoed to the bathroom and took a quick shower, which, like the night before, proved to be the secret medicine.
He got out feeling relaxed and calm. The pain was still there but after the two ibuprofen he was planning to take, he was sure it would be bearable. His knee was swollen and purple in color but it was his chest that was more concerning. Some patches were dark blue, but the most painful areas were now almost black. He hadn’t seen a bruise that color before and he made a mental note to keep a close eye on it to ensure it didn’t get worse.
At eight-twenty Asmir was showered, shaved and fully dressed. The painkillers he had taken a few minutes before were kicking in and he was feeling more human. A few of the others were stirring now but no one had had the bravery to get out of their warm sleeping bags and venture out into the cold. In the corner, Dante was still in the same position as he had fallen asleep in. He had a knack of doing that. Annie on the other hand, wasn’t. She had inadvertently started spooning him at some point during the night, probably because of the cold. But as Asmir tried to pack in silence, he was plotting ways of waking them up together to make it as awkward as possible. He was evil like that. But, as a thank you for saving his life, he decided not to do that to Annie. Instead, he woke Dante on his own and told him that the guys’ showers would be packed in the next few minutes, so he should get up. Dante agreed and left to take a shower, which gave Asmir plenty of time to plan his next genius prank on him.
Sure enough, at eight-thirty, Kelis’ ‘Milkshake’ began to play at full volume. A chorus of groans went up and people began to sit up in their beds to see what idiot had set the alarm. What they saw was an empty bed and Dante’s phone blasting the tune and buzzing loudly as it tried to move around his bed. But the greatest reaction had to be Annie who nearly had a heart attack as the phone had been inches from her right ear. She grabbed the phone and fiddled with it until it finally turned off. She sat bolt upright and saw Asmir packing with a smirk on his face.
“I know this was you, Dante wouldn’t do that,” she growled at him.
“How dare you? I am just over here minding my…”
She interrupted him, scowling, “Oh, save it! Even after I saved your…never mind,” she said catching herself. Everyone was watching and they had agreed not to mention it.
“Why would you even do that?” she asked instead.
Asmir raised his voice so the rest of the passengers could hear. “Me? It’s his phone and his alarm. Maybe he did this on purpose. Where is he now?”
People started bad-mouthing Dante all around the room. It didn’t take much to convince the rest of them that it was his fault. He had been the villain of the trip after all.
“Whatever, Asmir, you’re an asshole,” she said.
“I could’ve done a lot worse,” he whispered under his breath.
She obviously heard this. “What the hell did you say?” she seethed.
“Nothing, Annie.” He waited for everyone to start doing their own thing before going over to Annie. He hadn’t been mean for no reason, so he needed to explain this to Annie.
He went to sit down in Dante’s corner and got the reaction that he knew he would.