by SM Koz
Chris had been watching us and since JC was so scared, she decided to have us trade positions so I would be in the rear of the canoe and he would be in the front. Once we were resituated, I handed him a paddle and Chris pushed us into the water.
I backed our canoe into the middle of the river towards Mia and Neeky while he sat stone-still, continuing to breathe heavily. By the time we reached the other boat, he seemed a little more relaxed. I was thankful the river was so calm. If we had rocked side to side at all, I’m sure he would’ve completely freaked out.
After Chris and Bling joined us in one canoe and Jason in another, we spent the next thirty minutes going in circles and figure-eights as Jason taught us how to maneuver the canoes. Once he was confident we’d be able to navigate down the river, we began the two-mile adventure. I kept an eye on JC the whole time, but he seemed to be doing much better after the initial shock. His shoulders were relaxed and he was easily sliding the paddle through the water.
He was uncharacteristically quiet, though. I didn’t know if that was out of fear of drowning or if he was appalled by what I had said earlier. I was positive he’d never met a murderer and was probably wondering why the hell he was friends with me. I couldn’t blame him.
After we cleared a downed tree blocking most of the river, he said, “I’m sure there’s more to the story. I don’t believe that you maliciously killed your best friend.”
“Doesn’t matter if it was malicious or not.”
“Yes it does. Did you pull a trigger?”
“No.”
“Beat her with a crow bar?”
“God, no.”
“Hold her down and pour poison down her throat?”
I stopped paddling, now the appalled one, and stared at his back. “It wasn’t on purpose.”
“Then it was an accident.”
“Still, an accident I’m responsible for.”
“I’m sure there were other contributing factors.”
I ignored him, making it clear I didn’t want to talk about it.
“What kind of accident?” he asked, turning his head to look at me and failing to heed my not so subtle clue.
“I don’t want to talk about it.”
“Fair enough.” He rotated around, but after a few moments, added, “What happened to your mom?”
I sighed and said, “Why are you so nosy?”
“It’s called getting to know each other. Building a friendship.”
“Then tell me something about yourself. I’m tired of talking about me.
“I’m an open book. What do you want to know?”
I contemplated his question with my paddle held above the water, little droplets falling down and breaking the otherwise smooth surface. I knew virtually nothing about him and could ask any one of a million questions. Since he was focused on my family, I decided to do the same. “What happened to your dad? You never talk about him.”
“He’s a dick who left Mama as soon as he found out she was pregnant. Last I heard, he was serving time for larceny.”
“He wasn’t Jalen’s dad?”
“No, that was another scumbag, although he did stick around a little longer and as far as I know, doesn’t have a criminal record.”
“So, it was just you, your mom, and Jalen?”
He turned around to look at me again. “And Nana. She watched us while Mama worked. I also have a bunch of aunts, uncles, and cousins.”
“You have a big family.”
“Yeah.”
“What happened to Jalen?”
There was a long pause and then he bit his lip. He also had wrinkles on his forehead that I’d never seen before. Without saying anything, he faced forward again. He expected me to talk about Jenna, but he couldn’t talk about Jalen.
“Now you know how it feels,” I said, focusing on my paddle slicing through the water as I steered us down the middle of the river.
“Drive-by shooting,” he replied quietly.
My head snapped back up so I could watch his back. “Why would anyone kill a little kid?!”
“They weren’t going for him. He was visiting a neighbor friend who had an older brother. The older brother was involved in gang activity that irritated a rival gang so they decided to take him out. Or at least scare him. Jalen was in the wrong place at the wrong time.”
He looked over his shoulder and smiled, but the raw pain was still visible. This was not something he’d accepted yet. “I’m sorry,” was all I could think of saying.
“So, about that mom of yours,” he said, feigning an upbeat attitude.
“Similar story as your dad.”
“How old were you when she left?”
“Three.”
“You must be close to your dad, then.”
“No. He hired a nanny to take care of me. Then married Sheila when I was in the fourth grade. She hired a new nanny to take care of me until I was in high school and deemed old enough to take care of myself.”
“You must be very close to two random people who were paid to take care of you, then.”
Despite everything, I laughed at his comment. It was true. My closest ‘family’ members growing up were people not related to me who were paid to take care of me. What a depressing thought.
“No siblings?”
“No.”
“What was your best friend’s name?”
“Jenna.”
“I bet you were really close to her if you had no one else.”
I nodded even though he was facing forward and couldn’t see me. Swallowing against the lump in my throat, I said, “Her parents were great, too. I liked to pretend they were mine. They called me their adopted child since I was there so often.”
“When did she die?”
“May 3rd,” I replied in a whisper and tried to focus on something else around me so I wouldn’t think about that day again.
Looking to my right, I could see the sun dipping towards the horizon, casting long shadows beside the river. I studied them, trying to identify shapes in their inky lines, but my mind was focused on despair so all I saw was dead animals and bloody corpses.
“After Prince Jalen defeated the army of giant flying snowmen with missile-guided firebombs, he had some downtime to enjoy his palace,” JC said, as he dipped his paddle into the river and distracted me from my dark thoughts. “The neighboring lands were so grateful for everything he had done to keep them safe that they sent a new gift to the prince daily. The first day was an ice cream sundae the size of a house. It had ladders and slides and tunnels so you could get from the strawberry room to the chocolate room. Each area had ropes dangling from the ceiling and tugging on one unleashed a blizzard of toppings from sprinkles to hot fudge to whipped cream.”
“You’re making me hungry.”
“Thinking about food is good.”
He was right. Thinking about food meant I wasn’t thinking about Jenna. I’d take that tradeoff any day.
I got to hear more Prince Jalen tales until we finally reached our destination. Chris and Bling disembarked first so they could help the rest of us. Because there wasn’t a sandy shore area, we had to pull up to a big rock formation extending into the deep part of the river. Chris walked to the front of the rock and told Mia and Neeky to go to her. JC and I headed towards Bling. When we pulled alongside the rock, he told us he’d hold the canoe as I got out.
We lowered our paddles and then I stood. As soon as I did, the canoe leaned away from the rock.
“Stop!” JC yelled, but it was too late. We were already falling into the water. My head went under, but I popped right back up thanks to the life jacket.
“What the hell was that?” I sputtered.
“My bad,” Bling said. “It’s slippery.”
“Help me up.” I reached for his hand. He leaned over and offered it to me, but then I realized JC wasn’t by my side. “Where is he?” I frantically spun around. About ten feet downstream was JC, flailing his arms above his head.
“Relax!”
Jason yelled from his canoe. “Float on your back!”
JC either didn’t hear him or didn’t believe him because he continued flailing and somehow managed to drop below the water every now and again, despite the life jacket.
I started swimming towards him while Chris ran along the bank and Jason paddled in his direction. “Go to shore!” Jason shouted to me.
I shook my head and continued in JC’s direction. He was so freaked out, I couldn’t just leave him.
“It turns to rapids after the next set of rocks! Go to shore now!”
I shook my head again and kicked my legs harder. The rocks were still a good fifty feet away so there was plenty of time.
Jason continued to shout, but I ignored him and focused on JC. In no time, I was about ten feet away and Jason was at JC’s side, handing him the paddle to grab onto. JC managed to grip it, but when Jason pulled him in, he frantically leaned on the edge of the canoe. Jason yelled and the next thing I knew, they were both in the water and floating closer to the rapids.
With renewed energy, I kicked to JC’s side as Jason tried to right the canoe. JC continued to splash, almost hitting me in the head in the process. He also kept spitting out water. I had never seen him panic before, but his thrashing revealed his state of mind—he was sure he was going to drown.
“Dammit! Stop moving! Keep your mouth closed!” I shouted.
When he didn’t listen to me, I reached out and slapped him across the face. I was sure he’d give me shit about that later, but I didn’t know how else to get him to calm down. It worked like a charm and he just stared at me, too shocked to move.
“Lie on your back. Don’t move. You’ll float, trust me.”
He rolled over, still breathing heavily and followed my orders.
“Stare at the clouds. Nowhere else.”
His eyes were wide and there was a wildness to them. He was scared to death.
Jason joined me with the canoe but after judging the distance to the rapids and our current speed, he let go. “There’s not enough time. We have to swim.”
Jason took JC from me, hooking one arm over his shoulder and across his chest. I did the side-stroke towards the rocky shoreline, keeping with them in case JC needed anything.
“Hurry up!” Chris yelled from the shore. She and Neeky backed into the tree line while we continued our slow progression. The problem was JC’s size. He was bigger and heavier than Jason and they were moving way too slow. We were only covering a few feet towards shore for every few feet we moved closer to the rapids.
“Mal? The water’s getting louder,” JC said in a clipped tone.
“We’re okay. Just keep staring at the clouds.”
I was trying to be positive, but at that moment I became scared, too. Looking at our trajectory, we were due to enter the rapids before we’d reach the side of the river. I swam up next to them and grabbed the shoulder of JC’s life jacket. I then tugged with Jason, hoping we could move faster. I kicked my legs harder and tried to move more water with my one free arm, but it barely made a difference. The entire river was being funneled through a narrow opening and it was taking us with it.
I looked back to where Chris was and saw that she and Neeky were running along the rocks in the same direction as us. They were also dragging a large fallen tree branch. My eyes met Chris’ and I knew what was about to happen. I nodded in understanding then looked to Jason. He nodded, too, and we both stopped fighting the current. We needed to conserve our energy.
“Okay, JC, change of plans,” Jason said.
“What?!” he asked, trying to sit up and getting a mouthful of water.
“Lay down!”
He followed Jason’s orders, but the fear in his eyes was even worse.
“When I tell you to, you’re going to lift your arms in the air. There’ll be a branch hanging above us and I need you to grab it. I’ll push you up, but you need to do your part, okay?”
“Uh huh.”
“Mal, will you be able reach it?”
I nod.
We started moving even faster as the current carried us along, as helpless as weightless leaves floating on the surface. The narrowing grew closer and closer. Chris and Neeky got in place with Mia standing behind them.
“Okay, on three … One … “ The branch almost spanned the entire space between the narrow rocks. As long as we weren’t on the far right, we’d hit it.
“Two …” We reached some sort of eddy that started spinning us to the right. “No, no, no,” I yelled. “Kick your feet!”
We kicked with all our might. While it didn’t get us closer to Chris, it did stop us from moving farther across the river. In seconds, the branch was only a couple feet in front of us.
“Three!”
Our arms shot up and met the branch with such force that I knew I’d have bruises the next day. Miraculously, though, JC and I both got a good grip and were able to hold on. I looked for Jason, but he was floating down the river on his back, feet in front. He didn’t have a chance of grabbing on after helping JC.
I tried to watch him descend into the rapids, but Chris and Neeky started hauling in the branch. I got there first and Mia reached down to help me up. Once I was safe, I tried to help Mia lift JC, but he was too heavy. Neeky reached over my head and grabbed onto his life jacket, lifting him in by the shoulders and pulling him on top of us. We all fell into a heap on the giant boulder.
At first no one said anything. The only sound was our loud, labored breaths with the whoosh of the rushing stream in the background. Then, I broke the silence. “Where’s Jason?”
“He’s through the rapids and swimming to shore,” Mia said, looking downstream. “He’s okay.”
I let out a sigh of relief.
“Holy shit,” JC said. “That, Mal, is why I don’t like water.”
“Understood,” I said and rolled over to face him. “I’m not a huge fan right now, either.”
Our mouths were only inches from each other and I could feel his breath tickle my nose every time he exhaled. He reached over and wiped spittle from my lower lip. “Thank you. You saved my life.”
I shook my head. “Jason, Neeky, and Chris saved both our lives.”
“Is everyone okay?” Chris asked, reaching down and turning our faces as she inspected us. “I don’t know what happened. This is one of the safest haul out points on the river. We’ve never had a problem in the five years we’ve been using it.”
“Yeah, well you’ve never had Bling here to help,” JC said.
“All he had to do was hold the canoe so you could step out.”
“Apparently that was too hard for him.”
Her jaw tensed and she looked upstream, shaking her head, but not saying anything else.
It took a few more minutes for us to catch our breath and then we bushwhacked our way back to where we were supposed to exit the water. Bling was there pulling our canoe out. We didn’t bother helping him, choosing instead to sit with the others in the clearing and wait for Jason to make his way back.
When Bling joined us, JC scowled and said, “Thanks for the help, man.”
“Why you buggin’?”
JC stood and postured in front of him. “You tipped us over!”
Bling mimicked JC and said, “You ready to catch a fade?!”
“Whoa, whoa, whoa … let’s all calm down,” I said, stepping between the two of them. Even though I had no idea what Bling was saying, his body language was perfectly clear.
“Get yo breezy outta’ my grill or she gonna be balled up, too.”
“Mal, get out of the way,” JC said.
“No. You two are not doing this. Chris!” I yelled urgently.
Chris, who was partially down the trail looking for Jason, rushed towards us. “What’s going on?”
“He tipped us on purpose,” JC said.
“Bullshit!”
Chris said, “All that matters right now is that everyone’s safe.”
“He tried to kill me!” JC yelled, nar
rowing his eyes at Bling.
She shook her head. “No fighting. You fight and you’re both out of here. Is that what you want?”
The two guys continued staring at each other, making me really uncomfortable. I had never seen a real fight, just the silly ones in school where a few light punches are thrown before a teacher rushes out to stops things before anyone even gets hurt. I had a feeling that if JC and Bling went at it, there wouldn’t be light punches and someone would definitely end up hurt.
“No,” JC said to Chris, but he continued glaring at Bling.
“Put up your tents. All three of you.”
I slipped out from between the two guys, happy to follow Chris’ order for once. I figured JC would come with me, but he kept staring at Bling, who kept staring back at him.
“MOVE YOUR ASSES NOW!” Chris yelled in a voice I had never heard from her. That broke Bling’s concentration and he shifted his glare from JC to her. If he had looked at me like that I would have peed my pants. Chris didn’t even flinch.
Chapter 11: August 24
“God, I was scared,” I say, focusing on Marta and coming out of my memory. I’m still at the island and gripping the journal so hard my knuckles are white. Marta has taken the seat next to me. Her book of crossword puzzles is on the counter, but she’s absently tapping her pencil against it rather than writing any answers.
“What happened?”
“JC almost drowned. Then he and Bling almost got into a fight. It was awful. I was so hyped up, I couldn’t even sleep that night. I just kept replaying the whole evening in my mind. We were so lucky nothing bad happened.”
“Was JC scared?” she asks.
“When he was in the river, yes. Later that night, I’m not sure. We sat around the campfire like usual, but he was quiet. Contemplative, maybe? I have no idea what he was thinking, though.”
“What’s his journal say about that night?”
My head snaps down to the notebook held tightly in my hands. “Good point. We can know exactly what he was thinking.” I turn the page to the correct entry and lay the notebook flat in between us so we can both read it.
Day 6: Today is not a day I ever want to repeat. I saw my life flash in front of my eyes as I drifted down that damn river. I am confident I’d be dead if Mal and Jason hadn’t been there. Mal tried to downplay her role, but I know she risked her life for me. I’m not a spiritual person despite Mama’s and Nana’s wishes, but I can’t overlook the signs. It’s as though Mal and I were meant to meet. Like fate or destiny or something. We both had a parent walk out on us. We both lost someone important to us and feel responsible for their death. Then there’s the most unlikely connection of all--they died on the same day. What are the chances of that?
