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He saw Jun’s face in his mind. He’d never get a chance to convince her they were right for one another. In that moment, staring straight at what he thought would become his watery grave, he didn’t even think about the surf competition. Or the endorsements. Or selling surfboards. All he thought about was Jun and the things he’d wanted to say to her but hadn’t.
I’m not ready to go yet. I’m not ready.
The ocean didn’t care. The ocean would show him no mercy.
His lungs burned and stars clouded his vision. This was it. Seconds more and he’d have to breathe in, breathe in the water that would kill him. With one last great effort, he kicked upward, his life jacket propelling him, and miraculously, he popped up to the surface once more, inhaling a huge breath. In the roaring surf, he saw a shadow and heard a sputter: a Jet Ski.
“Grab on!” Henley called, turning around in his seat, and Kai grasped the floating barge attached to the back of the ski and held on for all he was worth. He’d never been so glad to see a pimple-faced teenager before in his life. Henley gunned the engine and whisked him away from the next approaching wave. Kai looked at the fierce blue water. That wave would’ve killed me. No doubt in his mind whatsoever. He watched it as it crashed monstrously against the black rocks, shooting up a wall of white foam in all directions as he coughed up brine.
He made it to the rocky shore and just lay there, breathing in deep gulps of air.
“You saved me,” Kai told Henley. “Thanks, man. Sorry I doubted you.”
“No trouble,” the boy said. “Just paying you back for Hammy. Glad to do it.”
The two men from the ad agency who’d been operating the drone cameras came clambering up then. “You okay, man?” one asked.
“That was the most heinous wipeout I’ve ever seen!”
“It felt even worse than it looked,” Kai said, staring up at them both.
“Anything broken? I thought for sure you’d split yourself in half, bro!” Henley was all agitated adrenaline.
Kai did a quick assessment of his body but found nothing but his head hurt. His life jacket was mostly wrecked, two of the three buckles split clean in half. It was a miracle it had stayed on. “I don’t think I broke anything.” Kai was amazed he’d gotten out in one piece. “I thought I was going to die out there.”
“Looked like you were, too,” Henley said, nodding in agreement.
“Kai!” a voice shouted from the distant rocks. Kai looked up to see Jun headed for him, slowly and awkwardly picking her way down the lava-rock beach. He blinked, wondering if it was hallucination, an effect from having a five-ton wave bash him on the head a few times. He quickly realized what he was seeing, however, was real. She was here, in the flesh, wearing a white sundress and impractical sandals that weren’t giving her any traction on the rocks, but that made her muscled legs look amazing.
“Jun?” he asked, sitting up, his head feeling as if it were in a vise as he swiped wet hair from his forehead.
“Kai! Are you okay? I saw...you fall. I saw...” Emotion overcame her then and she lost her ability to speak. She made it to him and collapsed on her knees beside him. “Are you okay?”
“I’m bruised and battered but fine.”
She threw herself on him, ignoring that he was wet and seawater would soak through her dress. She squeezed him tight, and he nearly fell over. He wrapped his arm around her and hugged her back. He felt a sob ripple through her chest.
“Hey...don’t cry. I’m fine.”
Henley and the others busied themselves with packing up gear, trying to give the two a moment.
“You scared me,” Jun sniffed as she pulled back from him, wiping at her eyes. “I saw you go down. I didn’t see you come up. I thought you were going to drown out there.”
“So did I,” Kai admitted.
Jun shook her head, as if wanting to deny all of it. “It’s too dangerous. I just... I didn’t understand what I was training you for. I should have, but I didn’t. I had no idea it was like...this.” She swung out her bare arm toward the roaring waves still coming in about a hundred yards out.
