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My Bennett. In the raging river.
I scrambled out of my pack, screaming, as time sped up. Luckily, I remembered to grab the coil of rope I’d clipped to the outside of my pack for this very reason before I started running downstream.
“BENNY!” I screamed. “Let go of your pack!” I didn’t know if he still had his pack on or not. I just knew if he did, he was a dead man. I ran down the river bank as fast as I could, catching glimpses of Bennett as he fought to stay above water. His arm was caught in a tangle of small branches and I knew if he didn’t get free of them, they could catch on a rock and pull him under.
“BENNY!” I screamed again, only this time it was more of a sob as I saw him go under. No, no no no. I had to get to him. To pull him out before he hit his head on a rock and got knocked out or was pinned against a boulder and forced under the water forever.
“Benny, I’m coming,” I cried through tears and nausea as I stumbled to unlace my boots and throw them behind me. I saw him reach up again and try to grab hold of the branches he was tangled in as if they were a flotation device instead of one of the worst hazards in the river with him.
“Let go of the branches!” I yelled. I got ahead of him down the river a few yards and threw the rope across the expanse of the water.
“Grab the rope!” I shouted. He must have heard me because he scrambled to get to the brightly-colored rope, but it slipped through his grasp. I quickly coiled it as I ran down farther to try again.
“Benny,” I sobbed again, losing hope. I considered just throwing myself into the river after him, in hopes we’d end up near each other somehow and I could pull him to safety, but every water rescue course I’d ever done was screaming at me to do the right thing— to give him the best chance possible by following the rules.
I threw the rope across again, trying my hardest to place it perfectly so he couldn’t help but grab it. This time it was in the right spot and he grabbed onto it, using it to help him get his legs under him so he could push toward the side of the river. I quickly ran the rope around a nearby tree to help me get leverage and shouted encouragement as he got closer.
“That’s it, baby,” I called out. “You’re doing it. Come on, come to me. You got this. Just a little bit more.”
I could tell it was taking every ounce of his energy to make it to the river bank. The water was snowmelt from the alpine peaks, and I knew we had precious little time before hypothermia would drain what little energy he had left. He was already white as a sheet and completely waterlogged, and I sent up a prayer for him to just hang in there a little longer.
He stopped pulling and looked at me, and I knew in that moment he didn’t have enough energy left to keep going.
“I can’t,” he mumbled. I couldn’t hear the words as much as read his lips.
“I know you’re tired, baby, but just a little more. Please.”
The current knocked him sideways and his head went under. He was struggling so hard to keep a hold of the rope, but when he popped back up, I could see his hands slipping. He looked at me with the most heartbreaking expression of apology.
“No!” I screamed through my own tears. “Don’t you fucking dare! Hold that rope. Hold it Bennett Crawford, goddammit, do you hear me?”
I knotted the rope where it was and ran after him, knowing I had seconds before the current would rip the rope out of his hands, and I’d lose him forever. It was my only shot. If I couldn’t get to him in time, I might as well throw myself in the river and go with him.
Because a life without him in it was a life I was no longer interested in living.
I scrambled out into the water and grabbed for him, managing to snag his shirt with my hand until I got a better grip on one of his arms. As I pulled him toward me, I saw some gashes on his skin— watery blood pooling for a second before being washed away by the river every time he was splashed. The current tried to pull him out of my grasp, but I held onto him for dear life.
If the river wanted him, it was damn well going to have to take me too.
My stockinged feet slipped in the shallow water as I pulled him closer to the bank. I could already feel the numbing of my own feet and was terrified of what that meant for Bennett, who’d been in the water longer. I needed to get him dry and warm as fast as possible.
