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She made me feel really dumb. Before I could respond, Genesis turned back toward the ocean, screaming and waving, trying desperately to get Charlee’s attention. I joined her in jumping up and down and screaming. We were drenched and hoarse after a couple of minutes.
“Why would she go out there in this?” Genesis cried. “Is she trying to get herself killed?”
I shot my head back to where Charlee floated. She was being tossed around violently, but she was balancing like a pro. It looked like she had something dangling from her mouth as she was setting up to catch a wave. A really big wave.
“No, no, no,” Genesis said and then shouted, “Charlee, no!”
“Is there something in her mouth?” I was squinting, but I still couldn’t make out much.
“Oh, no. It’s Bridger’s ashes. She said she wanted to spread them in the ocean, but I just assumed from the cliffs or something. I didn’t know she’d be crazy enough to go out in this.”
Crazy or deliberate? “I’m going out there.”
“What? In this?” Genesis asked, shocked. By now, the wave chasers were gathering on the beach with their boards tucked under their arms.
I rushed across the shoreline toward them, watching as Charlee rode the wave. She was incredible. Even in this storm, she rode effortlessly.
I reached the line of surfers. They were admiring Charlee’s skills.
“Damn, that’s one brave betty. That wave has got to be at least a triple overhead.”
Another surfer put a fist to his mouth when he shouted, “Whoa, she’s in the green room.”
I looked back at Charlee, and she had tucked herself in the barrel and wasn’t visible anymore. My heart started to race and panic was setting in. If the curtain closed on her, she could get crushed. And then she popped out just before it closed and then entered another one that formed on the same wave. She was barrel surfing.
“Hey, I need your board, brah.” I didn’t wait for an answer. I grabbed his board off the sand and raced into the waves, pumping my arms harder and faster than I had ever done before, not knowing what I was going to do once I got out there. I’d have to wait for her to shoot out or resurface if it closed on her. I was at the mercy of the ocean and Charlee’s choices. I had no control over what happened to her now. All I could do was be out in the ocean with her so she wasn’t alone.
By the time I got past the break, she had ridden two more barrels. It could have taken me ten minutes to get past the break for all I knew, between the storm pushing on me and my adrenaline warping time, but based on the wave speed and barrels, it was likely to have been maybe a minute or two. I didn’t know where she would end the wave, but I was ahead of it, ready. A bright flash of light lit up the sky, and I could just make out Charlee’s silhouette inside another barrel. She would be passing me any second now. The wind was howling and the darkness loomed even with the rising sun. I had several moments in my life I thought were the worst, like Evie and mom’s car accident and my first heart break, but now I understood what the worst moment looked like. It was right now, being completely helpless for the woman I had fallen in love with.
Just when I thought there was no hope for Charlee to pop out of this barrel, I saw her emerge milliseconds before the curtain closed and the wave broke. She flew out so fast it seemed unreal. Everyone on the beach cheered and whistled, and just as most surfers did, she reached out her arms and fell back in the water. It was the sign of a successful run. Some of the tension released when I saw her come out of the barrel, but then when she dropped into the ocean and didn’t resurface right away, my adrenaline kicked back up.
“Charlee,” I yelled. I lay out on the board and swam hard to where she fell in the water. It was reckless for her to have done that in this storm. She should have stayed on her board.
Her board was floating nearby, but she could be anywhere under the water in these conditions. The adrenaline in my system was deafening, and all I could hear now was my heartbeat racing as I frantically scanned the surface of the water. I unleashed from the surfboard and dove under. It was nearly impossible to see under water in the ocean, especially for more than a second or so, because the salt burned too much, but Bridger had trained me for this in case I was caught under a wave too long and couldn’t find my way back up. The chaos of motion underwater from the storm made it even more difficult to see, though, so I jerked my arms around, hoping to feel her.
I popped back up to search the surface in case she had resurfaced and immediately dove back under when I didn’t see her. The cloudiness of the disturbed sea was making my search nearly impossible. Why the hell wetsuits were made in dark colors was beyond me. If she had been wearing bright orange or pink, I’d have had a better shot at finding her.
Swimming down to the bottom, I searched all around. As the time ticked by, panic was shifting to dread. I was running out of oxygen and needed to resurface soon, but something caught my eye. I swam toward the shiny object to find Charlee’s lifeless body being tossed around on the sea floor. What caught my attention was the reflection of her wedding bands hanging on a chain around her neck.
I wrapped one arm around her waist and swam hard to the surface, barely making it out before I ran out of air. I rolled her onto her back and swam toward the beach.
“Come on, Charlee, don’t leave me, please,” I begged.
The borrowed board was floating in my path, so I weighted it down and slid her on it. She was unresponsive, but I could put my feet down now, so I leaned over and started breathing into her mouth. Surfers were already closing in on us as I continued her breaths. As soon as the others reached us, they helped carry the board and Charlee’s lifeless body the rest of the way to the beach where I began full CPR.
“We already called 911,” someone shouted.
Genesis plopped down next to me. “Let me take over.”
She started compressions as I fell back on the sand, my muscles exhausted and my lungs burning. Charlee was still unresponsive, and I tried to do the math of how long it had been since she went under the water. It felt like forever, but realistically maybe several minutes.
I rolled over next to Charlee and whispered in her ear. “It’s not your time, Charlee. Come back to us. Please, come back to me.” My heart felt like it was being crushed a million times over. Charlee felt so familiar the first time I saw her, and every day since I had fallen for her more and more. The way she made me feel was something I couldn’t imagine living without.
Her fingers suddenly twitched, and a moment later, she started gurgling.
“Charlee! Oh, my God,” Genesis cried.
We rolled Charlee onto her side so she could cough out the water. There was a large group of people circling around us now, and you could hear the relief wash over the crowd. Sirens blared in the distance.
