Conflicted in Paradise Ch. 03

He shot to his feet, his body washing away his sleep in a surge of adrenaline-fueled action. He quickly put on his shorts and shoes, after which he ran to the edge of the beach, being joined by Ryan. Both of them stared out across the bay; the fog limited their sight, but every now and then a small breeze would raise visibility for a bit, and it showed that there was no sight of their boat, just like Carynne had said.

"You've gotta be fucking kidding me. Shit!" Ryan snarled.

"How the hell could it be gone?" Damon asked incredulously.

"I don't know. I doubt someone stole it, so I guess the anchor didn't hold or something. Fuck!"

"Jesus Christ, what the fuck do we do now?"

The girls joined them, all of them with worried looks on their faces.

"Don't worry," Ryan said reassuringly after a few moments, once he'd gathered himself. He held his hands up to forestall a panic. "The guy I borrowed the boat from is expecting us back by the end of this afternoon. If we don't show up by midnight or so, I'm sure he'll send out someone to come looking for us the next day."

"Does he know where we are?" Kelsey asked.

"Yeah. I told him we were going to these islands. We'll build a large fire, and they'll have no trouble finding us."

"Are you sure?" Siara asked, sounding less than confident.

He nodded. "Trust me, babe. By the end of midday tomorrow at the latest, we'll be out of here, I promise. Maybe even earlier if we see another boat once this fog clears."

Damon silently cursed his damned luck. "What about our boat?"

Ryan shrugged. "I dunno. If it just got loose, it'll probably drift further out into the Atlantic, provided it doesn't run aground anywhere."

"Will they find it again?"

"If they care enough to go look for it, they should be able to track it via GPS, but who knows when that'll be. And all it takes is a single wave hitting it wrong, and it'll go down."

"Won't your dad's buddy be angry that we lost his boat?" Siara asked.

"Pretty likely, yeah. If they can't recover it, I'll have to ask dad to buy him a new boat, I guess," Ryan sighed. "I'm sure he'll love that. Fuck!"

All of them stared out at the spot they'd left their boat the night before, as if they could somehow conjure it back through combined willpower.

"How far do you think it might have gone?" Damon asked suddenly.

"I have no idea," Ryan said. "It depends on when it got loose."

"Yeah, but wasn't the tide rolling in towards the island when we arrived here?"

"So?"

"So wouldn't that mean the boat would have washed up on the shore somewhere if it got loose during the night?"

Ryan blinked a few times, thinking it over. "Eh... maybe, yeah."

"So if the tide switched at some point, and that wasn't too long ago, it might not be too far away yet?"

Ryan opened his mouth a few times, though the words wouldn't come out. Finally he threw up his hands. "I guess it's possible, man. I just don't know. What are you getting at?"

Damon, however, was looking around. "This fucking fog... I wonder if..." Without saying anything else, he took off running towards the huge rock formations on the north end of the beach.

"Damon, where are you going?" Amanda yelled after him.

He just waved at her, sprinting full speed towards the rocks. It took him a few minutes to get there, and as soon as he arrived, he began climbing. Though rock climbing was nowhere near his specialty, and the rocks were pretty slippery from all the seawater and the clinging fog, he made good time, and soon he lost sight of the beach.

"Damon? Where are you?" he heard the girls yelling for him from below.

"Up here!" he yelled back. "Stay there, I'll be back down in a second!"

"What are you doing up there?!"

He didn't reply, instead focusing on his climb. He scaled several more rocks, scraping his abdomen and leg in the process, until after about ten minutes he stood as high as he figured he could go. Like he'd surmised, the fog was a low cover, and at his height he had a much clearer view. He began scanning the surrounding ocean to see if he could find anything.

For quite some time he looked around, seeing nothing. Though the fog mostly seemed to dissipate just a mile or so outside the shorelines of the islands, there was nothing beyond it other than calm waters. He let out a loud expletive and was about to climb down, when suddenly he saw a small dark shape wallowing in the water, right at the edge of the mist bank.

He cupped his hands around his eyes, focusing his sight on that small shape. Could it be? After waiting another minute or so, suddenly the distinctive shape of a boat appeared; it was hard to tell from the distance, but it definitely seemed like their yacht. He gauged the distance as best he could, estimating it was maybe a mile to a mile-and-a-half away. After triangulating the position with another island off to his left, he practically raced down the rocks, nearly breaking his neck several times in the process.

Stumbling onto Ryan on his way down, he just motioned for his friend to follow him. Ryan gave him an aggravated look, but obeyed without questioning.

"Why did you climb up there?" Amanda asked worriedly when her boyfriend jumped down from the rocks onto the sand right in front of his friends, with Ryan landing right beside him.

"I found the boat!" Damon exclaimed. Without waiting for them to reply, he took off towards the point of the island that was closest to it.

"What? Where?"

"It's about a mile out, over that way!" Damon replied, pointing in the direction he was running. His adrenaline was still surging through him, and he quickly ate up the distance, leaving everyone behind.

By the time they'd caught up to him, he'd already taken off his shoes and was wading into the water.

"Damon!" Amanda and Kelsey yelled simultaneously, with Amanda adding. "What are you doing?!"

"I'm gonna go get the boat!" he yelled back, before he dove forward into the water.

"Oh my God, that's crazy!" Carynne yelped. "Stop him!"

All the girls were looking at each other helplessly, staring out over the water. He finally resurfaced a good twenty yards ahead of where he'd been and began powering away from the island with huge strokes.

"Ryan, go with him!" Stacey cried.

Ryan just nodded, ripping off his shirt and running into the water in the same direction Damon was going. He ran for a few dozen yards, then dove into the water himself. He came back up after a few yards, never having been a great underwater swimmer, and he grimly set off after Damon. He tried yelling a couple of times, but his friend apparently couldn't hear him, and he soon realized he just didn't have the raw speed to catch up to him either—Damon appeared to be trying to swim a new world record on the mile!

He swam on, ignoring the screaming of his muscles. Going full-out without doing warm-ups was a surefire way to get injured, but he grit his teeth and kept going.

It was after about ten minutes that Ryan knew he was in trouble. His breath was rattling in his chest, and he was having to struggle mightily not to cough. His head was feeling woozy as hell, and he desperately fought to get enough oxygen into his body just to stay conscious, much less to keep swimming. The fog seemed twice as thick in the area that he was in, and he had no clue where he was, or even whether he was close to Damon or not.

"Damon!" Ryan yelled weakly. He knew it was a mistake as soon as he'd done it, as the cough he'd been trying to keep down came roaring up, feeling like it was exploding his lungs. He quickly rolled over onto his back to gain more buoyancy while hacking up his entire stomach. Water kept sloshing over his face, not really helping with the whole coughing thing, especially not when he swallowed a great mouthful of the salty shit.

Panic gripped him. He was pretty far away from the shore, and he'd likely never make it back, not if his asthma kept playing up the way it was. At the same time he doubted he'd ever make it to the boat either; not that he knew where it even was, as only Damon had seen it.

He coughed and hacked for several minutes more as a mental image of Siara floated in front of him. He reckoned that if she could see the state he was in, she'd be pretty damn pissed. "Sorry, babe," he groaned, fighting just to keep himself afloat.

"That better not have been aimed at me. We hardly know each other that well," Damon suddenly said from right beside him. He wrapped his arm around Ryan's chest from behind, then started moving him in the lifeguard's carry. When he saw the state Ryan was in, he grinned, "Jesus, I can't take you anywhere, can I?"

"Very fucking funny," Ryan said, immediately launching into another coughing fit. "Why are we even out here?"

"I am out here because I was going to go get the boat. I have no idea what your gimpy ass is doing here! How did you think that swimming a mile in the open ocean was gonna work, genius?" Damon said in between gasps for air.

"How did you?"

"Hey, I'm not the one who has that fucking death-rattle of a cough going on. I'm doing fine! In fact, I'd already found the boat when I heard you hacking up a lung. I figured you were in trouble, so I went back to check on you."

Ryan coughed for a few more moments, then he sighed. "Thanks."

"No problem. Now try to be quiet, would you?"

"Why, are you expecting a phone call?"

"Haha. Actually, I'm trying to listen for the boat."

"Huh?"

"Just shut up!"

Ryan bit his tongue, working hard to keep his cough inside. Damon floated for a few moments, and Ryan soon became aware of just how quiet everything was. The ocean was barely making a noise, and he slowly started noticing a whisper of sound.

Damon started swimming again, towing Ryan into the direction of the sound.

"What the fuck is that?" Ryan asked. His coughing fit has passed, and he was regaining his strength as Damon pulled him along.

"Music," Damon said. "Remember that we forgot to turn the radio off last night? It's just kept playing. With the fog over the ocean, you can hear it from quite far out."

"Son of a bitch. Did you know you'd be able to hear it before you set off?"

"No."

"Then how did you think you were going to find the boat?"

Damon spit out a mouthful of seawater, courtesy of a slightly larger wave that had hit him in the face. "I hoped I'd get lucky."

"And what if you didn't?"

"Jesus, will you shut up? It's hard enough to pull your ass without you interrogating me!"

Ryan quickly clamped his mouth shut. There was no point arguing with the guy who was very likely saving your life, he figured.

Damon swam for another five minutes or so, with the music getting louder as they progressed, until suddenly a dark shape appeared in the fog in front of them. "There it is!" he grinned.

"You really are the luckiest motherfucker alive!" Ryan marveled. "But I'm very glad you are. You can let me go, I can swim this last bit."

Damon let go of his friend, and together they swam towards the boat. Ryan got up on the diver's aid behind the rear deck with a quick skip, but he had to bend down to hoist Damon—who suddenly looked utterly exhausted—on board.

"Thanks," Damon groaned weakly as he collapsed on the rear deck.

"That's about the least I can do," Ryan said sincerely. "Didn't you say you'd found the boat already when you heard me cough?"

Damon nodded, gasping for breath.

"So why did you swim back, rather than getting on board and coming back for me with the boat?"

Damon gave him a wry smile. "Because I have no idea how to get it going."

Ryan stared at him in disbelief. "But... what were you gonna do if it'd just been you out here then?"

"Either figure it out, or I'd have gotten what I came for, waited for the fog to lift, then I'd have swum back."

"What you came for?"

"Yeah," Damon said, slowly getting up. He waved off Ryan's offer of help, and he made his way down into the cabin. He grabbed a bottle of water while he was down there, gulping it down, then he got the bag out of the small cupboard. His spirit soared when he looked inside it. It was going to be a great day after all!

When he came back upstairs, Ryan was getting everything up and running again. "Did you get it?" Ryan asked.

Damon nodded, holding up the velvet bag.

"You went back for a damn bag?!"

"No. I went back for this," Damon said, opening the bag and letting Ryan look inside.

"Oh!" Ryan said, clearly surprised. "That looks fucking expensive!"

"Yeah," Damon grinned. "Fourteen grand."

"Holy shit! So were you planning to do it on this trip?"

"Yeah. This morning, in fact."

"Well, I guess you still got time!"

"As long as she's not too pissed at me."

"I figure that when we show up with the boat, they'll all be pretty happy," Ryan said with a big grin. He fired up the engines, and the deep, vibrating rumble made both of them feel pretty thankful.

"So did you figure out why it just took off?" Damon asked.

"Yeah... it seems I forgot to actually lock the anchor in place," Ryan said sheepishly.

"Oh, good job, captain!" Damon grinned.

"Ah, just blow me!" Ryan laughed.

They sat there for a few moments, with Ryan looking around a bit in confusion. He finally turned back to Damon. "So, eh... which way is the island again?"

*** ***

It was a few hours later when the guys arrived back at the bay. The girls were sitting around the remnants of the bonfire, and they began jumping up and down as soon as they saw the boat.

Rather than receive a hero's welcome, however, Ryan and Damon were in for a surprise when they waded back through the bay after having sailed the boat straight into the entrance. Ryan made sure the anchor was secured that time.

Amanda's face was devastated, obviously from crying for hours on end. She ran up to Damon when he waded out of the water, but instead of kissing him or flying in his arms, she began punching him, her small fists flailing away. "You... asshole! I thought you were dead!" she screamed at him.

Siara's response to Ryan was even more direct. She just walked up to him, slapped him in the face, then stormed off. He stared after her for a few moments before he ran off after her.

Damon let Amanda hit him without defending himself. His heart nearly broke to see how much grief he'd caused her, even though there wasn't really anything he could have done. She kept punching him for nearly a minute before she finally collapsed into the sand, weeping pitiably.

He knelt down beside her, taking her into his arms. "I'm so sorry, sweetheart. We found the boat pretty quickly, but we couldn't find our way back because of the fog. We had to wait for it to clear off most of the way first, because we were worried we'd run it ashore."

Amanda just cried, clutching his arm frantically, her face buried in the crook of his elbow.

"Why did you even go after it?" Kelsey asked. Her face showed she'd been crying no less than Amanda had, though she seemed to be handling her brother's return slightly better than her lover was. "Ryan said they'd find us eventually."

He gave his gorgeous sister an apologetic smile. "I'll explain in a little while, okay?"

She nodded, then she dropped to her knees beside the two of them, wrapping them both in a huge hug. A second later, Carynne and Stacey flopped down beside them too, and for the next ten minutes they all just took comfort in each other's company.

Ryan and Siara came back awhile later, obviously having made up. Damon was still holding Amanda, and she was still clinging to him like her life depended on it, as if she was afraid that if she let him go, he'd vanish again. She finally stopped crying after he'd spent the entire time apologizing to her.

"I was so scared," she said softly. "We figured Ryan would catch up with you, and the two of you would just come back. Then, when you didn't, we thought you'd go to the boat, and you'd be back in like fifteen minutes or so."

"I'm sorry for scaring you, baby," he said earnestly. "But even I can't swim a mile that fast."

She glowered at him, trying her best not to laugh. He just gave her his biggest goofy grin, and she began to struggle, finally bursting out into a giggle. "You jerk!"

He grinned at her, and she climbed into his lap, facing him. She locked her hands into his hair and kissed him so hard it felt like she was trying to devour him alive. He kissed her back just as hard, hating that he'd put her through so much grief.

Everyone around them was smiling at the two of them, and when Amanda finally let up, Kelsey came over and hugged her brother, kissing him on the cheeks several times. "You may have made up with Amanda, but I need some making up too. You can get that to me when we're by ourselves," she whispered in his ear.

Damon just grinned at her, giving her a wink.

"Okay, so what happened?" Stacey asked.

"Well, I couldn't catch up with Damon, so we both just kept going..." Ryan began, relating the events of the past few hours. When he came to the part where Damon came back to get him, Damon blushed fiercely and tried to shake it off, but Ryan exaggerated as much as possible, insisting that Damon had basically saved his life.

The girls all smiled at Damon, and Siara crawled over to him and just gave him a huge kiss. "Thank you," she said softly.

Damon nodded at her, his blush just growing even larger, much to Kelsey's and Amanda's delight.

"I know you said you found the boat because of the radio still being on, but how did you find Ryan?" Carynne asked.

"Because he was coughing so loudly," Damon said with a small shrug. "Sound carries quite far in the fog, and he was barking like a dog with pneumonia."

Ryan threw a rock at him, causing the girls to giggle.

"Anyways, once the fog finally cleared off enough so we could see where we were going, we found the bay again, and here we are," Ryan finished the story, smiling proudly.

"So basically you were ballast for Damon while he went and saved the boat?" Siara asked, her eyebrows raised mockingly.

"Hey!" Ryan said, sounding hurt. "I sailed it back!"

The girls again giggled.

"Okay, enough stalling," Kelsey said, giving her brother a penetrating stare. "Why did you go back? You didn't care about the boat that much, did you?"

Damon got up, and he fished the velvet bag out of his pocket. "No. I went back for this. Or rather, what's in it."

Everyone looked at him expectantly, until Kelsey finally blurted out, "Are you going to show us or what?"

He looked at Amanda, smiling at his gorgeous girlfriend. He reached down towards her, and she took his hand and quickly got up, coming to stand in front of him.

"Amanda, I love you so much," he began hesitantly. He swallowed a few times, then continued, "I'm sorry that I scared you so badly, and it's kind of ironic that I did that really just because of how much I love you."

She gave him a small smile, obviously not understanding what he was getting at.

"The past year of my life has been incredible, because of you. Falling in love with you, and having you love me, is the best thing that has ever happened to me. I honestly don't know what I would ever do without you anymore, and I never, ever want to have to find out. I want to go to college with you, I want to live with you, I want to grow old with you. Without you, I'm nothing."

Tears started welling up in Amanda's eyes, and she bit her lower lip to keep from crying, though her efforts weren't very successful.

He lowered his voice a little, making sure the next bit was for her benefit only. "I know we've both still been worried about our decision regarding others, and what it will mean for our relationship. I promised you I wouldn't let it affect us, and I meant it when I made that promise. You are my number one, and you always will be, no matter what happens."