chapter FIFTEEN
I looked up and down the other bank. Nothing. My eyes scanned the surface of the water — there was no sign of him. The unreality of it was overwhelming. I felt like something in my brain had slipped and shifted: I was alone, Spider had never existed, because if he had, how could he have disappeared like that?
Suddenly, away to my left, there was an extra movement in the swirling water. Something broke the surface — a knee, an elbow, or something. Spider was about a hundred feet away already, being swept along in the current. I started running down the bank. Different bits of him were visible as the water turned him around like a rag doll — his arm, his back, the back of his head — but not his face. His face stayed underwater.
I was panicking, running as fast as I could. Branches along the bank whipped me as I ducked and dived my way through. I got level with him, screaming and running at the same time. He couldn’t hear me. I looked wildly around for something to reach him with. I pulled at a long branch, trying to break it off, but I wasn’t strong enough. He was away from me again. The thought of him helpless, breathing in water, made my own breath nearly stop. This wasn’t meant to happen. His number, 12152010, it wasn’t for a week yet. What the hell was going on? I started running again.
I got thirty, forty feet ahead of him. There was no one around. No one and nothing to help us. I had no choice now. I plunged down the bank and into the water. It wasn’t just the cold that shocked me, it was the strength of it. The river buffeted at my legs with terrifying force. It was only up to my thighs, but it was all I could do to stay on my feet. Down at that level, it was more difficult to see where Spider was. I searched the water frantically, and at last got a glimpse of a dark shape heading toward me. He was going to pass to my left; I had to go toward the other side or he’d slip right past me. I started wading across, but the water was getting deeper. I was so slow, grunting with frustration. Spider was only a few feet away now — damn it, I was going to miss him. I lunged forward. I was there, but my feet were on slime, and as Spider’s body came barreling into me, I lost my footing and went down into the water, too.
Everything was mixed up now — up and down, water and air, Spider and me. Even as I thrashed around, I held on to his hoodie. Whatever happened to us now, it was going to happen to us together — I wasn’t going to let go of him for anything. When my face broke the surface I gulped down some air. I kicked my feet around, desperately trying to find the river bottom, but the current was relentless. Spider was like a dead weight, bumping into me, pushing me under. I wanted to straighten him out, get his head above water, but it was hopeless. It was all I could do to find some air myself. Still holding Spider, I got onto my back, so that my face was upward. I tried to flip him over, too, but I couldn’t manage to. We were carried downstream, ’round a couple of bends. I was just wondering if we were going to carry on like this until we got to the ocean, when there was a sickening scraping feeling down my back, and I jarred suddenly to a stop. The jolt made me lose my grip on Spider for a second, but I grabbed him again.
We’d both stopped moving. The river coursed on around us, but we were wedged on some sort of stony bar, sticking out from one bank into the river. Spider was lying facedown on top of my legs. I hauled him off me and over onto his back, then gripped him under his armpits and pulled him up the sandy spit of land and out of the water. He was heavy, a lifeless weight. I knelt next to him, looking at him with disbelief. His eyes were shut. He was gone.
This was all wrong — so, so wrong. It wasn’t meant to be like this.
“Spider, wake up!” I yelled. “Wake up!” Nothing. “Wake up! You can’t f*cking leave me! You can’t do this!” I brought my fist down on his chest in sheer frustration. His mouth fell open and water trickled out.
I drew myself up, leaned over him, and pushed both my palms down hard into his stomach. More water came out. I did it again. And again. And again. Suddenly, a plume of water spurted out of him, like a whale’s spout, and he made the most godawful noise I’d ever heard as he drew a massive breath into his waterlogged body.
I’d sprung away from him with the surprise of the water, and I just sat back on my heels for a while, watching his chest rise and fall on its own. He opened his eyes and seemed to be trying to focus, then he said, “What you crying for? What’s up with you?”
I hadn’t realized I was crying, but when I wiped my hand across my face there were hot tears and snot there.
“Nothing,” I said. “I’m happy.”
He closed his eyes and opened them again. “I don’t get it. What’s going on?”
“You fell in the water. I got you out.”
“Right,” he said, “that’s why I’m all cold and wet, then. I don’t remember a thing. I thought we were walking through a field and then suddenly I’m flat on my back, soaking wet, and you’re crying — sorry, happy.” He started to sit up, looking around him like he’d just landed from another planet. “Here, you’re all wet, too,” he said, then a big grin slowly spread across his face. “You didn’t give me the kiss of life, did you?”
“No. Shut up.”
“You did, didn’t you?”
“No! I squashed your stomach down until the water came out, but I wish I hadn’t now, you bloody moron.”
He reached over to me and ran his hand over my shaved head, the smile fading away as the situation sunk in. “You saved me. You saved my life. Jesus, Jem, I owe you big time, man.”
I shrugged him off.
“Forget about it. I just did what anyone would’ve.”
“There isn’t anyone else here, though, is there? There was only you. Only you could’ve saved me. And you did.”
“Just drop it, alright? It’s not a big deal. Look, at least we’re on the right side of the river now. We just need to walk back to our stuff. Get some dry clothes. I’m f*cking freezing.” It was true. I was shivering violently, and so was Spider.
We helped each other to our feet, staggered up the bank, and trudged upstream again. Spider was in front, like usual, but he kept stopping and looking back at me, then smiling, shaking his head, and carrying on. And all the time my mind was racing double-time. So, the numbers were right after all. It wasn’t his day today. But if I hadn’t been there, surely he would have drowned — he was nearly dead when I dragged him out of the water. Spider knew it: I had saved him. I’d kept him alive.
My head was spinning now. What if he’d been meant to die today, but I’d made things turn out different? For the last couple of weeks, I’d felt guilty about the old tramp. I’d never meant to hurt him, but there was no escaping it: It felt like we’d chased him into the road. But perhaps the numbers were a two-edged sword. What if I didn’t just have a hand in causing death — what if I could save lives, too? And if I had saved Spider today, could I save him on the fifteenth?