In complete agreement, I laid the two trays down on the blanket between us and picked up my beer.
“Cheers,” I said, holding it up and clinking it to her wine glass. “Here’s to me not killing you today at the beach, so we get to enjoy this evening together.”
She smiled shyly as we both drank.
“I keep telling you, it wasn’t your fault,” she said.
“I know, but it really freaked you out, and I’m sorry for that. Kind of ruined the mood, didn’t it?”
“Yeah, it did.”
She rested her wine glass on the blanket beside her, and the vibe noticeably changed.
“Can I ask you something?” she asked, looking up at me sombrely.
“Go for it.”
“You said before that you’ve been dumped by a few waves yourself.”
“Kinda par for the course when you’ve been surfing as long as I have.”
“So, have you ever had a… moment, like a… I don’t know,” she shook her head, giving up. “Never mind, it doesn’t matter.”
“No, go on – I’m intrigued now. What kind of moment?”
She sighed, picking up a battered mussel and nibbling on it half-heartedly. “I don’t really know how to explain it. I just felt like, when I was down there, under the water, it was like I was seeing things… or something. I don’t know.”
“What kind of things?” I frowned, not really grasping the concept, although the look on her face was making the hair on the back of my neck stand on end.
“I’m not sure,” she said quietly, staring at the mussel in her hand, turning it over and over, as if trying to decide whether to eat it or not. “I could’ve sworn that I saw faces, but I don’t know. It was weird.”
The air seemed to hush around us. Even the waves seemed to quieten down.
“So that’s why you were so freaked out when I pulled you out?”
She nodded, her cheeks tinged pink.
“Why didn’t you tell me?”
“Because I didn’t want you to think I was crazy,” she shrugged. “And because I don’t really know what happened. It was almost like some kind of out-of-body experience or something.”
I didn’t like the sound of that. It made it sound like I’d come close to losing her.
“I know I thought I was going to die,” she said. “Maybe I was closer than I realised.”
I felt a chill suddenly, like a cold hand reaching in through my ribcage from behind and squeezing my heart.
“God, don’t say that,” I shuddered. “It’s giving me the heebies.”
She looked over at me, the sun lighting up her eyelashes as though they were blonde, not brown. Her eyes themselves seemed to glow.
“Maybe you saved my life,” she said. Then she smiled tentatively. “Maybe I should’ve bought you dinner, not the other way around.”
Jesus, when she smiled like that, I just wanted the world to disappear and leave us here, like this, together. With the light just like this, the breeze keeping us warm, the ocean lapping not far from us.
I gave myself a mental shake, glancing down at our dinner, getting cold between us. “Next time. In the meantime, we better eat this, don’t you think?”
She took another bite of the mussel in her hand and I picked up a piece of battered fish.
“Thank you for this,” she said. “It’s just what I needed.”
“You’re welcome,” I smiled.
It’d been a while since I felt this lucky. Lucky to be here, with her. Lucky that the evening was so pleasant. Lucky that we got the chance to do this. Life seemed to be more and more about chances lately. Seeing them, missing them, making the most of them.
I found myself doing most of the talking, but she seemed interested enough, laughing in all the right places. I loved her laugh. It was quiet, melodic, understated. The more time I spent with her, the more I wanted to hear it. She was very adept at dodging questions about herself. She asked more than she answered, sitting back and letting me do the talking. That was going to have to change pretty soon. My curiosity was building.
I came to the end of my story and she smiled at me. It was that smile that was unhinging me. It was an odd mix of familiar and challenging at the same time. As if she was inviting me to do something, say something, feel something. Every time she smiled, I could feel myself letting go of the past, little by little. She was taking me outside of myself, outside of my life, or at least the one I was living until she came along.
“It really is a beautiful spot,” she said, watching a small boat crawling past silently, so far away the engine noise was lost in the waves. “It feels like we’re alone in the universe, doesn’t it? So quiet, peaceful.”
It was almost as if she had read my mind.
“Sometimes, all you need is a little bit of peace and quiet and suddenly you feel like you can face the world again,” I said, speaking from experience. “I know a few places like this, where you can go to get away from everything for a while.”
She turned back to me. “Do you surf, out here?”
“Here? Sometimes, not often. It’s more for swimming.”