Rory yelled, “Backpaddle!” We gladly did—for a blissful second, I thought we were going to bag this one—then he called out, “Oars up! Lean back!” We dropped down onto the smooth pate of stone with a flapping sound, my heels hitting hard even through the rubber. We skimmed over the thing for what felt like a full minute, headed straight down.
Just before the front of the raft slammed into the pool, Rory shouted, “Everybody lean right! Now!” He lurched forward, grabbed the line, and leaned, pulling right with all his weight. Commanded to do the same, so did we.
And then I was drowning.
17
It was almost peaceful, those first few seconds under the water. Certainly quieter than above. Stunned by the cold, I couldn’t comprehend where I was. I watched my dead-white hands grope in front of my face as bubbles escaped my mouth and floated upward to a sun that shimmered yellow and wavy through the water. That’s what I saw, but my mind’s eye held the picture of Rory riding the side of the raft, cowboy-style, hooting and waving his oar until he and the four of us came tumbling down into black water.
I realized where I was. Punched my fists upward, opened them, and hauled the water back, aiming toward the squiggle of golden light, but it was cut by shadow, as if a storm cloud had drifted over the sun. Still I shot up through dark water, lungs screaming for air. I bulleted up and out and smacked the top of my head on something hard, coughing up river water that tasted of iron and moss and fish. I took a breath. Treaded water that lapped at my neck. A stink of wet canvas, rubber. Panicking, I whipped around in my tiny space trying to figure out why our tent was bobbing in front of me, soaked but still strapped onto other gear that hung at odd angles in the water.
I had come up underneath our upside-down raft.
The dry box came at me fast, and I realized the raft was moving, pushed by the current, so I filled my lungs and dunked down, feeling my way along its undersides to the rim, where I pulled myself up and into daylight.
Coughing and sputtering, Pia, Sandra, and Rachel bobbed in the eddy that scythed the bank. Yards away, the skull rock rose up white and round, as though the moon had sunk itself halfway into the river. Rope in hand, Rory side-stroked to a slice of shore where the beards of ancient cedars hung down in tangled knots. He pulled himself out by a drowned branch, tied up the raft, then slipped off his helmet and shook his head like a dog.
“Whoa, ladies! Great job!”
Rachel dragged herself up the bank and sat, breathing heavily. Soaking wet, she looked scrappy and capable. Pia stayed treading water in the relatively calm portion of the eddy, while Sandra and I swam past her.
“Why did we do that?” Rachel’s voice was laced with disgust. “Why did we lean right?”
Rory un-Velcro-ed a vest pocket and pulled out a 3 Musketeers bar stashed in a Ziploc bag. Offered it to her. She shook her head and waved him away.
“So we could flip,” he said through a mouthful of nougat.
Sandra pulled herself up onto the bank, hacking and shivering. She took off her helmet and emptied it of river water, her hair oddly wedge-shaped on one side, flat to her skull on the other.
“You’ve got to be fucking kidding me.” Rachel examined her miraculously unbroken glasses before strapping them back on. “What the hell is wrong with you? We could have all drowned!”
Rory straightened, puffed out a bit. “Hey, man, chill. We’re all still here.”
“This is nuts,” I said as I hauled myself up onto the shore, feet squelching in my thin rubber shoes. “I came up under the raft! Under it!”
“And you got out, right? Just like we talked about in training? Remember, we went over a bunch of different scenarios.”
Pia pulled herself handily up and onto the bank, removed her helmet, and wrung out her hair, accepting the half a candy bar he offered her. Smiling, she lifted a wet dread out of his eye and tucked it behind one ear. He moved closer to her.
Rachel took a step toward him and raised her hand. I thought she was going to hit him, but she jabbed at his chest with her finger. “You are an irresponsible child, and I am going to report you when we get back, do you hear me?”
He calmly finished the chocolate and crushed the wrapper in his hand. “Listen, this isn’t Disney World—”
“Yeah, we get that,” Rachel spat back.
“I just made you more safe, not less safe, get it?”
“No, I don’t.” She turned to Sandra, who was trying to unwedge her hair with her hands. “Do you get it, Loo?”
She shook her head and feigned interest in the sky and the trees as if this was a battle she had zero interest in taking on. “Nope. Not at all.”
“This raft—any raft—flips, and when it does, you have to be prepared. You get no warning. You need to always be ready to be upside down and in that water. So you just had a little practice, okay? Some awesome real-life experience, not some bullshit talk.”