Maya spent the next twenty minutes scanning the water with each flash of lightning. The sloshing water and the rain made the task difficult. Everything was hazy at best, but she focused hard on the water in front of her. After maybe two dozen more flashes, she hadn’t caught sight of it again.
A part of her wanted to tell Paige what she’d seen. But Paige was looking worse and worse. Not only was she pale, but her lips were definitely blue now. She looked sick—like she had pretty bad case of the flu—and her eyes were fluttering as if she were actively trying to keep them from closing. The last thing she needed was to find out there might be a shark in the water. Besides, Maya had only seen it for a brief second. She didn’t want to worry her friend over nothing.
She stared hard, scanning the water to the best of her ability, but Maya didn’t see the fin again. She remembered what Paige had told her on their way to Ripper’s Cove—the news about the windsurfer who’d been attacked by a bull shark not long ago.
I’m just imagining things, she told herself. The idea of a shark was planted in her mind, and now she was just projecting the image onto something harmless in the water. I saw driftwood or some kid’s arm floatie. Nature wouldn’t be cruel enough to make this situation worse. She almost believed herself, but she continued to scan the water for the fin. Sooner or later, they were going to have to make their way across the waves and onto land. She wanted to be as sure as possible that there wasn’t a dangerous predator blocking their path.
It took what felt like at least an hour, but eventually the lightning flashes became less frequent. The rain began to get lighter, the sky turned from almost pitch black to a deep gray, and the wind began to die down.
“Okay, I think it’s safe,” Maya said. “I’m going to go for it.”
Paige didn’t respond.
“Paige?” Maya said, looking to her friend. Paige was unconscious, lying motionless beneath the surfboard. “Paige!” Maya shouted, shaking her gently. Paige didn’t wake up. Sometime during the storm, she must have passed out from pain or exhaustion. Either way, Maya needed to get her medical attention as soon as possible. Maya ran into the water, jumped on her board, and began paddling as fast as she could. Normally, she would have surfed into the shore, but this was no time to take unnecessary risks. She was far past the point where she and Paige had agreed to bail off their boards for fear of hitting the rocks below. She’d paddle until she could run.
It wasn’t easy. Her head felt as though it was full of cotton and the water wasn’t helping much either. There were still some swells and waves that Maya didn’t anticipate. They threatened to push her off the board, or at the very least, farther down the coast.
Just get to the phone. Just get to the phone. Just get to the phone, she kept repeating in her mind. Her heart was racing, and she was tired and cold, but she could deal with all that later—after she got Paige the help she needed.
Maya paddled harder than she had ever done in her life. As soon as she got close enough that she could touch the bottom, she got up, picked up her board, and sprinted to where she saw their bags. The towels were gone, and one of Paige’s shoes had vanished, having blown away in the storm, but the bags had miraculously stayed put.
Kneeling down, she undid her ankle leash and dug in her bag to get her phone. She tried to unlock her phone, but nothing happened. The screen stayed dark. Maybe it turned off, she desperately hoped. She held down on the power button, but still, nothing happened.
“No, no, no, no, no!” she shouted out loud without meaning to. It must have gotten too wet in the rain!
She tossed it back into her bag and began digging in Paige’s bag for her phone. She hit the power button, but just like with the first phone, nothing happened.
Maya didn’t know whether she wanted to scream or cry. Maybe both. She took a few deep breaths to force her mind to slow down. Home. Her parents. It would take nearly thirty minutes, but her parents should be there. They could call an ambulance, the Coast Guard, someone. Maya didn’t like the idea of leaving Paige out there alone, but there weren’t any other options at this point.
Maya looked at her friend lying on the sandbar. She felt like she was forgetting something, some pivotal danger that she hadn’t accounted for. There was some reason she couldn’t leave her friend lying there while she ran for help.
The tide! Maya’s mind screamed.
It would come in soon, which meant the water level near shore would be rising. It was approaching late afternoon, and within a couple of hours, the sandbar would be completely underwater. Even if Paige wasn’t already unconscious, she had a badly broken leg. She wouldn’t be able to tread water very well, much less swim to shore.
Every muscle in Maya’s body ached, but she gritted her teeth, strapped the ankle leash back on, and headed toward the water. She had to bring Paige back to shore. As painful as this will be for me, it’s going to be worse for Paige, she told herself as she ran back out into the waves.
She got on the board and started paddling. Her body wanted so badly to rest, but she continued.
She caught a glimpse of something out of the corner of her eye. It was about forty feet from her. It sliced through the water briefly before dipping under again.
Maya felt her heart skip a beat as she remembered the fin she thought she saw during the storm. She sat up on her board and stayed perfectly still. Maybe it was just her mind playing tricks on her again. There wasn’t anything there, just driftwood.
A seagull landed on the water and started cleaning its wing with its beak right where Maya thought she had seen the shark. She stared at it hard.
The bull shark leaped out of the water and attacked the bird so quickly that Maya flinched and fell off her board and into the water. When she resurfaced, the bird was gone, but a single feather was floating on the water where it had been.
Maya scrambled back on her board so quickly she surprised even herself. Back above the water and safely on her surfboard, she turned and started paddling as fast as she could back to the shore. The second she could run, she did, sprinting like her life depended on it—back onto the rocks of Ripper’s Cove, back onto dry land where that creature couldn’t get her.
She’d only seen it for a second, but she saw it clearly. Not only was it a bull shark, it was a full-grown adult—much bigger than even the ones at the zoo. Maya tried to control her breathing. Adrenaline was pumping through her body, and she realized she was shaking.
Just then, the shark’s dorsal fin appeared again. It cut through the water halfway between the coast and the sandbar. It was patrolling the waters between Maya and the spot where Paige lay helplessly on the ever-shrinking sandbar.