The Overboard Mistake by Elana Johnson

Author:Elana Johnson
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: AEJ Creative Works

CHAPTER 10

Justin refused to focus further than ten feet in front of him. He didn’t want to see the way the waves crashed over the break, couldn’t stand to let himself doubt that they couldn’t get away from this island.

Guilt pulled through him with the sharpness of a fishhook, and he had to make things right. He had to get them back to civilization.

He pulled against the water, wishing it would just relax for one minute. Sixty seconds. Then he could get them over the break and back out into the open ocean. He’d have to row a lot to get them back where they needed to be, but he could do it.

Sure, his muscles burned already, and the four days without adequate nutrition certainly wasn’t helping. But he was going to do this. He’d been in difficult and trying situations before. He’d spent two days in a hole in the desert, for crying out loud. He’d spent sixty hours confined in a submarine.

He could get them over this break and back to Maui. He could, and he would. Justin had a mental space where he went when things were tough as a SEAL. He just needed to get inside that space, and he’d be fine.

So he only looked ten feet in front of him. He took each swell as it came, and he ignored the pain in his shoulders and arms. There would be time for pain later. Right now, he needed to get them over the break.

“Get in the bottom of the boat,” he commanded when he saw the whitewater ahead. The break. “Now.”

Thankfully, Iris didn’t contradict him. Didn’t argue. She just got down. She held onto two of their coconuts and steadied herself in the boat. He dug his feet into the bench in front of him, using every ounce of strength he had.

“One time,” he grunted. He would get them over the very first time. If he didn’t…well, he wasn’t sure he had the strength to try again.

The water pushed him back violently, and he stroked against it, coming up to the break before the next wave. Halfway there, the waves pounded the boat back again. He groaned as he strained against an ocean full of water, but he could see paradise just on the other side of the break.

Three more strokes. Then two. Then one.

He made them quickly, pulling, pulling, pulling them over and into the open water.

Relief hit him, and Iris said, “Justin, you’re a beast,” but he didn’t stop. The waves were still coming, and he didn’t need them shoved back into the rocks and getting their boat smashed to smithereens.

He yanked on one side, putting the boat parallel to the break and he rowed as quickly as he could. He didn’t realize how much noise he was making until Iris said, “We’re clear, Justin.”

“We’re not,” he said, still desperate to get farther from the break. “Those waves can take us right back to it.”

“But we won’t go over.”

“We could lose our boat,” he said, still positioning the boat where he wanted it.

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