Page 5 of Loving Roman
I glance around and see that one of the boys has removed his jacket and is balancing on the edge of his kayak. The boy in front is trying to coax him to sit and follow the rules laid out by our guide.
“Hey, take a seat and put your life jacket back on!” Brenton calls, causing the kid to spin around and lose his balance.
He topples into the water as his friend shouts his name, then frantically looks around. “Fuck, he can’t swim!”
Damn it! I rip off my life jacket and drop into the water, careful not to rock the kayak too much and send Alice into the bay. We don’t need two people who can’t swim floundering in the water. With powerful strokes, I swim to where the kid fell in and, after taking a deep breath, dive under the water, thankful my job requires me to have my lifeguard certification among several other certifications.
I locate the kid and drag him to the surface by the back of his T-shirt. He’s not moving, which is concerning. When I breach the surface, Brenton is waiting in his kayak and helps me to position the teenager across the deck so we can get him to shore quickly and get him the help he needs.
“Are you okay, sir?” Brenton checks with me.
“Yeah. You’d better head into shore. I’ll follow.”
He nods sharply, and then surges through the water at speed. The other college kids follow him in, worried looks clouding their faces, and I swim to Alice and carefully climb into our kayak, so we can follow suit.
“Are you okay?” Alice asks, her eyes wide and breaths coming fast.
“Yeah, I’m okay.” I grab the paddle and drag it through the water swiftly to get us moving.
“Oh my gosh. Everything happened so fast. He was in the water, then you were in the water. I didn’t even realize what was going on at first until that boy was shouting that his friend couldn’t swim. He’s lucky you acted so quickly.”
4
–alice–
My chest risesand falls rapidly with each breath of air I draw into my lungs, and my heart feels as though it’s going to beat its way out of my chest. Thanks to Roman, we swiftly glide through the water, taking no time at all to reach the shore. We’ve barely stopped moving before he’s leaping out of our kayak, dragging it onto the sand, and heading for the boy who fell into the water. For a big guy, he moves fluidly, his muscles shifting and moving beneath his T-shirt with ease.
I still can’t make sense of what happened. The college kids were fooling around, shouting and laughing. Then I heard a splash, a shout, and before I knew what was going on, Roman was tossing aside his life jacket and jumping into the water, almost tipping our kayak as he dropped over the edge and making my heart race with fear that I’d also fall in.
He didn’t pause for a moment. Not even our guide reacted as quickly as Roman did.
Roman flicks his brown hair out of his eyes, sending droplets of water flying around him as he falls to his knees near the boy. I gather my wits and climb out of the kayak, then grabmy phone from our dry bag so I can call for an ambulance with shaky hands.
“9-1-1, what’s your emergency?”
I explain everything that’s happened and where we are, and the woman on the other end of the phone assures me an ambulance is on its way. I stay on the line, explaining everything that’s happening while Roman turns the teenager on his side as water spurts out of the boy’s mouth, causing him to cough violently. I glance around at the other teenagers and watch their shoulders sag with relief. This could have turned out to be a tragic vacation for the group—one they’d remember for the rest of their lives for the wrong reasons.
One boy steps forward, pushing his fingers through his curly hair. “What the fuck, man? We thought you were dead.”
The boy on the beach tries to sit up, but Roman gently pushes on his shoulder to keep him prone. “Hang on. You need to be checked over. You could still drown.” The boy turns whiter than he already is, and his eyes widen with fear.
I notice a patch of blood on the back of his head, matting his blond hair. “Roman.” He looks up at me, and I point at the boy, moving closer as I do. “He’s bleeding.”
Roman leans over to study the wound. “That explains why he was unresponsive when I found him in the water.”
A siren sounds in the distance, growing louder by the second, and Brenton climbs to his feet to meet the paramedics so he can show them where we are to prevent any delays. I let the dispatch officer know the ambulance has arrived and hang up. By the time the paramedics have the boy loaded into the back of the ambulance, his friends have dispersed to follow him to the local hospital, leaving Roman, Brenton, and me to collect and store the kayaks.
“I’m really sorry our tour got cut short,” Brenton apologizes for the fifth time.
Both Roman and I wave him off. “Things happen.”
“At least let me refund your money or book you on the tour for another day,” he offers.
I glance at Roman to see what he wants to do, though I don’t know why I’m deferring to him for guidance. It was a coincidence that we were on this tour together and sharing a kayak.
He looks at me and shrugs. “Do you have time to do this again?”
Butterflies erupt in my stomach that he would like to see me again after I blew him off this morning. But after watching him take charge, I feel more comfortable spending time with him. “Sure. I’d like that.”
