I Hope You Find Me (3 page)

Hundreds of suitcases and bags littered the
entryway, haphazardly strewn about the sidewalk. Someone had
written on the wall in bright red spray paint:
NO MORE BUSES.
PLEASE GO HOME.

One peek through the glass doors told me no
one was alive inside. Bodies were slumped shoulder to shoulder up
against each other. Some people sat and others lay slumped on the
floor under blue blankets. My heart sank as I noticed all the
parents that had died with their arms cradled around small
children. A dark grey stroller lay empty, turned onto its side with
the contents of a pink and yellow polka-dotted diaper bag dumped
out onto the ground. I kept my hand clasped tightly around my nose,
trying to ignore the smell from the building until I saw a police
officer who sat awkwardly on the linoleum leaning against a wooden
desk, a gun in his hand, and dried blood caked along the side of
his lowered head, and my stomach lurched.

I turned around so quickly that I tumbled
over a red and black suitcase, and just before I landed on all
fours, watery vomit flew from my mouth ungraciously, splattering
against the pale sidewalk. I shook and lurched until I was sure I
would heave my stomach lining out onto the dirty concrete. Zoey
whined at my side, unsure of what to do and dodged away from me as
I stumbled to my feet, swaying a bit before turning my back on the
depot.

I didn’t look back as we continued on to the
Bay. I walked slowly, taking each step deliberately, wanting to
run, but knowing that if I did my knees would buckle underneath me
and send me face first onto the concrete. Even though I willed my
nerves to calm down, and told myself I was going to be fine, my
body betrayed me. I was shaking with fear from the inside out.

CHAPTER TWO

I sat on the edge of the narrow wooden dock
with my naked feet dangling slowly over the water. I left my bra
and underwear on, as if the small amount of clothing would protect
me from the cold. For a bit I listened to the creak of the nearby
boats as they gently bobbed in the murky water, every so often
leaning into their dock slips with a groan or a sigh.

When my shoulders felt warm from the sun I
knew it was time to jump in. The challenge would be getting the dog
to go with me. We could have just climbed across the rocks and
walked right into the water, but the dog hated baths…even if I
carried her in and kept her leashed, she would drag me out, or die
trying. Anyhow, the bay water near the shore looked disgusting.

But at the end of one of the small boat piers
there was nothing but water, she would have to swim a bit before
escaping to dry land – which is exactly what I wanted. The only way
I’d be able to rinse her off properly would be to haul her into the
deep water and be able to keep her there long enough to scrub the
bubbles out of her thick coat. At the time, it seemed like a good
plan. She stood peevishly at my feet, her thick dark coat lathered
thickly with shampoo. I was prepared for her to hate me
forever.

She put as much distance between us as she
could, fully aware that I had leashed her for a reason she wouldn’t
like. When I pushed off the pier with the strap wrapped around my
hand I tried to sound happy as I said, “Jump, girl!” but my words
lost their breath when the cold water cut into my core like
ice.

It started at my feet, and quickly spread up
my legs into my torso…a painful stinging sensation, like I was
being jabbed everywhere with thousands of angry needles. For one
very terrifying second, I was sure I was being stung by jellyfish,
and I thrashed at the water around me until I realized the pain was
simply from the cold water.

I managed to close my mouth after gasping for
air just before my head slipped under. The last thing I heard was
Zoey’s nails scraping along the edge of the pier as she tried to
pull against the taut strap. She crashed, indecorously, directly on
top of my head, feet pummeling, struggling to find something to
stand on. I let her kick circles around me while I struggled to
open the shampoo bottle I dove in with, and pour it all over my
hair. I washed what I could, and did my best to rinse the dog’s
head before swimming back to the ladder to heave myself out. I made
the mistake of taking the leash off my wrist and suddenly, Zoey was
gone.

I spun around in the water and saw her
swimming away from the dock, deeper into the bay. I pushed off the
ladder with enough force that I felt it rattle underneath my hand.
I struggled to catch up to the dog.

“Zoey!” I tried calling for her, but soft
waves of water lapped over my face as I swam, and I mostly choked
out her name.

She doggy-paddled further out to sea, clearly
terrified, not aware that she was swimming away from the shore,
rather than closer to it, and with each stroke of my arms, the
water became colder beneath me as if a giant hole had opened up
somewhere in the depths below. I fought back the urge to panic at
the thought of what could be swimming freely just a few feet
beneath me.

“Stop!” I yelled, “Zoey, come here!”

Eventually she turned and saw me, and made an
awkward and slow turn back in my direction. The gentle waves
splashed against my face and into my ears as I tread the water,
waiting for her. As soon as she was within touching distance, I
reached for her leash and secured it to my hand again.

“Damn dog.” I said, as my body trembled
violently. “I don’t want to drown out here, let’s go.” I tugged on
the leash and she began swimming next to me, her dark eyes rimmed
red from the ocean water and an almost comical expression of fear
in her gaze.

By the time we got back to the dock, I was
certain I swallowed an unsafe amount of saltwater during my
struggle with the dog, and the impromptu swim had taken most of my
strength. The cold was debilitating; I was shivering so hard my
teeth were banging together, and my legs felt like solid lead.

Climbing back up the ladder seemed almost
impossible with my semi-frozen limbs but I reached up anyway and
gripped the rough metal for support. My hands were numb as I
slumped my forehead up against the first metal rung in frustration.
Zoey barked beside me, treading the water in tight circles. As my
fingers tightly gripped the frame, I willed myself to pull up and
get the hell out of the water. With my eyes closed, I raised one
hand up at a time. By the third rung I couldn’t feel my fingers
anymore so I hung there unable to move up as my legs floated in the
water below me, my knees pressed into the ladder frame for support.
I refused to let go and fall back into the water.

After counting to ten, and funneling what was
left of my adrenaline-packed swim into my arms, I pulled myself
upward, and the lower rungs of the ladder broke off beneath my
feet. I gasped as the whole frame tipped forward and came apart in
my hands.

“
Damn it
.” I hissed, in disbelief, as
my body slammed back into the water.

What was left of the old ladder slipped under
the water line and disappeared into the dark blue of the bay
beneath the pier like a metal skeleton. I swore again at my luck
and glanced nervously up at the pier, knowing it would be difficult
to heave myself the few feet out of the water over the edge without
a ladder. I could barely climb the rungs as it was.

Pushing away from the pier in frustration, I
floated onto my back, looking up at the warm sun which was a total
contrast to the freezing bay water. Zoey barked loudly and swam
past me, tugging on my arm, bringing me back to where the ladder
had been hanging just moments before. Exhausted, and unable to swim
anymore, I reached my hands up as high as they could go, and
gripped the edge of the wooden dock with my fingertips.

I stayed like that for several minutes,
letting the flow of the water push my body and feeling the warmth
of the sunlight penetrate into my hands and arms, until something
dry and warm closed around my wrists and yanked me upward. I felt
strong arms go around my waist as I was tugged over the edge of the
dock, but I didn’t have the strength to lift my head and look at my
savior.

I flopped, water-logged, back onto the pier
like a fish and tried to stutter out the words “
My dog
” but
it came out sounding like, “
Ny og.”
instead.

A few seconds later Zoey was scrambling onto
the pier, shaking her body every two steps. The water droplets
flying from her wet coat went so high up into the sky that they
fell back down all around me like rain drops.

I stayed on my side, curled in a ball,
breaths shuddering in and out of my mouth, ignoring the sharp
pin-pricks of the roughly sun-warped wooden planks digging into my
cheek. The marina swayed in and out of my vision and I was startled
by a deep male voice above my face.

“You must be out of your mind!”

With no energy to answer, I nodded in
agreement as a dark haired man loosely wrapped one of the fluffy
white department store towels around my shoulders, rubbing my arms
for a few seconds. Then he went to work on Zoey with the other
towel, vigorously rubbing her up and down until her tongue hung
from her mouth in satisfaction.

In the background I noticed an older couple
standing on the shoreline. They were holding hands, watching us
with sad expressions on their faces. The pier heaved softly with
the water; distorting my vision and making the couple appear to
shimmer in the sunlight, almost like they were bobbing up and down
on the rocks. I gave up trying to focus on them and closed my eyes,
listening to the steady creak of the wood underneath my cold body
until his hands were on me again, so gentle and reassuring. When I
opened my eyes the couple was gone.

“Hi.” He peered at me curiously from clear
blue eyes, his dark brows furrowed with concern.

He was close enough to my face for me to see
how long his eye lashes were. And they were long, insanely so. His
full lips were flushed the same color pink as his cheeks. Long,
dark brown strands of hair framed his face and for a moment I
thought I knew him.
There’s no way I’ve met him. I could never
forget a face like his. But I know him, from somewhere.

When I realized I was staring at him and he
was staring back, I cleared my throat and tried to speak. My teeth
clattered together violently as I answered him, “Um…Hi.”

He smiled. Wow. It was a beautiful thing
really; the roundness of his mouth parted, showing off a perfect
set of bright white teeth, and as his smile deepened and his lips
curled upward. I thought it should be illegal…having a smile like
that. The little voice inside my head said softly, but firmly,
a
smile that amazing can only mean one thing…danger.

I slowly shifted up onto my elbow and Zoey
casually walked up to me, licked the side of my face and sat down
by my hand. Her brown eyes were open wide as she peered at me, then
the stranger, then back at me, waiting for one of us to speak
again. It wasn’t me. I didn’t trust my voice at the moment. Even
though this man had pulled me out of the frigid bay, I was sitting
before him half naked, half conscious and realizing my dog now saw
him as the post-bath rub down person; which meant at this moment he
was more in her favor than the woman that dragged her into the
frigid water.

“Are you alright?” The man asked me quietly,
a trace of smile still playing on his lips.

When I didn’t immediately answer, he gestured
to my dirty clothes heaped at the end of the pier and said with a
wisp of a European accent, “It’s kind of cold to go swimming, don’t
you think?”

He shifted back on his heels and I took in
his whole frame for the first time. He wasn’t a huge guy, he had a
slight but strong looking build and again I got the overwhelming
feeling I knew him.

“I’m fine. I…” I trailed off with a wave of
my hand, not feeling comfortable trying to explain to a perfect
stranger why I jumped into the Bay in the middle of January.

Feeling self-conscious, I straightened my
shoulders and said, “Thanks, for the help. I should probably get
dressed now.” I was painfully aware that I was sitting in front of
him, wrapped only in a towel.

He smiled again, stood and took the few
strides to the end of the dock and scooped up my pack and shopping
bag. After he casually walked back to me and dropped them in my
lap, he bent down and picked up the second wet towel and held it
out in front of him.

“I won’t look, I promise.” His voice had a
hint of playfulness to it and he turned his face away from me as he
talked, “What’s your name?”

I slipped into a clean bra and underwear as
quickly as I could. My voice was muffled as I pulled a blue cotton
Henley shirt over my head, “Riley. What’s yours?”

I sensed the slightest hesitation before he
said carefully, “Connor. Nice to meet you Riley.” He laughed softly
and I heard his accent thicken somewhat when he asked, “So, do you
make a habit of jumping off docks in winter?”

“Not really,” I let myself smile a little.
“There’s a shortage of hot, running water, in case you haven’t
noticed.”

I pulled my new jeans up my legs, jumping up
and down as the fabric stuck to my wet skin like spandex. Standing
barefoot, I rummaged through the last bag and brought out a pair of
converse shoes, socks and a large hoodie. When he heard me zipper
up the sweatshirt he turned to face me again and lowered the
towel.

“It’s nice to see another living person.” He
said quietly. “For a while I thought it was just me.”

We stood there for a moment, looking at each
other, until I remembered the man and woman on the shoreline
earlier. “Wait, what about the older couple?”

“Older couple?” Connor raised an eyebrow and
looked at me quizzically. “Where?”