Like she’d rather drown.
“Hey! Listen!” With a burst of strength he pulled her higher toward his shoulders. “Hold on!” What about Shane? Was he back on the beach? Had he turned around? Jack yelled so the child could hear him. “Don’t let go!”
“O-o-o-k-kay.” She was shivering. Definitely in shock. But she was clinging to him now.
The girl didn’t weigh much, so Jack quickly turned around and began swimming to shore. The whole time—with every stroke—he searched the beach for Shane. Come on, Brother. Where are you? God, where is he?
Suddenly the girl began crying out. “Mama!” she screamed. “Come get me, Mama!”
Jack was working too hard to tell her everything was going to be okay. Her mother was waiting for her on the shore. But what about Shane?
“Daniel!” The girl was screaming again. “Don’t leave without me!”
Poor kid. Jack could feel her shaking. Probably terrified. Another few seconds and she wouldn’t have made it. He gritted his teeth and kept swimming. He could see his parents now and more people. The group of them formed a circle and they were looking at something on the sand.
He couldn’t make it out. A sea turtle or was it the little girl’s brother? A boy named Daniel? Another sweeping look across the beach and still he couldn’t see Shane. His brother had to be there, standing in the circle. Looking at whatever was on the sand.
He might not have been a strong swimmer, but he could make his way back to shore. Of course he could.
Eight yards, six… four. And finally Jack could feel the ocean floor beneath his feet. Even then the girl didn’t weigh anything. He took hold of her legs and she grabbed on to his shoulders as Jack walked through the water to the shore.
The girl’s mother saw them and she screamed again. “Eliza! I’m here!”
“No.” A faint cry came from the child. “No! Mama!”
“Your mama’s coming.” Jack was shivering now. Where was Shane? And what was everyone looking at on the shore?
Sirens screamed from just down the beach, an ambulance and fire truck coming their way. What was happening? He looked over his shoulder at the child. “We’re almost to your mother.”
“No! Mama, come get me!” She sounded more afraid now than she’d been out at sea. Like she was delirious. “Daniel, I’m here!”
The little girl was still in shock. That had to be it. Jack was in ankle-deep water when he slid the girl into his arms and carried her up the sand to the woman. Later he would remember that something didn’t add up. The woman looked more angry than fearful. And the two big guys standing just up the shore had machine guns.
Was the child an heiress from some European country? Were those her bodyguards? Whatever the situation, the little girl didn’t want to go to her mother. Jack still cradled her in his arms and now he felt her go limp. “Here.” He handed her to the woman. “She’s fine.”
But what about his brother? “Shane!” His yell sounded like a guttural cry. “Shane, where are you?”
Without waiting for the girl’s mother to say anything, Jack ran up the beach to the spot where a dozen people were gathered. The ambulance was parked now and paramedics were running out with a stretcher. Running straight toward the circle of people on the sand.
A stretcher? Jack’s heart began to pound. He felt like he was running through wet cement. Faster, he ordered himself. Who’s in that circle? And then between the legs of his parents he saw that it was a boy. A teenage boy.
And he saw Shane’s short dark hair and his rugged face. But his eyes were closed. Why was he sleeping? Here on the beach?
“Shane!” And suddenly everything slowed down. The roar of the angry ocean waves and the sirens from the fire truck and the paramedics yelling for everyone to clear the way, all of it faded until only one sound remained.
The sound of Jack’s heartbeat.
He reached his brother and fell at his side. “Shane! Wake up!” He took his brother’s hand and squeezed it and in a blink they weren’t on the beach anymore.
Shane was running down the stairs ahead of him, Christmas morning ten years ago. And there parked beside the tree were a pair of bicycles. And Shane was saying, “That’s all I ever wanted. This is the best Christmas ever!”
And it was summer, a dozen summers, and Shane was chasing him down Maya Beach and Jack was yelling back at him. “You’ll never catch me, Shane. I’m too fast.”
Shane laughed. “One day I will, Jack. I won’t be little forever.”
And then Shane wasn’t little. He was a teenager and he was sitting beside his brother on the flight to Belize and he was staring out at the ocean and he was smiling. “I’m going to do something really special with my life, Jack,” he was saying. “Just you watch.”
Jack was nodding, because he already knew that. Shane was going to be President of the United States and the whole world would know his name. And Jack would be a Navy SEAL, but he’d have an office somewhere in the White House just so he could be close to his brother.
His best friend.
But then they were loading Shane onto a stretcher. “Keep the oxygen up,” a paramedic shouted. “Don’t stop!”
His dad and mom started running after the paramedics toward the ambulance and Jack jumped to his feet. Where were they taking him? Breathe, Shane. Please, God, make him breathe. He’s my best friend.
Jack blinked and he was in the front of the ambulance with his mother. And she was weeping, her hands over her face. Jack put his arm around her but he couldn’t catch his breath, couldn’t talk or think or let himself imagine if—
No! Everything was going to be okay! Shane had made it back to the shore. Of course he was going to be okay. But then Jack realized something. His father’s shirt and shorts had been drenched. Which could only mean… his dad had swum out and brought Shane back and now… now…
Jack closed his eyes and Shane was sitting beside him, football in his hands. You might have a little competition at quarterback, big brother.
And Jack was grinning because this was the third day of their vacation and they had forever till they had to go home again. A million hours of sun and sand and surf. And they were playing catch and the storm was moving on. They were still playing catch.
Please, God, let us still be playing catch.
But when Jack opened his eyes he wasn’t on the beach, he was sitting in the front seat of the ambulance and his mother was still crying beside him and when he looked back, his father was still there next to Shane. And Shane still wasn’t moving, no matter how hard the paramedics worked to make him breathe again.
The next two hours passed with Jack in the most horrible fog. He kept closing his eyes and finding himself in a place where yesterday lived. He didn’t fully realize what had happened or why they were in a hospital until his father found him in the waiting room.
Shane had taken in too much water, his dad was saying. The paramedics did everything they could. They needed to take his body home and…
“No!” Jack tried to stand, but he couldn’t make himself move. Instead he fell to the cold, dusty hospital floor and he could see the headlines. East Coast Teen Dies Saving Little Girl. And everyone would know his name. Shane Ryder. Not because he was President of the United States, but because his life had been cut short.