Facing Fears

I stared at my reflection. It was a warm summer’s day in the city of New Orleans. The air was sweet with the occasional salty spray, which was expected since I lived so close to the beach. My friends invited me out to swim since it was our last week of summer vacation before school started at the beginning of July. I rushed upstairs to my bedroom to get my swimming trunks. My room was what you would expect out of a 16-year-old boy. The walls were painted a dark blue, almost to embody the colour of the water that I stare out to from my window almost every day. My bed was unmade, wrinkled white bed sheets with piles of shirts and jeans stacked on top of each other. You’d almost think that there was no bed with the number of clothes on it, but I really hated doing the laundry. My desk, on the other hand, was opposite my bed, it was actually very organized. My laptop sat on top with books neatly stacked beside it, and containers holding different pencils and pens. I dug through my closet, which practically matched the chaos on my bed, and found some white swimming trunks that I put on. After poking through everything in my closet, I finally found my sleek black sunglasses and slung the navy bag with my change of clothes over my shoulders, and I was ready to go. Except, before I left I glanced at my tall mirror that nearly touched the ceiling. But, instead of catching my reflection, which would usually mean staring at a guy with tan skin, dirty blonde hair, and the sunglasses covering his sky blue eyes, I saw my father instead. Every time, I am never looking at myself but him. My father left me and my mother nearly a year ago. It was all after he was too much of a coward to help my mother when she needed him most. My father was a fantastic swimmer. He was who I got my love of water from, the reason we lived so close to the ocean and the beachside. One day, while I was lying on the sand, my mother fell asleep in the water and nearly drowned. The lifeguards were coming but they were too far away and who would know if they would even make it in time? But my father, he was the closest, he was practically right in front of her, just a couple of strokes in the water and he could have saved her. But instead, he just froze, kicking in the water to keep himself afloat, but he didn’t move, he didn’t do anything to try and help my mother. Thankfully, the lifeguards got there in time and rescued my mother. Ever since that day, I kept on seeing him in my reflections, his bald head, his black clothes, hands covering his ears, screaming. Shocked and scared expressions clouded his face acting as if he was so surprised at the fact he was even here in the mirror as if he didn’t know that he was invading my dreams and turning them into nightmares. Everyone kept on saying how much I was like my father, that I was gifted with his swimming abilities. Before it seemed like a compliment, but now it seems more like an insult. My father was too scared and frightened to help my mother even though he was fully capable. Even though he is gone, the memory haunts me like a ghost. Every time I look in the mirror the possibility arises that there is that part of him in me that is too afraid to help those I care about most and live with that guilt. A feeling that no matter what you can’t shake off. The one question that you keep asking yourself. Is this what I am going to end up like? I force all these thoughts out of my head and make my way downstairs and towards the beach.

The sun is already high in the sky by the time I arrive. I see my friends sitting in the shade under an umbrella. There’s Johnny, my best friend who I've known since kindergarten, his black hair was blowing in the slight breeze. He acknowledges me with a wide smile and beckons me over to where they are, I obliged. The girls, Ashley and Bridgett, are laying their towels on the sand. “Hey,” Ashley said, tucking her brown hair behind her ear and laying her grey eyes on me, stirring up the butterflies in my stomach. I secretly had a crush on her for nearly a year, but I never did anything about it. Bridgett just gives me a slight smile saying “Hello” in a demure manner, her intimidating hazel eyes give me a look that says “not today”, as if she knows exactly what was going through my mind and that she’s protecting her best friend. Ashley announces that she is going to go swimming and I decide with her. As we make our way up to the ocean, I glance back and see Bridgett reading a book and Johnny lying on a towel beside her. I chuckle to myself and head into the water to catch up with Ashley. Ashley swims like a fish, dipping, and diving in the water. Her abilities match my own which is one of the many reasons why I love swimming with her. Her green bathing suit hugs her skin as she splashes water on me and dives back into the water. The next time she rises to the surface, I return the favour. We keep on playing like that, taunting and teasing each other until it happens. An earthquake comes up so unexpectedly that I’m so surprised at its appearance. The rocks and sand on the beach shake uncontrollably, waves start forming in the water that it starts to become dangerous. “We need to get out of here!” I yell to Ashley. She agrees and I grab her hand and we start heading towards the shore where it is safer, an earthquake is not safe regardless but being in the water is the worst place you could be. As we start swimming a gigantic wave hits us and forces me to release my grip on Ashley. I manage to come back to the surface and Ashley does as well, but the waves keep on coming and then it finally hits me, Ashley’s drowning. Suddenly, I understood the inability of movement my father had, I understood exactly what he felt. It was like the very ground you stood was being removed from right under you, and you were wandering in limbo. The immediate sensation of panic and fear overwhelms you so much, it’s like your brain can't comprehend what your eyes are seeing. Now I could understand why my father didn’t do anything even though he had the chance, he was too involved in his own fear to do anything, he let the feeling of losing someone, the dread consume him. But unlike him, I did not have the luck that he did when the lifeguards saved my mother, because the lifeguards were too busy saving everyone else from the earthquake, that even if they realized that Ashley was drowning, they would be too late. I managed to use all the willpower in me to bring myself back to the present. As Ashley was pulled under the waves, I managed to dive under after her. She looked like she had lost consciousness and she was going under so fast that I only had one chance to reach her. I managed to close the distance between us, wrapped my arms around her waist, and swim back up to the surface. After she regained consciousness, she held onto me tight and I swam us back to shore. Thankfully when we came out of the water, the earthquake had stopped. I kept a hold on Ashley and managed to bring her to where our towels were laid under the umbrella, which miraculously hadn't fallen over during the earthquake. I wrapped her towel around her and started to dry her off. She stopped me, looked me in the eye, and softly said “you saved me.” 

“I…I guess I did” was my only response.

She leaned over and pressed a kiss on my cheek. “Thank you,” she told me, cupping my face in her hands, her eyes shone with thankfulness, I was speechless. Eventually, Johnny and Bridgett came over, worried after what had happened.

“We saw you both in the water, but the lifeguards guided everyone on the beach to higher ground” Johnny explained.

Bridgett hugged Ashley and analyzed her, scanning her from head to toe. A troubled look on her face.

“I’m fine Bridgett, Nate saved me,” Ashley said as she looked towards me.

Bridgett gave me a grateful smile, the first one I'd ever received from her.

“You did it man,” Johnny said, punching me in the arm. I guess I did, I finally understood my father’s point of view of what happened. And honestly, I couldn’t blame him, but instead of letting that fear consume me, I managed to overcome it and learn from his experience in the past. So I guess that situation helped with something, I thought, as I stared out at the endless water and the near dipping sun in the cloudless sky.