Lost Without You

It was one of those rare sunny days in La Push, Washington so my best friend and I took the advantage of the day to go toward the beach to spend the day there. Paul, my best friend since diaper days, took off running toward the ocean water of First Beach after striping from his shirt and shoes, throwing them aside with his towel. Smiling after him, I picked up his stuff to move them where we normally would stretch out and spread out both of our towels. I dropped his stuff on his towel while placing mine on my towel before stripping from my cover up which was one of Paul’s old shirts to reveal my bikini bathing suit and kicked off my shoes.

I heard Paul calling for me from the ocean and I quickly made my way over toward the water. I dipped my foot in the water to feel how cold it was and it was warmer than most days that I would come to walk along the shore barefooted. Slowly, I began to make my way into the water toward Paul stopping at every wave that rolled up so it wouldn’t knock my light weight body down if I tried to fight against it. Eventually, I made it waist deep into the water until I felt a huge splash of water being splashed on my front.

Looking up, I saw a laughing Paul just a few feet in front of me. “Paul!” I yelled trying to splash him back but failed when another wave rolled up splashing the water on me instead. This caused Paul to double over laughing and I took the chance to pounce on him sending him under water. I laughed when he came back to the surface spitting water out of his mouth along with wiping his eyes free of water.

“I’m going to so get you back Emmanuelle Carter!” Paul yelled and I took off swimming further into the ocean diving underwater whenever a wave was coming my way. Reaching the surface after the last wave passed over, I looked behind me hoping to see Paul still trying to chase me, but he was nowhere in sight. I looked around wondering where he was at, even checking the spot where our stuff was at to see that everything was still there. Before I could yell out for him, a hand wrapped around my ankle pulling me under water causing me to let out a yelp as I went underwater which water took the chance to fill up making me choke as it tried to force its way down my throat.

An arm wrap around my waist pulling me back to the surface as I coughed up water and trying to catch my breath causing my lungs to burn. It took me a while to stop coughing and to catch my breath before looking to see that Paul was holding me above surface watching me carefully with a worried look. I gave him a soft smile showing him that I was okay, but he never relaxed. “I’m okay, Paul.” I informed him.

He nodded, but I could still sense that he didn’t believe me. “Let’s get you to the shore.” He said moving me to his back. Frowning, knowing that the fun was over, I wrapped my arms around his neck and he began to swim back to the shore. Getting close to the shore, I let loose from Paul to place my feet on the ground making my way toward the towels knowing that Paul was following shortly behind me. I sat down on my towel stretching my legs as Paul collapsed on his letting out a loud sigh.

“You okay?” I asked.

“I’m fine!” Paul snapped making me jump. He looked over at me obvious aware that I had jumped. “Sorry. My body’s sore a little, like my muscles are stretching.”

“You want me to message them?” I asked.

Paul shook his head no. “No, I think it’s better if we leave.” I nodded not wanting to argue with him when he wasn’t feeling all that good. We got up to pull our clothes on, well just me, before slipping on our shoes and grabbing our towels to leave. Paul walked me home first despise of his practically cramping everywhere before walking back to his house. I asked him to call me when he got home to show me that he made it in okay and his mom was there to help him. I waited by the phone the whole night waiting for the call, but it never came.

That was also the last time I had seen Paul, up close. I’ve seen him from a distance a week afterward, hanging out with Sam and his former friend Jared. They apparently were forming some kind of gang and whenever I got close to Paul to talk to him, Sam led him away from me before Paul could even glance at me. It broke my heart that I couldn’t talk to my best friend anymore let alone see him up close again. It’s been over a month since then and he hasn’t even showed up at school since then either. I was beginning to wonder if I was going to have to sneak to his house when Sam and Jared weren’t with him to talk him, but I decided against it not wanting anything to do with him anymore.

It was locker break before first period and I was standing at my locker looking through my math notes for the test that we have today. Although I always as pretty good at math, I haven’t exactly been keeping up lately with my mind always drifting off to Paul wondering exactly what happened to him. Feeling confident enough to at least pass the math test with a B, I got my math textbook out and closed my locker making sure that it was locked until I heard a lot people down the hallway started whispering and giggling looking down the hallway. Looking to see, I saw someone who looked so familiar, someone I hadn’t seen since in what felt like forever.

Paul Parker.

Along the side of him was Jared Mercier, his old friend and Jared’s somehow girlfriend Kim Conweller. I had only meet Jared a few times during the years that I had spent with Paul and knew Kim from some of the classes. I forced myself to look away from them to look over Paul to see exactly how much he had changed and quickly rushed passed them to head toward math class on the other side of the building. I had managed to get pass them and safely into my math class and took my assigned seat, taking a deep breath. Not long after the bell rang and students piled up into the class room leaving one seat beside me empty which belonged to . . .

“Nice to have you back Mr. Parker.” Mr. Sherrill said taking mine and everyone’s attention that was in the classroom.

So much for trying to ignore him.